The Birmingham age-herald., 1909-06-17
NEAR BEER TAX IS
 WHITE ELEPHANT
Georgia Legislature Will Take
 Up the Problem !
FUND IS ACCUMULkTIN6
Effort Will Be Made to Have the Money From This Tax Set Aside For Use of the Public
 Schools.

Atlanta, June 16.-(Special.) )-When the legislature meets this summer 1t will have to deal with the question of what to do with the s25o,O00 in the treasury col- lected from the tax on near beer.
 The legislature, of course. will find no trouble in disposing of the money; It will be rather a question as to which of sev- eral objects it shall be devoted to.
 It is not a part of the general fund in the treasury, the law having specifically provided that it should be used only for expenses of the prison department It will require preliminary legislation, there- fore, before it can be put to any other purpose.
 This fund Is accommodating now at the rate of about s1500O0 a year. It was proposed at one time to use 1t for the purchase and equipment of a state prison farm for the white convicts, but the his tory of the failure of that arrangement, because Governor Smith and the prison commission could not agree, Is well known.
 The prison commission 1t is said, Is yet in the mind to buy farm for the white convicts. But the plan of putting the white convicts on the public roads in the larger counties where they can be properly cared for apart from the negroes seems to be working well, and, as far as can be learned, there is disposition to try 1t out
 It is decidedly probable the legislature will take that view of 1t and apply the near beer money to other projects. Just what the legislature will do with it can- not now be predicted.
 Comptroller General Wright has sug- gested that the near beer money now on hand. together with the accumulations from the same source for the next two or three years, would prove sufficient to relieve the state school fund without the necessity of bond issue for that purpose.
 And then, again, it may be necessary to turn this money into the general fund of the treasury in order to meet various and sundry obligations, the appropriations for which have been and still are grow ing larger from year to year.
 Pardoning of convicts.
 Apropos his proclivities for exercising the pardoning power it comes from good
  farewell message to the legislature, rec ommend the enactment of a law requiring the pardoning power to investigate cases of convicts transferred from county camps to the state prison farm as the result of infirmities contracted subsequent to conviction, and report whether or not the ends of justice would be met and the state benefited by the exercise of execu- tive clemency, either through a full par don or by communication of sentence
 The governor will also recommend, it is understood, that trial judges be required when called upon by the chief executive, to furnish information concerning cases referred to them and to advise whether, in their judgment, events subsequent to conviction warrant executive interfer- ence with the original sentence of the court.
 In exercising the pardoning power Gov ernor Smith has been largely controlled by the development of inf1rmities in pris- oners while in the penitentiary. It is his opinion that the state should not be bur dened with the expense of keeping help less and harmless conyicts In the batch of % convicts recently pardoned by Gov ernor Smith following his visit to the state prison farm, most of them were in- valids as the result of diseases and com plaints acquired while serving In the pen itentiary.
 In addition to the foregoing it Is now practically certain that the governor has determined to recommend the abolition of tion of one-man control for the penitep- tiary. He will also suggest other radical changes In the management and control of the states penal institutions.