The Manning times. [volume] (Manning, Clarendon County, S.C.) 1884-current, 1916-11-11
IS trainers was that the General As

its trainers was that the General As
sembly should meet once every year.
The whole scheme of taxation, for
raising money to defray the expense
of the State government, and for
raising money to defray the expenses
of county governments, was based
upon the idea of anual sessions of
the General Assembly,, and that the
Legislature alone, has the power to
levy these taxes. The whole scheme
tee the terms of Office Of the Judges
of the State, college trustees, and
many. other matters, are based upon
the idea of annual sessions of the
Legislature. If you simply cut the
Gordian knot by changing the word
annual" to biennial" and leave the
matter there, then what's going to
be the effect Of it, and how much
turmoil and litigation will we have
as the General Assembly could. esti-
mate the ordinary expenses Of the
State government for two years, and
that the county governments would
get along better by having local
boards to levy the taxes within the
respective counties to defray ordi-
nary county expenses, instead OF
county taxes being levied by the
county delegations, which is now in
effect the case, but how are you go
ing to do all this under the pres
ent Constitution?
Now you will prehaps say Mr.. Ed
itor, that I have raised a lot of ques-
tions, and offered no remedy. Very
well. Everybody knows that when
the constitutional convention was
held in 1895, it was shortly after the
great reform revolution Of 1890 and
1891, and while there were a great
many good and conservative men in
that convention, men from both po-
litical factions, yet there was a
great deal Of stir and confusion, and
some bitterness in that convention.
The State had not settled from the
revolution through which it had just
passed, and the time was not pro-
pitious for framing a fundamental
set of governmental principles and
leaving the matter at that. Instead
of doing that the convention under
took to descend into matters Of de-
tail legislation, which should be left
for the Legislature to do, and we
all know the result. Can anybody
tell me how many times the present
Constitution has been amended since
1895? Why that one matter of 'Spe-
cial Laws Prohibited" in section "a
of Article III, in regard to a dozen
or more subjects has been the cause
of many amendments already, and
a nightmare to all the lawyers in the
State and all the cities and NUM-
cipalities. The Constitution has al
ready been emasculated by so many
amendments that one can hardly tell
what is constitutional and what is
not, and 1 suspect that on next Tues
day we will be voting on more
amendments to the Constitution to
allow some village to issue bonds to
pave a street.
The Constitution of 1895 accom-
plished the main purpose which I'M
PEELED the calling of the convention,
that being the elimination of the ne
gro vote. Give praise to the genius
of B. R. Tillman and D. S. Hender-
son, but beyond that the document
was no great improvement, over she
old document of 1868.
Biennial sessions of the Legisla-
ture were not popular in 1895. I
am told that in New York State the
constitutional convention convenes
automatically every twenty years to
make such changes as are necessary.
Our Constitution has been in force
now about twenty-one years, and in
that time has been much amended
and emasculated. The cost of a con-
stitutional convention will be. very
little if any more than the cost of
a session of the Legislature, and the
convention could eliminate one ses,-
sion, like it did the session of 1896.
1t looks to me, Mr.. Editor, that
since biennial sessions are practically
sure to come in few years, (be-
cause + think the masses are thor
oughly in favor of the .idea), that it
would certainly be better, and save
much confusion and litigation in the
coming years, for the people Of the
State to assemble in convention and
j IL