The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1897-02-02
STATE
LEGISLATIVE
TOPICS.

assessed against foreigners is strongly
approved in many quarters. mo class OF
people," remarks the Pittsburg Times,
make proportlonately so much expense
for the state or local governments as the
foreigners who work about the mines ana
big plants of various kinds where un-
skilled labor is IA prominent factor. They
get into the police courts into jail, into
all sorts of scrapes that entail costs they
have to be taken care of when times are
hard, their children must be sent to school,
and in one way or another they add more
than a fair proportion to the public bur
den. Now it is all right for these people
to share in the advantages of the schools
for their children and in the rewards of
the court when they have been cutting
each other to pieces at christening or n
wedding. But they should pay their share
of the expenses involved. In the rural
districts. where the most of them are en-
ployed they are assessed and a tax
charged against them. But they put off
the collector, or deny their identity, or
hatch up some other preteXt to save their
money and escape the tax collector until
the amount collected from them is hardly
worth going after" Mr.. Smiths bill would
make it the business of the employers OF
alien labor to pay the taxes for them, and
take the amount out of the wages earned,
that they might Ray fair proportion of
the expenses to which they put the local
and general governments of the state,
-:ll:--
There is truth as well as humor in what
the Pittsburg Times says about over
abundant legislation. Everybody who
has Il grievance, everybody who has
hobby, has bill to remedy the grievance
or to promote the hobby. Every ill
physical, moral, mental, intellectual or
spiritual-is to be cured by bill. There
are bills to regulate everything from the
manner of the wearing of hats to the
method of trimming trees and planting
onions; bills to regulate drinking and eat.
ing, buying and selling: bills concerning
births and bills concerning deaths; bills
affecting every action during life, and
bills that concern the rest of the dead;
bills of all sorts by the hundreds and
thousands; such a quantity of bills that
if all of them were passed they would
turn the world upside down. This flood
of legislation is the result of the growing
belief that somehow or other we live by
law and that ills that are due either to
the inherent defects of human nature or
to our own carelessness and neglect of
our duties as citizens can be cured by
legislation. Undoubtedly in every state
there Is a great deal of room for wise
remedial legislation which would better
conditions and conduce greatly to the pub
lie welfare, but the majorit/. of that
which is proposed is crude, unnecessary
and unwise and, should it be enacted,
would bring upon us unknown ills greater
than those from which we fly. No COM
munity or state can be happy and pros
perous without good laws but there is
nothing truer than the adage That peo-
pie Is governed best which is governed
least, and no laws can supply the place
of energy, enterprise, thrift, prudence and
intelligence"
ill.
State Treasurer Haywood has all the
data prepared for his annual report of the
business of his department for the last
fiscal year. 1t shows the apparent debt of
the commonwealth to be $6S,15, 3O5.47, of
which the 3l2 per cent currency loan, due
1912, contributes 81 6i2 800; the per cent.
currency loan, due the same year, $i,52l $50;
the 6 per cent. agricultural college scrip
bond, payable 1922 $500, ,00O and proceeds
from sale of eastern and western expert
mental farms, with interest at per cent,
$1,000. These items run the interest bear
ing debt to $6,6Sl $50. TO get at the total
debt there must be added items on which
interest has ceased, including the relief
notes outstanding of the 81, ,220 264 issued
by thirty-four banks under the act of May
4, lS4l, amounting to 500, 1872; interest certi-
ticates outstanding and unclaimed, ST.
5S3.77; bonds, $2Oil4.70, and $25 owing do
mestic creditor. With these items added
debt amounts to $6,Sl5, AZ Toward the
cancellation of the state debt there are
in the sinking fund 1900, 900 bonds of the
Allegheny Valley Railroad company;
1927, ,0S33+ interest on the same; $2775, 900
United States per cent. registered bonds
at l09, and $Sl2, ,347.19 cash on hand, making
total of s., 1874 1903, and leaving the net
debt of the commonwealth 81 l24.9i. OF
the relief notes outstanding 50, ,4O1 are cred
tied to the Exchange bank of Pittsburg
81, 1888 to the Merchants and Manufacturers
bank of Pittsburg, and 1881 to the Monon-
gahela bank of Brownsville. These three
banks originally issued about $4,000 Of
these relief notes
-:I':-
In his report State Treasurer Haywood
says this of the condition of the treasury:
THE balance due to common schools for
the current appropriation year, to Phila-
delphia on personal property tax, the
| quarterly payments for the next six
months on appropriations made by the
| last legislature to charitable, reformatory,
educational and training institutions; the
| salaries to judges and state officers to the
| National Guard, etc, together with the
| expenses of the incoming Legislature, will
not only consume all the above balance
| (Si,250 25O, but will require in addition a
| large portion of the receipts for the same
period. There We're no new sources of
| revenue during the year. On the Otnef
| hand appropriations were made to a num-
| Der of new institutions and those already
| receiving state aid were in some cases in
| creased. The total of the appropriations
| of the two years reached about $23 900 900.
| The net receipts for the same period We're
| a little less than $50, 900 900. This excess
| may to some extent have been occasoned
| from the fact that under different acts of
| assembly certain moneys are required 10
| be paid into the treasury which are again
| returned. The total receipts, IL taken as a
| basis for appropriations are therefore mis-
| leading. The largest of these sums is the
| three-fourths of the state personal tax
| returned to the counties. OF the $2,7lG
| 2O79i received from this source and in
| cluded in the receipts for the year but
| 81, ,679 80 can be classed as actual rev.
| enue. In addition there are the personal
| fees and commissions paid into the treas
| ury by the secretary of the common
| wealth. insurance commissioner and at
| torney general; also, the tax on sale of
| fertilizers, which is drawn out and eX-
| pended in the collection of samples and
| making analyses of the same. The total
| of these items including a few minor ones
not mentioned, amounted during the year
TO s., 0S9, OlO35 leaving a net revenue of
| so, 176.745 1t can be readily seen, there
fore, how the legislature could have been
misled by supposlnS that the total receipts
| as reported We're available for the pay
ment of appropriations instead of the
| amount only. The net estimate for the
| year 1886 made by the auditor general and
| my predecessor, was S9,7I3,G4S The actual
| nat a Ia fnr ha "a -