Askov American. [volume] (Askov, Pine County, Minn.) 1914-current, 1937-04-22
Legislative News
BY c. G.. MANN,
Representative from Pine County

Representative from Pine County
On Monday evening of last week,
l secured the passage in the House
of bill appropriating money to
pay the indebtedness of the school
district at ClOverton. However, l
understand now that the state holds
some of these bonds and unless Sem
ator Johnson succeeds in amending
the bill in the Senate to allow the
state to also settle on a compromise
basis, the bill will do no good.
The Senate has been amending
some of the bills passed by the House,
and in most cases the Senate amend
ments are agreed to by the House,
but several conference committees
have been appointed. On Friday
| evening the Senate passed its So
called Omnibus Tax bill, known as
House File No. 845. The original
House File No. 845 was bill plac-
| ing a tax on the gross earnings of
| natural gas pipe lines, but now the
bill contains nearly every kind of a
tax there is except the tax on nat
ural gas. 1t seems that the Senate
was just waiting for a bill to come
over there that they could use with
out amending the title, and they
surely made use of that one The
majority group in the House is up
in arms about it, and l doubt very
much whether the bill will get much
consideration here, which makes a
| special session certainty.
| There will be two special sessions
this coming summer and winter,
believe, the first to try and work
out a tax program; the second to
appropriate money for relief through
| 1888. A bill appropriating nearly
Sill 100000 for only one year passed
the House this week. The original
bill was for $17,OOO,OOO to cover a
period of two years. An amendment
| to make it cover only one year was
| adopted, which cut the amount some
| $6,50O,000. later offered an amend
ment to make it cover two years,
with a reduction in the total of ST.
100000. The speaker ruled my mo-
ton out of order on the grounds that
it was similar to the motion defeated
previously; l appealed from the de-
cision of the chair but Mr.. Eastwood,
chairman of rules, came to his rescue
so l withdrew the motion. If Mr.
Eastwood had not taken part, 1 think
the House would have upheld me,
and we would have adopted the
amendment, spreading it over two
years and possibly eliminating one
of the special sessions now necessary.
Most Of us feel that our people care
little for rules of order, but send us
down here to work out a good leg
islative program.
/ voted against the relief bill on
its final passage more as a protest
against the amount involved than
against relief. l think we have to
have relief to some extent, but l do
not think it should be any such RI
diculous figure as $17,000,0OO, four
times the valuation of Pine county;
a levy of nearly II mills tax on ev-
cry foot of property in the state.
The chairman of emergency relief
said that they arrived at the sum
of $17,000,000 by taking the requests
from every county in the state, but
it developed that these requests were
made for six months period, jan
uray to July of this year, which had
just been multiplied four times; that
some counties requests were not
known to the county boards of those
counties; and in my own case he
had no request at all.
l expect to vote for some relief
because l do not believe we can cut
it off entirely at this time, but 1 do
hope that the amount can be lessened
considerably. l have been trying to
help pass many tax bills at this SEES
sion in an effort to balance the bud
get, as l think l have written before,
and l feel that the old adage about
" dollar saved is dollar earned"
| should be hung on the wall of leg
islative bodies
The speaker of the House, Mr. Bar
ker, read a speech Tuesday, con-
demning the policy of the Senate in
making up an omnibus tax bill, say
ing that if the session ended with
out material accomplishment, it could
be laid at the door of the Senate.
Senator Orr retaliated by calling Mr..
Barker "Minnesota's Problem Child
No. g." which did not add to the dig
nifty of the Senate chamber.
The only other bill of considerable
importance to our section passed this
week was the setting up of a spe-
cial fund to aid distressed counties
on their portion of the old age as
sistance. l have sent copy of this
| to Commissioner Patrick for county
| board action.
With only three days left of this
regular session, we will probably
work all three nights and 60 over
into Thursday morning. We look
for a special session to start the first
part of May.