Camas Prairie chronicle. [volume] (Cottonwood, Idaho) 1901-1917, 1917-02-16

anyone that has not had oppor.
tunity to observe the workings OF
a legislative body will wonder
why one should be so busy be.
cause the House doesn't convene
until ten and nearly always ad.
journs before five in the evening.
But remember that most of the
legislative work is done in COM
mittee of which there are thirty
three in the House alone. The
committees are made up of mem
bers of the legislature and for
that reason must find time out
side of the time we are in regu-
lar session to get together to dc
their committee work. Of these
committees t h Appropriation,
Reference and Judiciary are the
most important and hardly a day
goes by but what each one has a
meeting and sometimes a dozen
bills are to be passed upon, which
entails a great deal of work.
Every member is on from three
to five committees. can make
myself understood by citing my
own experience. | was appoint
ed on the following committees:
Education, Private Corporations,
Railroads, Carriers and other
corporations, Roads, Bridges and
Ferries and Judiciary. There is
never a day that one or the other
committee does not meet and
sometimes two or three. The Ed
ucational and Judiciary commit
tees have caused me the most
work. l don't know why | was
ever put on the Judiciary COM
mittee, because I don't know any,
thing about law, which, of course
is equally true of some other
members on this committee, but
l suppose this committee has
to have certain amount of
ballast outside Of judicial talent
that generally makes up this COM
mittee. AS soon as a bill is re-
ferred to a committee it is up to
you to get busy and study it so
that you are in a position to act
intelligently thereon i n COM
mittee, for unless you do you will
be carried away or influenced by
the champions of the bill or
some LOBBYIST that is there to see
that the committee makes a fav-
orable report on same.
All this takes a great deal of
time. Anyone that has not been
in the legislature, except a law
yer, perhaps, has little idea of
the amount of work entailed in
drawing up a bilI' that is to be
enacted into law. If it is an en-
tire new act it is not so bad or so
hard as when old laws are amend
ed or repealed. 1t takes a good
lawyer to draw up bill that will
stand the test of constitutionaiity
and not to conflict with already
existing laws. I never before
realized so fully that to be a law
maker, one should know the
state constitution and also have
some knowledge of existing laws,
to that end we are furnished
with complete set of law books.
About half of the bills introduced
are simply amendments to, or re-
peals of already existing laws
and it is impossible to act intelli-
gently on them without knowing
what the old law is and what the
changes are, that are proposed in
the new. This takes a lot of
time and it is impossible to
thoroughly inform ones self on
every bill that comes up and that
is the reason of so many COM
mittees. If a bill comes up hav-
ing to do with the game laws it
is referred to the Educational
committee, etc., That committee
then takes up the consideration
of the bill and if they think it a
good bill, send it back to the House
with recommendations, that 1T
do pass" Of course a commit
tees report is not conclusive and
when thew reDOrt with reconn-