The Ely miner. [volume] (Ely, Minn.) 1895-1986, 1927-02-25
THE MANUFACTURES OF BIND
ING TWINE BRINGS PROFIT
-2I,OOO,OOO POUNDS SOLD
LAST YEAR.
HILL AND WILSON WIN FIRST
ORATORICAL SPURS WITH
GOOD SPEECHES IN THE
HOUSE.
By R. w. HITCHCOCK,
REPRESENTATIVE, Goth District.

for Its strict out nuihah'oii"h
pline but it is unique among state
prisons for the fact that 1T IS the
only penitentiary in the world that Is
self-supporting. Since 1908 it mas
cost Minnesota nothing, either tor
capital cost or for upkeep. Today II
has a revolving fund, almost entirely
built up from the profits it has &C.
cumulated, of more than 100000
and its net profits for the past year,
over and above all cost of operation of
its various industrial plants and the
maintenance of the prison itself, ex-
coed $4,000. How has all this been
done? For the most part, next to
good management, binding Irvine has
done it-binding Irvine of which 21,-
100000 pounds was sold to farmers
hast year at one and one-half cents
below the market price.
A Popular Place?
If we are to judge by the rush to
get inside the prison gates, the Min
nesota state prison is a popular place.
Commitments have increased rapidly;
today the prison has a population Of
over 1900 with accommodations for
about HOO. The board of control in
sists that a new cell block must be
built to cost $250,000 and the board
also wants to build a hospital for the
criminal insane at the prison to cost
1925, 000-almost three quarters of q
million for new buildings at the pen
itentiary with out a penny's cost to
the taxpayers of the state, for it will
all be paid for from the state prison
revolving fund. The building pro-
posals are now before the legislature
and there is some controversy over
them but it is likely that they will be
authorized.
Battle Over Parole Board.
The state board of parole has been
the target of a good deal of criticism
both in the legislature and out of it.
A vigorous fight against the parole
board was staged in the 1928 legis-
lature and again in 1925. Now the
governors crime commission wants
to do away with it entirely but the
present legislature does not seem dis
posed to agree. Attacks upon the
parole system outside the legislature
have resulted in the granting of COM
partively few paroles during the past
year and it is claimed by those in
authority that this is partly respons-
ible for the present crowded condition
of the penitentiary. Most of the popu-
lation of the penitentiary consists of
gun-men, murderers and ,habitual and
confirmed criminals of one kind and
another, but a very minor fraction is
made up of men who are not GRIM
inals by nature. They have gone
wrong and must be punished but after
they have served one, two, three years
or longer they constitute the possible
parole class. The individual would
be helped and society benefited, in
many of these cases by parole. One
authority, in a position of advantage
to know, declares that if all of this
class could be paroled today, the state
prison would not need a new cell
block. The parole system seems des-
tined to endure somewhat longer in
Minnesota for the senate committee
on crime prevention has rejected all
attacks against the parole board.
The Senate Grows Modern.
One by one the entrenched and en-
battled senate is yielding up its ira
dltlons. The first woman senator,
Mrs. Naplin, now sits in the Mime
sofa state senate, but that's not all.
Not to be outdone by the house, the
senate has a girl page, Miss Alice
Huntley, and just to go the house one
better, it also has a cull'ud boy as a
page, Mr.. Louis Vale. But it is
still bad form to refer in debate to
a member of the senate as "the gen.
tleman from so-and-so;" he is "the
senator from so-and-so" if you please.
In the house under the unwritten
rules we may, under great stress,
look with suspicion upon the motives
of fellow member, but for one
senator to impunge the motives of an
other is but little less than high crime
and treason.
Power Behind the Throne.
1t is not only in the membership of
the legislature that woman is making
Roadway, She just simply runs
things generally. Time was when no
one but man was fit to be chief clerk
of such august and powerful COM
mittees as finance and appropriation,
but now woman commands them both.
For the past three sessions Miss
Florence Weber has been chief clerk
Of the finance committee Of the SEN
ate and for two sessions Miss Luverne
Freidel has held that important posi-
ton with the appropriations commit
tee of the house. So expert and eff
ficient have these young ladies be-
come that they win the best paid po-
sitions in the legislature without an
effort; they never run after the job;
1t is their services that we solicit. We
suspect that Miss Rever knows more
about the business of the finance
committee than does its chairman,
Senator Rockne, for all his reputa-
ton as a watchdog of the treasury,
and we know that what we know
about the appropriations committee is
what Miss Freidel tells us. The posi-
tion of chief clerk of these commit
tees is a most responsible and ardu-
Gus one and demands, day after day,
the highest type of intelligence and
ability.
Oratory and OratiOns.
Oratory and orations still flourish
in the senate. Not so in the house.
There we just talk. This sessions
most notable burst of oratory was
suddenly and quite Unexpectedly
staged in the senate the other day in
a debate on the 54-hour week for
women. Most of such senate stall
warts as Carley, Sullivan, G. H., and
Sullivan, ]. D., and Putnam took Wig
orous and eloquent part in the pro-
ceedings. The rugged senator from
Goodhue, A. j. Rockne, stirred the
senate with a surprise speech, a per-
feet sob speech, when he knowingly
told of the "little old mother" who
rises at four in the morning and tolls
the long dav through "doWn ON the