The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1881-04-14
Our Boston Letter.
The Great and General Court-The Ele-
waited Railway Question-The Liquor
Legislation-The Late s. N. Stockwell
and Other Boston Journalists-That Pom
ca Business.

Boston, April IL, 1881.
The Great and General Court, as we call our
Legislative body, continues its dull sessions.
Predicting the future from what we know of
the past should say the visitor to Boston in
June, if not in July. would still see the flags
floating beside the gilded dome; for this Is the
way our Senate and House indicate their pres
ence in their respective chambers. As there
are no night sessions they do not have any
historic light like that which beams In the
tower Of the English Parliament house to indi-
cate that the Commons are still in session.
Our parliament doesn't deal with questions of
sufficient importance as to call for night ses.
sions. There is one peculiar feature of
a Massachusetts, Legislature. During the
months of January and February, whom the
average member has nothing to prevent his
giving his undivided attention to business, the
Legislature meets at p. m. and often adjourns
in half an hour. Later in the season, when
some of the members want to attend to private
affairs part of the day, sessions are held fore
noon and afternoon.
The most important question before the leg
islature was that of elevated railroads. Every
one within and without the city Of Boston
knows that the demand for some new method
of passenger conveyance from the business CEN
tire to the suburban sections is imperative.
While the horse cars are run so frequently
now that iocomotion on foot or with team is
retarded from one third to one-half, yet the
accommodations of the street railways are in
adequate Not half the the time can one OBJ
tain seat, and one-fourth of the time not
even decent standing-room. Morning and
night during the past winter hundreds of peo-
pie have stood on the platform Of horse car
for from half hour to an hour to ride down
town or up town. And yet the twenty or thir.
ty millionaires who own property along the
line of the proposed elevated road were power
full enough to kill the mouement. But five
years hence Boston will have an elevated rail-
road. The men who are tortured in horse
car semi-daily can out-vote the men who drive
down town in their private carriages, and they
will do it soon.
Several absurd liquor bills have been pro-
posed and killed. The only change in the law
has been to perfect the local option part of the
present license law. Heretofore the power to
license was vested in the aldermen of cities
and the selectmen Of towns. A vote of q town
against granting licenses amounted to nothing
SNAcAeOA0eAoAo
of license or prohibition in selecting
municipal officers Now the towns cav
vote eyes" or mo- on the ques-
ton and that settles 1t. Among the men who
surpass Gen. William Cogswell who sits in the
lower House. He should be promoted to the
Senate next year and then to Congress from
the old Essex district. He doesn't talk much
and this is terribly tslkatys sens1sy I1s
votes ON con,me4. sense grounds and does not
follow Ueopian schemes. Mr.. Brown Of Bos-
ton is another able member, and Col. Higgin-
son would be if he were not so visionary on
The death Of 8. N. Stockwell Of the Journal
removes another landmark of old Boston
journalism: Rodgers (Journal, Greene (Postl,
Haskell TranscripD, and now Stockwell
school journalists. And even Stockwell was
part new school. Goddard of the Advertiser
and Worthington of the Traveller are contem-
poraries of Stockwell and connect the old school
with the new. think the biogrsphers err in
new features among the Boston press. That
may have been true twenty years ago, but cer-
tainly no Boston journalist has ever shown the
genius of originality displayed during the past
aid, and put into execution by the enterprising
proprietors of that paper. / think the feature
of different editions for different sectionSis ono
Of the most brilliant ideas Of modern Journal
ism.
People have assigned various reasons for the
recent Ponca unpleasantness in Boston, in
which feeling ran higher between Republi-
cans than it ever did between Republicans and
Democrats The fact is Gov Long, usually
a clear-headed man, Stopped over" whom he
headed the call for the first meeting Tin Fam
euil Hall, think) some months ago. The
call condemned the national government and
the Interior department beyond the bounds Of
common decency. In any other country such
an attack on the general government would
have been called treason. Subsequently Sec.
retary Schurz defended his part Of the affairs
in such terms that the men and papers that
had criticised him had NO foundation to stand
on. The affair was injuring Gov. Long per-
sonally and politically, and his friends in
rallying to his defense committed woeful in
discretions and made undignIfed, uncourteous
and untruthful statements. The other side
was guilty of some indiscretion and ill-natured
retorts, also. The usually sensible Traveller
made a very malicious attack on the admins
trations Of Schurz and Hayes both, in which
passion smothered truth and propriety. This
was the more to be regretted because the Trav-
eller, with all its partisanship, is the most in
danaudant In RostOn SCOTT.