Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1883-02-14

be proper now to hear something from the other
side. The bill before the House had come
before it in the due course of business.
The subject had been examined and dis
cusssd, Hearings had been ordered,
and a report had been made to the
House, signed by q majority of the COM
mittee. 1t had come to tho House in the
ordinary cause of business. The gentleman
from Portland had said the bill did not
originate with the committee. The answer to
this was that bills rarely originate
draw them up and present them for
consideration. The matter of apportionment
had been reached two years ago, but was not
made, for reasons not necessary TO state. 1t
was then clearly understood; and from with
IN the second year after, the subject had been
prominently before the people. Discussions
had taken place in the new papers, and among
leading men, as to what would be doue. The
subject of a special session of the legislature
for the purpose Of apportionment had been
discussed. Two months before this session
the people, without respect to party, discuss
ed the matter. and leading newspapers also
engaged in it. The Lewiston Journal asked
for and received the opinions of very many
gentlemen. More than fifteen plans
were published in the various news
papers with regard to it. No less
than four or five of those plans came
from the city of Portland. Was it not fair
to assume that some of those plans were en-.
titled to weight? Ii was new theory to
enunciate that the leaders and the newspapers
of the republican party had no interest in
this question. He took issue with the last
speaker upon this point, and declared that he
was willing to go to them for suggestions
upon complex and important question like
this. The result of this call for opinions
was between 40 and 30 different opinions and
plans with regard to the superintendent of
the State. He had taken pains TO compare
these different opinions plans and suggestions,
and he found that certain principles seemed
to have been held in common. Four-ffths
of these communications agreed that county
lines should be preserved intact. Two-thirds
agreed that the question of population should
be made subordinate to questions of territory
and association. One half agreed that
old districts. SO far as possible, should be
Incorporated into new ones as to retain
their old associations. large number
agreed upon the point that railroad,
and valley and water lines of COM
munication ought to have due weight and
force in the arrangement of the districts. He
found that the bill reported by the committee
was the only plan that had generally followed
throughout these reports and letters of advice.
Taking the plan of the committee he found
that | counties out of the l6 stand as they
did before, and do not have their associations
changed OF the five remaining counties four
are associated together with each other a.
they were before, two and two; that is, four
out of the five stand in pairs, and out of the
whole IL counties only one is isolated from
all former associations, and that is the county
of Washington. The gentlemen who had
made the attack upon the bill had submitted
no plan, although the gentleman from Port
land Mr.. Mattocks had declared for the
Spoford amendment; but that only changed
two districts, and left the other two without
change, although the difference between the
populations of the first and second districts
was greater than that of the third and fourth.
The difference between the populations of the
third and fourth was about Il, 900, which the
gentleman from Bucksport proposed to
equalize by putting Washington with the
third and Somerset with the fourth. The
only reduction of the difference by this would
be from 10 900 to about 5000. To make
this small reduction he proposed to put
Washington with the third district and dis
member Kennebec and Somerset and sepa-
rate them. The counties of Kennebec and
Somerset constitute twO-thirds of the whole
valley of the Kennebec river. He argued to
show that the interests of the two counties
are so interviewer that it would be injustice to
separate them; also that the lines of commIn-
ications between the two direct, and it
would be of great inconvenience to Somerset
to oblige her to go east to attend district con-
ventions. The people of that county did not
desire it. He also argued that the interests
of Washington county, both business and So
cial were as naturally with Aroostook as Som
erset's are with kennebec He again referred
to the discussion of the subject that had taken
place before the meeting of the legislature,
and said if the gentlemen from Norway Mr..
Bearcel had been among those who had
understood the wishes of their localities. he
must have known them at the meeting of the
committee. If he was not among those who
had begun to understand the question and the
wants of their locality, then he must have
presented himself before the committee in the
condition of man who didn't understand the
matter and didn't know what his locality
desired, and he ought not to find fault if he
found himself associated with twenty other
statesmen on the committee who did know
what they and their constituents wanted, and
provided for it by bringing in the bill. He call
ed the attention of the House to the fact that
480, 900 people of the State, under the bill,
are as they were before, and only l70, 900 had
been called upon to take on new congress
slOHdl ItldtiOus. HI NipsiuB bt ediu
Something has been said about Kennebec
county. have no apology to make for her.
do not apologize for the f'I face of her
nature. do not apologize for her schools,
her colleges. her asylums, or manufactures.
do not apologize for her that she produced
the first temperance platform and the first
temperance governor of the State of Maine.
do not apologize for her that she produced
the first governor of the State of Maine.
have no apologies for Kennebec county, that
of 90 members of the United States Senate
since her constitution was adopted, IA of them
were from Kennebec county. rather rejoice
that her Evans was the peer and the contem-
porary of Webster, and that her Morrill, has
made this State famous in this country, and
her Blaine has made it famous in the world.
[Applausej. l have no apology to offer for
Kennebec county. Old in her civilization
when Aroostook was a forest primeval, do
not apologize that for quarter of century
her representatives have stood on the floor of
this House and appropriated money to build
Aroostook's bridges, develop its roads and
bring population to her from across the sea.
do not apologize for my own vote for four
years in this legislature, to contribute to her
wealth, and remind the people of Aroostook'
county that they owe something to the men
who have built her up as well as to her rest
less and ambitious citizens who are fattening