The Richmond Virginian. (Richmond, Va.) 1910-1920, 1910-02-25
TO REPORT BILL TO
STRENGTHEN LINES
Almost Certain Senate Com
mittee Will Advise Break
ing Baylor Survey.
MEANS MORE REVENUE
FOR THE STATE
-
Financial Arguments Are of Most
Potential Offered-Com-
missioner Lee
Heard.

With as much accuracy as anything
can be forecasted. it can now be said
! that the Senate Committee on Fish
and Game will fayorably report the
Wiekham-Byrd bills providing for
Strengthening the lines of the Baylor
survey.
Whether the General Assembly will
| thus remove the oyster course from
the legislative bill of fare cit has been
a more or less toothsome and apetizing
morsel for a decade or moreJ Is quite
different matter. and one that no
cautious prognosticator or seer would
venture to approach The fact re-
| mains. however. that the Senate Fish
and Game Committee will put its
stamp of approval on the provisions
/ of the oyster measures or measure.
House Committee Nom ommittaI.
The House Committee on the Ghes-
apeake and it's Tributaries. which
heard the same argument on the bill
as the Senate committee. reported the
Byrd etit without any recommended
{ ton as to whether it should or should
/ not pass, THIS. coupled with the fact
that the oystermen of Tidewater are
] Willing to have the ifue TN Jarues
river Strengthened. portends that
fruttion of the many years of fight
and labor on the part OF the COM
missicners OF fisheries in the past ten
or twelve years is tot only possible,
but is TO be expected just as Ger
tain as death and taxes the Baylor
survey line Is going 10 have the kinks
taken nut-of- 1t -ass this Legislature or
the next General Assembly.
Fought on Different Lines
{ The tight In the past for straighten-
tng the Tine MAS based principally on
I alleged high handed violation of the
Law. and some little heat and ami
/ mostly was shown. This year the fight
i was more calm. deliberate and deadly
Commissioner Lee based his con-
tention for performing an operation
on the line for the removal OF the
twisting and wriggling deformittes,
almost entirely on financial grounds:
1 the ground that by reason of the
lines resemblance 10 a dew York
politician I'm the matter OF crooked
ness. the State was losing thousands
: Of dollars that might help defeat gem
oral deficit With retrenchment.
economy. even parsimony, as the
keynote Of the 1919 Legislature. the
General Assembly lent a most will
: ing kindly and attentive ear to the
straight talk"
The result was that q committee,
which was expected 10 adversely re-
port the bills trespassing on the sa-
cred precincts Of Captain Baslor's'
honorable blocking out Of legal
bounds reported 1t without recon-
mendation, and the Senate commit
tee can be banked on to recommend
that Captain Bayiorss survey was
good in Its day, but its sun has
set.
Weight of Moore's View
The statements OF Or. III. G. Moore.
assistant commissioner of United
States fisheries. that the line should
t be strafghtened IN the financial in
teres,s Of the State, are believed to-
have had great weight with the COM
msttees not only because they sug-
gested a new source of revenue. but
/ because they were from a-nan not
interested one way or the other, and
we're the products of months of sin
cere scientific investigation
Lee Before Committee.
E.ridav morning the Senate Fish
and Game Committee met. Commits
s,onar lee was there with his much
worn map and architects It" Once
aoain he explained how he would
chanre the line for the betterment
az the States finances II the Legis-
fature would only give him the au-
thortty. DR. Gravatt. an ex-navai or
ficer. who knows the sea ana the
way to patrol 1t. made certain suG-
gestions about STRENGTHENING the line.
witch MFR. Lee. although not only
a,,thnsiast,c about them. agreed to
accent Senator's Hall and Saunders
both of whom have large numbers
~ oysfermen IN their constituencies,
ana Who have opposed any change in
the line up to this time, agreed to
the Grayatt amendments TO the
line and added III it had been made
main TO the soystermen when they
we're here that the line was to be
straixhtened that way they would not
have objected"
,nents,' will not. exclude a vast deal OF
oyster beds. 1t will straighten the
line II IL Appropriated that about
& 500 acres will DO excluded.
Committee VIII Hardly.
II Ia not within the range of prob
ahility that the members Of the Fish
ana Game Committees Of the 1910
virginia LEGISLATURE will go a-visiting
To Annapolis TO confer with Mary
lands lawmakers anent UNIFORM
laws relative TO fish and oyster dredg-
ing and longing In the chesapeake.
although the MARYLAND Generai As
sembiy has extended = cordial tnvi-
stinn 10 wine, dine and entertain the
u Old Dominionites II they come.
No laws applying 70 the Chesa-
neake can become operative unless
passed by both Legislatures. The vir-
rinta soions and the Maryland law
makers have met In Richmond and
q Annapolis several times. with the re-
:, suit that Virginia has passed about all
. the laws necessary. and II ID now up
Ito Maryland
Il Although the recent invitation Of
the Maryianders has not been de-
fsNnsd. " NJ Hetieved Nv the nien1berl
8 AZ The Fish and Csasne COMMITTEES that
the same ends that might he accom-
plished by a. man "a man conferences
, can ~ Aohlsvsd by recourse TO ths
malta