The Ely miner. [volume] (Ely, Minn.) 1895-1986, 1929-04-12


was otherwise dressed up in modern
clothes.
Inasmuch as the law deals with the
licensing of teachers it was decided to
call the license q license instead Of a
certificate. Seems logical, doesn't itP
But a certificate to teach called Ii
cense to teach did not smell like the
same rose to $4,000 Minnesota school
teachers, and as one schoolma' am they
rose In protest Licenses are all right
for dogs and husbands but not for
schoolma ANS. They were so emphatic
about it that Commissioner McCon-
nell ran right out of his Office in the
historical building and up the steps
of the capitol to the committee on ed
ucation and had them rub out
license" everywhere it appeared in
the bill and write in certificate" in
stead So now at last the bill for the
certification of teachers is happily on
its way to become a law.
Grilling the Loan Shark.
Men and issues may come and so
but the iron range towns and the loan
shark the legislature always has with
it. Sticking pins and needles and
javelins into the iron range towns is
the biennial sport of the legislature
and grilling the loan shark is regu-
larly recurring thing in the winter of
every odd numbered year. The leg
islative winter is always a winter of
discomfort for the loan shark. Then
for four months he is held up to pub
lie scorn in the public prints and be-
fore the committees of public welfare
in the legislature the meanest things
are said about him. Faced with one
blast of such whitening fire any de-
cent man would perish, but the loan
shark has survived it for many ses-
sions and is a more lusty fellow than
ever
Everybody condemns the loan shark.
But the labor element, while it can't
say mean things about him, never
theless fights for him, fights for him
tooth and toe nail, fights for him so
bitterly and SO effectively that the
loan shark lives to ply his cruel call
ing, to wiring from his helpless vic
TINS his 100, his 800, his 500 per cent
and more, and year by year to wax
fatter and fatter. Labor representa-
tiveS, of course, contend that it is the
poor man they are seeking to protect
from a legalized interest rate of AZ
per cent, but the only result of that
protection thus far has been to de-
liver the poor man into the clutches
of the loan shark who extracts 100 to
500 per cent from him.
Fight Bitter One.
The biennial attempt to curb the
loan shark by law results in one of the
bitterest fights of the legislature.
Committee hearings are most turbu-
lent. Interested parties pack the
hearing and all but come to blows.
The fight this year has dragged its
course, as usual, over three months.
Finally it came up in the house last
week on motion by Mrs. Macbeth
Hurd Paige, chairman of the commit
tee on public welfare and social leg
iSlation, for special order, that is,
the setting of day and hour certain
when the loan shark bill might be
considered by the house. Frank
Starkey, the urbane and clever leader
of the labor forces, fought the mo-
ton bitterly and finally became SO
worked up that he charged Mrs. Paige
with unfairness in the committee and
with using her sex to excite sympathy
for her motion. His tactics did not
appeal to the house, however, for it
voted 96 to "a to set the special order.
About the time this is printed the
house will be debating for the many
eth time the vices of the loan shark
and the AZ per cent per year bit with
which it is proposed to curb him. Le-
galizing IL per cent per month or
AZ per cent per year was the boyle
man with which many country men,
f-;o ;,.@o
against the bill two years ago, and
doubtless this reliable boyle man will
be rugged out with a grotesquely
grimacing countenance and made to
do duty again this year.
A Valuable Member.
Mrs. Macbeth Hurd Paige has rep
resented Hennepin county and Min
neapolis in the legislature since 1923.
She is known thruout the state as
leader in social and philanthropic
work. She has been untiring in her
efforts for laws to ameliorate social
abuses in Minnesota. The loan shark
evil has engaged her attention for
several years. Thru her efforts an
interim committee was named in 1927
to study this subject and the present
bill to curb the loan shark is based on
the report of that interim committee
of which Mrs. Paige was a member.
She secured, in her first year in the
legislature, law providing for the
establishment of psychopathic hos
pital at the university and has been
untiring in her efforts to secure an
adequate appropriation for that much
needed building. She has been active
in revising the marriage laws of the
state, in promoting legislation Of in
terest to working women and her sup
port of educational measures has been
most effective. Mrs. Paige was one of
the first women ever elected to a Min
nesota legislature and is today one of
the most valued members of the Leg
islature Of 1929. She, has travelled
widely, is woman Of culture, a law
yer, an astute politician and a grac-
ious lady. In the house of repreSen-
tatives of the Minnesota legislature
Mrs. Paige stands high in everybody's
books.
Kept the Senate Dangling.
Another woman member of the leg
| islature, Senator Laura Naplin of Pen
nigton, was the center of considerable
interest the other day. Unwittingly
Mrs. Naplin, the only woman who has
ever sat as a member of the Mime
sofa senate, kept that same senate
dangling for full hour or more.
Here is the how of it. Senator ]. D.
| Sullivan's famous bill (some say Gin
| famous'D, S. F. 70, the duck pass"
bill to forbid private shooting grounds,
was up to vote. The senate was "un-
| der call" which means that every
senator was supposed to be in the
senate chamber or if nor. was sub