The age-herald., 1899-02-21
IN HOTEL LOBBIES
 AND ELSEWHERE

So'o eo "oiA ioE notnlnB-a contingency quite impossible. Tomorrow being the an- niversary of George Washington's births day. and therefore a legal holiday. the legislature will be in session on Thursday which will be the last of the fifty or dinary pay days allowed by the exist- Ing constitution of the state. It is impos- sible that the constitutional convention of next August will increase the number of days of the session. Thousands of good citizens hope that there will be provision for but one session every four years, lim- tied to fifty days. unless in emergency the governor shall call an extraordinary ses- sion.
 'The lower house of the general assembly, night" said man who has spent the time of the expiring session at Montgomery. '"The house passed In 90 minutes 75 local bills, or approaching one bill a minute. When you understand that each roll call requires fifteen minutes you will compre- bend something of the extraordinary leg isative work. And, at the same time, you must not lose sight of the time required for the third reading of the bills. At no time during this extraordinary night ses- sion referred to were there moro than B members present-a bare quorum. In short, the house passed in one hour and half local bills, the lawful roll-can, on which woud have required eighteen hours and three-quarters! This will remind the pub lic of the utter reckiessness of so-called local legislation by the general assembly It remains for the forthcoming constitu- tional convention to provide a relief from this farce of local legislation. What shall be of purely a local county nature should be left to some county authority. We night take lesson from Ireland. Under the law there everything of local nature Is left to purely local body of legislators"
 .There Is wisdom in what this man says, observed 'an old parliamentary hand. "Very recently we have had a graphic illus tration in the progress of the Moody dis pensary bill. Members popped up one after another all over the house, and cried out. MT. Speaker, move that Blank county be excluded from the provisions of this bill Unless there be objection the county of Blank will be excluded would gravely ans- wer the speaker. In each of many of the states-in fact, in nearly every state-the legislature is forbidden to pass any act that does not apply to the entire state. The framers of our new constitution should see that our fundamental law contains a simi- lar provision. Comprehend what vast amount of time and money would be saved if a similar rule applied to congress. In the congress which expires on the 4th of March nearly 20,eO0 bills have been intro- duced Frequently members introduce bills merely to advertise themselves at home"
 ''We do a business greater In volume than ever before," said a leading bookseller. "but prices ags very much lower. Almost everything in our trade has been cheapen- ed. Where a customer formerly paid dollar and half for note paper, say, he or she now pays fifty cents. The same prin- ciple applies to other stationery, and large ly speaking to books. The cheapness of some editions of standard books is remark able. Now we may sell two or three times the amount of goods in bulk. and yet re- ceve no more cashe
 There Is a story on the pedestrian acquire ments of two influential young men of Bir- mingham, one a doctor and the other a rail- road official They left the Southern club one evening to go out Twentieth treet south. Let us walk" remarked one. "An right" said the other. So they started out to walk home, which is near the foot of the Twentieth street hill. Arrived at their des- tination, they, on a wager. determined to take good walk. So they proceeded up Twentieth street, crossed over the top of Red mountain, and started down. Each was hoping the other would say "enough:" but the word was not spoken. Do you want a downright good walk?" asked the doctor. 1T am game" answered the rail- road off1cial,' and on they went down the mountain to Oxmoor, and so on around the circle, so to speak, reaching Birmingham about o'clock in the morning after walk of twenty-five miles. There was some ban tering, the result of which they started out to do an additional twenty-five miles. Once more they trudged out Twentieth street, and over the mountain. Just beyond the crest they looked at each other and gave up the contest During the night they had walked thirty miles.
 Former Senator Joseph s. c. Blackburn, of Kentucky, with party of friends. was in town yesterday on his way from Mont gomery to Washington. He had been in Montgomery to lobby for telephonescom- pany.
 Word comes from Santiago that Captain Norman Jones' company in the Fifth United State regiment of volunteers re- gently presented to that popular officer tho handsomest watch and chain that coslld be procured in Cuba. Captain Jones' Bir1ning- ham friends will be pleased by this evi- dence of his popularity.
 Solicitor w. B.. Oliver, of Tuscaloosa, was in town yesterday.
 Former Senator Cecil Browne, of Talla- dega, Is in town.
 Hon. Thomas L. Long, of Walker, is in town.
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