Los Angeles daily herald., 1889-01-31
The "Herald'S" Letter Gives
Pointers.
THE COUNTY DIVISION SCHEME
Junketing Tours of the SOlons at
the Expense Of the Tax
Payers Of the State.
special Correspondence to the HERALD

coast than California's capital city in
her normal condition, he is respectfully
invited to come to the front and declare
himself. Through greater portion o.
Friday, and all of Saturday and Sunday
Sacramento has dragged herself along al
a pace go sleepy and slow-going that the
few unfortunates who were called upon
to remain over here during the recess
hail the approach of a new season Of
work as a small boy halls the coming Of
a Fourth of July celebration. Tho exodus
of members and politicians from the
Capital Friday afternoon was SO general
that the railroad people were driven to
their visit end to find accommodations
for the crowd. If any State institution
escaped Sunday visit from one or more
'sinvestieeting" committees. the fact is
attributed to an oversight for which the
legislative junketers may reasonably be
expected to make amends before the
session closes.
This investigating business, when it is
once throughly understood, serves as a
most perfect demonstration of the never
diving intention of the .grabbers TO
get their fingers into the treasury tills.
Away back in the dim past some legisla-
tive hero who had been charged with the
prote cticn of the public morals of the
State scented prospect of personal profit
in a visit to all the crime. haunted quar-
ters of the commonwealth, from Siski-
you to Tia Juana. From that day to this
his successors on the Public Morals Com.
,,,.tkoo, ho un fo1loue1 his ovop, v,lo nd
the State has paid out in hard coin of the
country, on mileage and expense &C.
counts, enough to pave every
dollars. With what result? Purely
and simply, the announcement
of biennial raids on the States cash box
and the growth and development OF vice
and immortality generally.
During tho sessions CT the California
Legislature have had my eye on these
Public Moral Investigators, and l feel
called upon, now and here, to declare that
their work is raw-very, very raw. The
personnel of the average Public Morals
committee is enough to cause man Of
ordinarily virtuous tendencies to Jose
flesh as he sizes it up. The staidJold
gray-beards of the Senate and Assembly
are always conspicuous for their alb
sence from such committees; they are
made up, as rule, from the young
bucks, the legislative Hotspurs. Their
mod.s operandi. too, is peculiar. Of
the lowest dives, where vice is rampant
and immortality is glaring, they either
steer clear or prosecute their investiga-
tions through third parties, whose testi-
mony is taken in the committee room.
sACRAMENTo's MoDEsTY.
It has come to be pretty generally un
derstood throughout the State that the
city of Sacramento has been the greatest
beneficiary of special legislation of the
cities of California. Indeed, the capi-
tails porkish tendencies have grown to
be q sort of standing joke. At each sue
ceeding session she stands up,
in the person of one of her
representatives, and modestly asks
the State for an additional slice
of the earth or few more sections OF
wire fence. The capitol grounds and their
environments have heretofore yielded
to the hungry Sacramentans opportuni-
ties for the periodical sinking of large
sums of the peoples money. These
grounds are known to be the handsom-
est in America, every reasonable sug-
gestion of the best procurable landscape
artists having been acted upon, until
there remains little or no further possi-
bility Of improvement. It now seems
that the residents of Sacramento, not at
all abashed, propose to mar and tear
down what has been, with so much
pains and at so great an expenditure,
beautifed and built up. After casting
about for long time in vain still
hunt for some obscure corner Of the cap
itol grounds where they might bury
few thousands Of money, they despair
not, but start on the back track with
proposition to grade and beautify
the streets adjacent to the capitol
and to erect a speakers stand
in the park directly in front of the main
entrance of the building. A modest ten
thousand is asked for as the required
sum to pay the carpenters and buy the
material for the grand stand, and forty
two thousand more is deemed necessary
for the digging up of ornamental trees in
the east end of the park, the resettlng of
the same and the prosecution of other
similar work"
The action of the Sacramentans only
goes to prove to what length commun-
ity will 60 if it is not beaded off early in
the struggle. 1t is needless to add that
the present ridiculous measure will be
knocked into a cooked hat at the first
opportunity.
THE LONDON EXHIBITION.
1 find that whatever support the propc-
sition to appropriate morey for the Lon
don Exhibition finds in this Legislature
comes, for the most part, from the
northern and central sections of the
State. The southern delegation are a
unit in opposition to the proposition IN
it's present form. The amount OF the
proposed appropriation is deemed glar-
ingly excessive for the end sought to be
attained, and while not few OF the
Southerners would favor measure ap-.
propriating a quarter or even third OF
the sum suggested, there are number
of them who will oppose the appropria-
tion of any amount whatever, holding
that the scheme is one looking to the ad.
vertisement of the northern and central
sections at the expense OF the South
Two hundred and fifty thousand dol
lars, the proposed amount, is thought,
even by many of the friends of the meas
ure, to be too much money to be ex-
pended in an experiment.
ORANGE AND POMONA COUNTIES.
If present indications go for anything,
the bills proposing to slice off certain
corners of the county of Los Angeles will
either die in committee or be amended
by death if they ever get to second
reading. Assemblyman Edwards pet