Judsonia weekly advance., 1915-07-21

money for it, he was at the same time doing outside practice to the neglect of the interest of the state.
 We further find that the attorney general in making his biennial report, as required by law, failed to comply with the latter clause of section No. 4 of act No. 131 of the Acts of 1911, requiring him to include therein the amount of inheritance taxes collected from what estate and in what county the settlement was made. Had he complied with this law, many of the objections herein could easily have been corrected, and all inheritance taxes could have been accounted for. D
 The report then sums up the charges.
 The report was signed, Auditing Committee of State Departments and Institutions, G. w. Garrett, Monroe Smith, U. A. Gentry"
 Moose Issues Challenge.
 That he deposited franchise and in- heritance taxes in local bank in or der to be able to cash the salary war rants of the governor, the judges of the Supreme Court and their em- ployes, and that these officials advised him there was nothing wrong about such practice, was the statement made by Attorney General w. L. Moose in reply to the report of the legislative Investigating commit tee on his office.
 In conclusion of his statement, MT. Moose issues a challenge to the com mittee to bring it's proof of corrup- tion in his office before the Pulaski County Grand Jury.
 If the insinuations of this so-called committees report are true, the pres ent attorney general ought to be in dicted by the Pulaski County Grand Jury and be punished for the felonies the committee inSinuates he is guilty of" he said. 'I invite the gentlemen composing this committee to take their accounts and such other proof as they may have available and go be- fore the Pulaski County Grand Jury, and submit their proof to that body. It is body having adequate powers to investigate, and require the produc- tion of books, papers and other evi- dences. It has the power to indict, the Circuit Court has the power to convict and punish. If these insinua- O h a1f t,.f,1 eral ought to be indicted If they are false, and charge that they are, ma liciously, hypocritically and slander- ously flase, the committee itself ought to be indicted
 invites an investigation.
 MT. Moses statement follows:
 There are no direct charges of cor rupt misconduct in office on the part of the attorney general charged in the report of the so-called Investigating committee, as it appeared in the Ga zette, but there are several di- rect insinuations which amount to a charge of corruption. These in are hypocritical, false and aianderous. Some of them were known to members of the com mitee to be false, and some of them were not known to members of the committee to be true
 Aided Officers to Get Money.
 'The first charge made is that the attorney general deposited public funds in the Southern Trust Company, a banking institution of this city. That charge is true, and funds were kept in the trust company until March of the present year, since which time no funds have been deposited by the attorney general in any banking insti- tuition. The reason for depositing funds in the Southern Trust Company is as follows: When l came into office l found the state on a scrip basis. The governor and other state officials could not succeed, at the end of the month, in collecting their salary war rants unless someone provided the money in advance for that purpose The same condition existed under my predecessor, and when I came into of flee I followed the custom.
 t'In the collection of the inheritance and franchise taxes I deposited the collections in the trust company, and at the end of the month had accumu- lated sufficient money to pay the sala- ries of my own office force, those of the governor and his office force, the Supreme Court judges and their clerks, and the Supreme Court libra rian, and others. Although this had been the custom in the office before came into it, I discussed the matter with the governor and with certain members of the Supreme Court, and they all agreed that there was noth- ing wrong or improper in my so doing. During the session of the late legisla- ture, however, a bill was passed which made it unlawful for any person ow- ing money to the state to pay it to any officer except the state treas urer. Since that law was approved by the governor I have made no de- posits of state funds in any bank. al though I have good reason to believe that the law does not apply to the at