The record-union., 1897-03-17

mentS in the main, but there was no
present prospect Of striking at the root
OF the evil, and he favored the bill as
providing temporary relief for pres
ent suffering
Shanahan was violently opposed to
the bill. 1t established a worse form Of
slavery than that existing before the
war. By the terms of the bill the best
pay was 30 cents per day, the poorest
10 cents. The result would be that all
labor would eventually be dragged
down to the level of the lowest-that
was the inevitable trend-never toward
the highest. Like Dibble, he believed
the conditions would never be better
until the soil was returned to the use
OF the people. 1t was an old story.
Even Isaiah said: Woe unto him who
adds house unto house and lands unto
hands,
Cross strongly favored the bill. The
price need lower no mans self-respect.
He had worked for as little. and SO had
others or this floor. and had been
neither tramps nor slaves. Young men
of to-day did not realize that a gener-
alton ago men worked for SO month
and board. The provisions offered by
this bill would mean absolute comfort
to many q poor man and to his family,
too, until better times could come. He
favored the bill.
Emmons was glad to agree for once
with his friend from SonOma, Price. He,
too, had been amused and instructed
by the elCquence of his friends who
were going so far back into the centu-
rieS for the causes of the present UNI
happy conditions, who were so anxious
to strike at the root Of the evil that
they forgot that meanwhile humanity
was starving. 1t was while the doc
tors disagreed over the cause Of dis
ease that the patient often died. Here
was one measure offered to the House
in the interest of suffering humanity,
one which could do no harm and might
do untold good, yet members INSTRUCTED
it and denounced it, While the vast
army of the unemployed demanded just
such assistance. Dennery interrupted
to ask if the same vast army were not
complaining at this very time that a
dollar a day for work on the proposed
San Francisco boulevard was too small
wages. F.mmons was not informed of
the fact and went on in his appeal for
the passage of the bill. Gentlemen ac-
cused legislation of being the cause OF
the trouble, yet they won't have a law
framed especially to rectify the trouble;
1t was not pathos they talked, it was
bathos. The ten cents and the ore
meal a day were only for the man who
refused to work, and he deserved no
better. Emmons was asked if he had
ever positively known of a case of such
refusal and he replied yes; he had
caused the arrest of ten such. Like
Price, he fed all who came, but he had
an experimental ditch filled with very
tough weeds on his place and he had
tried ten able bodied fellows with that,
who had absolutely refused to touch
the work as the price Of a meal There
are two classes of unemployed in this
State and one class will not work I'M
less compelled. The statesmen on this
floor We're confusing them.
Treacy said he spoke not for the la
boring men, but for their wives and
families, when he declared that the
pittance offered-35 cents-would de-
grade labor. lower wages and counter
act the effect of his bill making 50 per
day the minimum for laborers on public
work.
Toland closed with an appeal for the
passage CT the bill as the best thing
that had been offered on behalf of the
unemployed.
Leavitt offered an amendment raising
the 30 cents to 81 81. but it was lost,
and the bill was carried by the close
vote of II to "a Bettman gave notice
of motion to reconsider
The House took a recess until = p. m.