Omaha daily bee. (Omaha [Neb.]) 187?-1922, 1905-10-12
Gas LAMP CONTRACT PASSES
officers At Mayors Command csmPsl
Attendance Of City Dads.
STAND WATCH At EVERY DOOR
Twenty-Eisht Dollar Gas Ordinance
Passed, with Chair Refusing 60
Put Question and Minority
withholding Action.

With policemen guarding every egress
by orders from Mayor Moores, Councilmen
zimman, Nicholson and OBrien we're held
in the council chamber Wednesday morn
ing so they could not escape and break a
quorum OF six members. The SOS gas street
lighting contract with the Omaha Gas COM
pany was passed. with the chair refusing
to put the question and the minority re-
fusing to participate. Mayor Moores, who
was present. Immediately, returned the con-
tract with the bond approve1. City Attor-
ney Breen says the ordinance is not worth
the paper 1t is written on Attorney w. J.
Connell says It is perfectly valid.
Men who have attended council meetings
for years in Omaha say that the session
was the widest and most profane they ever
saw. Epithets were hurled back and forth
between Mayor Moores and minority coun-
cilmen. Personal encounters between him
and Councilman O'Brien seemed imminent
at several stages. A fist fight between
O'Brien and Police Oficer Ring was mar
rowly averted. Temporary President Mich
olson from the chair made a speech in
which great excitement rendered his words
nearly incoherent in which he declared he
would leave the council chamber when he
got ready, even though II cost him his life.
He tried to borrow revolver, but did not
attempt to leave until Mayor Moores had
lifted the barricades.
An Adjourned Meeting
The meeting was adjourned over from the
regular weekly session Tuesday night when
zimman, Nicholson and o'Brien refused to
appear. Councilman Hoye the fourth MEM
Der of the minority had been excused
week before, so that the unexcused absence
Af thn
The effort to prevent a meeting was openly
explained as part of the plan of the mi
nority to delay the SIS gas lamp contract
until Mayor Moores' health forced him to
go south, when President Zimman would
become acting mayor and thus increase the
weight of resisting power placed in the
hands of the minority.
AT the adjourned meeting of the council
Zimman, Nicholson and O'Brien were again
absent Evans moved a call of the house
and the clerk was directed to have the alb
| sentees brought in. Mayor Moores ap-
peared and directed officers Ring and
Lahey to serve orders on the three coun-
cilmen. In few minutes O'Bren and Zim-
man appeared, followed shortly by Nichol-
son. Each had evaded the officers to escape
arrest. 1t was 10:45 when President Zim-
man took the chair and the call Of the
| house was raised
Proceed ms UsGaI.
| The proceedings went ahead as usual
until report from the committee on fire
water and police, signed by Schroeder,
Evans and Back, was received recommend
ing the passage of the gas ordinance
zimman. who had relinqushed the chair
to Nicholson, protested against approving
the committee report. He declared that
Attorney ConnelL representing the gas
| company, had promised Judge Sutton when
the latter signed the Temporary order for
bidding passage of pending gas ordinances.
| that new ordinances wauld be introduced,
consistent with they Judges opinion The
president claimed ithat' Judge Sutton had
held a SIS contract Ia modification of the
franchise that had9 to be published two
| weeks before final action He told the
councilman they were running a risk of
violating the temporary injunction IL they
voted for the ordinance, and asked for time
to consult the court order, for which AS
sistant City Attorney Herdman had been
dispatched.
Back and Huntington demanded an i'm
mediate roll call. Nicholson denounced i'm
mediate action as ''unfair." Back still in
sisted and the temporary president In
formed him that ne would not put the
motion to approve the report until he got
good and ready An appeal from the de-
cision of the chair, however, failed to have
the necessary two-thirds votes. At this
point City Attorney Breen was called upon
to define the legal premises. when Herd
man arrived with the order.
Mayor and Police Confer.
When the policemen returned to the coun-
Gil chamber after falling to find their mer
they took seats outside the railing and
Mayor Moores conferred with them After
a while they took positions at each of the
three doors leading from the council cham
ber This frightened the tension.
The city attorney ADVISED the council
against passing the ordinance, as the in
junction forbids the passing of pending
contract ordinance for the Omaha Gas com
pany.
He had scarcely finished when the Irisl
) blood in O'Brien moved him TO attempt &
leave the room at a door to the south o
the rostrum Policeman Ring, stationed
there, refused to let O'Brien out, but finall.
: did let him go into the toilet room. but no
) into the committee room behind. Word
followed and the councilman told the office
what he would do II he wanted particular,
to leave and Ring said he would have .