Lancaster daily intelligencer. [volume] (Lancaster, Pa.) 1864-1928, 1882-03-11


OK our first page to day will be found
some additional expressions of Democratic
newspaper opinion, regarding the next
state convention. In addition to these the
Pottsville Chronicle thinks there is luck in
leisure, and therefore a late convention is
tho thing for Pennsylvania Democrats !;
that secured delegates should be chosen
who will go to the convention with the
sole purpose Of promoting the best inter-
ests of the Democratic party
The game which the bogus "Drexel ="
played in Philadelphia and New York
seems to have been tried in our city yes.
terday, though, as has generally happened
here, with not much profit to the perambu-
lating thieves who dropped into Lancaster
for a day Or two to engage in it. The
story which we print of their operations is
not only an interesting narrative, but it
may serve useful purpose in warning our
citizens that hereafter when strangers
apply for rooms for day or two they
should promptly rent them-and also
notify the police authorities.
THE Nesc Era and Examiner undertake
to explain that no embarrassment can
arise from the failure Of tho new Republi-
can rules to be approved by a majority at
the approaching primaries, in the absence
of any call for the return judges to meet,
because in the schedule submitting these
rules it is provided that even though they
fail the delegates elected shall meet and
act as the return judges. Our esteemed
contemporaries need not be told that this
provision is made altogether outside of the
cxisting rules, which cannot be amended
without the consent of a majority of the
popular vote, obtained at primary cleo
tioD. Neither the county committee nor
tho subcommittee can regularly abolish
the return judges it may perhaps be done
by the omnipotence of General Consent.
He is big general.
The letter of Senator Bayard, to which
Preacher Babcock referred in temper
ancc speech before the Delaware NJ. E.
conference, yesterday, was private epis.
tie in which he expressed the opinion that
local option laws are Of very doubtful con.
stitutionality. 1t was upon this only that
Babcock charged that Senator Bayard was
employed"to to kill the local option bill
then pending before the Legislature.
Babcock may find fresh cause for another
windmill attack on Bayard for hls course
in the United States senate on the alco.
holic commission bill. In that body yes
tsrday this bill was considered, and Mr..
Bayard moved an amendment extending
the inquiries Of the commission to the eff.
fects of the use Of opiatcs and other drugs.
The amendment was lost-yeas "a, nays
25. On motion of Mr.. Plum the number
of the commission was fixed at seven and
the time within which it shall report at
eighteen months. The bill was then passed
by a vote of 81 to IA.
1t was stated yesterday in our local
columns that convict prisoner sent from
this county to the Eastern penitentiary
had earned more than the cost of his main
tenance in that institution and the differ
ence to his credit, some $40, bad been duly
forwarded to the county of Lancaster.
This illustrates two things first that in a
properly managed system of prison labor
every convict can be made to earn more
than the cost of his keep /; in New York
state the prisons are more than self-sup-
porting, as they ought to be everywhere !;
secondly, that it is folly, or worse, to agi-
tate the building of increased accommoda-
tions at our county Jail when convicts can
be sent to and kept in the Eastern peni-
Tertiary at less expense than they can be
confined here, if not at an actual profit.
If any change in the law is necessary to
have convicts sent from here to Philadel-