The Hartford republican. (Hartford, Ky.) 18??-1926, 1911-09-22

contract labor. Kentucky now hss
| In her penitcntiaries and reform
schools. viii roughly say. some
| thing like three thousand men
who have been incarcerated there for
| breach OF the laws. or In the reform
schools in some instances because they
| are. incorrigible youths. Society has TO
restrain these men for its own protection.
| II Is well that they should be employed
| II would be cruel punishment to keen
them confined without employment The
present system provides to hire them out,
sell their labor to the highest bidder, sub
ject to the approval OF the prison COM
mssIoners. They will bring. say fifty or
seventy-hve cents a day. The money de-
rived from the sale Is applied to paying
their expenses, that is, the cost OF keep
ing them in the penitentiary. OF guards
and clothing and food and doctors and a
little bit TO- preacher. You know we
pay the preacher less than anybody else
He gets his reward In Heaven. Laugh
teri
The laboring people on the outside Of
these penitentiaries object to this system,
and justly So They object uron the
ground that these men employing convict
labor In the manufacture Of shoes or fur
niture or whatever II Is. put their product
In competition with free labor on the out
side. The free labor on the outside as II
is called. has to house itself in pretty
good house. has to feed itself under the
high cost OF living. has to clothe itself.
and has a wife and lot OF children, IL II
is doing its full duty In the world. to
clothe and to educate. These children
must be put in schools and must be given
fair chance. and all that takes money.
You can't do that on seventy five or
eighty cents a day. not in this day. Now
they have to go into competition with
this prison convict labor, and the state
is actually using its convicts to depress
the wages OF its laborers on the outside
of the walls. The result of II Is to pre-
duce dissatisfaction and hard times, and :.
the state gets no benefit from II. Who
does? Why. some three or four con-
/ want to cite to you this instance. I
had q clerk of one of those contractors
say to me last fall, speaking in very UNI
n e shs pr S
that fellow did only to-day? Why, he is
just running our business. He pardoned
p best u worf R es"' we had They We're s q
couple of young fellows who were put in
there when about eighteen years old. for
feows snS The ss RaS besD s
there seven or eight years, and they had
become skilled worlSmen. as cutters in
worth seven or eight dollars a day apiece
to us. but do you know that SON. -a-gun
pardoned both of those fellows to-day?'
Qaughter.) The idea is they were get
ting them at eighty cents apiece, where
they could not strike and could hardly
get ,,, sick lick and o where L they did not do
strapping fellow with a cat-o-nine- tails
to cut their blood. That is the system in
Mss worth seven or eight dollars ave day n
the market, and here IL. was sold for a
pittance to the contractors. sold in sla-
very, as II were. You have right to pun
ish a man for crime. but. you have no
right to rob him. You have the right to
take mans life for certain capital Of
lrrA l.. l.. 80 s.I
of that capital offense you have no right
to break his life
Would Abolish System.
propose to abolish that contract sys-
tenn. | propose, so far as the free labor
on the outside is concerned. to remove
to permit these fellows to remain idle?
No, that is not good for them nor the 4
at the best work they can do and | pro-
pose to pay them for 1t. In other words,
to let that work of theirs be sold for what
petition with the work outside. at the
same price that the laborers outside sell
theirs. for Then they will have no just \
crime. he ought to be punished. but his
wife and his children have committed no
crime. and why should the state punish
them? II he commits crime he is in
generated in the penitentiary perhaps for
a term of years. maybe for his life. That
uDtS not dDSOlve MIN from MS ODlSaLlOn
to support that wife and those children
II is still his duty morally and legally
Instead OF selling his labor to contractors
for pittance. my idea is to cash his la
Dor at its fair value. pay the expenses Of
keeping him in that Institution, and re-
nit the balance to that wife and to those
There is one other feature that | want
to call your attention to as affecting the
i lag people Of Kentucky and par
not an organized people. We live under
a government of law, not of men. not of
majorities. The law is the government
in this country. II the laws be wise and
just. so is your government: but If the
laws be unequal and unjust. so is your
fudge can give you other relief than the
laws OF the land afford. Who makes the
laws? We popularity. suppose it is the
made by the legislative department We
call II in Kentucky the general assembly.
The people elect the general assembly and
you send them to Frankfort to make your
laws, and they never adjourn but what
the people of Kentucky heave a sigh and
say, Well. thank God. that bunch has
Is the matter? You were hopeful when
you sent them there. You are Invariably
Why do not mean to ni imply Som that s eses
gentleman who has been to- the legisla-
ture or Is now going or hopes to go,
biiity, What do mean to say and
charge Is that majority of them have
tailed, diSmally failed, ANONYMOUSLY
failed, aye. fatally failed. to the destruc-
struction OF popular government in Ken
lucky.
When they left here they left with your
seal of approval and endorsement and |
refer to all of thu. districts of Kenturky
and not Ohio county. What caused them
to miscarry In executing the commission
that they bore? They met folks up there
who were not "fittin" company for I'M
sophisticated country people to associate
with. They were always well-dressed
gentlemen, always polite. always courte-
Gus, always kindly, and always corrupt
Laughter and applause.) They are
known as professional lobbyists. We call
them the Third House." You know
there are two houses to the legislature,
the senate and the lower house. This is
the Third House" IL you would speak
of them right In many instances. you
would say THE House"
They always work slyly. clandestinely,
secretly. They never made a speech, but
they are powerful in whispering. laugh
teri They may not get up early In the
morning, but they sit up late at night
That is the baneful poisoning i'm
luence that has for twenty pears
dominated the legislature OF Kentucky.
has suspended section after section OF the
constitution for twenty years, many Of
them to-day unexecuted and no attempt
made to execute demonstrating there
empty and meaningless to the Deopla ~