The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1896-01-19
THE HOUSE.

THE HOUSE.
Representative Wilson made his
maiden effort on the floor of the house
convened. He arose and moved that
when the house adjourn it be at
o'clock. His first motion was re-
warded with success. for the motion
carried. but was later reconsidered.
! A message from the senate an
nounced the adoption by the upper
house of S. J. R. No. 5, by Booth, pro-
a bill fixing the salaries of all state
and county officers.
SPECIAL ORDER.
Taylor called up the special order set
! for 2:90, being the consideration of the
/, majority and minority reports of the
rules committee on substitute for rule
40. He moved the adoption of the ma
jority report. directing that contests
for seats be heard before the commit
! tee on elections.
Monson moved to substitute the mi
nority report providing for such hear
/ ing before committee of the whole.
/ From the outset it was apparent the
! Republican side did not intend to allow
| the views of the Democratic minority
any consideration.
Monson spoke in favor of the substi-
| tute, urging that unless all the mem
! ,berS heard the evidence they could not
| vote intelligently upon the question of
who was entitled to the Utah seats
! involved and for the hearing of which
the rule was especially designed. He
. thought the house in hearing the pres
/ mt To icL,
dent which would in all probability
be followed in the future in like cases
He did not doubt the integrity of the
I present members, but was not
certain of the membership of
! future legislatures. He thought
! it safest to establish precedent
which if followed in future would leave
no loophole for defeating the ends of
| justice Besides, if the matter were
| left to the elections committee he
/ thought there was very little likelihood
of that committee would be adopted
by the house no matter what difference
of opinion the minority of the commit
tee might hold. He considered it of the
highest Importance that all the mem
bers hear the evidence.
Taylor, chairman of the rules COM
mittee explained that the elections
committee would simply inquire into
! the facts and submit them to the
house. Caziar favored the minority re-
port. This brought Taylor to his feet
again. He was afraid there was going
to be division of the Republican side
He again explained the majority re-
port was in the interest Of time. The
evidence was so voluminous that the
committee of the whole would consume
hours considering it, The smaller COM
mittee he held could go through it
much more rapidly. He asserted once
more that the committee was to sim
ply examine the evidence and report
its finding to the house.
Howard wanted to know what that
passage of the rule in the majority re-
port meant which directed that it
make a recommendation to the house.
Taylor was confused but replied that
it was simply matter of form and
| sat down much agitated lest the mi
| nority report prevail
Sorensen INTERCEPTED the query as to
what the effect would be if the COM
mittee hearing the contests were to re-
! turn different findings. The house he
thought would have to adopt one or
the other and it could not do SO intel
ligently without hearing all the evil
dence, the thing the minority report
| WdIlICQ uOIlC dI OIICCs liz ILOQS III LILO
would be the case, and that if time
was to be considered, the minority re-
port had better be adopted now.
Monsoon REPLIES.
Monson made another strong argu-
ment in favor of the minority report.
He thought Taylor's argument that
the house could not afford to spend the
time necessary to hear the evidence
/ i. Io.I tod
a great deal of time over much less
important matters. He knew of no
matter so important as that the
| sacredness of the election franchise
should be preserved. 1t was mat
| ter of so much greater important than
anything else the house would
have to consider, that no matter
how much time was consumed
it would be we'll spent if justice pre-
vailed in the end. Taylor had once
united in unanimous report of a rule
providing for just what he was con-
! tending That rule had not been &C
/ cepted by the house because it was not
in keeping with the dignity of the
/ house that attorneys should argue on
! the floor That contingency had been
obviated by proposing to hear the con-
! tests in committee of the whole, yet
| Taylor was now drawing out after
having agreed to the former rule. He
thought the gentleman's action sig
nif1cant. Again he did not doubt the
integrity of any member, yet leaving
! the matter to a small committee left
| open a possibility of a miscarriage of
| justice, since it was possible for the
smaller committee to become warped
| by outside influence. He did not think
such thing would be done, but there
was a possibility of it and to avoid any
| such possibility it was imperitive the
members should all hear the evidence.
Maughn favored the minority report.
! He could not vote intelligently or feel
sure he was voting for justice unless
| he heard the evidence. Harris con-
! tributed his usual quota of irrelevant
and incompetent remarks, and upon
the question being put Monson called
for the ayes and nays. The minority
vote, all the Republicans voting
against and all the Democrats
for. The majority report was
then adopted and the elections COM
rnittee will hear the contests.
DECLINED TO RECEDE.
A message from the senate notified
the house that the senate had concur
red in the house amendments to S. B
II with few exceptions. The house
after losing much time in senseIess
wrangle, refused to recede and the bill
was sent back to the senate, confer
ence committee being subsequently ap
pointed. The bill is the one designed
! for the government of the supreme
court which consumed SO much time
the previous day 1t was desired tt
get the bill through to enable the courr
to begin proceedings under it's provi
| eli h1It of a.