Tabor City tribune. (Tabor City, N.C.) 1946-1991, 1957-02-13
Arthur
Says
By-Billy Arthur

eral Assembly mas convened TO
take up the important matters
of tax revision, separation of
the highway from the prison
department. and correcting
and clarifying some laws pass
ed in the 1855 session.
That's nice way of putting
it, Ante-bellum editors were
not as generous. For instance,
in 1852 the Asheville Gazette
reported that the Leather
headed apostles of government
have met in Raleigh"
In 1881 the Raleigh Gazette
recorded the converting of the
Assembly during court week
thuSly:
LAS the warm weather comes
on, and the bilious and bully
ing season approaches. the de-
mand increases for Lees Pills
and pocket pistols: and goggles
and gunpowdcr, black patches
and dirk knives grow in de-
mand.
THE superior courts in the
different circuits: are also in
session, and a good deal of
having and liquoring is going
on, as we'll as fighting and
physicking. Attorneys and
physicians, il is presumed,
have their hands full. We like
to see all trades prosper
One delves into the bowels of
statute, and the other into
the state Of the bowels. This
blceds u patient in the arm for
the state Of his health, and the
other bleedS him IN the pocket
for the health of his state.
Gamblers and gambling are
seen in the back rooms, and
gingerbread jacks and judges
in the public squares. Duns
and dirk knives grow scarce.
Enemas and endorsements are
sought for by some, cocktails
and characters sued for by
others. Half pints and hickor-
les are flouriShed in these
times, and teething and goug-
ing toleratcd-all for the hon.
or of liberty and the encour-
agment Of business ="
The Moravian Falls Fool
Killer, edited then by North
Cardinals present poet laurie
ate-James Ldrkin Pearson,
took legislative lawyers to
task in 1911.
1T used 10 be the business"
wrote Pearson, of a lawyer
to walk behind Madame Just-
ice and hold her dress tail out
of the mud, but now about 30
of the jack legs will jump a.
straddle of the old lady all a;
one time and ride her hell bent
for \ dollar
Even from their nurseries
come the walls Of their infants.
Now, therefore, !, the baby.
being the party of the first
part, being duly washed and
dried by the hired girl, party
of the second part, in the
presence of these witnesses. do
affirm and testify that the
party of the first part wants
its nursing bottle
THE lawyers have a should
er load of secondhand law
books half hidden in spider
webs. There sit the Patrick
Henrys and Henry Clays day
after day waiting for someone
to fight or two farmers TO fall
out over a fence line.
eve elect lawyers to our leg
iSlative bodies TO frame new
laws. They tangle things up in
such mess of legal forms that
II takes twice as many lawy-
erS to straighten il out. They
believe a deed or any legal
paper won't hold shucks I'M
less you tie its legs into forty
eleven double bow knots
There is no reason on earth
why a law should not be as
plain and as easily understood
as the directions for taking .
dose Of medicine"
Back in the late Twentics.
Nj. W. Nash represented Rich
mond County in the Legisla-
turc. To inform clients of his
departure for Raleigh, he past
ed this notice on his Hamlet
office door:
81 have closed my office for
60 days.
Have gone TO Raleigh to
serve my State"
Another lawyer, Wade Sand
ers, saw the notice and wrote
beneath it in big letters:
God Save the State"
Whether another legislator
was joking or not has never
been determined, but in his
first speech in the Assembly he
said.
81 am come here with the.
unanimous approval OF every
body in my home county. Half
OF them were happy to see me-
$50