Semi-weekly south Kentuckian. [volume] (Hopkinsville, Ky.) 1883-1889, 1888-04-20
THE COUNTY tEaIsIAguaG
Establishs q Work House And At.
tends to Other Important
Business.

The County Court of Claims met
Monday morning and remained in
session till yesterday, the longest
meeting the Court has held in the
memory of man. 1t takes 500 a day
TO run the Court, but as important
measures were discussed the extra
expense is excusablc. We must not
fail to mention the cataclysm of ora
tory that swept over the esquires, and
the meeting put to shame the State
Legislature easily.
The Court established a county
work. house. A Committe of Magis-
trates met the City Council, Tuesday
morning, with proposition that the
city and county Jointly operate the
work house, the city to purchase the
rock crushed by the prisoners and
employ them in street work. This
the Council refused 10 do, and sub
stitute was offered by Councilman
Anderson that the city shall allow
the county to work the city prisoners
but that the city will not contract fol
any of the prison labor. This propo
sition was adopted by the Court
Further the jail is to be used as the
work house, the prisoners to be taken
out each morning by manager and
returned at night, If not too great q
distance from the Jail. The manager
can employ ball aud chain, fog, oil
put prisoners on bread and water
diet as means of discipline. The
Court appointed Judge w. z. Win.
free and Esquires L. g. Tinsley and
5. B. Younglove as Board to exer-
else supervisory care over the work
house. Should the city employ
the prison labor at any time it shall
pay the ordinary wages for same.
Other details of the order ofthe Court
need not be mentioned.
The action of the City Council in
refusing to cooperate with the coun-
ty is reprehensible. By refusing to
employ the Jail labor it virtually de-
stroyed all chances for the prisoners
to be worked as Hopkinsville is about
the only market for the labor, and
thus the work-house is nullitied, as il
were. The city will not be benefited
one cent as the matter stands. The
ghost of Convict labor" was what
scared them of, and the vote for the
work-house was, yeas; Thompson,
Beard, Campbell, Gilliland; nays,
Starting, Brown and Auderson-five
votes being required, the matter was
lost. We do not propose to advocate
convict labor, but Messrs. Startling
Brown and Anderson were certainly
stuck on a profound political princi-
pie to prefer that our prisoners should
Law in the lookup to being worked on
tbe streets. when it is notorious
fact that there are dead beats in this
town who fly to the calaboose in cold
weather as to city Of refuge. One
other point, this labor would not in
terfere in the least with honest labor,
as there is now great demand for
workmen in this county, and the
question is not at all similar to the
effort to turn 900 or 800 penitentiary
birds into the mines of the State. AS
it is when the city wishes to use the
prisoners it must pay regulation
wages for them. Further, these gen.
tlemen in permitting the county tc
work the prisoners violate the very
principle they contended for in the
Council meeting.
The work-house is now merely es
tablished and the details will be per
fected as experience may direct.