The Green Forest tribune., 1902-12-20
THE COMING LEGISLATURE.
CONTINUED FROM FIRST PAGE.

cussion or even of mention.
 "What action will be taken upon the question of salary of members, or can you guess?"
 ''It would be a guess at the best. Under the present law, members are paid six dollars per day, and so paid by the day because the constitution requires that they shall receive per diem. The amendment which carried last September changed the words per diem to "pay." The effect of this is that the legislature may in it's wisdom fix the compensation of members in the form of a def mite salary for the term, instead of a certain amount per day. l think the object of the amend ment and of the voters who voted for it, was to reduce the sum total of the compensation of members, or at least, remove the temptation to an extension of the sessions.
 If so, I hardly think the amend ment will accomplish the desired results without swinging to the other extreme. The member who
 votes for an extension of the ses- sion for the extra pay it gives
 him, will just as readily close out the session before necessary bus- mess is transacted, in order to
 save private expenses, if he is on
 a fixed salary, which he would get whether the session is short or long. It seems to me that law
 providing for sixty day session
 at the present per diem, and for a dollar a day for all the time to which the session is extended be- yond that period, would come nearer getting at results wished for, than either the present plan or a salary law. This idea could have been carried out without any amendment to the constitution. Candidly, 1 do not believe any change will be made, but you may expect to hear a great deal of discussion of it, and several six dollar days used up in deciding to leave it as 1t is.
 "What are your ideas as to the purchase of a convict farm?o
 CT think that is one of the most questions that will come before the next legislature, as from present indications, 1t ap- pears that it is going to be before that body with vengeance. The systems of farming out convicts, or of renting lands for them, are full of leakages and necessary expenditures that ought to be saved. The state has used both methods with her convicts and in spite of such objections to each system, she has managed by eff cient supervision to make our penitentiary pay it's own way, and in addition pay annually into the state treasury, an apparent sur- plus of profit. These yearly sur- pluses have been apparent rather than real, but the self-mainten- ance of the penitentiary is fact of which we may well feel proud, and the more so, since in many of our sister states, the penal in stitutions are not self-supporting, butrequire annual appropriations to keep them in proper condition. In the past fifteen years the state has gone largely into the cotton raising business with her convicts and in so doing has paid out about S200,000 in rent alone, or more than enough to pay for a good farm of our own, and it has been during this period that the penitentiary has made enough besides, to pay all of it's running expenses. There can be no ques- ton as to the actual necessity of purchasing farm of our own. While we could go on renting as in the past, the business sense of an outright purchase is such that it becomes mismanagement and little less than criminal negli gence on the part of the state, to longer defer such a purchase. Of course, of the merits of the six or seven different farms offered, l know nothing, except as the daily press chronicles, and l could not say what particular farm is best suited to the needs of the state. It would be difficult to find one