The White Pine news. [volume] (Ely, Nev.) 1906-1910, 1907-04-22

dom thought that it was acting for
the best interests of the state and of
the miner; some of the acts of the
legislators are past finding out. 1t
seemed that the senate was afraid of
cultivating a spirit of paternalism;
of the horrible precedent it would set
for men who would follow and would
be endowed with less of wisdom and
wisdom and knowledge, with their
fear of paternalism and the bad infiu-
ence their act would exert on those to
follow them, the senator's who voted
against the old miners home bill are
wrong. They did the miner an injus-
tice which time alone can heal 1t is
not paternalism to care for those be-
coming bent and gray and decrepit
while employed in the wearing and
hazardous work of unearthing the
minerals which the earth contains.
Every dollar given to the world by
the miner is new dollar added to
the wealth of the world. On the
wealth which he produces rests the
security of commerce, industry and
finance. lie is the creator, and to
him more than anyone else does the
nation look for its stability and pros
perity.
1t is not paternalism to nourish
and care for the miner broken in his
health and purse from long years of
hardship and exposure. II is a duty
which the state owes him. How many
of the men who braved the perils of
the desert and of the ocean and came
to California to develop our vast min
eral wealth lived to return? How
many brave and courageous prospec
tors have been sacrificed to the rig
ors of the Nevada deserts while in a
search for the veins that have made
the state famous?
The rational government provides
homes for he aged and crippled sol
diers who offered their services in the
hour of the nations peril. No one
questions the right of the govern
ment TO maintain these homes at the
expense of the public treasury, and
no one accuses it of paternalism. If
to care for the old soldiers is pater-
nalism, then it is paternalism which
every American views with admira-
ton and pride.
In California we have our county
hospitals. These take the place of
homes to the worn out miner. If any
one will take the trouble to go to any |
one of the institutions maintained at !
the expense of the mining counties
he will find that almost the majority
of the inmates belong to that class |
known as the pioneers of California |
the shelter of the county's benefac- |
ton These are the men who have |
made the history of our state, who |
have blazoned the name of California |
in letters of gold on ever trail and |
mountain fastness. And while they |
may not receive all that they and all |
that we think is due them for the
invaluable services that they have
rendered to the commonwealth, the
very fact that these hospitals or
homes are established by the counties
is evidence that we are in a measure
under obligation to them.
If men who preserve wealth and
property in time of war are deserving
of the solicitude and care of the gov
eminent are not the men who ere
ate that wealth also deserving of an
equal solicitude and care? Lest we
forget we should remind the legisla-
tors of this and other states that it
was the wealth which the alluvial de-
posts and the quartz veins of Cali
foInia poured forth into the lap of
the nation which preserved the cred
it of the Union in the hour of its
greatest extremity and made the sue
cess of the north possible in that
great interneeine conflict.
The Legislators of Nevada may
have acted wisely in their own judg-
ment in defeating the old miners
home bill, but they did not act well.