St. Paul daily globe., 1895-02-11
RUM REASON ROBILLARD.

Iature, has made two or three unsuc-
cessful attempts to gain the public ear
since he became member of the law
making body, but until recently has
been given, to use a slang phrase not
unfamiliar to the doctor, 1.-The marble
heart"
His bill to place the medical profess
sion on a military footing, or the mili-
tdry profession Oh a medical footing,
as the case may be, was not greeted
with the general uprising of the public
which the author of the bill expected.
But that is neither here nor there, nor
anywhere else, in fact, except upon
general orders. There seemed to be
feeling of Indifference with reference
to the bill which was really tantalizing
to it's author. Several members,
among them the inimitab BILE jacobson,
even went so far as to make the bill an
object of ridicule, and went into a
paraphrase on that miserable old saw
about the cat-and-a-half which has
come down in history with the enviable
record of having killed rat-and-a-half
in a minute-and-a-half,p pursuing an in
quiry as to how long it would take to
eXterrinate the national guard, three
surgeons to be allowed to each regi-
ment.
But the First ward representative
now has a bill which will not be dis
missed as a joke. 1t takes up good
deal of space, but the only part of it
which materially affects any one might
be put into two lines. 1t is a provision
prohibiting the issuance of more than
one liquor license to single person or
firm. OF course there are a lot of
other provisions to swell out and round
up the appearance of the bill, but the
one-license provision is the meat of the
bill. The rest is all bone and suet
There are two kinds of legislation;
that which is desirable and that. which
is not desirable, and Of the latter class
there are also two classes; that in
which the author is honestly commit
ted to a policy which is wrong in it's
design, and that in which the author,
for reasons best known to himself, in
PRODUCES a measure which he knows
to be wrong in design. But there is
still further subdivision of the last
named class. A member may intro
duce bill that is wrong in it's concep-
tionS and harmful in it's operation as a
measure of revenge upon a certain class
which has opposed him in his election,
or it may be in the interests of the
party which elected him, and some
times bill is introduced by designing
members for no other purpose that
that of eXtorting money from the par
ties affected by the operation of the
bill, the consideration for the payment
being the withdrawal or the defeat of
the bill by its author.
Now to analyZe the motive for the
Introduction of this bill it must be ad-
mitted that the doctor knew the bill
was not just or reasonable one. 1t
does not take single step in the direc-
ton of that temperance reform which is
so popular in the doctors own dis
trict, for it does not throw a single re-
straint around the saloon, or in any
way regulate or curtail the business of
liquor selling. The bill would not con-
serve any public interest would not re-
suit in the addition of a single dollar
Ito fthe revenues of the state, county or
city, and would not remedy single
evil consequent upon the sale of liquor.
Its only result would be to force whole
salers to withdraw largely from the re-
tail business, leaving that business
to the less responsible and often less
f|reSpectable parties who engage in the
business.
Only the Doctors unimpeachable
public character, his correct personal
habits and the possession of an un-
tainted escutcheon upon which no flies
+ have ever been permitted to roost, pro-
tect him from the suspicion of selfish
motives in the Introduction of this bill
But for the fact that he is, in his daily
walk and conversation, a living en-
bodiment of all those virtues and
moral principles which he so success
fully advocates, the suspicion might be
| born that he was after the brewer
and wholesale liquor dealer for stip-
| ulation." Fortunately for the doctor,
| it was made apparent before, during
and after his campaign that he was
| far above any. consideration of this
| kind, and now when the scoffing un-
believer in the honor of a legislator
points out this fact that this bill has
| in every detail and particular the ap-
pearance and peculiarities of a '1eg
puller," the fact becomes merely an
| insignificant coincidence, like the
| meeting of two John Smiths at a
strange hotel or the marriage of Tom
Long to Mary Short
Conceding, then, that DR.. Robillard
| is too high minded to be prompted by
motives of greed, too consistently vir-
tuous, as one may say, to be work
ing" the brewers and the wholesale
liquor dealers, and taking it for granted
that he is honestly in favor of the bill,
for everybody seems inclined to place
the most favorable construction pos
sible on the doctors eccentric move
ments, what are we to conclude was
the. e.real motive back of the introduc-
ton Of this curious measure?
In charity to the doctor and the citi-
zens Of the First ward, whose very
bosomS swell with pride, or some
other emotion equally as strong, at
the mention of the name of their rep
resentative, let it be agreed that the
doctor drew this bill after day of
that vexatious toll which besets the
statesman who spends all his waking
hours in the consideration of grave
problems; that worn and buffeted in
his conflict with the forces of evil, he
stopped a moment by the wayside, and
giving way 10 one ol the Weaknesses
common to frail mortals, he fell into
a trance, and the bill was drawn be-
fore he "came to-"
This is really the easiest and most
creditable way out Of it, and it is to be
hoped that it will be the theory gen
orally adopted by the citizens of ST.
Paul. 1t is far more creditable to the
doctor to accept this as the origin of
the bill than to enter into an analytical
/ discussion of the other thirty-nine
/ reasons which might be advanced for
4 the introduction of such measure.
n Both Instantly Killed.