Evening capital news. (Boise, Idaho) 1901-1927, 1917-01-07

numerous public institutions, such as
the university. the normal schools. the
penitentiary. the industrial school, etc
These reports would average each
more than 60 pages of ordinary size,
some containing 100 pages, and were
full of important information upon the
appropriations necessary to mainta In
these various departments and insti-
tutions efficiently and yet economical
ly. To do this right would alone have /,
been good sized job for 80 days
VAST NUMBER OF BILLS.
But we were in daily session and the
introduction of bills was gradually
speeding up On the goth day we had
no on their way in the house alone
and held our pace to the close. passing
under the wire with total Of 465 bills
introduced. The senate did almost as
well in proportion to the number of |
members with a total of It's bills.
Then there were in the two houses |
40 joint resolutions. &c concurrent res
buttons and Is joint memorials, maxi
ing grand total of 731 measures to
be carefully considered and passed up
on.
They were all printed in pages con-
tanning about $50 words and while 7 |
number of pages. by averaging quite !
a number of bills of which l have
copies. l am sure the average for the
whole would be not less than seven
pages per bill or total of over 5000
pages.
Some of the most important bills
contained 80 to 20 pages, few 30
pages and one, the school code. 143I
pages. To have read and understood
any one of these would have taken
whole day at least
TOOK OFFICE SERIOUSLY.
took the importance of my office
rather seriously and for about the first
10 days l tried heroically to read the
reports and bills as fast as they came.
But when the volume was steadily aug
mented, had to give it up and by the
30th day ! realized that ! had as well
try to swim the Pacific ocean as to en-
deavor, within the time limit. to get
an intelligent grasp of all the matter
that was going through the legislative
printing press.
1t was about this time that one mem
Der suggested that we repeal half the
laws already on the statute books and
go home. And there Is no doubt that
many felt that the deluge should be
stopped in some way.
However each member seemed to
feel that 1t was his duty to have his
name on one bill at least, that he might
send copies to his constituents. and
once the ice was broken, it became
habit.
NINE FOR EACH MEMBER.
It will be seen from figures given
above that the measures introduced
I i A
| the two houses. Barely three mem
| bers in the house refrained from offer
| ing any, and not one member in the
| senate.
The greatest number introduced by
| any one member Of the house was sc
and by any senator. %.
| The greatest rush was in the last
| half of the session, but as will be seen,
the average was IL for each day for
the entire period
| In ne meantime several members
were engaged in a lengthy investiga-
| ton of the Carey act land operations of
| previous administrations, several 9TH
| ers were on committees visiting state
/ institutions and two had gone to Wash
! ington, D. c.. on state land grant af-
] fairs
! The reports of these committees were
/ made at the very close of the session.
/ with practically no time to consider
them. and We're, therefore, of little use
to the Legislature.
NIGHT SESSIONS HELD.
| After the 50th day 1t was apparent
| to all that 1t was impossible to dispose
of all bills in the regular order of BUSH
ness. before the expiration of the 60
days, and we began to hold night ses-
sions, there was strong pressure from
nearly all members to get their par
! ticular measures through, and the
/ greater number of bills acted upon
/ from this time TO the close. were dis
posed of under suspension of the rules.
/ Suspension of the rules means that
/ the provision requiring that bills be
read upon three several days is sus-
pended and the bill placed at once
upon final passage.
/ 1t is supposed to be read once in
| full anyway but even this Is evaded
in practice, by the clerk skipping page
after page in long bill. and hurrying
! through It unless some member OBJ
jects. In this way IT is possible to
rush through a great many bills in
a day. and either pass or defeat them.
| But even with this accelerated pro-
| gress. we were unable to get ready for
/ adjournment on time, and on the
| sixteth day a resolution was passed
! empowering the speaker to appoint a
sitting committee of three members.
/ This committee WAS to select from the
/ bills which had not been acted upon
| those which they thought should he
! passed and report to the house the
next day.
REPORT ON BILLS.
!! They performed this duty and re-
! ported 30 bills and resolutions for
passage. and these together with -
more from the regular calendar or
| total of Sc were passed during the
| two additional days we remained in
session. Practically all of these were
| passed under suspension of the rules
and some of them were the most i'm