The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1891-03-15
REPRESENTATIVE DOUGLASS INTER.
VIEWED.
He Roasts the Bossisn in the Senate
and Exposes the Animus OF
Elders Herd


and Exposes the Animus OF
Elders Herd.
A representative of the EAGLE called
| upon Representative Douglass yesterday
with several questions, the answers to
which are given herewith. To the first
| question, what Of the legislature of 1891,
he replied:
"The legislature of 1891 is the momu-
mental failure of Kansas history. and no
impartial critic will place the response
| bility wholly upon either branch. As a
matter of fact, the house passed some OF
the worst bills ever considered by the
| legislature, and it is also true that it
passed some other bills that deserved the
commentator of every honest--and fair
minded man.
There were many straight, honest,
| true men among the Alliance members
and there were also some of the most
narrow-minded and windy demagogues
in the state. But as body they were
led into some ridiculous positions. Take
the
WOMEN'S RIGHTS
question, for instance The Alliance
wanted to pose as the friend of woman's
suffrage and the members were actually
trapped into passing bill through the
house purporting to confer the right OF
suffrage upon women. 1t was in direct
conflict with the constitution and not
worth the paper it was written on. Re-
| publicans, of course, voted against the
| hui of n
cluded, expressed their entire willing
ness to submit to the people propo-
sition to amend the constitution so as to
allow the people to say whether they
desired woman's suffrage or not. also
succeeded, in the revision of the calender,
| in getting the joint resolution for this
purpose put near the top SO that 1t was
soon reached; and vet when this was done
the Alliance at once faced about and
unanimously adopted motion to In
definitely postpone the whole matterl l
am not an advocate of woman's suffrage.
SO long as the great majority OF women
| themselves persist in not wanting it; but
the action of the Alliance in this matter
was the clearest case of political jockey
ing on record. The equal sutfragists
will wake up to the hypocrisy of the
business when they examine the house
journal.
| HOUSE FINANCIAL MEASURES.
The house was ready at times to pass
some measures in the interest OF
genuine reform in certain lines, and fol
! this every fair man will award it due
credit. But when it came to legislation
affecting financial matters, and the rela-
! tons between borrowers and lenders,
even men who seemed to possess good
sense on every other subject
would vote for the widest meas
ure that could be brought
before them. The idea seemed to pre-
vail that the way to make money plentl-
full was to make life miserable for every
man who dared to lend dollar.
Elders "usury bill'' was fair sample
of a legislative boomerang. 1t provided
for FORGETTING the entire debt whenever
any interest in excess of 10 per cent was
charged, and this Notwithstanding the
note had been sold to an innocent pur-
chaser-a provision unknown in civilized
nations and absolutely destructive of the
whole system of commercial paper. AS
sort of cure for this, an amendment
was added providing, in effect, that the
penalty should not apply to any note on
which the borrower made affidavit that
no more than 10 per cent had been
| charged. The immediate result of this
wonld have been Tin every county where
money is actually worth more than 1C
per cent? to absolutely prohibit every
man who was too honest to perjure him
self from borrowing money, while the
man who was willing to swear to
! lo only w
could get loanl 1t placed ban upon
| honesty and premium on perjury; and
vet this bill was pushed through the
| house in the supposed interests of the
borrower and got nearly every Alliance
vote.
The "anti-gold contract" bill was an
other beauty in its way. 1t 1T had be-
come law it would have efectually
barred out every foreigner from loanlng
a dollar in Kansas: and when l asked
Mr.. Elder in the debate whether such a
law would not make money scarcer than
ever, he substantially admitted 1t would
by replying that it would be better If we
didn't borrow so much-whlch IS un'
doubtedly true. But / think the average
Kansan will agree that this is a bad
time to begin shutting off the supply.
Calamity orators and calamity meas
ures had full swing for awhile
and if all the wild schemes pro
posed had got into the statute
books there would have been
nothing for common sense men to do but
to move out of the state. AS 1t Is, the
rumors circulated all over the country OF
the threatened doings of the Alliance
legislature have lost more money to Kan
sas than all the so-called economy of the
house Gin cutting down wages Of laborer;
and employees at the public institutions
can save in hundred years.
ALLIANCE ECONOMY.
But even in the matter of economy it
was conclusively demonstrated that
gored. The most enormous leak in the
state treasury for years has been in the
matter of state printing. We spend
about S115, 600 year for public printing
nearly twice as much as the great state
! of Ohio. Yet when Mr.. Rice, of Fort
Scott, and other Republicans, with the
| assistance, it is fair to add, of Speaker
| Elder sought to reduce this enormous ex
penditure by throwing around it some ad
equate restrictions, the great majority Of
the Alliance HeHD eiS iallleu III Soilt
phalanx to vote down the proposition
and to insist (as some Of them did openly
IN debate) that as they had elected 6
state printer they proposed that hi
should enjoy every item OF spoils which
had ever belonged to that office; and tbs
appropriation made was 1888, 600 witt
the prospect of the usual deficiencies.
ACTUAL RESULTS.
The two most important things done