The Meridional. (Abbeville, La.) 1856-1906, 1891-11-21
Am Erroneous Legal Conclusion

Legislature, otherwise it's grant.
would be repealed by the opponents
of the lottery by legislative enact
ment.-Caucasian.
If our confrere is no better posted
in regard to the limitations of legis-
lative power, than this excerpt ex-
tracted from it's editorial columns
appears to indicate, it ought either
to make a notarial Remuneration of
it's right to expound the law or EN-
ploy q competent legal pilot, who
will steer the Caucasian bark clear
of the breakers of misinterpretation.<
The merest legal tyro knows or
ought to know, that after an amend
ment has been ratified by a majority
of the people and has been incorpo.
rated in and become q part of the
organic law of the State, the law
making department is as powerless
to repeal it by legislative enactment,
as it would be to disIodge the rock
of Gibraltar 10y the same process.
- Catahoula Times.
Neither the merest legal tyron or
the newspaper man is supposed to
know much law, and hence the astute
editor of Catahoula Times may be as
readily forgiven for a legal blunder
IS the Caucasian. II the Times ia
tends to imply that after the Lottery
amendment becomes a part of the
Constitution tits beyond reach for
Is years it is far from right. The
lottery gang need not lay any such
.fattering JUNCTION to their souls if
any they have, for the Ants are in
it 'sfor the war; and will never con-
sent that Louisiana shall become the
Monaco of America; they will never
lay down their arms, until the Lottey
is banished the State. The propos*
ed amendment, if carried and incor-
porated 10 the Constitution will
amount to. no more than . temporary
license TO carry on the business, La
BILE to be terminated at any time by
the State authorities. No legisla.
ture can bargap away the public
health or the public morals. The
people themselves can not do it.
much less their servants. The su-
pervisionof both these subjects Of
governmental power, is continuing in
its nature, and they are to be dealt
with as the special exigencies Of The
moment may require. Government is
organized with view to their pre-
servation, and can not divest itself of
the power to provide for them. No
contract can be made concerning
public morals, or governmental pow.
er that may not be terminated at
will by the State. The contracts
which the Constitution protect are
those that relate to property rights,
not governmental.
Any n who accepts a lottery
charter does so with the implied
understanding that the people in
their sovereign capacity. and through
their properly constit uted agencies.
may resume it at any time when the
good shall require; and this
whether it be paid for or not.
It is the Times and not its "Shreve.
port contemporary" that is unsound,
decidedly unsound, in its conclusions.
Last week the gran d jury of New
Orleans had up before its body for
investigation. a charge that Repre-.
S. o. shattuck, of Calca
sieu parish, had received a bride Of
$500 for his vote on the concert
saloon bill, while before the last
legislature. Larry Plant. the pro-
prietor of the notorious Royal street
dive, refused to testify ia the case.
was ordered to iaiI for contemnt