The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1892-12-28
THE LEGISLATURE.
DissOlving Views of the General As
sembly-The LEGISLATORS.


own vernacular, means that a drunken man
will speak the truth. And 30 last Friday
night one Of the "boys" who was taking his
Christmas In advance spoke only the literal
Party" as applied to the dominant element
In this State, was misnomer, and that they
should be dubbed the "Ruinatlon Party"
1t is sad truth that the General Assembly
certainly exhibited most destructive tenden-
cies, and has not reformed worth cent"
Where is the salary reduction bilp'?-gone
where the woodbine twineth; the whangdoo-
for his first born. is the answer that echoes
through the now empty corridors OF the State
House.
Where is prohibition 9-killed In the house
of its friends and u travesty substituted for
1t, is the reply that Is sadly heard as the tread
of departing feet dies away Ia the distance:
And where, oh. where ~ the much talked Of
reduction Of taxation 1t comes IN the
and our over.burdened Taxpayers, many Of
whom find 1t hard work TO dodge the sheriff,
will pay, for the year 1893. one mill more TO
the SLate than they did in 1892.
Reform" as defined by the majority OF the
State Legislature, consists in harrassing the
great corporations by vezatious and arbitrary
legislation, and In destroying the LIQUOR bus
iness in the hands Of individuals and making
the State the vender OF intoxlcants. Truly
the mountain has labored and brought forth
a very, very small mouse.
But cui bonof What is done Is done, and
1t only remains for me to chronicle briefly the
leading events Of the closing week Of the ses
sion.
The week opened with battle royal on
prohibition" In the Senate.
The Evans dispensary bl!F' was taken up
rs an amend IN ent 10 the "Roper-Netlles bill"
and in this shape was forced through Sec
ond reading. The minority, under the
skilled leadership OF that able and accom-.
pllshed parliamentarian, Senator Smythe, of
Charleston, ably seconded by bis colleague,
Senator Buist, and by Senator Sloan, OF Rich
land, and others-made an all night fight Of
1t. and attack ed the bill with el0quence and
logic that could not be answered.
But 1t was all in vain. The fiat had gone
forth, and the royal command was obeyed.
In speaking against the Evans amendment
Senator Smythe said he could not see how the
prohibitionist who bases his opinion On moral
bounds could vote for a bill to transfer the
traffic from one channel TO another. 1t was
not right to embark the State In such specu-
atSn; The cry Of this bLegisIatnre is doTn
worst kind. We are all going In as partners
TO sell liquor. II Is paternalism. Here we
are creating little army OF government en-
ployes. BY this bill we send the State OF
on credit.
Senator Buist made a three.hour speech dis
cussing almost everything under the sun.
Several Senators rose to points or order, ask
ting down, and inqnirlng If member could
be regarded as present when he was asleep.
The amendment passed It's third reading In
the Senate Friday night at $50 O'clock and
then the fight was transferred TO the House.
There. as In the Senate, the antis made stub
born but fruitless fight.
The speech Of Mr.. Sullivan, of Charleston,
against the amendment was very funny. He
said that it reminded him of the Black Code?
1t was filled with nothing but persecution
and punishment. Under II you had 10 be q
william or an angel If you looked at a bottle
unsealed you were william. II you buy one
from the State sealed, you are an angel. Un-
der 1t liquor could only be purchased In bot
tles He hoped the Legislature would not
compel him to carry his drink around In his
pocket.
Citizen Josh Ashley, made charact eristic
speech against the bill. He had come pledged
for prohibition, but If anybody would show
him any prohibition he would eat It. The
amendment was twenty-eight sections long
courts would decide In ten minutes that no
such lengthy amendment could be made on
the apur Of the minute. There was no prohi.
liquor, but they compelled you to buy a
whole bottle In order to get any.
. Mr.. Thomas, Of Columbia, gave the most
forcible argument against the passage OF the
great length 1t was practically new bill and
II had not been read three times in the House
as was required OF all bills by the Constltu-
ton. The bill had not been printed, thus pre-
venting all opportunity to consider It The
DILL did not relate TO but one subject and that
subject was not expressed In the title, as re-
quired by the Constitution.
The amendment was passed by vote OF 81
to 80 as follows:
Yeas-Burry. Breazeale, Bulst, Carpenter,
Cox, Coyington, Dendy, ]. T. Duncan, Ed
wards, Estridge, Fielder, Folk. Foster, Gary,
Graham, Hammett, Hardy, Harper, Hill, JEFF
eHs s6S 5Sdfn }oh9SoD Tona Kennedy, knoif MSp
Maulding, McWhite, Mitchell, Nettles, OIL.
yer, Parks, Pearmun, Phillips, Rast, Roper,
skinner, smith, Stack house, Stur-
ters, Whilmire, WiIborn. W. e. Wolfe, j. s.
Wolfe, Wiley, YeldelI.
Nays-Speaker Jones, Anderson, Ashley,
Bacot, Carol, Cooper, T. c. Duncan, Elder,
Harris. Hughes. Hydrick, Kelly, Lesesne,
Love, Lawrence Manning; Moses, Perry,
nits, Weston, Williamson:
the following statement: II do not favor
this bill, but, believing IL to be much better
than the present license system, and long
step towards prohibition-becaus by taking
the vast amount OF capital invested In LIQUORS
the great influence II now has will be greatly
weak ened.-I vote for II, hoping that soon we
may be able, the capital OF whisky removed,
TO enact q prohibition law, such as the House
bill for which this bill was substituted"
About 4 o'clock Saturday morning there
was some CONSERVATION when 1t was found
that the first page of the bill, containing the
enactiug words, was missing from the en-.
crossing department where II was being made
ready for ratification. Some members were
quick to cry thief, but the missing page was
soon fou nd where II had been Inadvertently
left by one OF the clerks who had been copy
At 6:30 O. m. the bill was ratified by the two
houses, consisting Of about dozen Repre-
and a score Of Sena tors. The Gov
ernor signed the act Saturday morning, and
IL became law.
on Thursday Messrs. ]. A. Sigh. Of New
berry, w. H. Thomas, Of Sumter, and D. Z.
Duncan, of Union, were elected railroad conf
m issioners.
Col. Duncan and Mr.. Thomas are members
of the old board. The election of MIR. Duncan
was q surprise, as It. was thought that Yel-
dell, Of Edgefield, Walter. Of Orangeburg, or
Stanland, Of Berkeley, would get third place.
The election of Messrs. Sligh and Thomas
was a foregone conclusion and they got In on
the first ballot. MIR. Yeldell's defeat was due
TO the fact that the members had come to the
belief that Edgefield had gotten enough Of
that the Governors lieutenant would have
been elected.
All the members are prominent Allla nee.
men, and the result shows that the Alliance
Is still POWER In the land.
IN REPLY TO Mr.. KINARD.
To those who know the facts and olrcum-
stances incident 10 the continuance Of that
long-titled bill Of Mr.. Kinard's, his card In
your last issue was source Of considerable
He says that every time allude TO the bill
l show concluslvely that / know nothing
about the nature OF 1t, and what disposition
was made Of 1t.
Now, one would really think that the gen.
tleman from Ninety-Six had, after days and
nights Of laborious effort prepared and intro.
duced bill so profound In its nature, 80 wise
and beneticent In It's provisions, that u news
paper correspondent could Ill afford even IL
attempt to grasp It's Titanic proportions.
But The bill is a very simple one. AS much
so as Mr.. kinard. IT It were otherwise the
from Ninety-SiX could not lay
claim to It's paternity.