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NOTE: You may notice textual errors throughout this document, many of which have been left intact from the original text. Should you want to investigate the integrity of the original report, please refer to the original two printed volumes containing the official report of the proceedings and debates.

Roll call showed a quorum present.

Prayer was offered by Delegate Halliday, of Utah County.

Mr. CANNON. Mr. President, I move that we suspend the rules and go into committee of the whole.

Mr. SQUIRES. The chairman of the judiciary committee is not here.

Mr. HART. Mr. President, the chairman of this committee, no doubt, will be here soon. I think we can take up the article on third reading on education and school lands and dispose of it now. I do not know anything connected with it particularly that requires the chairman to be present.

The motion was rejected.

The Convention then proceeded to the third reading of the article entitled education.

Sections 1 and 2 were read.

Mr. PETERS. Mr. President, I desire to renew my motion to strike out section 2. I made the motion on Friday.

Mr. VARIAN. Mr. Chairman, we do not want this action to be taken at this stage. Section 2 has received a prolonged consideration by this Convention in committee of the whole. A compromise was reached, as I thought, that would be fairly observed. Certainly that was what might fairly be considered from what was said by those who were opposed to some features of section 2. Now, by striking out this section you leave the question open so far as Salt Lake City and Ogden City are concerned, in relation particularly to the high schools. The amendment that was incubated, slept upon, the nature of the proviso that was adopted to this section, received the unanimous support of the Convention in committee of the whole on yesterday. I trust that we will not have to go over that ground again, and that we may rely upon the good faith of those gentlemen who acquiesced in the suggestions incorporated in that proviso.

Mr. PETERS. Mr. President, I do not desire to take up much time, but I have the same objections to this section to-day that I had on Friday, and I would like to state a few of them. I stated then that I was opposed to a binding down of the proposition. Section 1 of this article provides that the Legislature shall provide for the establishment and maintenance of a uniform system of public schools. Then it goes on to say what the public school system shall be. Now, I do not see any good in trying to form an unchangeable and detailed plan of, a school system.

Mr. PETERS. I am aware of that amendment too. But I know further that the friends of the city schools, according to my idea, are jeopardizing those schools. The Enabling Act, section 6 says, that sections 2, 16, 32, and 36 are granted to the State, the proceeds of the sale of which shall go to the support and maintenance of the common schools. Now, if I understood the remarks of the gentleman from Salt {1332} Lake, the proposition is that Salt Lake City and Ogden shall have the right to maintain a high school. A high school is made a part of the public school system. Being made a part of the public school system, they expect to get a portion of the fund which is obtained from the sale of these lands for the support of their school in proportion to the number of students that they have in attendance who are within the school age. Those children attending the high school will be drawing from the public school fund which is known as the common school fund.

Mr. VARIAN. Wouldn't they be drawing money anyhow between eighteen years and six?

Mr. PETERS. They would be drawing it.

Mr. VARIAN. Of course.

Mr. PETERS. The name of the school is changed. It becomes a high school and a, part of the system, and as the section now reads it says that all common schools shall be free, so it strikes me that we are too good, as the saying is, to the school system, and by that means we have a tendency, according to my idea, of providing future legislation which will be in accordance with the growth and development of the educational system. The tendency is to make schools more practical and we do not know what the future may bring about as to the kind of schools.

Mr. EVANS (Weber). Mr. President, it seems to me that section 1 is sufficient to provide for anything which will be found necessary in the future respecting our school system. I am like Mr. Peters. I see no necessity for section 2. It provides a fixed, rigid school system, which, if in the future the Legislature shall deem it wise to change, it would be unable to do so. If we were simply to say that the Legislature shall provide for the establishment and maintenance of a uniform system of public schools, which shall be open to all the children of the State and free from sectarian control, that would be ample for all purposes. As I understand it, that would leave our school system as we have it now.

Mr. BUTTON. Would that first section make public schools free?

Mr. EVANS (Weber). That can be very easily remedied.

Mr. BUTTON. It don't do it as it is.

Mr. EVANS (Weber). All that we would have to say is that the common schools shall be free and

that would not be a limitation upon the Legislature to make other schools free if it desired to do so. Now, I have examined a good many constitutions and I find that this is somewhat out of the ordinary_to fix the particular class of schools or system of schools which the Legislature in all future time must provide for. For instance, you take the great state of New York, with all its complicated and elaborate system of public schools, and it has about three lines, simply saying in effect that it shall be the duty of the state to provide a free common school education free from sectarian control. That does not argue that we are not in favor of the higher schools. We are, in Salt Lake and Ogden, at least, and I desire to maintain them there; but what I object to is a fixed, rigid, unchangeable system of schools in the Constitution. I would rather leave it more flexible, so that it would meet our conditions of the future. If we are prosperous and have plenty of money we can establish a higher grade of schools at the public expense. If we should happen to be poorer and unable to raise sufficient means we should simply limit the public moneys to the education of the children in common schools. I believe that it is the part of wisdom to strike that section out, and I believe it would do no harm to any section of the Territory.

Mr. FARR. Mr. President, I understand from our present system, according to what we have got, we have {1333} fixed the school age in which our children shall have public support to the age of eighteen. We no doubt will have some members of the school and some of our children will graduate at eighteen, while others will want to go on until twenty-one and twenty-two, and so on upwards, as long as they are a mind to go and support themselves, but they get no public support according to the provisions of the law, after they are eighteen, and some of our children are better prepared to graduate at sixteen than others are at eighteen. Now, why should we cut off those that are capable and have got natural abilities and have applied their minds to study and got so far along_to tut them off at sixteen, if they are prepared to go into a high school at sixteen? I say let them have the money that is appropriated for all schools alike, whether they are very smart or not so very smart. Let them have the money until they are eighteen, even if they want to go into a high school, and we cannot provide for them after they are eighteen. Then the benefit of the money of all these different sections will go to them until they are eighteen, and they should be kept on, in my opinion, improving, and be supported out of this money until they are eighteen, the same as if they were not quite so smart, consequently, I think, the section is all right as it is.

Mr. EICHNOR. Mr. President, the way the section originally appeared, no doubt it would be better to have it stricken out, but after the amendment that was proposed by Judge Goodwin and adopted in committee of the whole, I think the section is very good. In other words, the section as now amended is flexible. Any contingencies that may arise in the future in the way of some new school can be provided for. Now, gentlemen, what is the object of striking it out? If Salt Lake City has twenty thousand children of school age, we will just get a certain proportion of the school fund of the State. It does not interfere with any one, either, in the high school or the common school or the kindergarten. Not a county outside of Salt Lake pays one cent more if this provision is placed in the Constitution. It simply guarantees that we may proceed and conduct our high schools in Salt Lake City and Ogden, and such other districts as the Legislature shall provide. A number of objections were raised to the amendment of Mr. Varian at first. Mr. Chidester, of Garfield, and various others objected to the amendment as it was first proposed. It was then. agreed by common consent to let the matter rest until the following day and the defects were cured.

Mr. ELDREDGE. Mr. President, before that motion is put to strike out, I would like to offer an amendment to the section. I would move to strike out the word “kindergarten,” which appears in the second line, and add at the end of “university,” in the fourth line, “and such kindergarten schools as the Legislature may provide for by law.” My idea in moving to strike out the word as it there stands is that I do not think it should be made a part of the system. That would leave it optional with the Legislature to provide for kindergarten schools.

Mr. VARIAN. There is an amendment which would cover that.

Mr. ELDREDGE. Well, if the amendment covers the grounds so that the Legislature could provide for the school {1334} that would reach the end which I was endeavoring to get at.

The amendment proposed by Mr. Eldredge was rejected.

The PRESIDENT. The question is now on the motion to strike out the entire section.

Mr. PETERS. Mr. President, I just desire to ask the gentleman a question. It may be that if I can understand this section right, I will withdraw my motion. The way I understand it, at the present time_and I would like the gentleman from Salt Lake to correct me if I am wrong_it would require each district_that is, the Legislature in passing a school law will naturally require each district to have kindergarten schools in connection with their schools in the district. Section 1 goes on and says what the school system shall consist of, first a kindergarten; they will have to provide for the maintenance of that or its support. Now, if that is not a correct interpretation of this section_that is one of my greatest objections_the districts are not prepared to establish kindergarten schools, except in the cities. I ask if that would be the correct interpretation?

Mr. VARIAN. Mr. President, it is true that the kindergarten school should become a part of the public school system, but they are not free schools. That is left open to the Legislature. So far as I have been concerned, at no time during the discussion of this question have I had anything to say upon that question. I am dealing now with the free school system here.

Mr. EVANS (Weber). What Mr. Peters wants to know, and I would like to understand it, too_the kindergarten schools would be a part of the public school system, and the public would be required to support them just the same as it would the university, would it not?

Mr. MAESER. No, sir.

Mr. VARIAN. Mr. President, if the Legislature provided for it, yes_by local taxation, I suppose. That question was all gone over the other day. So far as I am concerned, I had nothing to say

about that kindergarten system. I supposed that the house was perfectly satisfied upon that question. As it stands, it will require an act of the Legislature to provide for the support of the kindergarten. If your Legislature that you send up here want kindergarten schools, they will provide for their support. Now, it comes in the same line with the university. What I am dealing with here is the proposition to strike out this declaration that you are going to have a free school system here. Consider it first from the general standpoint. What effect is it going to have upon emigration? If you have a declaration like this in your constitutional law, that you are going to have a free school system in part at least so that it can be changed, doesn't every gentleman know that that will appear more strongly than any other advantage that this people can offer to people looking for a home for themselves and their family_the irrevocable promise that there shall be such a school system here as is in accord with the systems elsewhere in the United States, free to them and to their children? You strike it out or leave it in that uncertain way, and I tell you, gentlemen, you are retrograding twenty years in this Territory. Now, as to the second branch of the proposition, I call attention to the fact, as was suggested by my colleague from Salt Lake, that it will not and cannot in any degree interfere with the sum of money that this city_for instance, to make a pertinent illustration_will be entitled to get. It is not the number of pupils, I will say to the gentleman, who attend the high school or the common school or the kindergarten schools, or the university, that make up the basis of school apportionment. It is the number of children between six and eighteen years of age. Am I not right_eighteen years of age?

Mr. PETERS. Yes, sir.
{1335}
Mr. VARIAN. Now, it makes no difference, sir, whether those children attend school or not; that is. so far as the apportionment of money is concerned. If only a third of them attend the school and there are no laws sufficiently effective to make the remainder attend school, still the proper apportionment of school moneys made up from territorial taxation and county and city taxation are diverted unto the Salt Lake City and county school fund. That being so, it can make no difference to any other county or district how they are expended. This proviso goes to this extent, that if the school fund, so apportioned to a city or district, as I have indicated, shall not be sufficient to maintain these schools free, then the high schools shall be maintained by local taxation. That is fair. If there are enough children in the county and city and if there is enough money to make a sufficient apportionment for our special purposes, it can make no difference, I submit, that we have enough to run a high school too. If we have not we must maintain the common schools with what money we have got, free, and support the high school by local taxation. New, that is all there is in it, and I submit we ought not to be met with further objection on that score.

The PRESIDENT. If the word free was put before “public school,” in the third line of the first section, would not that answer the whole purpose?

Mr. VARIAN. No. That would leave the question open, Mr. President, to have the Legislature determine that the high school should not be a part of the free school system. That is the whole ground that we went over the other day. We are perfectly willing that the outside counties shall have the question left open that way, but we have in this city too much money here_we are too heavily in debt. Our system has gotten under way. The whole community is impressed with it

from the children to the parent, and I am told that it is so in Ogden. We do not want it changed, and we do not want the menace of change fixed by omission or commission upon this statute here, and we simply ask you to leave it as it is. It cannot affect you.

Mr. GOODWIN. Mr. President, I want to impress upon some gentlemen who seem to have a wrong idea of these actual facts. The free school system of Salt Lake City is decidedly the biggest advertisement that Utah has. The high schools of Ogden and of Salt Lake are the wonder of people that come here, and when gentlemen look at these schools they think there is something wrong. They do not stop to think of their effect. That if, for instance, there was a fund of a hundred thousand dollars to go to Salt Lake and to Sanpete, that no matter about the high school, if Salt Lake had six thousand children and Sanpete had four, Sanpete would get four-tenths of all the money and Salt Lake would get six-tenths, and it would not matter whether Salt Lake put her money in high schools or anything else. We went over this thing two hours the other day and spent out of the United States money and I guess our own funds probably one full half day. It probably cost us three hundred dollars_this discussion of this matter the other day. It is all right as it is. I hope the Convention will let it stand.

Mr. ANDERSON. Mr. President, I am opposed to the motion to strike out. I am in favor of the section as it stands. I think that it is broad enough to embrace every system that is possible for us to want in the future, and I think that the common schools should be free. Therefore, I will vote in support of the section as it now stands.

Mr. PETERS. Mr. President, I do not desire to be misunderstood on this proposition. I am not attacking all of the schools of Salt Lake City, and I am not unfamiliar with the school law {1336} either. I think I know nearly every line in the school law and particularly the school system of Salt Lake. I have written that law once and was very familiar with it. Now, I do not want to be misunderstood that I am attacking the high schools, but I claim that if we put in free common schools, Salt Lake can get all that she has now. Why is she so tenacious to hold on to the high schools? The article which provides for the city schools also says that it shall provide for high schools and mechanical schools and manual schools. Now, they only include the schools named. It may be in ten years from now they will want mechanical schools connected with the high schools here in Salt Lake City. They may want manual schools. The tendency of the age is-_

Mr. VARIAN. The gentleman will permit me to call attention to the fact of the amendment adopted by the suggestion of my colleague on yesterday, “such other schools as the Legislature may provide.”

Mr. PETERS. I understand that, but you seem to think I was attacking the high schools. I do not wish to be understood that I was attacking them, but I wanted it to be left open for future legislation, in order that they can legislate according to the progress of the age. I have no desire to attack any system.

The motion of Mr. Peters was rejected.

Section 3 was read.

Mr. GOODWIN. I think that suggestion came in connection with the deaf and dumb and blind asylum.

Mr. VARIAN. Well, the principle is the same. I move to insert after the word “purposes,” in line 8, the words, “and all unclaimed shares and dividends of any corporation incorporated under the laws of this State.”

Supposing that we change that and offer it after the word forfeiture in the 5th line. I would ask the chairman of the committee whether that was considered?

Mr. PIERCE. That was considered in the committee. We are willing the school fund be as large as it possibly can be.

Mr. BOWDLE. Is that not covered by the preceding clause the proceeds of all property that may accrue to the State by escheat or forfeiture?

Mr. VARIAN. No; I do not understand that private property is forfeited to the State except in cases of decedents; they are the only forfeitures that I know of.

The PRESIDENT. Wouldn't that come in the fourth line_the proceeds of all property or stocks unclaimed?

Mr. VARIAN. No, sir; that would presuppose that it must be escheated or forfeited. Escheat and forfeiture of property is a very different question. That is to take in for the benefit of the State all dividends on stock that may be allowed to accumulate and which I am told is done frequently in commercial cities, and no one gets the benefit of it eventually but the holder. It is not called for; it is not escheated property or forfeited property in the sense that it is used there.

Mr. MONS PETERSON. Mr. President, I have a substitute I wish to offer for section 4, as follows:

The university of Utah shall comprise all departments and institutes of higher learning of the public school system, including the school of mines, the agricultural college, the state normal school, and such literary, scientific, and technical schools and colleges as may be established by law, and shall be located at Logan, Cache County, provided that normal schools, experiment stations, and the school of mines may be established by law at other places.

The Legislature shall provide at its first session for the removal of the university to Logan by September 1st, 1896.

nearer the center of population and in my opinion it is the best place every way. Therefore, I am opposed to this substitute.

Mr. KERR. Mr. President, the question has been already quite thoroughly discussed before the Convention. I do not desire to take up the time of the Convention in going over any of the ground which has already been covered in this discussion, but this substitute, as I have stated before, it does seem to me is one of the most important subjects that has come before this Convention. First I desire to call attention to two or three points which I should have replied to before, that have been made on the floor of the Convention, after my remarks on Saturday morning. It has been stated that the students in the agricultural department of Cornell were looked down upon by the students of other departments. In refutation of that, I desire merely to call attention to two points; first the honors won by the present class and the demand for graduates in agriculture as managers of farms, and teachers, testify to the high character of the work done by the students.

Now, I admit, Mr. President, that if the students of the agricultural college of Cornell university were looked down upon by the students of that institution, they would have little opportunity to participate in the oratorical and other contests in that institution. The fact is, gentlemen, that you would hardly know the departments in which the students of that or other great universities are laboring. While there I associated with students in the engineering courses, in agriculture, arts, letters, philosophy, etc., and in the classes in mathematics, in French, in German, in history, and subjects of this kind. We there associated together, in the departments in which we were registered; an hour or two a day at most, and that only during the junior and senior years is devoted to the technical work, or the work which characterizes the several courses, and I state that the students of the agricultural college of Cornell university and the agricultural departments of other institutions are not looked down upon. Again, we find that students in institutions of higher learning gain prestige and position through their intelligence, their ability, their energy, and not from show. As an evidence of that, I need only call your attention to a number of students, whom I know now in eastern institutions. The only class distinction in these great universities is freshman, sophomore, junior and senior. They have their class organization. Who is president of the senior class of Michigan university to-day? A poor farmer boy of Utah, and I grant you that were he looked down upon he would not occupy that exalted position is that great university, and he also is a student in civil engineering, one of the courses of the colleges of agriculture and mechanical arts. Who of all the students of Cornell university, numbering nearly twenty-two hundred, was selected as the man to represent that institution in the great oratorical contest at Chicago? Young Nebeker of Logan; a poor farmer boy, a graduate of one of our Logan colleges. If he were looked down upon, how is it that he was thus recognized? It is ability, I repeat, and intelligence that give to students in these great universities prestige and influence. It is not merely show. It does not depend upon the courses in which they are registered.

In the university of Utah and the agricultural college of Utah, I stated in my remarks Saturday morning, there are certain courses which are the same. The work in the agricultural college is {1338} to a great extent a duplication of that of the university, as taken from the two official catalogues of those institutions. I have noted here of the thirty-seven subjects of instruction in these institutions, only eight are given in the agricultural college that are not being given to-day in the university of Utah. This is official. I need not take your time in enumerating the subjects,

but of thirty-seven subjects, only eight that are given in the agricultural college are not given in the university of Utah. The other twenty-nine subjects are being taught in both institutions, and by a union of these institutions there would result a large saving. Now, again, it was stated by one gentleman that the union of these institutions would be largely an experiment. Why, gentlemen of the Convention, in many of the states throughout the United States for years and years these institutions have been united, and I have here a letter from Commissioner Harris, the United States commissioner of education, in which be makes the statement that in the following states or territories the agricultural colleges are connected with state or territorial universities:

Arizona, Arkansas, California, Delaware, Georgia, Idaho, Louisiana, Minnesota, Nebraska, West Virginia, Wisconsin, Wyoming, and New York_the greatest agricultural colleges of the nation, the greatest schools of technology of the United States, established in pursuance of the Morrill act, are connected with the universities of these states. Now, the question is, can we afford in this Convention to grapple with this question and finally settle it? I tell you, gentlemen of the Convention, who have been working so hard to keep down the expenses of the State, that which will result in an annual saving of thousands of dollars of the people's money is worthy of our consideration and it is not a question that should not be handled by this Convention. It is a question, I venture to predict again, that will result according to our action in our having no institution of higher learning in Utah or our attempting to maintain the institutions apart, and if we do that, and tax the people sufficiently to maintain these institutions, as separate institutions, we will fasten a mill-stone about the necks of the people which will drag them down to bankruptcy. Can we afford to do it? I say, gentlemen of the Convention, let us take this question and consider it upon its merits. Now, one question as to location. It is evident from the action of this Convention taken yesterday and Saturday that the union of these institutions cannot take place at any other place than Logan. I came to this Convention a strong advocate of union; I have been an advocate of union for three years. I believe that it is in the interests of the people of the State, educationally and financially. The greatest educators of Utah, including the president and vice-president of the university of Utah, and the professors of the university of Utah to-day, say, gentlemen of the Convention, unite these institutions at Logan and let us not starve out the university and the agricultural college. Let us have an institution of higher learning, in which the young people of Utah can prepare themselves for the profession and work of life. After all, are there any serious objections to the removal of the university to Logan? I admit, gentlemen of the Convention, that many of the supposed points against Logan, when examined, do not amount to much. Referring again to Cornell university_I could refer you to many other institutions, but I refer you now to that, because it is an institution with which I am more familiar. That institution is located, not in the center of the state of New York, not in a great city of commercial importance, of great population, but in the small town of Ithica, in the lake regions of New York, and that institution having been established {1339} for twenty-seven years, ranks to-day among the best institutions, not only of the United States but of the world. They have students there from different countries of Europe, from different countries of Asia, and indeed, also from the more civilized countries of Africa. They have students there from all over the world. It is an institution, the growth of which is not paralleled in the history of higher education in the United States. The university spirit predominates there.

The people of Cache County are very much interested in education. That institution already there

is their pride, and if the university goes there it will be the pride of the people of that county; it will be the institution of the county; it will be the life of the county; the papers will take pride in advertising the institution, and they will take part in supporting the institution. As to the question of location, its not being in the center of Utah, I desire to call attention to merely this, students who go there will have only to pay the additional expense of railway transportation from here there, and the difference in living there will far more than counterbalance that. It is in a city, the prevailing atmosphere of which is such as to in no way interfere with the work of the students. I will just call attention to one fact, of the two Utah students who graduated with high honors in Harvard, it having required only three years for them to complete the four years' course, one was honored with being appointed the only member of five hundred students in chemistry, a member of the German society of chemistry. They graduated with high honor in civil engineering, having had charge of their classes in their summer schools. They were graduates of one of our Logan institutions. The president of the senior class of Michigan to-day is a graduate of one of the Logan institutions. I have labored in Salt Lake. I have labored in the university here; I have labored in the college at Logan, and I know that the surroundings there and the climate there are all favorable to the work of higher learning in those institutions. Now, gentlemen of the Convention, meet this fairly, and I state frankly that I did not come here to wage any local fight. All I want is that we take such action as will secure to the people the greatest possible higher educational opportunities for the minimum expenditure of money. Let us consider this union elsewhere than at Logan as impossible. Let us unite the institutions therefore at Logan. Let us, instead of having two struggling, starving institutions, have one institution that is worthy of the State.

Mr. SQUIRES. May I ask the gentleman a question? It has been stated here this morning, and I would like to have you confirm it if you can, that the building at Logan in which the agricultural college is now located is sufficient and will be for many years to come, for the combined uses of the two institutions. Is that a fact?

Mr. KERR. Thank you. I am very glad you asked that question, because I can now answer it. And to show you that I am not prejudiced I will give you exactly the same answer that I gave a year ago when I was then professor in the university of Utah and was in no way connected with the agricultural college or any other institution in Cache County. By converting the boarding house there into a physical and chemical laboratory, the buildings there are ample to accommodate all the students of both institutions, and a year ago when I went there, I took my note book and noted the size and number of all the rooms in the buildings and made a very careful estimate of the capacity of the buildings, and I am free to state, as I stated then, that by converting that boarding house into a physical and chemical laboratory, and it would require but a {1340} very little to do that, the buildings are ample to accommodate all the students of both institutions. Now, really, the expense that will be incurred in moving the university to Logan is simply the expense of transporting the apparatus from here there, in addition to the small amount that would be required to remodel and fit up the boarding house as a laboratory. Now, all of the students could be accommodated in the other building; but to be frank, I said that in my judgment this boarding house should be converted into a chemical and physical laboratory, in order that the students may be amply provided for.

Mr. CANNON. Build another one.

Mr. KERR. The students board with private families. The students of the Brigham Young college do that and the fact is that the students of the agricultural college do the same. Very few of the students occupy rooms in the boarding house, so I am informed. They prefer to live in private families and would do that if the boarding house is used for a laboratory. And in that connection I will state just, locate the institutions there and there will be dormitories or boarding houses established all around the campus there for the accommodation of students. There have not been during the last few years, because they were afraid the institution might be removed and then their property would be lost, but just fix it there permanently and these houses will be built up around there and then the students can be amply provided for free of cost to the State.

Mr. GOODWIN. How far is it now from the college to the town where there are houses?

Mr. KERR. The houses come right up to the college.

Mr. GOODWIN. Is the agricultural land attached to the Logan college proper in all respects for an experimental station?

Mr. KERR. I will be frank with the gentleman from Salt Lake. I will state that the soil there is a good soil and the lands are good. Now, when the State can afford it, my opinion is and has been that there should be one or two other experiment stations in the State.

Mr. GOODWIN. The reason I asked you was some gentleman, I do not remember who, told me that it was impossible to raise anything on the soil without a wind rake behind.

Mr. KERR. That is certainly incorrect. It is a good soil, and in every way adapted to the work going on. I will state also the college has a water right for all the water that is required for any and all purposes; it comes out of the canyon there and is ample to provide all the water needed.

Mr. GOODWIN. Do the shrubs planted on that soil stand up straight or do they lean?

Mr. KERR. I could not say.

Mr. GOODWIN. Some gentleman_if he is a liar he must be outside of this Convention_told me that all the plants leaned towards the college, that the winds from the canyon kept them that way.

Mr. KERR. There is of an evening in Logan a gentle breeze from the canyon there which makes it very pleasant in the summer, but I do not think it is sufficient to interfere with the shrubbery on the hill.

Mr. JAMES. Mr. Chairman, I arise for the purpose of asking unanimous consent of this Convention that a gentleman present here, who I think probably can give this Convention some

information regarding this question that will be a benefit to us all, Doctor Talmage, be permitted to make a few short remarks regarding the university of Utah.

Mr. ANDERSON. Mr. President, before Mr. Talmage speaks I wish to offer an amendment bearing on this subject. I wish to amend the substitute by striking out” Logan, Cache County,” and inserting “Salt Lake City,” and strike {1341} out “university to Logan,” and insert “agricultural college to Salt Lake City.”

The PRESIDENT. If there is no objection the doctor will talk to us a few moments on this educational question.

Mr. TALMAGE. Mr. President and gentlemen, I cannot refrain from expressing my very great gratitude for this unexpected and I believe unparalleled honor that you bestow upon me. I am informed that certain delegates in the Convention have been inclined to doubt the statements that educators connected with the university here have felt to sanction the proposition to move the institution to Logan. I would say in that connection simply this, I believe that every earnest educator in Utah recognizes the absolute necessity of the union of these institutions, in order that anything may be accomplished worthy of the institution of higher education in the State of Utah. I believe that the State is within two hundred thousand dollars of the total indebtedness allowed by the Constitution, and that for several years the agricultural college, the university of Utah, perhaps also the reform school and other territorial institutions, have been to a great extent conducted upon borrowed money, the indebtedness of the Territory increasing from year to toyear. I submit that if these institutions remain apart, it will be absolutely impossible for the Territory or the coming State to provide funds ample for the work and that in consequence we will have two weak institutions.

I believe that the educators here cannot be charged with having any personal aims in this movement or any selfishness at heart at all. It surely must appear to be a purely professional motive which prompts them_educationally. We regard it as altogether a wrong principle to separate these institutions. Professor Kerr has read to you a letter from the commissioner of education of the United States, and it is but a few weeks ago that I had the pleasure of a personal interview with that distinguished gentleman, and a conversation with him concerning this matter, in which he urged for the sake of the future State that we would refrain from that destructive policy that is ruining the educational interests of a number of states and territories which have become virtually a by-word in the educational world through the separation of these interests and the segregation of these different departments. In the department of domestic arts_and it was to that department to which Professor Kerr alluded_there are thirty-seven subjects offered in the agricultural college, and of those thirty-seven twenty-nine are carried on at great expense in the university of Utah to-day. The classes in those several courses are of sufficiently small size to be conducted by one and the same teacher and with practically the same equipment, except in the case of laboratory work, which of course would require new apparatus and material from year to year. I have been in favor of the union of these institutions at Salt Lake City. I believe those who have conversed with me upon the matter know that full well. But location has always been_I was about to say, secondary_but I will say, very, very greatly subordinate to he question of union. I think that without this union there is little prospect of a strong institution being built up in Utah. I

am not here and do not take advantage of this courtesy you have extended to me to advocate Salt Lake City or Logan, or any other place in the Territory. I would rather see the combined institution placed in the extreme south than to see both institutions placed in Salt Lake City and kept separate, for the reason that there would be a waste of energy that will consume the funds and result in ill effects as long as the institutions remain separate. I cannot believe that for fifty years to come Utah is going to increase in population and wealth so greatly as to {1342} make it advisable to carry on these institutions separately.

If they were combined it would seem to me both reasonable and in every way proper that the name agricultural college of Utah should be retained, that the identity of the institution should be retained. To me agricultural college stands, I believe, supreme above all other courses that are offered in the Territory in importance. I am a lover of agriculture and of agricultural pursuits and agricultural arts, and would do nothing, if I had the power to do it, that would hinder the work of that institution. I have never cast a reflection upon it, and have only had words of honor and praise upon my tongue for the institution. I submit that the effectiveness will increase, that its good works will be multiplied by making it work !n harmony with other departments. Its work will be strengthened in its academic branches, which every student of agriculture ought to be trained in, and that without special expense to the institution. I understand that some question has been raised as to the possibility of that institution losing its appropriation from the government if it be made part of another educational institution. I ask you to consider that act providing for the endowment and for the support of agricultural colleges, and you will see that one part of that appropriation is to go to the institution that maintains the agricultural department, or an agricultural college. That was plainly, then, the intention of the lawmakers that in most cases_in many cases the institution known as the agricultural college of the State would be a part of some other institution. I want to take this advantage of your kindness, to urge most earnestly the welfare of higher education of the country and State of Utah, and to submit that that can be achieved by union. I have nothing to say in favor of Logan. There are others who have represented the claims of that city. I have absolutely nothing to say in favor of Salt Lake City, more than I have said. There are others far abler than I to urge those claims. But provide for union. Leave the matter for the Legislature as to the location, or provide for such now, but, gentlemen, this state of uncertainty is turning away every stream of endowment that was approaching our institution. No one will give anything to the institution while it is in an uncertain state. I am in a position to know that, to realize that there are many who are willing to help the institution of the State if permanently located and established, and that its future growth is to some degree at least assured. The support of an educational institution to-day is not what it was a few years ago. Education is advancing every year and the university is an expensive institution. An agricultural college is not a whit less expensive and if these are united the expense thus saved will be sufficient to increase the efficiency of the institution very greatly. Mr. President and gentlemen, I thank you again most heartily.

Mr. KIESEL. I would like to ask the professor if he would be kind enough to give us his views of the metric system?

Mr. VARIAN. One thing at a time.

Mr. HALLIDAY. One thing at a time.

Mr. JAMES. I would like to ask the gentleman a question, if this Convention will permit. I want to ask the professor if from his experience as a professor and his knowledge of locality throughout the world, he knows a place within the whole United States that has the advantages, from a scientific standpoint, as well as a central standpoint, for a great school that Salt Lake City has?

Mr. THURMAN. I object to that {1343} question. I ask that the professor be not put in that embarrassing position. He has avoided it in his speech and it is a wrong to him.

Mr. TALMAGE. I have nothing to say on that. I simply desire to repeat that I have nothing to say as to the location. I urged before the Legislature at the last session that the question of union be discussed upon its merits, without any sectional feelings intervening, and I have only waived that in one instance, when certain statements were made regarding the location in the north that I thought misrepresented some facts connected with Salt Lake City.

Mr. JAMES. I want to state, Mr. President, just a few words. I have no personal preference for any locality. I have simply a particular desire that the best good shall be done for the greatest number. Now, there isn't anything that has come up before this Convention that I have been more deeply interested in than this school question, since we convened. However, I have refrained from saying anything, for the very reason that I realize there are those who are better able to talk to you and explain to you the necessities in this case than I am. But must say_and I do not say it, sir, because I live in Salt Lake City, but I say it because my observations compel me to say it, that I never have had the privilege, I never have had the opportunity of witnessing any spot within the United States that is so advantageously situated for a great school as Salt Lake City. It has geological surroundings. It has attractions, it being right upon the great highway through this great nation where everybody must come if they pass from east to west. It is a point that has not only a national reputation, but is known all over the world. It has attractions which are equal if not superior to any place between the Missouri river and California, and that much I did want to say in the interests of what I believe ought to be one of the greatest schools that this nation can possibly have within its confines, and that it should be established here in Salt Lake City.

Mr. HAMMOND. Mr. President, I am opposed, sir, to this substitute offered by the member from Grand County, although he is my son-in-law. He is a republican and I can forgive him, but he is off_plumb wrong. The idea of moving the university, as his substitute provides, to Cache County_why he may as well take it to the North Pole so far as San Juan could get any good from it. [Laughter.] I am astonished that a member from the south would make such a motion. Professor Kerr converted me the other day to the doctrine of union, and I have not in any manner departed from that position which I took then. Union first and union last and all the time of these school systems, and when it comes to location I leave Professor Kerr. I cannot follow him any longer. Salt Lake City, if we are going to locate it, is the place. Why, sir, we people in San Juan, when we pray, we turn our faces to the north_the great temple city, and I feel that Salt Lake is

entitled to it by every consideration. It is the great city of wealth and renown and population, and beautiful location on the sides of the mountain. Then again, Mr. President, I feel that they need it. They are absolutely and hopelessly in debt, and it will help to stir up business enterprises here and to create a way by which I believe they will get out of debt sooner or later.

Mr. IVINS. I understand, gentlemen, from this substitute and the amendment that two propositions are now fairly before this Convention. First, the union of these two institutions of learning, the university of Utah and the agricultural college. My position in regard to that question has already been defined. Therefore, I shall not devote time to its consideration. I {1344} am in favor of this union. The next important question is that of locality. If these two institutions are to be united, if this new State is to have one great institution of learning, shall it be located at Logan, in the extreme north of the Territory, or shall it be located at some other point? There are considerations, perhaps, in favor of both the substitute offered by the gentleman from Grand, and the amendment offered by the gentleman from Beaver. My own feelings lead me entirely to support the amendment to the substitute. I do not believe that it is best for this Territory that these two institutions united should be located in Cache County. If they are to be located at all, gentlemen, it seems to me that this valley in which the city of Salt Lake is situated is pre-eminently the most proper place for the location of an institution of learning of this character. In the first place here is the center of population of the whole Territory. An institution of this character of necessity must draw its support largely from Salt Lake County, if it is supported at all, and to my mind this is one question which should not be overlooked. From this city and from this county a large proportion of the support which shall be rendered to an institution of this character must of necessity come so far as population is concerned.

Again, in this city and county is situated a great proportion of the wealth of the Territory, and I apprehend if this institution is ever to become a great institution such as it is anticipated it will become, it must be made so largely from bequests from men of wealth. The point referred to by the gentleman from Salt Lake, Judge Goodwin, when this question was under consideration a few days ago, is one that ought not to be overlooked, and I apprehend that more bequests would be bestowed upon the institution if located here near the mass of those who are able to give than could possibly be the case should it be located in the northern part of the Territory. Now, another question that is one of importance in connection with this matter is this, in this institution we expect that medicine will be taught, surgery will be taught, there will be a school of mines attached, civil engineering will be taught, and I want to ask you to stop for a moment and consider the advantages that are afforded in Salt Lake City, above those that can be afforded in any other city in the Territory, so far as these branches are concerned. Here are the hospitals, here are the places where students can get practical information, that cannot be obtained so far as medicine and surgery are concerned in any other place. Here are the great mills, here the mines are within easy access, where students can become practically acquainted with that industry. Here the electric works are situated, here are the great machine shops, in fact, gentlemen, here are all of the facilities necessary for the acquirement of knowledge in these branches to which I have referred, facilities that for a generation at least to come never can be had in Logan.

Another thing, Salt Lake City is the central city of this Territory; it is the great overland highway from the east to the west. Here professors will visit in passing to and fro. Here educators will

come, and during their temporary stay is it not a fact opportunities will be afforded to the pupils of this institution to get the benefit of an occasional lecture, to get the benefit of their opinions, of their experience, which will not possibly be the case if they shall have to diverge from the regular course of travel and spend a day or two perhaps in going into an insolated neighborhood in order to make visits to this institution? It is no small matter, this to which I refer_no small matter, gentlemen, that these opportunities should be afforded. Again, this institution, if the two institutions are united, will become the pride of the people of this new {1345} State. It is eminently proper that it should be located where tourists, where travelers, where men from other regions may easily have access to it, that its renown may go abroad through the reports that will be made by individuals of this character, which again can never be the case if it is located in an isolated region. From a financial standpoint, what will be the result? I do not know just what may be the value of those buildings and grounds in Logan, but I do know that we will lose in Salt Lake City ten acres of ground in the very heart of this town with valuable buildings, perhaps also concessions that have been made hen upon the bench, and I am of the opinion that from a financial standpoint the loss will be much greater if interests in Salt Lake City are abandoned than will be the loss if interests in Logan, Cache County, are abandoned.

I contend that the climate in this valley is better adapted to agriculture, it is better adapted to the establishment of an institution of this kind, than is the climate further to the north. I maintain that that isolated point is not proper for the establishment of an institution that is to be the only institution of the character established in this State. Now, in opposition to that comes a sentiment. The agricultural college we say has already been established at Logan and it is unjust that we should take it up and move it away, thus depriving the people of the benefits we have derived from it. I want to call your attention to the fact that the university of Utah has been established in Salt Lake City, ever since the establishment of this Territory. I opine that it never was the design of those who established it and it is not the design of the people of Utah to-day that it shall be torn up and removed to an isolated point in this Territory. It is said that the moral influence surrounding the institution in Cache Valley would be so much better than the moral influence surrounding it in Salt Lake Valley, that this alone is sufficient reason why the change should be made to that point. There may be something in this argument. I believe there is, but as a rule students who attend the university of Utah will have acquired sufficient years and wisdom to take care of themselves. All things considered, I want to say here that I shall favor the amendment offered by the gentleman from Beaver. If there is to be a union of these two institutions, I shall vote for that union at Salt Lake City. That failing, I shall then vote for union at Logan because I believe union at Logan is better than nothing, but to my mind this is the point eminently fitted. There is no better. I do not believe in the whole world there is a point with surroundings better calculated to establish and successfully maintain an institution of this character than right here in Salt Lake Valley.

Mr. PIERCE. Mr. President, there are one or two facts that I desire to call the attention of the Convention to. The property upon which the university is now located, by figures which I obtained this morning from men who put conservative values upon property, is worth two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. It is a block in the heart of the city, and as has been stated by the previous speaker, if the union is at Logan, we will lose the entire benefit of that property. There is a condition in the deed. When the deed was first given to the university by the city for

that block the block was to be the property of the university as long as it was used for university purposes. The last month_I think it was about the 13th day of March, the city of Salt Lake changed the conditions in that deed. They provided that that property or the proceeds thereof should be used for the university as long as the university remained in Salt Lake City, with a view of locating or so that the university proper could be located upon the Rawlins' {1346} site granted by the government. So that here is the proposition right square before us. If we locate the university upon the site in Fort Douglas, where it-should be located, we have at once property worth two hundred and fifty thousand dollars to be converted into cash and to be used as a fund for the purpose of establishing houses, and dormitories, and whatever is necessary upon the Rawlins' site. It seems to me, with two hundred and fifty thousand dollars, that we can do an immense amount of work towards starting our university upon a proper footing, and that with the two hundred and fifty thousand dollars so granted to us by the city, we will place this university, as far as building is concerned, far ahead of the condition that the agricultural. college at the present time is in, and in addition to that we have a large tract of laud_sixty acres up there that is valuable in itself. And it seems to me that all of the arguments are in favor of locating the university, if it is united, in Salt Lake City. And another thing that I desire to call the attention of the Convention to is this, in regard to the university, that during the last year there was one endowment made to the university to the amount of sixty thousand dollars by the Salt Lake Literary and Scientific Association. I say, gentlemen, that if the university was moved to Logan, if it had been in Logan, we would not have received that endowment, and I think that the university should be in the center of population where men of wealth, men who are capable of endowing chairs in universities, are situated, so that their attention shall be immediately brought to the institution and that they can grow up with the surroundings and in that way have a love for the institution, which they could not have if they were located in an isolated part of the Territory where there is not the center of wealth as there is in this city. There is a time soon coming when I hope that the university of Utah or the agricultural college, if they are united together, will be able to maintain themselves wholly upon endowments and the land grants, and I believe the time is not far distant, but, gentlemen we must cultivate a spirit in favor of education and we must build up everything tending toward that, and the location in the center of the population of the State of Utah is where we want the university. And another thing, if you locate the university at Logan, then Salt Lake City, Salt Lake City, being the center of population, instead of our Utah boys going to Logan to the university, they will go to eastern colleges and western colleges, and the university would not have the advantage that it would have if it was located in Salt Lake City; and I think, gentlemen, that every argument that has been made or that can be made is in favor of the location here in Salt Lake City.

Mr. THATCHER. Are you quite sure, Mr. Pierce, that the Literary and Scientific Society which contributed sixty thousand dollars to the university would not have done so had it been located elsewhere?

Mr. PIERCE. That is my moral conclusion, sir. I say, I am not quite sure, but I say that here is the proposition that I make, Mr. Thatcher, that wealthy citizens, those who endow universities_the most wealthy citizens, as I believe, reside in the center of population everywhere, wherever you go, and their attention must be immediately called to the conditions, to the needs and necessities, before they endow, so that being right upon the ground we are more likely to get endowments if

it is located in Salt Lake City than we could if it was located in an isolated part of the Territory.

Mr. THATCHER. I just simply wanted to say that as an officer of the Literary and Scientific Society, I voted with my colleagues for this sixty thousand dollars to go the university, and I {1347} do not think the location would have had any effect upon my mind.

Mr. PIERCE. That may be so with you, because you, perhaps, desired it elsewhere.

Mr. THURMAN. Mr. President, I have struggled as hard as I have been able to keep this question out of this Convention. I do not believe it has any business here, I mean as far as location is concerned, and at the proper time in this discussion I shall offer an amendment by which the question of union may be determined by this Convention and the question of location will be left to the Legislature, where it belongs. I understand that such an amendment now would be out of order. In taking this position, Mr. President, I trust that I am keeping myself consistent with the positions that I have taken heretofore upon this question. I am opposed to both of the proposed amendments. I place my reasons upon the same ground that I placed them yesterday. Either of these proposed amendments, if adopted, would prevent the Legislature through all coming time from establishing any kind of a branch or department of the university in any other part of the State. To that I was opposed yesterday, and I had gentlemen yesterday standing shoulder to shoulder with me, who voted with me on that proposition, who to-day will abandon me in this Convention and vote on the other side. I stand there to-day, and I say, gentlemen, if you are wise men you will come to that position yet. In deference to these professors_Professor Kerr and President Talmage, and all the educators whose opinions we have had the advantage of, I shall yield_I won't say my judgment, for I never had a decisive judgment on the question of union until I heard them, but I am now in favor of union, if it can be accomplished without too great a sacrifice. I concede that we ought to make some sacrifice for the sake of union, but I say the question of location ought to be left to the Legislature of the State, and from what I see of men in this Convention and what I know of their opinions and their indecisions and their doubts and their fears on this question, I say it ought to be a question for the Legislature, and it ought to be made a question in the campaign, and let the people all over the Territory of Utah know that this thing is to be decided by the Legislature, and let men come here instructed what to do, and not take up longer the time of this Convention. Gentlemen, I intend to vote against both of these amendments and I propose to offer one on the lines that I have suggested.

Mr. SQUIRES. Mr. President, in view of the great importance of this subject, and along the line, indicated by Mr. Thurman, would it not be possible for us_it would have to be, I suppose by unanimous consent_to vote upon the question of union, disassociated from the question of location, so that the prejudices of the delegates here would not enter into the question of union? If it could be possible, I would like to have the consent of the Convention to a vote squarely upon the question of union first, and then if it is decided that we shall unite these two institutions, let us discuss the question of location. I ask unanimous consent to have a vote taken first upon the question of union or no union.

Mr. HART. Mr. President, I object to that; it cannot be considered, in an abstract sense. It is not a question of theory but it is a condition.

Mr. JAMES. May I interrupt the gentleman for a moment? He is pretty well acquainted with the values of land in that locality. I would like to ask what he considers that land worth?

Mr. CANNON. I will answer that question in the course of my remarks. This tract of land, gentlemen, as has been stated by some of the other speakers, is a very valuable one. It comprises 132 rods frontage, overlooking the city of Salt Lake, situated immediately upon the brow of the hill east of us, and could not be excelled any place in the world so far as the location is concerned. It has been urged as an objection to it by some of our friends from Logan and other parts that there is no water with which to conduct their experiments in agriculture. I would call attention to the fact that Parley's canyon conduit brings water from Parley's canyon, one of the largest streams in the valley, and conducts it in pipes above this and at a sufficient elevation to water the entire tract. The water coming from Parley's canyon is largely in excess of the quantity which was used formerly by the residents of Salt Lake City, to water their entire city. And it was obtained principally by an exchange of the waters of Jordan river made with the farmers of Sugarhouse and Farmers precincts in this county. Many hundreds of acres of land well watered by the waters which come to us through this canyon conduit formerly were watered and that water is now utilized by the citizens of Salt Lake. It could, should the city of Salt Lake see fit to, grant the water, and I have no doubt that it would be used in utilizing that entire tract with as great an advantage as 9 obtained at Logan upon that point. I have heard the objection raised that the soil is not suited there. I would state, gentlemen, that some of the finest soil that we have in Utah Territory is found upon this bench immediately surrounding Salt Lake City. Some of the finest grapes that we produce and everything of this character can be found there. You have only to go to the fruitful gardens of our citizens in the upper bench, in what is known as the dry district, to see the character of soil that exists there. In addition to that the climate here is more suitable than it possibly could be in the location proposed at Logan.

I have in my hand the report of the United States department of agriculture and weather bureau, which shows the temperature in the month of December, 1894, in both stations, showing the great variation that exists. From this I find that the mean temperature at Salt Lake City for that month was 31.4 degrees, the mean temperature was 22 degrees at Logan, the difference in temperature was 9.4 degrees. It is well known to the people of Utah Territory, and I need not discuss it, that Logan is not so situated that you can conduct with the greatest advantages the experiments that should be conducted for the benefit of people of Utah in an agricultural line. The people of Davis County do not get the benefits that would result, and the people of all the mountain valleys and counties do not, that would result from the establishment of agricultural

college in a location where they do not have to raise onions under the cover of glass; from a location where they do not have to do that which they do in Logan, and it is no disrespect to Logan that I say that which I do. I have been informed by some of the gentlemen who visited Logan recently, one of whom was a {1349} professional gardener, that he made an examination of shrubs and trees that are growing upon the agricultural grounds there, and that he found the shrubs and trees which had been planted for a certain number of years, were only about one-half the growth that the same character of trees would have in valleys similar to Utah County, Davis County, and Salt Lake County, and I submit that it is not fair to the people of Utah that the main agricultural college should be located in a climate of that character. As I understand the gentleman, a university is a collection of colleges, and in this line there should probably be connected with the university a school of mines. We have in Salt Lake City advantages that could not possibly be had in Logan in the way of establishing a school of mines. The ore comes from all parts of the Territory, not only from Utah but from the surrounding states and territories, is brought in here and handled by our smelters. Samples can be secured and the people who are studying the subject of mining_and in a school of mines they would have immense advantage in that way. The same would be true of the school of metallurgy. Here, for fifteen cents, students can get upon the cars and go and see the practical operation of our smelters, as they treat the various ores which are handled by them and see the principles which they study in school applied in a practical way. We have had gentlemen upon this floor say that they believed in practical education. We have had men say that people who are educated in Salt Lake City are not good for anything when they go back to any other place, but there are men in Salt Lake City_boys who come from all parts of the Territory who come here with the special purpose of being trained in manual training, learning different kinds of trades, and no place in Utah will present the advantages for this kind of training that Salt Lake City will. If you want a practical education, you should place your institution at a point where that practical training can be given.

In the same way, if we have a school of medicine. you must have your school of medicine so located that they can visit the hospitals and see there the practical operations that are performed. You do not want to train your doctor so that he has read how to treat a limb that needs to be set, but you want him trained that he has seen those limbs set where they are broken, that he has seen the knife used where an incision is necessary to be made, and that he knows practically how to do that which is done. If you go to Logan, I submit that you have no hospitals there, that the climate is such that invalids and others will not seek it for the purpose of being treated, and that you will not have the advantages of a school of medicine that you would have in Salt Lake City. Again, we should have our college of dentistry. There are not people enough in Cache County to supply a good class of clinics in dental operations. You should be located in a place where the students can take the advantage of practisingupon a large population, willing to submit themselves at the low price that students usually charge, for the gold they put in their teeth. Then we come to the subject of the college of law. Who is there who has a large practice willing to leave his law practice and to devote a day coming and going to and from Logan, in order that he might appear before a class there and lecture upon some subject upon which he is a specialist. We have, in Salt Lake City, a most eminent bar. Its members are noted throughout the country and many of them would take pride and pleasure in lecturing before a law school were it in such a place that they could leave their business for a few hours or for a few minutes and drive to the location, deliver their {1350} lecture, and return to their business. We have a great many lawyers. I do not need to

instance them, because, besides those we have upon this floor we have Judge Sutherland, who is an eminent man in his line. We have Mr. Rawlins, who was our late delegate to Congress, who has written text books in some lines upon which he is noted, and we have countless others who would not and could not afford to give their time to go to Logan, but who would practically give, free of charge, their services for the university located in Salt Lake City. In addition to that I desire to call your attention to another advantage that there would be. The Deseret Museum, which is situated here and which contains a large collection for the use of students, has been placed free of charge at the disposal of students of the university, those who are studying geology, and other sciences of this character, and were it removed from this city, they would not have that advantage. But it is stated that in Salt Lake City it is not moral, the atmosphere is not morally good and that they should not send their students to Salt Lake City; that they are afraid that they would be contaminated. I regret that vice exists upon the earth, I regret that it exists in Salt Lake City, but I submit, gentlemen, that you cannot, by locality, make men moral. People in Logan may be good and Logan may be a good site for morality, but I submit that you will find in Logan as in other places immorality, and that if a large college is established there vice will follow in its wake, as it has done in other places and in other cities. You must regulate your institution in such a way that you can carefully shield the innocent who attend your college or university. You must teach them that they must resist temptation, not that they must yield to it, because I claim that true virtue consists, not in having no opportunity to commit a crime, but that it consists in doing that which is right when temptation is placed before you. I submit that if bad influences exist in Salt Lake City, good influences also exist, and I believe that those who have taught school here_their testimony will bear me out when I say that there is no more tendency to drunkenness, no more tendency to vice of various kinds among the students of Salt Lake City, and among those who attend the university here, than are found in cities of smaller kinds where there are to a certain extent vices and temptation.

The question has been raised as to the price of board, and it is claimed that in Logan the advantages of board will more than offset the expense of traveling so far by rail. I desire, upon this point, to call your attention to the fact that many of the students who would attend would be right at their own homes in Salt Lake City. Think of that for a moment, gentlemen. We have in Salt Lake City to-day over twelve thousand school children. We have in Salt Lake County over eighteen thousand school children, Salt Lake City and Salt Lake County combined comprise more than one-fourth of the entire school population of the Territory of Utah, and I claim that in the higher grades the proportion is greater than taking the entire average. I claim that there are more boys and girls prepared to enter upon a university course in proportion to the population in Salt Lake City and in Salt Lake County than any other city or county in the Territory, and I believe the statistics will bear that out. We have an attendance at the high school in this city at the present time of over four hundred, an increase in the past year of over one hundred and fifty, and when they graduate from that high school (its merits have been described frequently to you) they are admitted to the university of California, without an examination. They are admitted to other universities without an examination, {1351} the grade of that high school is so high in that respect. Now, I claim that it is not true that board is cheaper in Logan than it is in Salt Lake City, when the quality of the food is considered and the kind that is partaken of. [Laughter.] I claim that you can get just as good food and as cheap in Salt Lake City as you can in Logan. I have in my hand a letter from the secretary of the faculty of the university which bears that out. There is

one other thing. I desire to call your attention to the close proximity of Salt Lake City to a very populous district. We have around us on the north Davis County with a school population in 1893, of 2,505; Morgan County with 652, just over the mountains on the north-east; Summit County, 2,622; Tooele County, 1,268; Utah Comity, outside of Provo, with 7,364; and Provo itself with 1,823; Wasatch County, right over to the southeast 1,411; Weber County, outside of Ogden, 3,087; and Ogden City, 3,885; a total within a very small radius of Salt Lake City of 41,847, much more than half of the school population of Utah Territory. I call attention to that fact, gentlemen, and that this is naturally the center, and the place for the location of your university. In addition to this, I desire to call your attention to the fact that nearly every family in Utah has either a relative or an intimate acquaintance in Salt Lake City, to whom they can confide their children if they desire to send them. Go to the outside counties and ask where their relatives principally live and you will find that nearly ever family, if we go from San Juan to Rich County in the north, have representatives and friends in Salt Lake City, to whom they can entrust their children, if they desire so to do.

The question has been brought up about the buildings, and upon this subject I made an investigation, and I find to-day they can build buildings similar to those at Logan at a reduction of from twenty-five to fifty per cent. from what they were built for at the time when they were built. I have in my hand, and were time not too precious, I would read to you an estimate from the leading builders and contractors of Salt Lake City, covering everything from the stone of the foundation to the paint that would cover the buildings, and the glass within them.

Mr. JAMES. The gentleman did not answer my question.

Mr. CANNON. The question, I believe, was as to the value of the site that has been offered by Congress for a university location. I have made inquiries among different real estate agents in Salt Lake City and those most intimate with the matter, and I found that the lowest estimate offered was two hundred thousand dollars as the value of the ground, and that it ranged from that to three hundred thousand dollars as the value of the site that was offered by Congress.

Mr. KERR. In case the university is not located there, or in case it is located there, is it not true that that site is absolutely unmarketable. That it has a value only as the use for a site?

Mr. CANNON. The site has a market value independent of that which would attach to the university. It could be sold in ordinary times, for the prices named.

Mr. KERR. Could it be sold at all?

Mr. CANNON. This cannot be sold at all without the consent of Congress. It belongs to the government.

Mr. VARIAN. Mr. President, I regret that this discussion has been precipitated. I think sober reflection will convince the members of this Convention that the proposition and the discussion is out of place in the deliberations of a Constitutional Convention. The location of State institutions such as these is purely one of legislative concern. The Legislature should not be

restricted permanently the disposition and location of institutions of learning or of other institutions connected with the {1352} administration of the State government, such as prisons and reform schools. No such question as is propounded here for our discussion was presented or considered by the people, nor did anybody dream that a matter of this kind would be precipitated, having the result and the only result, if it shall be carried out to its logical conclusion, of embittering and antagonizing sections of the Territory, on the very eve of the vote to be taken upon the ratification of this Constitution, against each other. It is impossible in the very nature of things that this matter can be pursued further to a definite ending without such results. If you accomplish the union of these institutions permanently by this declaration n your organic law, necessarily and logically you will dispose of the question by fixing the location. If you remove from Logan the agricultural college and fix it permanently at any other point, you will disturb and antagonize and embitter those people to an extent which cannot be appreciated. If you act in the other way the same results will follow. You never knew of a more disturbing cause in politics in the relations of different sections of people in one commonwealth towards each other than interference of the kind indicated with existing institutions_with even county seats, and you cannot hope to escape the consequences which always follow such interference. I submit that none of these institutions ought to be fixed permanently by this Convention. The people did not expect it; it is taking a snap judgment, upon this and upon those directly interested the different localities. It is assuming a legislative fact which is unnecessary and uncalled for, and which ought not to be intruded upon this Convention. Already I can see and feel indications of the coming storm in this Convention. Already I can feel the bitterness in advance, which is being instilled into the minds of some of our delegates on the floor, and that is bound to go on and grow, and every man on this floor knows it. It cannot help but do so. The arguments that have been presented here, able and instructive and interesting as they have been and are, are in my judgment out of place here.

I am not prepared to vote for a union of these institutions in this Constitution. If I am forced to vote for a union, naturally you may expect me because of circumstances, as well as because of my convictions, to vote to place the institution, as united, at the city of my home and residence. The same impulses that will move me will move others like me on this floor, as they move men under all circumstances in such conditions. But I am opposed to doing anything more with this question here than to leave it open as it is. Let it become a matter of legislative concern. Let it be disposed of by the people through their representatives, when they shall be called upon to discuss the question, in accordance with the wants and necessities of the people at the time. Let us not put into this Constitution something, which I tell you, gentlemen of this Convention, in my judgment, may result in its defeat at the polls next November. Are we going to invite_absolutely invite every antagonism. every feeling of hostility that may be engendered against this Constitution, so that united, perchance, they may be able to defeat it? As I have taken occasion to say once before upon this floor, I did not come here to play politically or otherwise in constitution making. I came not here with any secret reservation that when we have gotten through I shall go forth and attempt, in so far as I may be permitted to do so, to defeat it. I desire to have this Constitution carry and settle once and forever these questions that have been agitating us for three or four years, and I deprecate the dragging in, unnecessarily, into this question a matter of this kind which cannot but help build up a large {1353} and hostile element who shall be in opposition to the ratification of this Constitution. And why should we? Why are

we called upon to do it? Why not leave every institution of the State just as it is, just as it always has been, subject to the control of the Legislature, who will presumably act in obedience to the demands and interests of the people.

In that view of the case, sir, it seems to me that it is just simply taking up time unnecessarily to discuss the propriety or the advantage of union or non-union. We take these institutions as we find them. We are not sent here to enact a code of laws governing institutions of learning, nor to permanently and irrevocably, as it were, dispose of the question which was not and has not been considered by this people. We were supposed to take everything, so far as the State institutions were concerned, and their locations, as they are found and to frame a Constitution which should limit only the powers of the Legislature, not entirely, but should contain such restrictions and those only as should be necessary to preserve the freedom and the quality of the people, and that is all, and when we have accomplished that, we have done all that we were sent here to do, and the people still retain the power as they have it now, and have had it heretofore, to dispose of these questions as in their judgment they shall see fit. I would like to see this substitute that is suggested by Mr. Thurman. I do not know of course how it shall be framed, but the underlying thought of it meets with my approbation and I would like to see it adopted and incorporated in this Constitution, and in that view I trust that this substitute, however it shall be amended, shall be voted down. I submit, Mr. President, that if gentlemen will stop just fora moment and see the signs of this Convention they need not go any farther. They will appreciate the solemnity of this question as it shall and will affect the people in the different sections whose interests are at stake here, and they will pause long before they undertake such a radical change as this_the more radical because it is proposed to be made permanent in the organic law. I say that the university of Utah and the agricultural college can wait_wait as the people of this State must wait until the people shall be enabled to take care of them as they shall be taken care of. They are not alone to be considered in this question. The grave responsibilities, the serious expenses of the new State government are taxing the judgments of those who are called upon to investigate and consider them. Let them wait. Go along as best you can. You may safely rely upon the honor and good faith of the people by whose suffrages they were established in the future, as occasion may serve to perpetuate and maintain them in accordance with the dignity they have and should have. I ask you now to stop and think of this question. Do not let it degenerate into a log rolling proposition, and that is where you are coming to, “if you will vote for my place I will vote for yours.” When you dispose of this, you will have this other matter coming up between the other State institutions or you may have, and you will not be dealing with this question with the dignity and with the propriety that it should be dealt with. I submit to vote down this amendment or proposition as a whole and leave the matter open to the Legislature as it ought to be without any mandate or without any restriction except that until otherwise provided by law, these separate institutions shall remain as now existing.

Mr. CHIDESTER. Mr. President, the thoughts expressed by Mr. Thurman and Mr. Varian are my own. [Laughter and applause]. They were not my own thoughts; I had them before they expressed them. [Laughter.]

Mr. THURMAN. I did not suppose you were going to give us away.
{1354}

Mr. VARIAN. I want to ask the gentleman a question. If it is desirable to test the sense of this Convention upon the question of union, why not make a motion to indefinitely postpone the substitute and the amendments offered, and if that should be carried that would settle the question of union. If it should not be carried, it would determine the sense of the house the other way, and we would go on with the amendment.

Mr. CHIDESTER. That is just exactly what I would like to see done. [Laughter.]

Mr. BUTTON. Mr. President, haven't we a right to ask a division of that question, when it is put?

The PRESIDENT. Yes, sir.

Mr. CHIDESTER. Well, I ask for it.

Mr. CREER. And the capitol building?

Mr. THATCHER. And she ought to have the population of the Territory, and no doubt would have, if our people who work on the farms could only move their farms here. Now, the real facts are, that if we could get together all in one county and develop that, perhaps it would be better for us. Who, that has had experience in sending their children abroad, does not know that when a student is sent away from home, and, therefore, is separated from his companions in amusement, he makes more progress in three years than he would make at home in four? If any one will take the pains to examine the records of the university here, and take the number of students who have attended that institution during the past forty-five years, you will find that the predominance as to numbers are from Salt Lake, but you will not find that the graduating classes are on that side. It is just so at Logan. It is the students that come from abroad, that leave the horses and the sleighs, and the theaters, and the parties, and the amusements, behind them, and come away from home for the purpose of securing an education that may be of advantage to them. Thus, those who have graduated in the colleges north have been from the poor families, and not from the wealthy, so that it is an advantage to send students abroad. I repudiate the idea that the north comes here asking this Territory for anything. I have studied economics enough to know that the populous centers always want to become to a state what Paris is to France. I comprehend fully that these large capital cities are like the eastern watershed, all draining into the {1356} Missouri, and

thence into the Mississippi, and thence into the Gulf of Mexico. We in the country understand that perfectly well; but we also understand that cities could not prosper unless there were country people who followed the plow, and who followed, therefore, agricultural pursuits. I, therefore, gentlemen of the Convention, stand just where I did Saturday, although, heretofore, I thought myself a strong unionist, but the more I hear this question discussed, the more I am convinced that these institutions ought to be apart and not joined, and I shall vote against this proposition to carry the university to Logan. I do not think it belongs there at all. I think it belongs where it is, and that the agricultural college belongs just where it is. And I disclaim this thought, too, that the people of the north have desired the university to be taken there, and I repudiate any such insinuation. It never has come from the people.

If, on the other hand, this body of men think it better to unite them and bring them here to Salt Lake, well and good, and I do not think it will affect very materially the vote on the Constitution. I do not think the people of the north are made of that kind of stuff at all, and it is possible that if you leave those buildings there, we could refer to them as the monument of the folly of the past, and perhaps we may invite our neighbor on the north to come down and occupy them, as they have no university building. I think likely they would be glad to join with us and build another institution there. Idaho is in our condition_very poor, and I refer to this matter, because the agricultural college has students from Idaho, from Montana, from Wyoming, and when you come to consider that fact, then it is centrally located, and you, gentlemen, know how far Logan is from Salt Lake_three hours. The idea that we could not take minerals from here to Logan and thus test them, that is no argument to me. Just one word on the water question; if we had a million dollars' worth of buildings on this bench, where is the guaranty of the water referred to? I remember that they wanted us to build the sugar factory up on the dry bench, but we thought we had better have an assured thing than a promise, and if I have read correctly, the chief question before the city council the other evening was how to increase the water supply of this city, and I do not think my memory fails me, when I refer back two or three years ago and see the lawns and the trees of this city burning up for want of water. You can remove the university to Logan without cost materially, if you so choose, and the agricultural college, so far as buildings are concerned, can take care of it without any effort whatever. Can you remove the college to Salt Lake City and take care of it? That is the question. One more proposition; thirty years ago I voted for an appropriation for the university, and I challenge this proposition before this honorable body of men, and while I am connected with the university, and as I stated before, it has my sympathy, I stand without any hesitancy in this declaration, that the university, backed up by all this population referred to by the speaker here, Mr. Cannon, does not show the progress that the agricultural college shows. In three years there has been built up in that north country a love of education that has not been built up here in ten years. You may have your capitol building on the hill, and your penitentiary on the left, and your fair buildings here, and we will contribute with our trade to keep those institutions going, we will maintain the friendliest possible relation with the city in which we also have a pride, because the city of Salt Lake is a part of Utah Territory, but, gentlemen, you in Salt Lake City and the surrounding counties here, in the sustaining of that university, have not testified your affection for education as {1357} the people of the north have done. It takes more than a legislative appropriation to build a school. It takes more than congressional grants to make a college or a university. You must have the people in that vicinity in full sympathy with it, working for it, and that is the history of the success of the agricultural

college and what it has gained in three years'.

I desire, while on my feet, to correct a statement made here the other day in reference to the attendance of the college now. I was appealed to as to the numbers that attended that school during the winter. Professor Paul tells me that the registered number was 357; I stated 360; I was out three. It was said that the present attendance was 145. He stated to me when I last saw him on Saturday that the present attendance is 265. Now, gentlemen, I do not think that the Legislature should be left to settle this question, but let this body settle it. I shall vote just as I voted on Saturday, for separation. Then, I would like to see the college established at Logan, so that the people who are working for it may continue to do so. If you leave it in doubt to be made a football by legislatures, as they change their political complexion, I fear that you will do one of the educational institutions of this Territory, if not two, very great damage, and whatever may be said of the capitol building, or of the penitentiary, or of the reform school or other State institutions, at least if we can, let us separate these two educational institutions from politics, and build them upon a foundation that we at least can refer to it with pride, if we may not make them compete in a few years with the eastern colleges. I do not think that the students from Utah will graduate in medicine or in law for a quarter of a century in Utah. If we had millions of money, it would not accomplish that. It takes an age. I can tell you that there are no schools in the United States that will satisfy some of the boys even now. The desire to go to college and they mean to go to the college, and they not only go to Harvard and Cornell, but they go to Berlin and to Oxford and Cambridge. These are my sentiments, and whatever this body decides to do, unite or separate, let us settle this question. I thank you, gentlemen. [Applause.]

Mr. GOODWIN. Mr. President, I think when we consider the character of the last gentleman who has spoken and the intensity of feeling which he displayed all the more by his efforts to repress it, it ought to be a sign to us that we are in rather deep water, notwithstanding the intimation that has been thrown out that this place is more or less short of water. I only want to ask a question. The progress of the university in this city has been for the last few years referred to and the charge has been made direct, that this city has made no such a demonstration in favor of education as has been made in the north. The gentleman is laboring under a mistake. We have done more for education in this city in the last five years than has been done in all the outside counties in this Territory for the last forty-seven years, and the reason the university has pot increased and improved and attained that eminence that it ought to is simply because the common schools and the high schools were neglected and the students that went to the university were not fit to be in the university.

Mr. THATCHER. Will the judge allow me to correct him on that point?

Mr. GOODWIN. Certainly.

Mr. THATCHER. I did not intend to refer in any manner to the district schools, but simply to these higher institutions, the agricultural college and the university.

Mr. GOODWIN. I understand, Mr. Thatcher, and that is why I am saying that this year there will be sixty graduates from our high school, next year {1358} over a hundred, three years hence,

there will be three hundred, and when those young men and young women get into the university, then you will hear something; simply because they will come prepared to take a university course. Only one more thing that I want to call your attention to. Boys will go from here and they will go from Logan, and they will go from the south to eastern and western colleges. They ought to, if their parents are able to send them, because all that a boy learns in school is only a little of what he knows in this world. The east is filled with educated men who are educated idiots. They draw a little horizon of their own around them and believe that the state of Massachusetts, or the state of Connecticut, or the state of Rhode Island, is the very end of the earth, and that a man that is born and reared outside of that is so unfortunate that he will never get over it, in all his life. They ought to be forced as soon as they graduate, if not before, to be turned into the west to rustle. And so I approve of the boys here going east for education, and that spirit is growing all over the east, and men of the east are thinking it will be better to send their sons west, that outside of the books they can learn the character of their fellow citizens in other cities.
That is why the university ought to be in this city, because Salt Lake City is better known east than Logan. It is probably because the bad is always more notorious than the good. There are people east that consider the climate and the other advantages of this region, who would be glad to send them here to be educated. They won't send them to Logan. Now, we hear that this city is all right, but it has to be supported by the country outside. That is, the people have to raise crops. That is not quite according to the standard of what this Convention ought to be. The man that works is the man that is entitled to respect, and it does not matter whether he is behind the plow or wields the pick, or for that matter, if he is engaged in making something that the man that follows the plow and that wields the pick needs, and if the effort is an effort of the brain, that is all the more honorable, because men that work their brains wear out sooner than those who simply work their bodies. But as to local pride in the matter, that ought to be waived. We ought not to do anything here that will create friction. I believe that this city, if let alone, will itself, through the natural generosity and public spirit of its people and the support which shall naturally come to it from the outside, build up here in course of time a magnificent university, and nothing but time will ever complete a university. When our high schools will begin to turn out their graduates we will take care of the university and stop all friction and all feeling. I move the indefinite postponement of both the amendment and the original motion.

Mr. VAN HORNE. Mr. President, I think that we should consider with some care the question of the indefinite postponement of these motions. I think we should consider very carefully the question of whether the good of our educational institutions is to be advanced by continued agitation, with regard to where they are located or to be located. I do not believe that it is in the interest of higher education in Utah that the institutions of higher education should have no local habitation or name. I believe that the sooner we determine_the people of our Territory determine where our institutions of learning shall be located, the sooner will begin that growth of higher education which we all desire. For that reason, I intend to oppose the indefinite postponement of this question. Gentlemen, it seems to me, without studying the question of the location of the university, one very important consideration has been left out, and that {1359} consideration is this, the reason why there has not been university growth has been indicated by the gentleman from Salt Lake. There was not the material to enter the university courses. You all know what the legislation of our Territory has been. It has provided for sending from different counties of the Territory students to the university, and part of whose expenses at least should be borne from the

territorial treasury. Unfortunately the system of schools in our Territory has been such that under such an arrangement as that, we found that they were scarcely able to enter a properly graded grammar school.

It was the discussion of such matters as that that led the educators of this town into the belief and the firm conviction that we should establish a system of graded schools here continuing on up into the high school, and making students of the high school so far advanced in learning that upon their graduation from the high school, they could become proper material for a university course. Matters of that kind take time, and the time is just ripe for us to have classes in a university who are competent to enter upon a university course. Now, gentlemen, the thing, as it seems to me, that has been omitted in this discussion is this, that as this high school rolls out this year sixty, next year a hundred, the year after that two hundred, the year after that three hundred graduates, who are ready to enter upon a university course, you must have a university for them in some way, and if the Territory does not provide it there will be a sectarian university of some kind started here to give the higher learning to those very pupils from our high schools. Gentlemen say that men should be sent away for their higher learning. Yes, when they can be sent away, by all manner of means. Interchange of citizens between one state and another_but that means money_that means resources on the part of those who are studying that not all of us can have. And gentlemen, the history of the great institutions, the history of Harvard, of Yale, and of Cornell, if you care to look at their catalogues, will show that they educate the people at their doors as their main work, and as their incidental work, their great character as institutions of learning bring to them from all over the country this, that, and the other man who is able to leave his home for the purpose of education.

Now, gentlemen, if we move away from the center of population, if we move from the center that furnishes the material_the students who can enter upon a university course, the university itself, and compel them to move away from home, in order to attend the university, they will attend, not the university of Utah, but they will attend Harvard, or Yale, or Cornell, or Columbia, or some other college, but in doing that you will say to them, “Gentlemen, you must have at your command three, four, five, six, seven, eight hundred dollars a year in order to enter upon this university course and attain the education that you desire.” Do we want to say to our people of Utah, “We will not furnish you in the most convenient place for your attendance a university that will teach you what you need at your homes, but will force you to move away and put upon you the inconvenience of moving away from your home to a university in Utah, or moving away from your home to a university outside of the boundaries of our State?” It seems to me such a policy as that would be futile and absurd. There are other questions with regard to location that it seems to me ought to be considered and many of them have been mentioned.

I call attention to one other, that the libraries of the Territory are in this city; aside from the professional and technical libraries here, there is a public library, containing some eight or ten {1360} thousand volumes, many books of reference that are rare and costly, that is completely at the use of the students of the university here. That is the universal custom in all centers of learning, that whatever libraries there may be, are thrown open to the students of the universities and colleges. Here we have what can be thrown open to them_another reason why the university itself should never be moved from this city. If, gentlemen, we had pursued throughout the course

of our work here in this Convention the uniform policy of leaving to the Legislature all that might properly be left to it, and attempting in no wise to interfere with their action, there might be greater weight in the argument that this is a legislative question and should be left to the Legislature, but I leave it to the candor of the delegates of this Convention if that has been the course pursued, and if it has not been the course pursued here, why on this question? This is one of agitation, it is one, as they say, that may degenerate into log rolling in this Convention; where we cannot trust the Legislature in other affairs, why should we trust them with the log rolling question of location of public institutions? Do gentlemen think a continued agitation before legislative bodies of this question of the location of an institution here or an institution there, or a consolidation here or a consolidation there, or a separation of the different departments of learning into branches at one or the other place, is a desirable thing to perpetuate in this new State of Utah?

I say, gentlemen, that wherever it may be that this Convention finally determines the site of the university and of the agricultural college, whether it decides they shall be united or separated, this body is as fairly representative of the people in that respect and knows as much about the question as any Legislature you are liable to get; and more than that, the uniform tendency of this body has been to say, “We are the people, wisdom will die with us, and we will settle the question for the people, and we had better do it.”

Thereupon the Convention took a recess until 2 o'clock p. m.

AFTERNOON SESSION.

Mr. ANDERSON. Mr. President and gentlemen of the Convention, in consideration of Mr. Peterson agreeing to withdraw his substitute, I wish to withdraw my amendment to his substitute.

Mr. PETERSON. Mr. President, I also wish to withdraw the substitute that I offered.

Mr. Chidester offered the following amendment to section 4:

Insert at the beginning of the section the words, “until otherwise provided by law.”

Mr. CHIDESTER. Mr. President, I do not wish to say anything on that. I merely wish to test the sense of the house.

Mr. EICHNOR. I would like to ask the gentleman from Garfield a question. Your amendment is “until otherwise provided by law.” Is that to qualify the whole section?

Mr. CHIDESTER. Yes, sir.

Mr. EICHNOR. Or simply the location?

Mr. CHIDESTER. I think that is the effect of it.

Mr. CHIDESTER. Mr. President, I will withdraw the amendment with the consent of my second, for the reason that I think it goes too far.

Section 6 was read.

Mr. CANNON. Mr. President, this morning my understanding was that a proposition was favored by a number of gentlemen, providing for union, but leaving to the Legislature the matter of location. I am certainly in favor of that and I desire to introduce as a substitute for section 4, the following: “The university of Utah shall comprise all departments and institutes of higher learning in the public school system, including the school of mines, agricultural college, the state normal school, and such other departments and institutes as may be established by law, and shall be located as may be determined by the Legislature.”

Mr. HART. Mr. President, I arise to a point of order. We have passed that section and we are now considering section 6.

Mr. CANNON. Mr. President, I insist that the whole matter is open for amendment. We have the right to amend any part of this article that we see fit to do. The fact that it was passed for a moment would not debar us from changing anything that might be desirable to change.

The PRESIDENT. The chair will entertain the substitute.

Mr. HART. Mr. President, I just wished to make a remark on it first. If the chair please, we have adopted the section here both in committee of the whole and upon third reading. We are considering the propositions in the order in which they are presented, and after a section is passed it has been the unanimous custom here to pass it for the time being. The only contrary position we have taken or the only amendments that have been permitted to sections that are passed are after we have gone through the whole bill. Now,. Mr. President, if the gentleman wishes. to introduce his amendment, wait until we get to the last section. We have passed that for the time being. I understand that after we go through the third reading of each paragraph, one by one, to the end of the article, amendments can be made to propositions that have been passed, but if we

are going to dodge back from one section to the other after we have passed them, we will reverse the order that we have adopted heretofore and all parliamentary proceedings. Let the gentleman wait until we get through the third reading and then let him go back.

Mr. THORESON. Mr. President, I arise to a point of order. There is no. motion before the house. We are now considering section 7.

The PRESIDENT. The chair decided that he would entertain this substitute.

Mr. CANNON. Mr. President, I arise to a point of order. My point of order is that the gentleman from Cache is out of order. The chair ruled it was before the house.

Mr. CREER. I appeal from the ruling of the chair.

Mr. HALLIDAY. So do I.

Mr. CREER. I claim that it is the {1362} uniform rule in all legislative bodies in taking up bills on their third reading by sections that we must go along regularly by sections until we get through, and then the bill can be amended in any particular.

Mr. THURMAN. I hope the gentleman will withdraw his substitute until we get through the article.

Mr. KIMBALL (Weber). I want to call attention of the chair and the Convention to a ruling made by the chair while the legislative article was under discussion. My next door neighbor here, after reading of the last section_the one offered by Mr. Varian, offered an amendment to it, and Mr. Varian raised the point of order then that no amendment to that section could be made as it had been passed before that time. The chair so ruled and that was the ruling of the house and the point of order taken by Mr. Varian was sustained. That was the decision of the house and should be the decision at this time, if we are to maintain the order as the chair has already announced it, else we will be at sea during the whole session of this Convention, as to what the rules of the house are.

Mr. CANNON. Do you interpret it, Mr. Kimball, that we cannot amend any section that we have passed?

Mr. KIMBALL (Weber). No, sir. When we have read all of these sections, then you can go back to any one of them before the yeas and nays are taken.

Mr. CANNON. Mr. President, I simply withdraw this substitute and give notice that I wish to introduce it when the time comes.

Sections 7 and 8 were read.

Mr. KERR. Mr. President, I desire to offer the following as section 9, to come in between section

8 and section 9:

In cities of the first and second class, the public school system shall be maintained and controlled by the board of education of such cities, separate and apart from the counties in which said cities are located.

Mr. KERR. I desire to state by way of explanation that at present, cities of the first and second class have to get their money from the State and also the voters in the cities of the first and second class vote for the county superintendents, and yet these superintendents have absolutely nothing whatever to do with the city schools. It seems to me, therefore, these schools should be entirely separate from the county schools and independent of the county superintendent.

The proposed section was adopted.

Mr. VARIAN. Mr. President, I just Avant to call attention to the fact that section 8, as I recollect it, in some degree may conflict with a section in the executive article. That ought to be borne in mind and not lost sight of when we come to arrange the different articles. I think that article provides that the superintendent of public instruction shall have general supervision. I only speak of it that members

The PRESIDENT. That calls the attention of the chairman of the committee on compilation and arrangement to that, then.

Mr. VARIAN. Well, we ought to remember it.

Sections 9 and 10 were read.

Mr. RICKS. Mr. President, there is a point in section 10 I would like to call to the attention of the Convention, and that is commencing in line 2:

All property belonging to schools for the deaf and dumb, heretofore connected with the university of Utah, shall be transferred to said institution.

Mr. CANNON. I would like to ask the gentleman a question. As I understand it, there is a building that belongs to these institutions that will be stricken out by this provision. I am not on the committee. I do not know what the purpose of the committee was. I simply took it to be that they meant to remain with the university the building, if there is a building, connected with it, or something of that character.

Mr. CANNON. You notice the language is “heretofore connected with the university.” If it was already there would you desire to strike that out and take it away?

Mr. RICKS. If there is anything there that would interfere with the transfer of that property back, if that construction could be placed upon it, I would not be in favor of that motion, but it seems to me it cannot relate to anything that heretofore belonged to the institution.

The PRESIDENT. Maybe the chairman of the committee could make answer as to what their design was in regard to it.

Mr. PIERCE. My own idea was that the clause can go out safely; that the property belonging to the institution should follow it wherever it goes. We put it in so that the property belonging to the deaf and dumb institution should follow it wherever it goes. I think it would be safe to strike it out.

Mr. RICKS. My attention is called to the fact that this provides for a transfer of the property to the school for the deaf and dumb instead of to the university. If that is the idea, I withdraw my motion.

Sections 11 and 12 were read.

Mr. CANNON. Mr. President, I now desire to renew my motion to substitute for section 4 that section which I read.

Mr. ROBERTS. I wish to ask the mover of that substitute if the effect of his substitute is not to undo the work of yesterday and refer this whole subject to the Legislature?

Mr. CANNON. Mr. President, I would answer that by stating that this morning when the two propositions were before the house, this substitute, or about the exact language, was proposed by several gentlemen who said that they would favor it if they could have it introduced, but it was not then in order and after those were withdrawn this is introduced that it may test the sense of the Convention.

Mr. ROBERTS. I would like to ask the mover of the substitute another question, and that is if the substitute does not unite the two institutions?

Mr. CANNON. The substitute provides that they shall be united. The question of location is left to the Legislature.

Mr. ROBERTS. Mr. President, the attempt was made shortly after this session of the Convention,

opened by the gentleman from Garfield, to accomplish the same purpose now contemplated in the substitute by preceding section 4 with the words “until otherwise provided by law.” I think, sir, that the sense of the house has been tested several times now upon the question of leaving the location of the university and of the agricultural college to the Legislature, and I believe so far that every time it has resulted in a refusal to do that. I hope that it will again refuse to do it. I do not want to see {1364} the work of the last few days utterly lost either to this Convention or to the people of Utah. If there is anything in this Territory that has been a vexed question, it is the question now before the house. The Legislature has had a trial at the solution and it would seem that it has judged itself incompetent to bring about the result that has been sought for in the agitation of this question in the Convention, namely, a union of these institutions. I was satisfied, sir, with the result of the work that was accomplished on yesterday, and was perfectly willing to let the matter stand as it was settled by this house yesterday. This morning, however, gentlemen approached me and stated that they were confident that two-thirds of the gentlemen upon this floor were ready to vote for union of these institutions at Logan. I had no confidence in that assertion. That is, I believe those who told me were mistaken. I have more reason now to believe that they were mistaken than before the discussion took place this morning. No sooner was the motion made for union at Logan than, of course, another motion was made amending the former, asking for union at Salt Lake City. I was convinced from the commencement that whenever you decide for union or whenever you decide to postpone this matter to be dealt with by the Legislature, fixing union now_I tell you, gentlemen, it cannot be disguised, it means union at Salt Lake City. I wish to say further that I am firmly fixed in my own opinion that union with the agricultural college of the university at Salt City, means the destruction practically of the agricultural college and the beneficial effects which would flow to this community from it. You will argue in vain to remove that conviction from my mind, and I am also firmly convinced that this Territory in its present educational status is more in need of the agricultural college and the industrial education that it contemplates than we are in need of the university.

Talking about our rivaling Cornell or Harvard or these great institutions of the country, and bringing all the ends of the earth together in search of higher education in Utah, I pronounce that an iridescent dream within the present century at least. It is all nonsense, it requires age, it requires reputation; we cannot hope in the next century to rival these institutions of learning; but what we can do, what is within the lines of possibility for us to do, is to make it, sir, in the line of industrial education, and we can make our agricultural college the center of that kind of education within this entire intermountain region. That is within the line of possibility, but you leave this question to be bandied about by future Legislatures, as it was bandied about by the legislation that has taken place in the past, and you mean to paralyze all our efforts at higher education in the next five or ten years. I am not willing that it should be left to the Legislature when we are so nearly within the settlement of this question. Settle it now, and tell you that one year, two years will not pass by until you discover that you have conferred great benefits upon the people of Utah. I am willing, sir, to go as far as any other man in leaving as much of legislation as possible to the Legislature. But I am not willing to skip this important question and shuffle it off on future Legislatures. We can settle it now, and that is the proper thing to do, and I tell you, gentlemen, that these efforts at getting the principle of union of these institutions means union right here in Salt Lake City. I want to emphasize that, and the gentleman that offers the substitute knows that well, and I believe is as much confirmed in it as I am. We heard a good deal of

patriotic talk this morning in relation to being willing to unite these institutions, even if the union had to take {1365} place at Logan, but the moment that the amendment to that first motion came in, you heard no more patriotic speeches about uniting at Logan. I was told here in private conversation that it might be illustrated by the two women who in ancient times came before King Solomon, one with a live infant and another with a dead one, and gentlemen were willing to give up the live infant and let it go to Logan, and when gentlemen were speaking upon that question, I listened anxiously for a willingness expressed on their part for a union to take place at Logan, but I listened in vain for giving up the live child and letting it rest peacefully in the arms of Logan. I rather fancy that the mother of the dead child was pleading here for the live one. Now, I am opposed to having this question disturbed, for one, as fixed by the action of the committee here yesterday. I have some remarks to offer upon the question of location, as I believe that this is still a question involved in this consideration. If gentlemen are still patriotic enough to vote for union at Logan, I am of the opinion that the sacrifices that will be required in buildings and in building sites will not be very serious.

In the first place, sir, I do not believe that a removal of that kind would involve the loss of the site granted by Congress to the university. When Utah is a Territory or while Utah is a Territory and with only a delegate in the halls of the national council, I find, sir, that she still has influence enough to have such a munificent grant made in aid of her higher institutions of learning, on the condition that she erects buildings on that site within a period, I think, of five years. As a prominent educator said to me this morning, we can still have that site for the asking and without complying with those conditions stipulated in the act. I am pleased also to state that that is the opinion of the delegate to Congress from this Territory. I am quite satisfied myself that when Utah shall have two senators in the senate and a representative in the house, that grant can still be secured without the conditions that are now fixed upon it. So that if the university shall be moved from here to Logan, I feel satisfied that we shall not sacrifice this beautiful site that is spoken of, and on the other hand, if we remove from the square the building where the university is now located, I think on the whole that will not be a very serious sacrifice, for the reason that it reverts to Salt Lake City and Salt Lake City is sorely in need of that building and that site for its high school. So that there will not be entailed the amount of sacrifice if the university is removed to Logan that would be entailed if we remove the agricultural college from Logan to Salt Lake City, for the reason that there is no practical use to which those buildings can be put if you remove the agricultural college from Logan, and hence, they would be useless to the city and useless to the State. So, sir, I was willing to vote for this motion that would take the university to Logan, if the majority of this Convention desires to do that. I am willing to vote with them for it, but I am not willing to give my vote to destroying the one educational institution in this Territory that the people need above all others. And when I think of the future establishment of the university here within easy reach of the military emcampment [*note*], I am not carried away with my admiration for a site of that kind. I think, sir, that such a neighbor as that is very undesirable for an educational institution, that there is serious objection to such close proximity of an institution of learning, with the young that would be there to be dazzled by the equipage and glitter of soldiers, to come in contact with the immoral atmosphere that seems almost inseparably connected with the kind of life {1366} forced upon the average soldier. I am willing, therefore, to use what influence I can for union at Logan if that is what gentlemen mean, but I do protest against gentlemen thinking that we can be hoodwinked into believing that to settle the question

of union now and leave the rest all to the Legislature does not mean a future agitation for union here in Salt Lake City. Therefore, I object to this amendment.

Mr. FARR. Mr. President, I very much desired to say a few words upon this subject all the forenoon, but I knew that there were so many that wished to speak, that are plumb full of gas, and if they did not let it off, there would be an explosion, hence I gave way. I like to hear that kind of gas, hear both sides. One fellow gets up and he tells his story so admirably here we all think that he has got the case. The other fellow gets up and he tells his story right in direct opposition to him, precisely, why he has got the case. Well, now, what does all this show? It shows that we are a lot of boys here together, that is what it shows, like the boy building a cob house, another boy throws a cob and knocks it all over. Now, I think it is time that we got down to business on that business. I have been here in this Territory as long as any of you, I do not care who they are, and I have been particularly friendly in favor of the university being established here in Salt Lake City, and I have had but one mind, that it should stay here all the time. If there had been a majority vote to take it to Logan, you would have found my vote against it. It must stay here and we are going to build it up and we are going to make one of the greatest universities in the United States, and you will find the greatest learned men will eminatefrom this university, but I can tell you another thing. We have gone to work and established an agricultural college at Logan, the best place that I know of in Utah. We have just got it completed, spent some two hundred and fifty thousand dollars, and here come some men with some fine speeches and knock it all over, like the boy throwing a cob against the cob house, just when we get it built, they want to throw it back to some other place. I trust we will not act as boys, but like men. I take great pleasure in going to that college and visiting it. It has a fine location; it has one of the healthiest spots there are in Utah, the finest water power I know of, an abundance of water, a good soil, and a climate that you can raise all the vegetables and most of the fruits, some fruits you cannot raise, but most of the fruits you can raise there, as fine as there are in Utah, and it has a fine climate, and a healthy spot and everything is reasonable and cheap, and I say we should sustain that. The argument is here, why it is going to cost so much, let us be united, union is power. I tell you, gentlemen, the agricultural college can be supported cheaper up there than it can be down here and the university can be supported here_in time have plenty of means and plenty of appropriations made and donations to the university to make a grand exhibition. I do not care whether it is fixed at Fort Douglas, or whether it is a mile or two south or half a mile south. I don't care anything about it, or whether it is down here on Union square, it matters not to me, but Salt Lake City is the place for the university. It was established hereby wise men, men that built up the country and came here first, and it should stay here, and I am in for it here, all the time, and I am in for the college to remain at Logan where it is now, and I am in for another thing, that we fix it now, right here.

This idea of leaving all to the next Legislature to quarrel and wrangle, over, have so many fine speeches that we have had here over it, and spend half of the session, and a few thousand or a few hundred thousand dollars in wrangling over that from session to {1367} session, I am opposed to it. I say, let us fix it, and have the agricultural college at Logan, the facilities being all there, and let us have the university and be united in it. Why, bless you, children coming here to the university get positions, or in other words go to school, they go to the general superintendent and they tell him what they want. “Now, what is your advice in regard to where we shall go?”

Why, says he, go to the agricultural college if you want to study those branches. They go there understandingly and without any acrimony, or feelings about it, and the agricultural college in the same way sends the students and scholars that come to school down here as being the best place for the university, because the branches were agreed upon. The management at the agricultural college and the management at university understand each other, and it is mutually arranged that such a class of children shall be at one college and the other at the other, hence, where there is union there is power; they move together as one. There need not be any feeling about it. Let us be united and sustain them both. I do not wish to take up your time, but I felt as though I ought to make these few remarks, having the experience that I have here in this country. And the location of these_do not let us go to work and break this up when they are just built up. Let us go to work like men and fix the thing to-day.

Mr. CREER. Mr. President, I move the previous question.

Mr. EICHNOR. Mr. President_

Mr. SQUIRES. It is not debatable.

Mr. EICHNOR. It may not be debatable. Mr. Cannon out of courtesy ought to have the privilege of debating it.

Mr. CANNON. That is all right.

The motion for the previous question was rejected.

Mr. EVANS (Weber). Mr. President, I had hoped that this matter would be terminated without the great delay which has taken place, but I can see now that we are confronted with a somewhat serious condition of things. I believe that the proposition now before the Convention means simply this, that if the substitute of Mr. Cannon be adopted, it will result in rooting up the agricultural college which has been located at Logan City. I do not believe under the present conditions that that ought to be the case. If it were an original proposition, I should readily accede to the arguments of gentlemen who have spoken in favor of union, but with the present condition of things confronting us, as they are, together with our present financial condition and together with the fact that the location of the college has been at Logan for some years, and also in addition to that the embitterments of feeling which would naturally arise out of taking the college from Logan, I am in favor of this Constitutional Convention settling these institutions in the locality where they are at present. [Applause.]

Gentlemen, there is no use disguising the fact that at Logan a quarter of a million dollars has been expended, that the people of Logan and Cache County have prided themselves in the establishment of the agricultural college there. They have supported it With their influence, they have been loyal in carrying out its objects, and to take it from those people now, under the present financial conditions of the Territory, I believe would be wrong, and would work an injustice to not only those people, but to all the people of Utah Territory. They have, as has been stated here, an abundance of pure, clear water, they have an abundance of fertile soil, the climate

is exhilarating, and healthful. It is removed from influences which would surround the children of the school, if it were established in Salt Lake City. I believe with my friend, Mr. Roberts, from Davis County, that the agricultural college {1368} will be conducive to more good than would the university, if one or the other had to be dispensed with. Let us settle the question here and now. Let us leave the institution at Logan where it is established; let us not destroy a quarter of a million dollars' worth of property which ha been properly expended there by the consent of the Legislature of the Territory, and let the university stay here where it is. Why, gentlemen, speaking upon the other question of the location of both of them in this city, however desirable it may be upon the part of some, certainly it never can be properly done upon the location granted by the act of Congress. I am informed that upon the east of the location is Fort Douglas, the military establishment, and on the north and the south are two grave yards, and on the west a brewery. Just think of such environments for children, where children might go and be educated, and think too, gentlemen, of the evil influences that might surround those people in a metropolitan city, such as Salt Lake is. All these things are not in existence at Logan. It was established there in the wisdom of the Legislature of Utah, and I believe properly established there, and ought to remain there. As my friend, Mr. Roberts, has suggested, it was reconfirmed by the last Legislature. Gentlemen, just so sure as this substitute of Mr. Cannon be adopted, just that sure will the agricultural college be taken from its moorings and destroyed, and the property which has been established there at the expense of the people of Utah, lost to us. Is it right to do it under our present financial condition? I hold that it is not, and that it is infinitely better_it will be more satisfactory every where throughout Utah, if we leave these institutions as they are now established, under the section as it is before the substitute was offered by Mr. Cannon.
And, gentlemen, I beg of you that you support the section as it now stands. I believe it is for our interest to do it, notwithstanding the theories which have been advanced by those who are better able to judge in educational matters than we are. It is a plain practical question. As has been stated, it is a condition that confronts us and not a theory at all. Let us accept the conditions as the people of Utah have formed them, and leave them in the condition that they are now.

Mr. LOW (Cache). Mr. President, I desire only to read from sections 8 and 12 of the act establishing the agricultural college. (Reads.)

I desire to say in reply to the gentleman's accusation this morning upon the floor_he made the insinuation, I believe jokingly, that in Cache County it was necessary to grow onions under a glass. I call the gentleman to witness that the best onions in Utah Territory are grown in Cache County. I also desire to state here without fear of contradiction, another statement that the gentleman produced this morning, which he is not able to sustain, that there are more students from all the surrounding counties adjoining Salt Lake County attending the agricultural college, situated in the northern part of Utah, than attend the university to-day. I spoke to the gentleman from Summit, who said that they had four to one_four students attending the agricultural college to-day where there was one attending the university. And the same will apply to the other counties. Utah County has more students in the agricultural college than they have in the university of Utah. Why? Because that institution is fulfilling the objects of its creation, as read from sections 8 and 12 of the enactment which I have just read to you.

Mr. RICHARDS. Mr. President, I only desire to say a few words in order that my position may

be understood on this question. I reiterate what I said on Saturday, that this question has no {1369} place before this Convention and has no place in this Constitution, and if the amendment offered by the gentleman from Salt Lake was to leave this entire question of union and of location to the Legislature, I should vote for it, but he proposes to dispose of one branch of it and not dispose of the other. I do not think I shall vote for it, and for the reason that I have stated. I do not believe that this is a matter that belongs in this Convention or that ought to have any place in this Constitution. It Is unusual. As has been pointed out, there are only three states out of forty- four which have done it. And I think we ought to leave this matter to the Legislature.

Mr. JAMES. Mr. President, if it is in order I will make a motion to amend Mr. Cannon's motion, to defer the whole matter to the Legislature.

(No second.)

Mr. KIESEL. Mr. President, I would like to say a word. I have listened to beautiful speeches of the gentlemen, professors of the university and others, and their theory sounds very nice, that is a union of those two branches of learning, but from what I know of Cache Valley, which I consider the gem of all the valleys of the intermountains, and the purpose for which the agricultural college was created, I am firmly impressed that Cache Valley, surrounded as the college is and will be by a farming population, that that is par excellence the place for an agricultural college, for all practical purposes. I should be very loth to see that institution leave Cache Valley. Cache Valley has been endowed by nature as hardly any other valley in this country. It has been called the granary of Utah. Everything grows there that grows anywhere else, and I especially want to refute the assertion that onions grow under glass, because I used to keep a store in Cache Valley in ancient days and I used to buy very large quantities of onions and ship them to Montana and elsewhere. I do not know but I shipped them to Salt Lake, where they do not grow them under glass, and as I said before, nature has done everything for that valley, and the institution ought to stay there, and you certainly, after nature has done so much for the valley and incidentally for the college, you certainly do not want to commit a crime against it.

Mr. HAMMOND. Mr. President, San Juan has got into a rather tight place. [Laughter.] Before the motion is put, I would like to explain, if I can find words to do it, my position. I am not a word painter, I have been studying men and measures, and women some_most of my life_and I am not very good at talking, but I want to state this, that if they were to be united, these institutions, and this Convention to fix their location, I was for Salt Lake all the time. Now, if they are not to be disturbed, I would vote all the time for the college to remain as it is. That is my position.

Mr. PRESTON. Mr. President, I wish to continue a few remarks that I was making awhile ago, and it was to this end, that it is too late now to talk about moving these institutions. 1888, if I remember right, was the time it was located there, was the time to have located the agricultural college in Salt Lake, but that time has gone by, and now it is the proper time for us to locate them right where they are and build them up. The country can grow for them and support them, and we will be proud after awhile that we did not move one or the other. It is too much like boy ism for legislators to meet and locate one thing here to-day and a few years after locate them somewhere

else. Let them stay where they are and let them grow up and we will be proud of them after awhile. I am opposed to the motion.

Mr. CANNON. Mr. President, in making the motion to substitute that which is desired, I did so without a desire to {1370} provoke the debate which has taken place. I was ready to vote at that time and would like to have done so without any further discussion. I believe that union is very necessary for these public institutions_our higher educational institutions in Utah. I believe that without union we will never attain the age or reputation spoken of by the gentleman from Davis County. He tells us we cannot expect to rival without age and reputation Institutions of the east. We never will acquire age unless we strive to establish our institutions so that they will have a beginning and a starting point, and if we refuse that I believe we will regret it in the end. I do not care to take up your time in giving you my views about that, because you have listened to Professor Kerr and Doctor Talmage, and to others who have spoken upon this subject and who are making it a life study. I desire to read to you for a moment the opinion of a gentleman to whom I referred yesterday, Doctor Andrew B. White, of Cornell, who closes his letter in this language:

Scatter your public institutions as much as you please through your state. Give your asylums, retreats, reformatory institutions, prisons, etc., to various localities, but I urge that you keep all your endowments for the most advanced education together, for in this way can you secure an institution strong enough to give your young men and young women an education worthy of your state and our common country.

Mr. ROBERTS. Will the gentleman yield for a question? Did that author from which you quote fully understand the condition which confronts us in this issue, and did he make the remarks in the light of all the conditions by which we are especially surrounded?

Mr. CANNON. I do not know that he had our special case in view. He speaks on general principles, and without the tinge that would be given by fixing Salt Lake or Logan. He speaks on general principles. The very discussion that has taken place here convinces me that men look at this matter from a local standpoint. The gentleman from Davis wants to know why it is, if we are so patriotic that we would move to locate it at Logan, that we do not do so at once. The reason is, I believe it is better to locate at Salt Lake, but I am willing to waive that and let the Legislature decide in the future which is the better place. It is just as patriotic for a man from Salt Lake to work for union and leave it to the Legislature as it is for a man from Logan to work for union providing union shall take place at Logan, and say that he is not working for union under any other circumstances. I desire to state this point, that I am not antagonistic to the interests of Logan. I believe that Logan has a beautiful location; I think she has many natural advantages. I believe she is naturally an educational center; I believe that her people have that sentiment which has been referred to by one of her honored delegates, and I believe that they are worthy of an institution of the character of the agricultural college. I am willing to leave it to the Legislature and let them determine whether it is for the best interests of the people of Utah that they should be united, but I should take the ground that it is for the interest of the whole people that we should unite these institutions. Thirty thousand dollars a year, it has been testified, is the amount

that can be saved when we give a proper appropriation for these institutions by uniting them. That is no trifling sum. The people of Utah are too poor and have too many burdens to afford to throw away this consideration, and I claim that it is our duty to provide now that there shall be union.
{1371}
The very fact that the gentleman to whom I referred reflected upon Salt Lake City, shows the spirit that actuates the people in different sections. I believe that he is as free from sectional feeling as any man can be, and yet he comes in and tells us here on the floor of this Convention that Logan has a higher educational spirit than Salt Lake, that Salt Lake does not have a high educational spirit. And gentlemen, it is that very feeling that causes me to say that this may be settled now. Every time your Legislature meets, there will be a delegation from Cache County asking first for an appropriation for the agricultural college, not to confine it to its original design, but to make it rival the university, claiming that they have a higher educational spirit, and that very rivalry is that which we should stamp out or it will destroy the usefulness of the two institutions. Unite them, place them under one board, and that rivalry would cease, and it is for that reason that I desire to introduce the substitute that has been proposed.

Mr. ROBERTS. I would ask the gentleman if any member from Cache County has asked for the union of these two institutions at Logan?

Mr. CANNON. Yes, sir.

Mr. ROBERTS. I will state in explanation that if there comes any request from Logan for the university then I am not aware of it. If the gentleman is, I would like to hear him answer.

Mr. CANNON. I do not state that any one had advocated it, except as advocated publicly on the floor to-day at this time, but I did state that it has been advocated by gentlemen who are for union if it can take place at Logan, and that is a fact. The public records will bear me out.

The roll was then called with the following result:

AYES_30.
Bowdle    
Brandley
Call
Cannon
Chidester
Christiansen
Coray
Corfman
Cushing
Emery
Goodwin
Green
Hammond

NOES_70.
Adams
Allen
Anderson
Barnes
Boyer
Buys
Clark
Crane
Creer
Cunningham
Driver
Eichnor
Eldredge
Engberg
Evans, Weber
Evans, Utah
Farr
Francis
Gibbs
Hart
Halliday
Hill
Howard
Hughes
Hyde
Ivins

The president declared the substitute lost,

During the roll call the following explanations were made:

Mr. KERR. Mr. President, I would like to state that I am in faver of union with reference to the place of union, but I do not favor the substitute, and therefore vote no. My reasons are that this substitute does not even fix the time when the Legislature shall unite these institutions. It leaves it entirely open to the Legislature to have wrangling and neither institution can do anything under such a dispensation.

Mr. KIMBALL (Salt Lake). I am in favor of union, but I don't want to see this left in this uncertain manner. I will consequently vote no.

Mr. RICHARDS. Mr. President, I desire to be excused from voting on this proposition, for this reason, I do not want to vote for the substitute and if I vote against the substitute it is equivalent to a vote for the section as it stands, and I do not believe in either of them, and, therefore, I ask to be excused.

Mr. FARR. He can be excused.

Mr. ELDREDGE. I object to the gentleman being excused. I do not think it is a proposition on which a man should dodge the issue.

Mr. RICHARDS. I submit, Mr. President, it is not dodging the issue in a proposition of this kind.

Mr. ELDREDGE. Then, let us get it so you cannot dodge it.

Mr. RICHARDS. I submit I have a right to ask to be excused.

The PRESIDENT, I think under the rule there is no excuse if a man is within the enclosure. He must vote aye or no.

Mr. RICHARDS. Then, I shall vote no, for the reason that I do not favor the substitute, because it does not leave the whole question to the Legislature, and I protest against having to vote because a vote of no is equivalent to a vote for the section, and that fixes the place, when it ought not to fix the place for either of those institutions. Now, I am on record. I hope the gentleman is satisfied.

The PRESIDENT. The substitute is lost, gentlemen. The question now recurs on the adoption of the article.

Mr. GIBBS. Mr. President, I wish to offer an amendment to section 2, on line 4, after the word “high school,” to insert “agricultural college,” so that it would be a part of our school system.

The amendment was agreed to.

Mr. GOODWIN. Mr. President, I am informed by the chairman of the committee on commerce and manufactures that they do not intend to report on the question of the metric system. Hence, I renew the motion I made yesterday that there be a section stating that the metric system shall be adopted in all the public schools of the State.

Mr. EICHNOR. I would like to ask a question of the gentleman who introduced that motion_that would make it compulsory to teach it even in kindergarten, the way that motion is.

Mr. WHITNEY. Let them teach it there if they can understand it.

The motion was agreed to.

Mr. MAESER. Mr. President, I desire to offer a substitute for section 4, that the union of the university of Utah and the agricultural college shall comprise all the institutions of higher learning in the public school system, including the school of mines, the state normal school, the agricultural college, and such other institutions and schools and colleges as may be established by law, and that the said union of the university and agricultural college be located at Logan, Cache County.

Mr. KIMBALL (Weber). Mr. President, {1373} I arise to a point of order, that the ayes and noes having been called on section 4, and it having passed, it is now too late to offer an amendment to it. The chair so ruled when the legislative article was under consideration under the amendment offered by Mr. Varian, and this same amendment has been voted down once or twice here this afternoon.

The PRESIDENT. I think the point of order of the gentleman is well taken.

Mr. VARIAN. Mr. President, I move the previous question on the whole article.

Mr. EVANS (Utah). Mr. President, I would like to be heard on a question of personal privilege. I want to say that if that section has been voted on this day, in any way, shape, or form, I do not remember it, and the ayes and noes were taken upon the substitute which was defeated, and I think that the gentleman from Utah County is perfectly in order. That was withdrawn. It was discussed all day, but withdrawn. That question has never been voted upon by this assemblage.

Mr. VARIAN. I withdraw the motion for the previous question. Mr. President, was there not a motion to strike out section 4 that was voted upon?

The PRESIDENT. I do not remember of a motion to strike out the section.

Mr. SQUIRES. Mr. President, in view of the fact that this matter has been discussed now for something like three days, I do not see how any new matter can come in. I move the previous question.

The previous question was ordered.

Mr. CLARK. Mr. President, if I understand the substitute, it forever settles this matter that it remain at Logan.

The PRESIDENT. That is the way the chair would understand it.

Mr. CLARK. For that reason I am opposed to it and vote no.

The roll being called on the adoption of the substitute offered by Mr. Maeser, the result was as follows:

AYES_23.
Brandley
Call
Cannon
Coray
Corfman
Evans, Utah
Gibbs
Hammond
Haynes
Ivins
Johnson
Kerr
Lambert
Maeser
Maloney
Morris
Nebeker
Partridge
Peters
Peterson, Grand
Sharp

NOES_78.
Adams
Allen
Anderson
Barnes
Bowdle
Boyer
Buys
Chidester
Christiansen
Clark
Crane
Creer
Cunningham
Cushing
Driver
Eichnor
Eldredge
Emery
Engberg
Evans, Weber
Farr
Francis
Goodwin
Green
Hart
Halliday
Heybourne
Hill
Howard
Hughes
Hyde
Larsen, C. P.
Lemmon
Lowe, Peter
Low, Cache
Lund
Mackintosh
Maughan
McFarland
Miller
Moritz

ABSENT_5.
Button    
Lewis    
Lowe, Wm.
Strevell
Symons.

Mr. SQUIRES. Mr. President, I move the previous question on the entire article.

The previous question was ordered.

The roll being called, the result was as follows:

AYES_98.
Adams
Allen
Anderson
Barnes
Bowdle
Boyer
Brandley
Buys
Call
Cannon
Chidester
Christiansen
Clark
Coray
Corfman
Crane
Creer
Cunningham
Cushing
Driver
Eichnor
Eldredge
Emery
Engberg
Evans, Weber
Evans, Utah
Farr
Francis
Gibbs
Goodwin
Green
Hammond
Hart
Haynes
Halliday
Heybourne

NOES_3.
Nebeker    
Peterson, Grand
Wells.

ABSENT_5.
Button    
Lewis    
Lowe, Wm.
Strevell
Symons.

The president declared the article adopted and referred to the committee on compilation and arrangement.

During the roll call, the following explanations were made:

Mr. CANNON. Mr. President, I am still opposed to section 4, but I vote aye on the article.

Mr. GIBBS. I am opposed to section 4. I will vote aye on the article.

Mr. HAYNES. I wish to express my disapproval of disunion, but I vote aye.

Mr. NEBEKER. Mr. President, I vote no for the reason that I think that the question of union of these two higher educational institutions overshadows every other proposition. It is a question that is of more importance than anything that can come before this Convention, in my opinion, and I think that the people of Utah will repudiate the vote that keeps them apart. I vote no. Mr.

Mr. EVANS (Utah). Mr. President, I desire to make a motion that when we take a recess, it will be until 7:30 tonight.

The motion was agreed to.

The Convention then resolved itself into committee of the whole with Mr. Evans of Weber in the chair, and resumed the consideration of the article on judiciary.

The proposed substitute for section 20 was read as follows:

Until otherwise provided by law, the salaries of the justices of the supreme court shall be three thousand dollars per year and paid quarterly out of the State treasury. The salaries of the district judges shall also be paid quarterly and by the counties comprising the respective districts in proportion to the taxable property of each and shall be in each district, until otherwise provided by law, as follows:

In the first district,__ dollars.

In the second district,__ dollars.

In the third district, $3,600.

In the fourth district,__ dollars.

In the fifth district,__ dollars.

In the sixth district,__ dollars.

In the seventh district,__ dollars.

The proposed amendment was read as follows:

The necessary expenses actually incurred by any judge in holding court in any county other than the county of his residence, including travel, shall be paid out of the State treasury.

Mr. FARR. Mr. Chairman, it is a very easy matter to raise the salary from two thousand to three thousand, should we want to or should any future Legislature want to do it, but it is a very hard

matter to get it from three thousand down to two thousand, and I find that the salary at two thousand would amount to $6.40 a day. I think under the present circumstances of the people that that is a good round sum for a judge, consequently, I am in favor of reducing and making this two thousand instead of three thousand, and certainly shall oppose the other motion which is not before the house now. I am sorry to see the feeling of some members_I hope not many_a desire to raise the salaries of officers, to put it before the people to that extent that it will create hundreds and perhaps thousand of votes against the Constitution, which I am satisfied it will accomplish, and it will be no harm if two thousand dollars is not enough. In placing it at two thousand dollars, it can be very easily raised to three thousand. I am satisfied that $6.40 a day, which is the number of working days_and I do not expect any one wishes to have them work Sundays_it would not be legal if they did. I am in hopes that this honorable body will take into consideration the propriety of making the salaries at a reasonable figure, especially under the present pressure of the people, so badly in debt, as nearly nine-tenths of the people of Utah are bankrupt, as well as the whole civilized world. They cannot pay their debts, and they go to piling it up and in these times I can tell you it will be the means of losing hundreds or thousands of votes on this. I want it understood that I am opposed to three thousand. I think that two thousand is plenty, $6.40 a day is plenty. These men have their expenses borne, or their traveling fees are. I hope this honorable body will look at that matter reasonably.

Mr. ANDERSON. Mr. Chairman and {1376} gentlemen of the committee, I am opposed to the amendment and also to the substitute. I am in favor of the section as it now stands. I think that the salaries of the judges should be paid by the State. The chief wealth of the State lies in Salt Lake and in one or two counties, and Salt Lake City would be better able to pay ten thousand dollars to her judges than some of the outlying districts will be to pay one thousand. We need just as good judges in the outlying districts as they do in Salt Lake City, and I do not think it will pay to be too economical_to cut down the salaries of our judges too low, because two or three mistakes made by a poor judge would more than amount to his yearly salary. I think that the section is about right the way it stands now, and I am opposed to both the amendment and the substitute.

EVANS (Utah). Mr. Chairman, I am not in favor of this thing exactly as it stands. However, I am opposed to the substitute and also the amendment by the gentleman from Weber. I think it is incumbent upon this State to maintain the order of the State. I believe the State ought to prosecute criminals of this State, and as was remarked by the gentleman from Weber, the rate per capita would be very small, in some of the most populous counties. I think, perhaps, I may take the liberty to speak on this question, for the reason that I happen to come from a county that would be, I presume, abundantly able_or a district, to bear their own expenses. Therefore, it will not he attributed to me as being selfish in this question, I think, but I speak upon it from principle. I believe it is the duty of this State, by their finances, to pursue the offender, to maintain peace and good order, and bring those men who transgress the laws to justice, and for that reason I am opposed to the substitute. I am opposed to the amendment for the reason that I think it is too small, and shall vote against them both, and if I shall be permitted at the proper time, I desire to offer some amendments to the section itself.

Mr. VARIAN. Mr. Chairman, I desire to state that I am willing to accept in place of my

proposition, the substitute that I understand is practically offered and will be offered, as soon as my motion is out of the way, by Judge Goodwin. I am willing to withdraw mine and let this take its place, and the question will then stand as before, upon Mr. Farr's motion to reduce the salaries of the justices of the supreme court to two thousand dollars.

The CHAIRMAN. The question is now upon the amendment offered by the gentleman from Weber, Mr. Farr.

Mr. VARIAN. To that question, I desire to submit a word or two. Gentlemen perhaps fail to appreciate the fact that when you take a man from the profession of the law, engage him for a period of years to serve you on the judicial bench, he is deprived not only of making money in any other way_certainly he cannot practice law. You all understand that, but if he acts in accordance with the higher ethics of the profession and as he should act, he is practically taken from all kinds of business, because the people would not want a judge and ought not to have one who was liable to be confronted in the cases that may be brought before him with the fact that he is interested in the several business propositions which may be involved, necessitating the calling in of other judges and blocking and obstructing the wheels of justice. The purport of this motion, if it should carry, would be, sir, to reduce the means of living of your justices of the supreme court to bare necessities.

I undertake to say that no man can maintain himself in this city and keep a family, as a justice of the supreme court should be permitted to do, on the sum of two thousand dollars. I do not mean to say that he cannot live. He can eat and he can sleep, and he can {1377} move about, but he is absolutely placed in a cramped situation, so far as money matters are concerned. You will hold him there, if this article shall go through as it is presented, for seven years, during which time you cannot increase that salary. Another one of these judges will be held there five years, if he shall live so long, during which time his salary cannot be increased; another for three; at the end of three years a new judge comes in and the salary may have been increased to something like a reasonable compensation, and you have then the situation of one judge getting three or four or five thousand dollars, whatever it may be, to other judges only getting two; they having also had longer and wider experience on the bench. You can imagine what sort of a feeling that kind of discrimination would engender. My own view is, I am in accord with the suggestion of the substitute by Mr. Goodwin. Two thousand dollars is not high enough, but I certainly ask you not to reduce it to two thousand.

Mr. KERR. Mr. Chairman, I certainly would not desire to take up the time of the committee on this subject, believing that the committee would not vote for a moment to make the salary two thousand dollars for justices of the supreme court, were it not for the action which was taken on the salary of other officers, when the article on executive was under consideration; and it does seem to me, Mr. Chairman, that a proposition on the ground of economy to reduce the salary of a justice of the supreme court from three thousand to two thousand dollars, thereby saving one thousand dollars a year only to the State, comes with little grace from a gentleman who has just voted to throw away twenty or thirty thousand dollars of hard earned money of the people in voting for a separation of higher educational institutions. Gentlemen of the committee, I submit that a man who is capable of serving as a justice of the supreme court of Utah is certainly worthy

of his hire, and we should not be guilty of such parsimony as will ask men learned in the law to sit on the bench for the paltry sum of two thousand dollars a year. I would like if it were possible to have reconsidered the article on executive, that we might pay the superintendent of instruction, the governor, and the other officers salaries that would be consistent with the work which is required of them. I do trust, gentlemen of the committee, that this amendment will be voted down and that in all of our efforts to economize we shall pay our men what they are worth. Talk about endangering the Constitution by a difference of a few hundred dollars a year, when we treated so lightly the question which involved thousands upon thousands of dollars! Let us be consistent and pay these men what they are worth.

Mr. GOODWIN. Mr. Chairman, I hope this committee will bear with me a little while. I have a man here who is opposed to my views and so I obtained his time, not so much to talk myself, but to prevent him. I feel very sensitive over this question and I would like to explain that in the committee we had the same opinions presented that we have here, and the committee will bear me out in saying that_anything less than four thousand dollars a year for a supreme or district judge would be disgraceful. However, we agreed upon three thousand dollars, but I was exceedingly glad yesterday when Mr. Varian proposed to increase that salary in this district, and I was not sorry when the gentleman from Weber proposed to reduce it because it brings the whole matter before this committee, and I believe a fair contemplation of it will be good for us. It will not be nearly so long a debate as we have had on some other questions of not nearly so great importance. I believe of all things in high salaries for judges. I believe in very long terms for judges. I do {1378} not believe any perfect judicial system will ever be established in any country without these two features being part of the system. Fortunately, I am backed in that opinion by some very high authority and I want to read just a few lines from a gentleman who has an international reputation as a lawyer and jurist. I mean Judge Dillon. I copied this from his lectures on law and jurisprudence. (Reads.)

I can bear to hear gentlemen talk about low salaries for almost any other office except such as pertains to the judiciary, or to public education. We are told how much a man can make a day sitting as a judge and how much more it is than as though he worked at manual labor outside. And the same gentlemen, if they had a fifty dollar watch that needed cleaning and repairing would gladly pay ten per cent. of the value of that watch to have some mechanic fix it and they will take it to a jeweler and not to a blacksmith, but the moment it comes to the handling of this most intricate and absolute science, the administration of the law, then their minds are filled in a moment with some venerable wooden headed old justice of the peace that they knew in another country, and about seven dollars a week they say is a fair salary. Do they ever stop to think that before a man is fit to occupy a place of that kind he has to consume years and years of patient study? And that the courts of our country, as they are administered and when properly administered show all the advance that mankind has made from the stone age? A judge who is elected in this State under this Constitution will have the lives and fortunes of this whole community in his grasp. Would you give him the same salary as you would give a bookkeeper? That is the point. If he administers his office properly he at once lifts up the standard of society in Utah. If, because of the miserable salary proposed for him, you can obtain no one who is fit for the place, then you lower society correspondingly. Again, there is no need of this miserable and costly economy. I understand that all the fees will be paid now into the treasury and the officers

of the courts who heretofore have been recipients of the fees will be paid salaries. In that case I take it that the fees paid will amount to just about as much as the salaries of all the judges in this new State. I know they will if the fees are kept up to where they have been in the past. There is a deeper question than all this.. We have more than once since this Convention met heard gentle men speak of that inspired instrument, the Constitution of the United States. Did they ever stop to think that half the reverence due that instrument and half the significance to that instrument
due to the interpretation and construction of it by the supreme court of the United States? Did they ever realize that while in politics Congress may go wild, while presidents themselves may be lured here and there by political questions and political dodging, from the first the supreme court of the United States has been the ark of safety to this land in times of great political excitement, in times of civil war, when every other hold was broken in the thoughts of men they turned their eyes and obtained rest watching the steady progress of that great court, moving as does the Gulf stream through the sea, and shedding only warmth and light around it, unswayed by any of the storms which shook the people, undisturbed by the passions which were rocking the nation and threatening to rend it in twain? That is what the supreme court of the United States has done for this country, and many of the courts in the states have been to the states what that has been to the nation. In this State you can elect cheap men. You can have incompetent or dishonest decisions for a few years, and then you attack the very life of the State itself, for just so soon as men lose their faith {1379} in the integrity and wisdom and justice of our judicial tribunal, that moment their patriotism will begin to wither and die, and patriotism to the citizen is what faith is to the religious man. Drag it down once and we have simply a community of anarchists.

Again, if a judge of this State is to give you the best efforts of his mind, he has got to be undisturbed by the petty cares of this world. He has not got to be worrying over the fact of how he is going to meet his monthly expenses, and on two thousand a year he will be doing that or will be clamoring for a re-election, because when the term has expired he will be out of practice. He will either be troubled with business or will be getting his hands behind him. There is not one of you if you had an important case involving as much as five, or ten, or fifteen or twenty thousand dollars that would not expect to pay the lawyer that you would have (for you would not have a cheap lawyer) for that one case about as much as it is proposed to pay a judge here for a year sitting on the lives and property of the community. Cut down the governor's salary, cut down every other salary, but do not put your hands on the salary of the judge and disgrace him before this community. If you have not dignity enough to hold up the salary then take the view of self-interest. You need capital. Do you believe that capitalists who are shrewd men will come to a state where the high judiciary is paid two thousand dollars a year? They will say a man who will take that office for two thousand dollars a year naturally will sell out cheap, if we get in trouble. Fix it so that men of character will take the place. I am sorry the terms are so short, I would like to have them go on twice as long for the supreme bench; I would like to have them for life, but don't disgrace those men or disgrace yourselves by fixing the salary at an amount which you would not dare offer a man fit to be your confidential clerk in a business house. [Applause.]

The substitute proposed by Mr. Goodwin was read as follows:

The judges, of the supreme and district courts shall be paid their salaries quarterly. Supreme judges shall

receive each an annual salary of thirty-six hundred dollars, which shall be paid by the State. Salaries and the mileage of district judges shall be paid half by the State and half by the counties in their respective districts, in proportion to the property valuations of said counties. The salaries of district judges shall be as follows:

First district, $2,500; Second, $3,000; Third, each, $3.600; Fourth, $3,000; Fifth, $3,000; Sixth, $2,500; Seventh, $2,500.

And therefore I say we cannot afford in that important department to deal out with a close hand the salary of these men. If we wish to be respected and looked upon as a State that has some means, as it has backing, we cannot say to them, “Take two thousand dollars a year; that is all you can get.” I believe there is no state in the Union where the supreme court receives the paltry sum of two thousand dollars a year, so far as I know. I do not know of a single one. The state of California pays its supreme court judges six thousand dollars a year. We cannot afford to pay that much. Therefore, I am in favor of this substitute.

Mr. JOLLEY. Mr. Chairman, I wish we were able to pay our judges the full amount or the largest amount that is asked for here on the floor. For one, I would be glad to vote for it, but there is a consideration to take in view, and that is the uniformity of prices. We had our chief executive voted upon at twenty-five hundred dollars. There was a motion made and it was cut down to two thousand dollars. I, myself, think that the supreme judges ought to be paid more than the district

judges, and I would hate for us to establish here a salary for either the supreme judges or the district judges that would cause our attorneys to leave our fair Territory. In the past, judging of the number that we have to-day, Utah has done a good deal for such men, and I would hate to do anything or put the salaries so low that would cause them to leave, but I want to tell you, gentlemen of the committee, the skeleton that was held up in the papers before this Convention convened, and that was constructed by the judiciary of Utah Territory, created great anxiety among the common people and the masses of the people of the Territory, and I, for one, was cautioned on leaving my constituents to carefully guard the act in rela-to the salary of the judiciary. Now, I realize that it is necessary to pay men well. My friend from Salt Lake, on my left, said he did not know of another state in the Union where those judges were paid as low a salary as two thousand dollars. But I find that South Dakota is districted as we are now districting this Territory. They have eight judges, with one judge to each district, at two thousand dollars, with a proviso that the legislature may raise that salary to twenty-five hundred dollars. Now, I have not heard yet that the attorneys and the judges have all vacated Dakota or that they are deprived of plenty of men capable of sitting upon those benches. And while I am in favor of paying all that we can pay, I think it is fair to look at this from both sides. The investigation that is now on_to consider that there would have to be a uniformity of salaries and prices in order to give satisfaction {1381} to the people and in order to do justice to those that are holding office. Now, for one, I do think that the chief executive of any state should have as high a salary as the district judges, and if the district judges are worthy of three thousand dollars, I think that the chief executive is. But I do think three thousand dollars a year is too high. I think that two thousand dollars is high enough for district judges. I think the supreme judges ought to have more than two thousand dollars. When you think about $6.40 not being enough a day for a judge or anybody to live upon, I think that $9.60 is a little too much. Therefore, I will sustain the motion of my friend from Weber.

Mr. EICHNOR. Are you aware how much time and how much money a man must spend before he becomes an attorney and afterwards a judge?

Mr. JOLLEY. I will answer the question, no. I am not aware for I have not tried it by experience; but Mr. Eichnor, are you aware of the number of hours a day that men have to spend, that have to pay the salaries to these men, on the farm?

Mr. HART. I would like to ask the gentleman whether he ever was able to engage an attorney to work for him in court at the rate of $6.40 per day?

Mr. JOLLEY. I have never been in a position that I have had to engage any attorney to work for me.

Mr. IVINS. Mr. Chairman, if I properly understand the substitute offered, it provides for a discrimination in the salary that is to be paid these judges on a sliding scale, indicating, I suppose, that the services of the judge in one of these districts might be of greater value than in another.

Mr. EICHNOR. Mr. Ivins, in districting the southern part of the Territory we found it absolutely

necessary to make two or three districts with only half the population which were first intended for a district, and it is in on that score that there is a discrimination made in the salaries. They will have to pay about half as much as in the second or the fourth district; should be one-eighth of what they will have to pay in this district.

Mr. IVINS. I have not taken time to make any calculation to determine as to whether the gentleman is correct in the statement which he makes or not; probably he is, but I notice that in the third district, which is provided for in the report of the committee, there are three judges, and one in the other districts. I suppose that the idea of the committee was that one judge would be able to take care of the business in each of these other districts, and that three judges, would be equally able to take care of it in this district. Now, I am of the opinion that the services of these men are equally valuable, no matter what part of this Territory they would perform services in, and if we pay a judge three thousand dollars for services in Salt Lake City, or the district in which this county is embraced, he should receive the same remuneration in any other district in this Territory. I believe that the report of the committee is a good one and that we cannot improve it if this system is to be adopted at all. I am opposed to the whole system and should have preferred the old system of probate courts, but the report as it is provides that those men shall be paid an equal salary, and furthermore that they shall be paid out of the State treasury. The substitute provides that one-half of their salary shall be paid by the State in outlying counties, and the other half by the district in which they serve. This I am opposed to. I believe the proper thing for us to do is to put these judges on an equal footing, pay them all out of the State treasury, pay them all the same amount of money, and if it is necessary, create another judge or two in order to do the work. Let us approve this just as it stands here.

Mr. VARIAN. Are you willing to pay {1382} them all the sum of three thousand dollars?

Mr. IVINS. Yes, I am willing to pay them the sum of three thousand dollars until otherwise provided by law.

Mr. VARIAN. Let me explain the reason why we put in this proposition. It was that we anticipated that the outside districts would pull these salaries down and that would be exceedingly disadvantageous to us in this district.

Mr. IVINS. I do not know what may be the feelings of the representatives from other outside districts, but so far as I am concerned, I am willing to vote for this section just as it has been reported by the committee, With that view, that if any injustice is done here, either in regard to salaries or the proportion paid in different districts, the Legislature will take care of it when it shall meet. Let us have the section just as it is.

Mr. THURMAN. Mr. Chairman, I am somewhat surprised at the substitute. At least, I was before Mr. Varian explained the motive for introducing it, for it seemed to me there never was a question discussed more thoroughly and fully in the committee by men of all classes brought together, than the question of the salary for these judges. I have no fear about the salary being reduced below three thousand dollars. I am satisfied that this Convention is intelligent enough to understand that judges cannot be obtained in Utah at a less salary than three thousand dollars,

that is, the kind of judges you want. Our judges are receiving to-day three thousand seven hundred and fifty dollars. They have been receiving four thousand dollars, and the Legislature of Utah_the representatives of the people have raised their salaries, and have even had to violate law, as I take it, to raise the salaries of our judges in the past from three thousand to four thousand dollars a year, but this committee thought, in view of the extraordinary expenses that we would have to bear, and the inability of the State, perhaps, to bear the burdens, they would put the salary down below what it has, been for several years, and below what we thought in justice it ought to be. The salary, gentlemen, in the judgment of the committee, is below what it ought to be even at three thousand dollars. Now, one word in relation to making a distinction between judges. I agree exactly with the gentleman from Washington County. I would feel ashamed, so far as I am concerned, to stand in this Convention and say that every judge in this State of a court of competent jurisdiction should not be placed upon an absolute equality as to salary. As far as the work is concerned, the judge who has to attend to the business in Sanpete, Carbon, Emery, Grand, and San Juan, will have as much work to do_he will have a far more difficult job to perform in order to do it, than the judge who sits here in Salt Lake City, who only has to go out of the courthouse to go to his residence a few blocks away, and from his residence back to the courthouse to attend to the business, and not only that, the judge who is to try a case involving a thousand dollars in Carbon County requires just as much ability and competency to try that case, and do justice between the parties, as the judge who tries a case involving the same amount in Salt Lake City. Our courts of general jurisdiction everywhere in the State ought to be put upon an absolute equality, and they ought to be paid out of the general funds of the State. I think there can be no question about that, and the same with all of these other districts. I believe there is not a lawyer in this Convention, there is not a lawyer in Salt Lake City, if he was called to the bench to-day and asked, “Where would you rather have your field of labor, in Salt Lake City, or in some of these outlying counties, where probably there will not be so many {1383} cases to try, but a good deal more traveling and roughing it to do?” but what would say, in Salt Lake City, every time. They have the advantages. I say it requires a judge of greater ability in San Juan district than it does in Salt Lake, or the Provo, or the Ogden district, for the reason that he would be compelled to act there without books. He has got to have the law in his mind_in his head. He has got to be able to decide it without the benefit of libraries, either private libraries or the public library, and, gentlemen, we cannot afford to place the salaries in these outlying counties so as to give us an inferior quality of judge to perform the work. I think that every one of us ought to unite upon this practically as it is.

Mr. CREER. Mr. Chairman, I understand the difference_the total amount would be but little, as between the proposition offered by the gentleman from Salt Lake and that as made by the committee. I think the total amount would amount to about $36,000 under the provision that is made by the committee. I am in favor of the report of the committee_that is, the principle; that is of giving each judge the same amount of salary, no matter whether he is in this or any other district, but as to this matter of estimating the ability and time that it takes to qualify an attorney to become a judge, I take it, gentlemen of the committee, that there are a great many citizens of this commonwealth that have expended as much time and means to qualify them to follow the business that is their particular avocation as it has taken to qualify a judge. Now, you may take a man that may have two or three thousand dollars invested in a firm and he cannot make as much as is proposed to pay a judge_

Mr. CREER. No, sir; no, sir. I take it, I am acquainted I believe with a great many in this Territory who have good qualifications as attorneys that I assert have not expended as much as a man would do on a good average farm. Of course, they have acquired some by their practice considerable. And furthermore, I will say this, that there are quite a number of good attorneys in this Territory now who do not, I believe, make more than ten dollars a day upon an average. Of course I will admit though that there are some that make more than that, but we must consider at the same time we fix these salaries the situation of those who have to pay the taxes. Here is $36,000 just for that one part of the civil government alone_that is, the matter of judges, independent of the officers and the jury and the witness fees and all of these things. Now, it seems to me that we ought to be careful. I would be willing to base it upon the estimate made by the gentleman from Salt Lake, that is to say, $2,500. I think that would be fair for the district judges_between the two extremes, and we can refer to a great number of states that do not pay any more than that to-day. In fact, there is now one of the most eminent members of the supreme court of the United States who served the state of Kansas, as I understand it, for $1,500 a year, so that I am not afraid of getting sufficient ability even at $2,500 a year for district judges, and $3,000 would certainly be ample to pay the judges of the supreme court. Therefore, I am not in favor of either proposition, but will vote to pay the district judges $2,500 and the supreme $3,000.

Mr. GOODWIN. Are you a lawyer by profession?
{1384}
Mr. CREER. Yes, sir; I was admitted to the bar and am acquainted with a good many others.

Mr. GOODWIN. What would you charge a client to take charge of a case in which twenty thousand dollars was involved?

Mr. CREER. That takes cases in the probate court_divorce cases for twenty-five dollars, and I venture to say that there is but one or two in our district out of the whole list of attorneys that make more than ten dollars a day. My practice is mostly city and probate business.

Mr. GOODWIN. Well, that is a very small part of the law.

Mr. CREER. I am speaking of what I know of the others.

Mr. GOODWIN. Suppose a man came to you with a case in which twenty thousand dollars was involved and wanted to retain you, what would you charge?

Mr. CREER. I have been connected with cases where there has been more than twenty thousand dollars involved where we have been paid two hundred and fifty dollars.

Mr. CREER. I think twenty-five hundred would be sufficient, compared with other states.

Mr. GOODWIN. Never mind other states.

Mr. CREER. Certainly.

Mr. GOODWIN. You do not compare Utah, with its great mining interests, with a state like North Dakota?

Mr. CREER. Wyoming, Kansas, Colorado_we have had good mining attorneys come here that do not make over ten dollars a day.

Mr. GOODWIN. Have you ever thought that the fees in the probate courts would pay the judges' salaries?

Mr. CREER. I do not understand that.

Mr. GOODWIN. It is proposed to pay the clerks' salaries and turn the fees into the State. Do you think those fees would pay the salaries?

Mr. CREER. They would in some districts.

Mr. GOODWIN. They would pay them three or four times over. They would pay the whole salary of all the judges in this State.

Mr. CREER. On an average, it would not do it_you take the nine judges.

Mr. CHIDESTER. Mr. Chairman, I am opposed to this unjust discrimination, as it stands in that article. I think that the district judges should be as competent as any, for the reason that the poor man gets into court in the district courts and the blunder there will perhaps knock him entirely out and he can never appeal to get the advantage of these supreme judges. In speaking of the cost that men have in preparing themselves for the bench, I want to say this, while I am decidedly in favor of low salaries, there is no class of people that are under such expense to carry on their business as are judges, for the reason that they have to subscribe and they have to buy the reports of the various courts in the Union, and the supreme court, in order to keep up with the times, and they are very expensive, and they pay out more than ordinary salaries for this purpose, and their expenses are great, but I would not favor this unjust discrimination in the salary and I favor paying them out of the State fund and also to knock off the mileage. If the mileage was cut off, then I would favor the three thousand dollars a year, but no longer terms. I think it is ample, and by leaving this mileage to be put on by the judges would simply mean a vast amount. In my mind, they could run up a vast amount in this mileage, and I think that it ought to be settled. There ought to be a definite determination of that question and leave the salaries fixed so that we

know exactly what we are going to pay the judges.
{1385}
Mr. HAMMOND. Mr. Chairman, I am in favor of this section as it stands. If I was to amend it at all, I would amend it by raising the salaries. That is my fix. Now, sir, instead of San Juan being a place where there is liable to be no lawsuits_why it will be the hotbed of lawsuits in a very few years, perhaps months. I have two cases there in my mind now, one a case of jumping claims with the parties backing the jumper_a company supposed to be worth a million dollars or more backing his suit. Well, would he go and employ_what do you call it_a peanut lawyer? I have heard about peanut politicians. I don't think he would do any such thing. Therefore, we want the best class of judges for San Juan, and pay them.

The motion of Mr. Farr was rejected.

Mr. FARR. Mr. Chairman, there has been considerable said in regard to making a niggardly price, that the two thousand dollars would amount to. I admit that it looks niggardly in the idea of some and compared to the salaries of some, or what some are getting. I admit that; but when I come to compare that to the circumstances of the people, I think it is very generous. I am satisfied that there are hundreds of lawyers to-day in this Territory that do not make their six dollars a day on an average. I am satisfied on that, and would be glad to make that. I do not wish to cut down and curtail any man in his salary, or getting what he earns. I speak understandingly. I know what I am talking about. I have not been here all these years without learning a few things. I presume this, that many of you think that I have forgotten a good deal. Well, I guess I have forgotten a good deal more than what some people know. But that has no reference to the present company at all; that is always excepted. But I want it understood that I feel liberal towards paying a man what he earns, and I told you that I know what I am talking about, because I have been in like circumstances. I have been in the law business and I have helped to make a great many laws, and I have served the public_I served one city alone for the period of twenty years as mayor, and I had a good many cases and a good many things to look after, and I attended to my business, and I only received fifty dollars for the whole twenty years. And I did not get poor over it, nor I did not rob anybody of anything, and when I was not going to the mayor's office or city council or looking after some mudhole in the road, to see whether the street man attended to his duty, I went to my garden and I hoed my potatoes and my corn, and I put in my time in that way, and by so doing I had good health, and I brought up my family, and they had good health, and it is a healthy exercise, consequently, I do not maintain that a man, because he is a judge, has got to sit on the' bench all the time. He should have healthy exercise, and the idea of these judges going to the outside counties; they have their fees and traveling expenses paid, and we want just as good judges in the outside districts as we have here at home. We must remember according to the provisions of the substitute that was offered, it gives Salt Lake judges three thousand six hundred dollars a year. You must remember that they have got three judges; that amounts to over twelve thousand dollars a year that Salt Lake has got to pay for their judges. I am satisfied, gentlemen, that two thousand dollars is no niggardly price for men these times, and if you do not tell me that ten years from now I will treat the crowd. If I know anything or see anything, we are getting into pretty tight quarters; we are owing some four million dollars in Utah at present. I would like to know where the money is coming from; if you do not begin to study economy pretty soon, you will wish you had, for you will be forced to it. I {1386} thought this was a good time to

commence. That is why I was willing to start in at two thousand dollars, and if we can get in better circumstances and pay our debts we will pay our judges more and pay other men more, but let us be consistent and reasonable and start in as we can hold out, for I do know that the people are being taxed to that extent that they feel cramped; they feel hurt; they feel as though they cannot do it; they cannot pay it. I know in one county between nine and ten hundred men that have been sold out for taxes. They would not raise the money, many of them_their homes have been sold, but others have had a portion of their property sold to pay taxes, because they could not get the money. Now, I would be glad to pay two thousand, three, or even four thousand dollars a year for our judges, if we had the means, but we cannot afford to start in on that at the present time. That is about all I wish to say. I do not feel disposed, because I have worked for nothing as long as I did, and got fat over it_I do not propose to cramp other people down to it, because they do not have the facilities to look after it as other people have, but I do believe in acting consistently and according to the signs of the times.

Mr. KIMBALL (Weber). Mr. Chairman, I am like my brother Farr, I am opposed to that substitute, but not for the same reasons. I do not think it is proper to make any discrimination in salaries, so far as district judges are concerned, because the committee certainly, in creating these districts, apportioned it so as to allot about the same work to each judge. If that be true, and I have no doubt it is, then the district judges' salary should be uniform. I am further opposed to the proposition of the substitute to pay any part of the salaries by the districts themselves or by the counties. I think that the State should bear the expense of the judiciary. And it is so in almost every other state and it should be so in this State. The taxes are paid throughout the Territory generally into the territorial treasury and the State itself should provide for payment of those salaries. So far as the salaries of the judges of the supreme court are concerned, I would be perfectly willing to see the salary raised to $3,600, but if we make the salary uniform for the present and allow the Legislature as the original section does, to provide to change the salaries hereafter, that matter can be easily arranged, but for the present, I think the provision as to salaries should remain as in the section reported by the committee itself. I hope that the substitute will be voted down and the original section stand.

Mr. VARIAN. Mr. Chairman, just one suggestion on this question of salaries. If this system of turning the official fees into the State treasury shall prevail, Salt Lake County alone, judging by the present and past, will turn into the State treasury at least fifteen or twenty thousand dollars and probably more. I think it is a conservative estimate, and when you take all the counties in the State you will see that the judicial salaries will not cut much of a figure.

Mr. GOODWIN. Mr. Chairman, I am perfectly willing to strike out the provision that half be paid by the districts and let it all go the same. I will offer that as an amendment.

Mr. VARIAN. Mr. Chairman, as I accepted that substitute, if it is in accord with the views of the mover, I am willing to withdraw the substitute. As I understand the temper of the Convention it is willing to let the original section pass as far as salaries are concerned.

Mr. GOODWIN. I think it had better be voted on.

Mr. EVANS (Utah). Mr. Chairman, I want to offer an amendment to section {1387} 20, in line 4, by striking out the words “and mileage.”

Mr. CREER. Mr. Chairman, I desire to offer a substitute for the section, as follows:

Until otherwise provided by law, salaries of the supreme judges shall be three thousand dollars per annum, and that of the district judges twenty-five hundred dollars per annum, and shall be paid quarterly together with their mileage.

Mr. KIMBALL (Weber). Mr. Chairman, I move to lay the substitute on the table.

The CHAIRMAN. That is not in order.

Mr. EVANS (Utah). Mr. Chairman, I am in favor of the amendment that I offered, but I am opposed to the substitute.

I think it has been pretty well understood in this Convention that I am opposed to high salaries, but there is not a matter that has come before this Convention so far, to my mind, where it would be possible to bring as much expense upon the State, through bad management and inefficiency in the officers, as the one that is now being considered by this Convention. I am in favor of paying our judges three thousand dollars. I see, in looking over the constitution of Idaho, our neighbor state upon the north, that three thousand dollars is what they receive_their supreme judges and also their district judges, and I think that three thousand dollars is not exorbitant, when we take into consideration the fact that we need competent men, and by reason of their blunders that the citizen is put to great expense in cases where his individual litigation is concerned, and that the State is put to a great expense where the State is prosecuting cases. I am opposed to the system of mileage, for the reason that it is susceptible of being abused. I think the temper of this Convention has declared on a number of other occasions that they are in favor of establishing salaries in lieu of all fees, and I take it, sir, that it is only another form of fees, where you place it within the reach of individuals_not casting any reflection upon our future judges_that it is another form of placing it within their reach where they may distort from the public treasury money that is not justly earned. It has been said by gentlemen from Salt Lake that many times the amount of the salaries that will be paid the judges in this district will be turned in in fees, as collected in Salt Lake City or in this judicial district. I believe that is true. It will be so to a greater or less extent through every district in the Territory. The more populous will turn in the greater amount, and I submit to you, sir, that while it is a fact that the cutting off of this mileage from these established salaries will have a tendency to work a greater hardship upon the outlying counties, I submit to you upon the other hand, that the cost of living will be, perhaps, much cheaper, and therefore, I believe that taking everything into consideration, being opposed in the first place to the mileage system_I have had some experience in dealing with that question, and it has made me cautious upon that point, and I am in favor that these questions be put upon a plane,

equal, just as our sister upon the north has put them, at three thousand dollars, without any mileage at all whatever. Now, allusion has been made to the great learning that is necessary. That is true, but I submit to you, sir, that the American people, and the people of this new State, have now laid the foundation deep and broad whereby every son and every daughter within the pales of this State may be put upon the plane of education wherein, if they shall have energy {1388} within themselves, that the road is clear before them, that they might attain to success in the literary field, and in that of sciences, and in that of the law, until we shall require at their hands, by reason of their services being proficient in these various avocations, that they shall be patriotic, and I do not believe that this system presented before us, that we will name a man at our conventions next fall that will refuse to take that position and step forth for the sum of three thousand dollars, either in Salt Lake district or in the outlying districts, and without any mileage either.

Mr. PAGE. Mr. Chairman, I sincerely trust that the motion of the gentleman from Utah County will not prevail, with reference to the striking out of mileage. In the seventh district, particularly, that will work a hardship upon the judge. There are hundreds of miles of travel that he will most likely have to make in that district, where there are no railroads or stage lines, in a wilderness country, where even the mileage will not justify him in traveling over the ground. The mileage that is allowed by law will not cover his expenses of travel in that district. It will certainly result In a discrimination. it seems to me, with reference to the judge in that particular locality. I am certainly opposed to the motion and trust that it will not prevail.

Mr. HART. Mr. Chairman, this question of mileage would not amount to much in some of the districts. For instance in the first, including Rich, Box Elder, and Cache, it would be a small item only, but it seems to me that in these districts, such as the 5th, 6th, and 7th, it would take a large part of the judges' salary for traveling expenses. We have fixed the number of terms of court in each county at four per year. He may hold more, and if one judge is to visit for instance the counties of Sanpete, Carbon, Emery, Grand, and San Juan, and go over that ground four times in a year, or if he has to travel over the counties of Juab, Millard, Beaver, Iron, and Washington, and some of the other large districts, it will take a large part of his three thousand dollars for mileage. I do not think we should shut that off. Mr. Chairman, a judge who is worthy to pass upon the causes of men, upon their property and upon their lives, can certainly be trusted in the matter of making up his mileage. Of all the characteristics of a judge, honesty is the first, and if he will swindle the people on the false return of his mileage, why he will be absolutely worthless as a judge.

Mr. FARR. Mr. Chairman, I hope this substitute will not prevail. The gentlemen who spoke on it have spoken my mind very fair; should the two thousand dollar motion prevail, I had it placed that the mileage was paid for. I know it would amount to considerable. There is another point in this substitute, the increasing salaries of the supreme court above the district judges. Now, I want to say, gentlemen, that the district judges have from three to four times the work to perform every year that the supreme judges have. They only meet two or three times a year, but the district judges are at work nearly all the time, and I am in favor that all the district judges should have the same salary as the supreme judges. I think it is right that they should have it. They are just as well qualified, only the supreme sounds bigger, but they are no better men and they are no better

qualified nine times out of ten.

The substitute offered by Mr. Creer was rejected.

Mr. CREER. Mr. Chairman, I simply want to say that the prosecuting attorney of Utah County serves that county for six hundred dollars a year, and the prosecuting attorney of this county, I believe, for twenty-five hundred dollars a year. I do not know what the attorney gets in Weber County, but I submit that a man that is capable {1389} of assuming that responsibility is certainly capable of being a judge, and you may compute them and they do not average nearly twenty-five hundred dollars a year_the estimate I have placed there for the salary of the district judges.

The amendment offered by Mr. Evans of Utah was rejected.

Mr. IVINS. Mr. Chairman, I move that section 20 be amended by adding after “mileage” the words, “to be paid out of the State treasury.”

Mr. VAN HORNE. Mr. Chairman, I do not understand how that amendment is necessary at all. These are State officers, and if mileage is provided for as part of their compensation, it would necessarily have to come from the State treasury.

Mr. IVINS. Mr. Chairman, I will say that my amendment designs to make it clear that not only the mileage, but the salaries shall be paid out of the State treasury, and I make it because the question was raised after my former remarks_when I stated it would be paid out of the State treasury, it was stated by a gentleman on the floor “Not necessarily so,” and in order to remove that doubt, I make this motion.

The amendment offered by Mr. Ivins was agreed to.

Thereupon the committee took a recess until 7:30 o'clock p. m.

EVENING SESSION.

The committee of the whole met pursuant to adjournment.

Mr. CREER. Mr. Chairman, I will ask if amendments are still in order to section 20?

The CHAIRMAN. They are.

Mr. CREEK. Then I wish to offer the following for section 20, that is the same that I offered before with the exception that the district judges be paid twenty-six hundred dollars a year and the supreme judges three thousand dollars a year.

Mr. VARIAN. I would like to know if an amendment to that section was not voted down about filling the blank.

Mr. SQUIRES.. Mr. Chairman, I understood Mr. Creer offered a substitute for that section which was voted down, just exactly like it, only twenty-five hundred instead of twenty-six hundred. We voted that down.

The CHAIRMAN. That is correct. The only difference now is in the amount.

Mr. VARIAN. Mr. Chairman, how long can this go on? I submit that when an amendment like that is proposed, any number of amendments are in order to the amendment, and they could be taken in their order, but these independent motions might be pursued indefinitely. The question now is whether this matter is in order. The question is whether a motion to strike these particular figures out and insert others is in order, a motion having been made and amendments opened thereto and having been disposed of by the committee.

Mr. CREER. Mr. Chairman, I wish to say this, I have not myself been fastidious in the matter of extending courtesies to the gentleman.

Mr. VARIAN. Oh, I withdraw at once, if that is the basis of it.

Mr. CREER. Mr. Chairman, now I wish to say that I have examined the salaries of some sixteen states, including eastern states and those of the south and those of the west, and the maximum_of course there are a number of states who pay higher salaries than the maximum that we selected_New Hampshire, Vermont, North Carolina, Sonth Carolina, Virginia, Alabama, North and South Dakota, Delaware, Idaho, Montana, Oregon, Washington, and Wyoming_the minimum of the salaries of the states that I have named is two thousand dollars, that is {1390} of the chief justices and their associates, and the district judges. I find by computing the amount of the salaries from those sixteen states, it amounts to $2,680 on an average. Now, it seems to me, Mr. Chairman, that this amendment that I offer, which is that the district judges shall receive an annual salary of twenty-six hundred dollars a year, is certainly in harmony with the states that I have reference to; but there is another point, and the gentlemen who have spoken upon this subject seem to emphasize the fact that it needs a qualification; it needs judges that are competent men, who are well versed in the law, and if that is true, certainly it seems to me that there ought to be a distinction as between the supreme judges and the district judges.

It is true as to those states that I have named, and in my motion there is a distinction there of four hundred dollars a year as between the supreme judges and those of the district judges, so that it seems to me, gentlemen, that we are only acting just and fair if we make this distinction, and furthermore, I am aware that the section as it is reported, and also the substitute presented by the gentleman from Salt Lake, was discussed more particularly from the members of the bar, but I think that gentlemen who have had experience in our Territory, and you will remember that previous to the calling of this Convention, the attorneys of the Salt Lake bar, and I think also of surrounding districts down below, met together and acted upon this matter of salaries_that is, they passed their judgment, and it was upon the judiciary question generally, and that provoked

some little interest amongst our constituents. Now, I know of a number of quite prominent business men who remarked to me before I came down here that they thought that twenty-five hundred dollars was a pretty fair salary for a district judge, and I think that the judgment of these gentlemen ought to have some respect; but I have another point that I wish to refer to; a gentleman upon this floor from the fourth district remarked to me that a very prominent lawyer of that bar said that he could pick the bar of that district at the annual salary of twenty-five hundred dollars a year.

Mr. THURMAN. Which district?

Mr. CREER. Ogden. A prominent gentleman had stated to a delegate of this Convention

Mr. THURMAN. You mean that he could get any attorney up there?

Mr. CREER. That he could select any attorney. He could pick that bar, who would serve at the salary of twenty-five hundred dollars a year.

Mr. EICHNOR. Dave Evans would not do that.

Mr. KIMBALL (Weber). That man was talking through his hat.

Mr. CREER, I will except present company. I will except the gentleman from Utah County, but I believe you could pick the judge from any member of that bar of the first district.

Mr. VARIAN. He says he believes. What does he know about it? What are the foundations of his belief.

Mr. CREER. From what I know of my observation. It would be simply worth no less or no more than anybody else's.

Mr. GOODWIN. Do you know Mr. McCornick or Mr. Hills    

Mr. CREER. I am speaking of the local members.

Mr. GOODWIN. I am speaking of local men here. Do you know that Mr. McCornick or the manager of Wells, Fargo or the manager of the Deseret bank, gets eighty dollars a day?

Mr. CREER. I know what we pay to our clerks. I am connected with an institution of fifty or sixty thousand dollars capital, but I am speaking of the members of the bar. I am acquainted with the other, and I believe that they would be willing to serve the {1391} people for that and there is no question about the ability of those men. Now, the states I have referred to_it must appear to you, gentlemen, that their wealth and population exceeds that of our State, therefore, I say that there is nothing in the point that the gentlemen seek to make that we have sometimes heavy cases; so they have in other states. We have mining cases, so have our neighboring states, and three thousand dollars is the maximum there, excepting probably Colorado, that gives a little

more to their supreme judge, but I do say that there ought to be a distinction as between the supreme and the district court, and I believe that it is a very fair salary. It is more than an average, than what those states pay.

Mr. GOODWIN. Don't you think the district judge ought to be a brighter man than the supreme judge?

Mr. CREER. No, sir; I do not think so, and I believe that is the prevailing opinion on the part of the attorneys, because they have altogether appellate jurisdiction, they have to decide upon the mistakes, and in fact your own committee, Mr. Goodwin_

Mr. GOODWIN. They have ample time, though; if the judges were only bright enough on the district bench, there would not be so many mistakes.

Mr. CREER. Your own committee, as I understand it, made one very just point in that respect. That was that the supreme judges should decide questions of law only, appealed from the district judges, saying that they should have superior ability in that respect, and I believe that is true. I believe that instinctively we would naturally seek better ability for supreme judges than what we would for district courts.

Mr. EVANS (Utah). I think you quoted Idaho. As to Idaho, it is a mistake. The supreme judges and the district judges are paid alike.

Mr. CREER. I will admit that, but I said, computing the sixteen states the average is $2680, including the chief justice and the associate judges, and district judges of those sixteen states.

Mr. ROBERTS. Mr. Chairman, my understanding was that in view of the fact that it was supposed to be the almost unanimous sentiment of the house that they would not disturb the sum fixed for the judges by the committee, gentlemen who had amendments pending before the house withdrew those amendments or substitutes. That was my recollection of the status of this case when we closed this afternoon's session, and I take it, sir, that if that is the case_

Mr. EVANS (Utah). I think the gentleman should be corrected on that. That was put and voted down.

Mr. VARIAN. If the gentleman will permit me, in substance he is correct. Opposition was withdrawn on the understanding as he suggests.

Mr. ROBERTS. I think if I am not technically right, I am right in this respect_    

Mr. VARIAN. You are right in substance.

Mr. ROBERTS. That the substitute offered by Judge Goodwin was permitted to come to a hasty conclusion in view of the fact that it was the understanding that we would not disturb the sum fixed by the committee, and all opposition was withdrawn. I am quite certain if that was not the

understanding, that the substitute would not have been so hastily disposed of, and that the members of the committee would have contended for the substitute, if they had thought that this sum fixed by the committee would be disturbed. Now, sir, I take it, that we are not dealing squarely altogether upon this question. Gentlemen who favored that substitute permitted that to go to a premature vote, in view of the fact that they supposed, at least, that all opposition to this sum fixed by the committee would remain undisturbed, and I call the attention of the committee to this, and ask them to {1392} come back and to stand by that tacit agreement on this proposition. I, the other day, spoke upon the subject of low salaries for the judiciary, and I am not in favor of catering to this sentiment of cheapness in the officers of this State in order to please the popular clamor, and I can state that when this question shall go before the people of the new State, I, for one, shall not fear to stand face to face with them upon that proposition, because, I take it, sir, that they are a reasonable people and they will know that this action of ours in keeping the salary up to this sum at least was in the interest of true economy, and not for the purpose of catering to the wishes of politicians. Now, sir, I take it that this committee is in honor bound by its tacit consent to let these salaries remain, and for that reason the substitute was permitted to go to a premature vote. I hope that we will not disturb this matter.

The substitute was rejected.

Sections 21, 23, and 24 were read.

Mr. RICHARDS. Mr. Chairman, I suggest that the word term in the first line should be changed to terms. I offer that amendment.

Mr. VARIAN. Let the secretary correct that.

Section 25 was read.

Mr. VARIAN. Mr. Chairman, I will just call attention to it now, that every point fairly arising upon the record of the case should be considered. I think that ought to be stricken out. I will make a motion to strike it out. I do not think any court ought to be held to decide questions not necessary to the decision of that particular case. The court ought not to be deciding in advance and building up precedents that might arise to vex the court and the bar thereafter. Perhaps, however, as there is not a full Convention here, I will withdraw the motion now and renew it on the third reading.

Section 26 was read.

Mr. VARIAN. Mr. Chairman, I offer an additional section to come right after this:

The Legislature shall have no power to grant leave of absence to a judicial officer, and any such officer who shall absent himself from the State for more than sixty consecutive days shall be deemed to have vacated his office.

the application to the Legislature. We all know how that is. I could recite instances. A judicial officer makes an application to the Legislature and it is easily granted. That prevents the Legislature from doing it at all, and limits an absence from the State to sixty days.

Mr. RICHARDS. Mr. Chairman, I offer as an amendment to that proposed section the striking out of the word sixty and inserting the word ninety.

Mr. VARIAN. Well, I will accept that.

Mr. ELDREDGE. Mr. Chairman, I think that ninety days is too long to grant a judge the privilege of leaving the State at any one time. The times that we are in are somewhat different than they were thirty and forty years ago, when many of the constitutions were made. The facilities of travel, the modes of going about are so much different that a man, in sixty days, can take most any kind of a trip upon this continent and in fact cross over to the old world, and then get back in time. Judge Goodwin suggests, supposing that he had typhoid fever in case of his absence, but if he secures as good aid as what he is supposed to be in the law, in regard to medicine, he does not need to have it run over twenty-one days, and it should be broken up in fourteen, so I think in that case there is no necessity of lengthening the time. I am opposed to the ninety days.
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Mr. EICHNOR. Mr. Chairman, I move to amend the section by striking out the word Legislature and insert the word governor. Our Legislature is to meet every two years. Suppose that the judge would have to go to some other climate for a month or two months, would we have to wait until the Legislature would meet?

Mr. VARIAN. You do not understand it. The Legislature cannot do it at all.

Mr. EICHNOR. I misunderstood it; I withdraw my amendment.

Mr. VAN HORNE. Mr. Chairman, I hope that that section will not be added. It seems to me unnecessary. We provide in section 11 of this act for the removal of judges for cause by any Legislature. I do not think that where we elect judges_the supreme judges, we will say, for a seven year term_that if by some misfortune of health one was to be away from the Territory or be compelled to be away from the Territory of Utah for sixty days, that we should say necessarily that he had vacated his office, or that he could be necessarily deemed to have vacated his office, or that the service for which he was elected through a long term of seven years could not be rendered upon his return to the Territory. It seems to me the provision is sufficiently covered by the provision against absenting himself without_

Mr. VARIAN. The power of removal requires the Legislature. It is offensive in its inception and its outcome. Naturally, it would require a good deal of reason for it. This section is designed to reach cases of judges going away. I find it in other states. I presume they found good reasons for it. A judge goes away for ninety days and he vacates his office. I think if he is sick or disabled for ninety days the public business requires that his office ought to be vacated. It is his misfortune, it is true; how else can the public business be conducted?

Mr. SMITH. Mr. Chairman, it seems to me the Legislature could provide for this without making a provision of that character.

Mr. VARIAN. I will ask the gentleman why it might be left to the Legislature? This is designed to prevent that very thing.

The section offered by Mr. Varian was adopted.

Mr. KIMBALL (Weber). Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment to section 15 as follows, by inserting “and” before “Morgan,” in line 6, by striking out “and Davis,” in line 7, and by inserting “Davis” after “Salt Lake,” in line 8. I offer that amendment for this reason, first, that will equalize the population; that will give about 24,000 to the second district.

Mr. THURMAN. I would like to ask the gentleman if that is the principal reason?

Mr. KIMBALL (Weber). So far as I am concerned, yes, sir. I have no bee in my bonnet. I am no candidate for office_and give about 72,000 to the third district. The third district having three judges, would have 24,000 for each judge, and the business of Weber County, as compared to the business of this district, is too great for one judge if Morgan and Davis are both tacked on. I have had some occasion to investigate that, and I am satisfied that the probate business of Morgan County and Weber County, thrown upon the district court, the district court would be in session in Weber County at least two-thirds of the year constantly, the same as it is now, or very nearly the same. For that reason, I would have the section amended in that way.
{1394}
Mr. BARNES. Mr. Chairman, I would like to have a word or two to say on that matter. I believe it will be perfectly agreeable for the people of Davis County to stay with Weber and Morgan in that district; from all the information that I can gather it will suit them better. The gentleman's speech with regard to numbers_if I understand the matter correctly, in proportion to numbers there is a great deal more business for judges to do in this district than there is in that constituted by Weber, Davis and Morgan counties. Now, outside of the probate business of Davis County there is not a great deal of other business, and for one I feel to protest against any change being made. I have consulted with my constituents and they are perfectly agreed to be united with Weber and Morgan counties. I think the change ought not to be made.

Mr. FRANCIS. Mr. Chairman, I wish to say, so far as Morgan is concerned, the district judge has never had very much work from there, nor is our probate business of very great importance. I don't think that we need take Davis off of the district on account of the extra work that may come from Morgan. I prefer to let the district stay as it is at present. I don't think the judge will have any overwork on account of it.

Mr. MALONEY. Mr. Chairman, I was a member of the judiciary committee and also a member of the sub-committee. We labored on this something like six weeks. We consulted with nearly every delegate in the Convention. We tried to district the State so as to suit the people of every county in the State. We at last, after laboring some six or seven weeks, came to an agreement, and I think that the report of the committee ought to stand precisely as it was made. Now, the people of Morgan County, the people of Davis County, were consulted about this business. They have agreed to this districting, and I think that before there is any disrupting of the districts as our committee made them those people ought to be consulted. In Davis and Morgan counties there is not a great deal of litigation outside of the probate business, and one judge in Weber County can attend to all the business in these three counties very easily. There is not that amount of business in those three counties, in proportion to the amount of business in the counties of Salt Lake, Summit, and Tooele. There is no necessity whatever for making the change offered by the gentleman from Weber, so I hope this committee will let the districts remain as the committee fixed it. And in addition to this I wish to say that in all the deliberations of our committee, I do not believe the question of politics entered the mind of a single member of that committee. The idea in the mind of every member of our committee was to get the districts in such a way that the judges of the respective districts might transact the business.

Mr. CANNON. I would like to know whether the number of people in the districts would then be proportioned about the same. As I understand it from the remarks of one of the gentlemen, the second district would then comprise about 24,000 people and this district would comprise 72,000.

Mr. MALONEY. Judge Goodwin investigated as regards the population of every county in every district, and I simply took Judge Goodwin's figures.

Mr. CRANE. Mr. Chairman, I second the amendment of the gentleman from Weber County. I know in the apportioning of the Territory for representatives we did so after giving one to each county, on an exact proportion of population as far as it was possible so to do. I notice since the amendment has been offered here, that in Salt Lake the {1395} judges would have 19,486 of a population to each judge, taking the census of 1890, and Weber County would have 31,187, almost twice as much of a population to the judge, as what the population of Salt Lake County would be for each judge. Taking Davis County, and adding it to Salt Lake County, would then give them 26,007, while Weber County would then have 25,000. It seems to me, Mr. Chairman, that basing the population as it should be for each judge, Davis County should certainly be put in the district in which Salt Lake County is. Salt Lake, Tooele, Davis and Summit would have a population altogether of 78,290, and the three judges would just give them a population of 26,000 each, a few less than Weber County would have.

Mr. VARIAN. Mr. Chairman, I don't think we should disturb this matter now. I don't know of course whether the Weber County delegation is divided upon it, but Davis County speaks. It certainly does not concern Salt Lake County.

Mr. VARIAN. And Morgan. The settlement of all these apparent differences concerning this article during the past two or three days, concessions have been made; and speaking for myself as one of the representatives from Salt Lake County, so far as that county is concerned, we appreciate the efforts that have been made by the gentlemen on the outside to relieve us from the anticipation that we have of a possible fixing of salaries that would handicap us here. We appreciate what we have done to-day. My friend, Mr. Roberts, from Davis County, and I assume with Mr. Barnes, speaks for that county. Therefore, I am not disposed to enter into a discussion of the merits of that question. I hope we will leave it as it is.

Mr. CANNON. I would ask Mr. Barnes whether the people of Davis County, in your opinion, would prefer remaining as they are now, added judicially to the other district, or would just as soon be attached to the district represented by Salt Lake?

Mr. BARNES. I think, sir, they would prefer to be attached by Weber.

Mr. CANNON. Is the most of their business done, and has it been in the past, in the other direction? I mean court business.

Mr. BARNES. Hitherto it has been attached to Salt Lake. The vote of the population I think of Davis County_the northern part of the county, is growing twice as fast as the southern part and it won't be very long, I think, before there will be two-thirds possibly of the number of inhabitants of Davis County nearer to Ogden than to Salt Lake.

Mr. VAN HORNE. Mr. Chairman, I wish to say in support of what has been said by the gentleman from Weber, that I believe the judiciary committee, democrats and republicans alike, paid no attention to the political phases of the division of districts. I know that there was a figuring on the question of population and of convenience of business and where the business had been accustomed to go, and would more naturally go in the course of trade. I think that in that figuring an allowance was made for a less population for the three judges of the central or third district, from the fact that the business was greater at the capital and the judges would have more to contend with. I don't see that it cuts anything except a political figure as to how this should be divided. If Davis County can just as conveniently be joined to the third district as it can to the second district, it would still have the same proportion practically of population. The third district, under such circumstances, would not be in excess of the number of people to the judge, of the other larger districts. It is a question {1396} that I am perfectly willing to stay by the report of the committee on.

Mr. THURMAN. Mr. Chairman, I only intended to say a word as a member of the committee, and Mr. Van Horne has_I have forgotten the expression of my friend from Garfield_if I remembered it I would use it; but he has expressed my thoughts. We had harmony in that committee in every respect, except as to such matters as men would naturally disagree upon, and we reached this conclusion after days and days of deliberation, and as far as Weber and Morgan are concerned, as one district, speaking of the amount of work, I do not believe that anybody

would pretend that there was more work for a judge in that district than in Utah, Wasatch, and Uintah, considering the distance the judge will have to travel to get there. I trust that we will not disturb this apportionment. If we do it will disarrange the whole scheme of apportionment, and we will be all day to-morrow getting through_

Mr. VARIAN. The day after, too.

Mr. THURMAN. And probably change the entire judicial system that we have brought out, because I will say before taking my seat that there was a strong division in the committee and I see that it has found its way into the Convention or existed here independent of the committee, against the system we have adopted itself. Now, if we get to disarranging this matter, we will open this matter here for a change of the entire system, and have a discussion here probably for two or three days.

Mr. HART. Mr. Chairman, I suggest that the people of Davis County should be entitled to some consideration in this matter in their views as to the district they desire to be attached to. I think so far as possible that each county should be permitted to be attached to that district which most suits its convenience. I cannot see any objection that the gentleman from Weber should have to the people of Davis doing business in his city or his county, if they wish to. I should think that he would favor any proposition looking to the closer relations between the county of Davis and the county of Weber. I am opposed to disturbing the work of the committee.

Mr. BOWDLE. I wanted to ask Mr. Kimball a question. Of course this Constitution will not fix the place where a suit may be brought. As there will be a district court in each county, that will be the jurisdiction, and there will be no such thing as bringing a suit arising in Davis County, in Weber County.

Mr. KIMBALL (Weber). I understand Davis County constitutes a jurisdiction by itself. I desire to say first of all, so far as I am personally concerned, when I offered that amendment, I did not do it for political reasons. I say, further, that I did not do it because I had an objection to Davis County, or to Ogden City, or Weber County doing business with Davis County. I conceived that the people of Davis County do just as much business in Weber County, if they belonged to the third judicial district, as if they belonged to the second. I cannot conceive then how the addition of Davis County to this district, instead of the second district, would affect the commercial business in any sense of the word. As I understand this Constitution and this judicial scheme, the design of it is to have a district court held in each county, so that the judicial business of the county will be transacted at the county seat of each county; so on the score of commercial relations, there can be no objection to this amendment. I offered the amendment for this reason, that the court at Ogden is now overloaded with business, is behind with its business, and has been for some years. Weber County furnishes at least two-thirds of all the business of the fourth judicial district, as it is now constituted, and if you add to the business of {1397} the district, the probate court and the Morgan County business, added to it, it is certainly sufficient to keep one judge in that district occupied all his time. Since I was on my feet before, I ascertained that the population of Weber County alone as returned by the county statistician is 25,000 and over, so that the proportion as compared with the third district court, is much greater for one judge, than it

is in the third district; and my motive in offering the amendment was to avoid our court being behind with its business.

Mr. MALONEY. I would like to ask Mr. Kimball one question. Heretofore, Rich, Box Elder, Cache, and Morgan, were all attached to Weber, and for that reason the docket is behind.

Mr. KIMBALL (Weber). I say with even those counties attached; Weber County has furnished two-thirds of the business.

The amendment of Mr. Kimball was rejected.

Mr. MALONEY. Mr. Chairman, I offer an additional section there as follows:

The justices of the supreme court shall be obliged to give their opinion upon important questions of law and upon solemn occasions when required by the governor, senate or house of representatives.

Mr. MALONEY. Massachusetts, Maine, Colorado, and a number of others. The reason I offer it is because, when the Legislature asks an opinion of the supreme court that they may have the advice of the supreme court, the highest judicial power of the State, so that they may not make so many mistakes. It has worked well in Massachusetts, Maine, and our sister state, Colorado. I think it is a good provision, and I think we ought to adopt it.

Mr. EICHNOR. Mr. Chairman, I hope that the section will not be adopted. If the supreme court as a body or individual judges should give their opinion to the governor, senate, or lower house, or all combined, and then if a case arises out of the matter. on which they give an opinion, the man can win the case, no matter if they were in the wrong. I think the supreme court should not act as attorneys.

Mr. MALONEY. It is for the Legislature to legislate. They may want an opinion. They may ask the supreme court to give an opinion on an act, it does not apply to any such instances as the gentleman speaks of.

Mr. EICHNOR. It is an old custom that prevailed in Massachusetts, I do not know whether it has fallen into disuse there or not, but I believe it has. I think our article, in article 22, goes about as far in this matter as it should go. I think that covers the ground fully.

The proposed section was rejected.

Mr. VARIAN. Mr. Chairman, I move we report this article when we arise_

Mr. RICHARDS. I desire to ask the chairman of the committee a question in regard to this article, if I may be permitted. I desire to know what reasons moved the committee to do away with the probate courts as a part of the judiciary system of the State. I had expected at some

period of the discussion on this article that that would develop, but as it has not, I desire to know.

Mr. GOODWIN. Mr. Chairman, we found a peculiar situation in this Territory. We found territorial probate judges, for each county. We found at least the representatives of twenty of those counties declaring that their probate judges were not fit to be blown up. They begged us to remove them so that they could get competent men. That was the reason.

Ms. RICHARDS. So as to get more competent men?

Mr. GOODWIN. It was to group the {1398} counties, and have business done with greater regularity and correctness. I consulted with some of the highest judges of the Territory and they informed me that about half of their time was consumed in correcting the mistakes of probate judges. The sentiment seemed almost to be universal that until this State or this Territory was much richer and the outside counties much more populous, it would be infinitely better to adopt the system which worked so well in California, and in Washington, and do away with the probate judges In name and have their work done by the district judges.

Mr. RICHARDS. Mr. Chairman, I desire, after hearing the explanation of the chairman of the committee, to propose an amendment to section I. I move that the words “in probate courts” be inserted between the words “courts” and “in,” in the fourth line of the section. I realize that to question the wisdom of this article, having been reported as it has by such distinguished gentlemen as those who compose the judiciary committee, may be regarded as presumptuous, but at the risk of being so regarded, I feel constrained not only by my own conviction, but by the suggestion of a number of gentlemen on this floor, to call the attention of this committee to what I believe to be a grave mistake that we are about to make if we adopt this system and exclude the probate courts. It seems to me that gentlemen have not fully considered the inconvenience that will result (putting it very mildly when I say inconvenience), from the adoption of this system. And I desire to say at this juncture that if I occupy more than my time, I have the names of several other gentlemen who have yielded me their time. Now, I want to explain first some of the inconveniences that will result from this system in some of the outside counties. Of course you will see it makes but little difference here. So far as I am personally concerned, it makes but little difference to me, because presumably we will have judges here in this city all the time, but in other counties what will be the effect? Take the district here that extends from Juab to Washington, and what will be the effect of it? The court has to be held in each county once in three months, four times a year. We will say that at the time the court is being held in Juab some man dies in Washington County, an administration is desired upon his estate, no matter how urgent it may be, no matter what the condition of the estate may be, the person there will have to wait three months, or practically that, until the court comes around, before an administrator can be appointed. Then the administrator is appointed; the bonds are filed, the inventory is filed, and the preliminary work of opening the estate is done. It becomes necessary to sell property perhaps for the support of the family, to pay family allowance, or for some urgent purpose. By the time the administrators have got to the point where they can make application for the sale of property the court has gone. They wait three months before the court comes back. Then the court comes back and here is the application for the sale of this property; it grants the order of sale, we will say, notice is then given of the sale of the property; the property is sold, and after the sale has

taken place it is necessary that the sale should be confirmed. The return is made to the court, an application is made for confirmation, but the court is off in the other part of the district and another three months will elapse before the court gets back, so that a confirmation can be had of this sale; and there you have a lapse of nine months or practically that, from the time that the man died until you can get an administrator appointed and get an order to sell and get a sale and have the sale confirmed of the piece of property.

Now, I might go on, if I had the time, and you had the patience to listen to {1399} me, all the way through the administration of an estate and you would find that it would work just in that way. You gentlemen who know anything about these probate matters understand just how inconvenient that would be. The same thing would apply to guardianship matters and to all business that would come within the jurisdiction of the court, because you would have no court there in the county except the justice of the peace, Now, it seems to me that it would be a far better system to restrict the jurisdiction of the justices of the peace to say one hundred dollars or one hundred and fifty dollars and retain the probate courts in the various counties, giving them jurisdiction, not only in probate matters, in matters of guardianship, but also limited jurisdiction in civil and criminal matters; give them jurisdiction of misdemeanors; give them jurisdiction in civil cases to the extent of five hundred or a thousand dollars, perhaps, as is the case in Idaho, where the system works very satisfactorily indeed, and perhaps give them jurisdiction in divorce. Let the appeals go from the justices of the peace to the probate court, and let them stop there unless the validity of a statute or the construction of a statute is concerned, and if that be the case let it go directly to the supreme court, or go to the district court, as may be considered best. Then, when the district courts come around, they having law and equity jurisdiction, they can attend to their business, the business is soon performed. The greater part of the work will be accomplished in the probate courts, they being there in session practically all the time. Now, the objection that is offered by the committee is that these men are incompetent_the probate judges are incompetent to perform this work. You, gentlemen of the Convention, know how far that is true; I do not pretend to know; but it does seem to me very singular indeed if there are not men in the counties of this Territory that are capable of performing this work. I know that the objection has been made and it has been said in this county that we ought to have more competent men for probate judges than we do have, because there are sometimes important matters that come before the probate court. That is true, but, gentlemen of the Convention, do you know, and have you thought, that three-fourths or four-fifths of all the business that comes before the probate courts of this Territory is simply informal matters, matters that are not contested, matters that require no great skill for the determination of them, simply pro forma? Three-fourths to four-fifths of the business, I will venture to say, that is brought before the probate courts and determined by them is business of this very character, that simply requires the following out of the letter of the statute and requires no special exercise of judicial knowledge or skill; and when these cases come on that are contested and these cases of importance that require unusual learning, let the probate judge_if you make your selections well, you will find as a rule, that the judges will give satisfaction even in those cases. But suppose they make a mistake in those cases, then what? Then, you have your district court right there in every county, and that district court can correct that mistake.

I understand very well how it has been inconvenient and difficult to have these mistakes

corrected; for instance, take the district that I have been referring to, extending from Juab to Saint George. Now, as I understand it, the district includes counties from Millard to Washington. I cannot understand how it would be very difficult to correct a mistake made by the probate judge of Washington County. If it was necessary to go to Beaver in order to try that case, it would be difficult, but it would be a very small matter comparatively {1400} to correct that mistake, if the court goes to the county seat, the very place where the first trial was had. It seems to me if you gentlemen will consider the extreme inconvenience that is going to follow from the adoption of this system you will hesitate about adopting it. I say here, in Salt Lake City, where we will have presumably a judge all the time, that the same line of reasoning will apply that will apply in the other counties, for this reason, as I have already stated, from three-fourths to four-fifths of the time of the judge who does this business, if one judge should be set apart for that purpose, will be occupied in simply doing formal work. Now, why should a judge of greater skill and greater learning, a more expensive judge, requiring a greater salary, be employed to do this formal work? It is not necessary. We have got along very well here with the probate judges, and when my friend, the chairman of the committee, says that one-half of the time of the courts have been consumed in correcting the mistakes of probate judges, I want to say to my distinguished friend, that whoever told him that does not speak from the record.

Mr. GOODWIN. It was Judge Bartch, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. SQUIRES. He was a probate judge himself.

Mr. RICHARDS. If Judge Bartch said that, Judge Bartch did not speak from the records. I will guarantee that the records of the court in Salt Lake County or any other district in this Territory will not bear out that assertion.

Mr. GOODWIN. Perhaps I gave a wrong impression of what the judge said; when he was probate judge, more than half his time was taken up in correcting the errors of his predecessors.

Mr. RICHARDS. That is entirely a different thing. I do not understand that we are now going to elect probate judges to correct the mistakes of their predecessors.

Mr. GOODWIN. I want to call the attention of the Convention to the fact that if Judge Bartch was half the time correcting the mistakes, it must have been a terrible record. [Laughter.]

Mr. RICHARDS. I desire to say that if the records of this district or any district in this Territory are examined, it will be found that a very small percentage of the litigation that has occurred in this Territory within the last year or five years has been appeals from probate courts. Every lawyer knows that who is in active practice. We all know it_very few indeed, but what is the fact? The fact is, that these courts are encumbered to-day and the dockets are congested with cases that are sent up from justices of the peace. That is what is the matter. We had here in the district court, at the beginning of the present term, a calendar of 1,300 cases. I am told by the clerk that 240 of those cases were appeals from the justices' courts. Now, I say that those appeals from the justices' courts never ought to go to the district court. They never ought to have come to this district court. If we had any other system by which they could have been disposed of, they

never would, and I would have these appeals go to the probate court and be disposed of there, because, in nine cases out of ten_I do not think I overstate, when I say that where these cases are taken up from the justices of the peace, they are taken up for the purpose of consuming time and getting delay. That is the reason. And when they come to trial one party or the other backs down, and the case goes to judgment. That is my experience in appeals from justices' courts. Once in a while, you will find one taken in good faith, but as a rule, they are taken in order to get time, because they can be taken without any considerable cost. So I say that that is not a good reason to say that so much of the time of the {1401} court is taken up in correcting the mistakes of probate judges. It is not a fair statement of the case to say that. Now, in regard to the cost; it may be said here this will be much more expensive than the other method. I say, no, it will not be more expensive, and in that connection I desire to call your attention, gentlemen, again to that which I said yesterday in discussing this question of the judges' salaries, that the expense of the district court does not lie in the salary that you pay to the judge, but it lies in the money that is paid to the jurors that are in attendance, it lies in the expense of the fees that are paid to the witnesses who are in attendance upon the court; those things are what run up into money. As I said here yesterday, we have in this district probably fifty jurors attending court, at two dollars per diem. There is a hundred dollars a day that is being paid out by the Territory every day for the jurors in the third district court, and fifteen or possibly twenty dollars a day for the two judges. Now, what will be the effect as to economy? These district courts, if this system is adopted that we have here, go into a county; whenever the court goes there, there is all the machinery of the court; it must necessarily be there; the panel of jurors will be on hand, not enough simply to try a case, but two or three panels must necessarily be in attendance upon the court, so that when one case is tried and the jury goes out, the panel can be immediately filled. There will have to be twenty or thirty at the least calculation of jurors in attendance upon this court. What does it mean? Forty or fifty dollars per day in expense all the time that this court is engaged in this formal business that I have been speaking about, which, as I say, comprises three-fourths to four-fifths of the time occupied by the probate judge; all the time that the court is performing this formal business that requires no jury, these jurors are sitting there at the public expense; the witnesses are there at the expense of the litigants, and this expense is going on and accumulating all this time.

During the time that these district courts are sitting in the various counties, then they have all the machinery of the court there; they have their jurors there, and these jurors will have to be paid out of the public treasury. It may be said that it is not right to count in witness fees. Why should it not be, although that is not paid by the public? The fees are paid by individuals, and it is our duty in providing a system here, to consider the convenience and the economy to the individuals as it is the economy of the State at large. And so I say that when you come to consider the amount of expense that will necessarily follow this system and put as an offset to that the amount that you would have to pay to your probate judges in the various counties, because their salaries could be graded according to the work they have to do, you will find, and any man will find, who makes the computation, that the balance is in favor of the probate court system. I challenge any man who will make the computation to deny that. Of course, I could go on and elaborate it, but I have not the time, or else I would give some computations on this matter. Now, as I say, I am told that competent men can be obtained to act as probate judges in the different counties in this Territory, at salaries ranging from five hundred dollars up, men who will do the work and do it right, do it satisfactorily to the people; and I believe if that can be done, so far as economy is concerned, it

will be a very great saving, and so far as the convenience is concerned, there can be no sort of question about it.

Mr. SQUIRES. I would like to ask Mr. Richards a question. If the system of probate courts should be adopted in the Constitution, would that involve a reduction of the number of judicial districts, {1402} and a corresponding reduction in judges.

Mr. RICHARDS. It would indeed, and that was exactly the point I was going to address myself to. I was going to say that in addition to this suggestion that I have made as to the difference between the compensation of the judges and the court expenses that follow from jurors, witnesses, etc., we would also save at least two or three judges. We have here seven. There is no question but what the work can be done by five. I do not know but what it could be done by four. I believe confidently and I assert now that I have no doubt that the work can be done with four judges, because when you take out the business that I have already referred to, the appeals from the justices' courts, and when you give this limited jurisdiction, if you should do it, to the probate courts in civil cases, and in misdemeanors, you will so relieve the volume of work that comes to the district courts that four judges, in my opinion, could perform all the work that is necessary to be done in this Territory and keep the calendar up and go from county to county. I am in favor of that part of the system. I do not ask that they should be eliminated, but I say that we ought to have probate courts and then we ought to have the district courts go around into the various counties and do their work there, and four district judges, in my judgment could do all the work that is necessary to be done in this Territory.

Mr. SQUIRES. Will the gentleman answer one more question? Reading section 1, I found at the end of it these words, “and such other courts inferior to the supreme court as may be established by law.” Would not that permit the Legislature in certain counties where they desired it to establish probate courts?

Mr. RICHARDS. I will say to the gentleman that I believe it would permit the Legislature to do it, but I say that if there is no mention made in this article of probate courts, it will be done by the Legislature as it is done by this Convention, it will be taken to mean to exclude probate courts. That is how they will take it and that is how they will act upon it, and there will be no probate courts established in this Territory. And so, I think, that if there is merit in this system, the system that has prevailed in this Territory for forty-five years and worked so well and satisfactorily, it ought to be retained, and it ought to appear in the Constitution. If there is no merit in it, if this system is a better system, then of course it ought not to prevail, but I think that all sides ought to be heard in this matter, before we determine what is best.

Mr. HILL. I understood you to say that for probate judges a salary of five hundred dollars would be sufficient to compensate for the difference between the district judges at three thousand dollars a year. We have twenty-seven counties in the Territory; at five hundred dollars, that would be $13,500 per annum. According to the proposition before the committee, the salary of the judges would be $28,000; adding to this the salary of the four judges, we would have $25,500. Now, I am simply making this statement as a business proposition. Do you not consider that it would be for the interests of the State to expend twenty-eight thousand dollars and carry

out the proposition made by the judiciary committee, in preference to spending $25,000 by returning to the old methods of having twenty-seven probate judges? Don't you think it would be to our advantage to carry out the purport of the report submitted to this Convention by the committee on judiciary?

Mr. RICHARDS. I certainly do not; if I did I should not be advocating this, and if the gentleman had been here and listened to what I have said, I think his question would have been answered before it was asked.
{1403}
Mr. HILL. I came in late.

Mr. RICHARDS. I think I have answered the question fully, and I would be delighted to answer it again, but I have no time remaining in which to do it. I do not wish to be understood that each probate judge in this Territory could be obtained for five hundred dollars; I mean that there are counties where they can be obtained for five hundred dollars. I say from five hundred dollars up their services could be had. I say that the saving in expense is not the difference in the amount of salary paid to the judge, but the difference in the court expense that would be incurred by these district courts when they are in a county with jurors and witnesses attending upon them, and they are performing formal work that can be done by a probate judge without a jury. We are in cases, as I have stated, where the expense of the court will be from fifty to a hundred dollars a day. Every day, then, that the court spends in doing this formal work, it does it at an expense of from fifty to a hundred dollars, and that expense could go to offset the difference in salary, and when it is considered and computed, I say unquestionably the balance for economy would be in favor of my suggestion.

Mr. HILL. Could not the clerk in the county perform those duties?

Mr. RICHARDS. No, sir; the clerk can perform no judicial duties.

Mr. EVANS (Utah). I would like to know if you know what the probate judge of Salt Lake County gets_what his office is worth?

Mr. RICHARDS. I do not know.

Mr. HILL. Forty-five hundred dollars.

Mr. RICHARDS. That is fees, you mean?

Mr. EVANS (Utah). I would like to ask another question; if the gentleman's system proposes to change this system, what he proposes to offer in the shape of reduction of district judges?

Mr. RICHARDS. I should reduce the district judges to four.

Mr. KIESEL. I would like to ask Mr. Richards if he would give the probate court criminal jurisdiction?

Mr. KIESEL. The reason I asked is this, was not Congress at one time compelled to take away that privilege from the probate courts of Utah?

Mr. RICHARDS. I will answer that in this way, that the territorial Legislature attempted to confer unlimited jurisdiction on the probate courts.

Mr. KERR. Trying capital cases.

Mr. RICHARDS. Trying murder cases and everything, and it was that that was restricted. The jurisdiction that I am speaking of conferring is conferred by the laws of Idaho upon their probate courts, and there are other states that have the same system that I suggest, and it works very satisfactorily,

Mr. KIESEL. The reason I make the remark is this, that I am afraid we will not get the ability required, and I have seen in Utah farmers acting as probate judges. While I have a respect for them, of course, I would like to see the very highest ability always in a court.

Mr. RICHARDS. I would like to see it too, but it is impossible to get the highest ability and have it always at hand. And my point is that it is a great deal better to have a degree of ability that is somewhat inferior, if in the main it is competent, than not to have these courts accessible at all, and have them absent from you two or three months at a time. That is where the great difficulty comes in, it appears to me.

Mr. CREER. Would you give the probate courts jurisdiction in divorces?

Mr. RICHARDS. Personally, I would have no objection to them having jurisdiction in divorce cases.

Mr. BUYS. I understood you to say {1404} you would cut the judges down to four; is that four judges for four districts? There are nine judges, as I understand it, under this system, with seven districts.

Mr. RICHARDS. I would reduce the judges to five, dispensing with four.

Mr. GIBBS. I would like to ask Mr. Richards a question. When there are no criminal cases on the calendar would it be necessary for the judge to call a jury?

Mr. RICHARDS. It is necessary for the court to be there, and I suppose if it should be found that there were no cases on the calendar it would not be necessary, but I apprehend that there will always be some cases that will require a jury.

Mr. GIBBS. In our county, when there is no case on the calendar there is no jury empanelled at

all.

Mr. VAN HORNE. Mr. Richards, could not the court easily arrange for disposing of business requiring a jury before it took up other business?

Mr. RICHARDS. I do not see how it could conveniently do that, coming into a jurisdiction once in three months. It seems to me it would be very difficult for it indeed to arrange business in that way so that it would not conflict.

Mr. GOODWIN. Mr. Chairman, I hope the committee will not consider this proposition. The judiciary committee went over all this ground. You will remember how we apportioned the State, and how we worked it up. and how we consulted with the gentlemen on this floor, and then when we got it arranged, and paying the judges the lowest salary that we could conceive, and finally got a bill that we knew this Convention would adopt, we think it ought not to be changed. So, notwithstanding the horrible case that has just been drawn, the wrongs that might possibly be done under this system, this article in itself contains a remedy for any disease of that kind. The first section permits the Legislature to establish any inferior courts they may please.

Now, the Legislature would be in session for instance before the system is tried two months. Reports can come to the Legislature from the various districts and counties, and any defects can be cured. Again the expense that we heard of is not in the judges, I admit, with all due respect, but it is, as stated here yesterday, in keeping criminals month after month in prison and in transporting them to some place for trial. Now, there are plenty of gentlemen here who are better horseback riders than the gentleman who has just addressed us, who will tell him that no two or three judges can go to those counties down south by any present means of conveyance and hold court there every month, so if you want twenty-seven probate judges, if you want at least seven district judges, why all this committee has to do is to refer this whole article back and have us go back to our figures which we made and ignored and call them up. I want to say that I gathered as many of the members of the bar of this city as I could find in a hasty run around town, and with one single exception they approved of this system and thought it would be an infinite improvement on the old one. I want to say that I first consulted with a great many gentlemen on this floor as to what they wanted, and I think the gentleman from San Juan expressed the sentiment of the majority when he said, “Group the counties and give us somebody that knows something.” I think if there is any wrong with this it can be found out at once and the Legislature can remedy it, and if a probate judge is wanted for this county, why, then some gentleman will not want it in Weber County, another will not want it in Utah County, and before we get through they will want two in Piute and Wayne. I think this is pretty good. I know how hard you worked {1405} upon it, Mr. Chairman, I know how much breath was exhausted, how much eyesight was used on it, how we renewed our arithmetic in making figures, how we got to be the best geographical scholars in the world in studying this State, to get it so that we could reach every point; and I do not think that a gentleman on fifteen minutes' consideration ought to get up and say that fifteen of us were idiots. If he had limited it to fourteen, the other one would have supposed it was himself and it was all right.

Mr. RICHARDS. May I interrupt you?

Mr. SNOW. Mr. Chairman, I do not think the committee ought to be in any particular hurry on this question. I had hoped that the gentleman who had just taken his seat would have attempted to enlighten the committee upon how the district courts would answer to the conveniences of the people. I do not desire to duplicate nor to repeat the arguments that were made by the gentleman from Salt Lake (Mr. Richards), in favor of probate courts, but I do wish to say that these courts have been in Utah for a great number of years, that they have been proved to be practicable, and very convenient for all the wants and necessities of the people, so far as their jurisdiction extended; that in giving us a new system, you are overturning an old one and you are depriving the people of a great many conveniences that, the district courts do not give, and cannot give, as he has pointed out, and which nobody has presumed to answer. Now, I want to say for my own county, that we have a very competent probate judge, and always have had, so far as I have been able to remember, and I do, not think at any time his salary has amounted to more than five hundred dollars. To-day he does not get more than two hundred and fifty dollars, and yet the work that is carried on in our probate court is of a competent character. Now, probate courts, as we all know, should be open to the people all the time. A bond cannot be approved, whether it be of an elective officer or an officer of a corporation, if the judge has just taken his departure, for at least three months, and in some cases this perhaps would invalidate, if not entirely nullify the actions of the officers whose bonds are to be approved. Everything must be needlessly delayed if district judges are to have chancery jurisdiction, and probate courts are to be abolished. Mr. Chairman, I think it is great inconvenience that the district courts will occasion the people in having probate jurisdiction that my friend from Salt Lake wishes to ask this committee to stop and think about, and especially the members from the outside counties. If we have such a probate court as suggested by him in each county with extended jurisdiction we would practically have no use in our counties for a district court. I do not think, since the collapse of Silver Reef, that we have ever had a case of any magnitude_that is any civil case, that would not be covered by the jurisdiction of a one thousand dollar limit. Very seldom would we have any criminal case that the probate judge could not try, and if we had a visit from a district court at least once a year, it would be all that we would require in our county for many years to come. {1406} Speaking from the experience that we have had, I say that probate courts would be a greater convenience to our county than this system, and I therefore favor it.

Mr. MALONEY. Mr. Chairman, Judge Goodwin, as chairman of the committee, sought information from every source possible on this subject, from every delegation I believe in the twenty-seven counties in this Convention. When we first started in to transact this business I submitted a plan similar to that asked by Mr. Richards and Mr. Snow, only for a superior court instead of a probate court, grouping the counties into twos and threes, with probate jurisdiction and enlarged jurisdiction, giving the superior court jurisdiction of civil matters up to a thousand or fifteen hundred dollars, and of all misdemeanors. When we got to discussing that plan before

our committee, I saw at once that there were objections to it, that it could not work well. Finally, after getting light from every source possible, we arrived at the plan that the committee has reported here unanimously. We have endeavored to give the counties each a superior order of judge, judges who were competent to transact all the probate and district business, to dispense with the twenty-seven probate judges and give them a very much higher order of ability. Now, my friend from Salt Lake and my friend from Washington seem to be of the opinion that the object of this article is to give them a probate court once every month in each county. That is true. You will see that the judiciary article says that at least four times a year_and if necessary the object of every member of this committee is to have a probate court once in every month in each county of this Territory. The suggestion made by the gentleman from Washington, that if the judge had just left, perhaps it would be three months before an administrator's bond could be approved_that is a matter of moonshine. The district judge could do it wherever he was and send it back. There is no law that I know of requiring court to be opened and a bond approved there. If we have a district court with probate jurisdiction once every month, it strikes me that the wants of the people can be supplied.

Mr. RICHARDS. Will the gentleman be kind enough to explain how it would be possible for the court to be in session in each county once a month? Take for example the district consisting from Juab to Washington County?

Mr. MALONEY. The idea was keep him going from one county to another every month. I am glad you suggested that, because that district formerly as we framed it consisted of nine counties, and when we got information from the gentlemen who were familiar with the cow trails out in that country, we found that one judge could not visit every county once a month; hence we divided it into two districts and gave them two judges, so that a district judge may be in every county in the district once a month.

Mr. RICHARDS. You say then that a district judge can travel from juab to Washington and hold court in four different counties every month?

Mr. CHIDESTER. He don't have to go from Juab.

Mr. MALONEY. He don't have to do that. The object is to have him once a month in each county for probate business. He would not need to be there more than two hours.

Mr. RICHARDS. If he is in each one of those counties every month, would not he have to travel from Juab to Washington?

Mr. MALONEY. That is true, and he can do it.

Mr. RICHARDS. And hold court and do the business of the district?

Mr. MALONEY. Why, Mr. Chairman, he can do all the business in two hours, No trouble about that. Then again, {1407} the Legislature can re-establish this probate court if they like. It is such other inferior courts as may be established by law. Mr. Richards goes on and insists on appeal

from justices' courts to the probate courts. We do propose anything of that sort. I do not wish to take up the time of this committee, but Mr. Richards suggests that there will be a vast expenditure because of the number of witnesses and jurors in attendance. If the district court is competent to transact business, there will never be such a thing as a crowd of witnesses waiting. Certain days will be set apart for probate court business and district court business, and there will not be any witnesses or jurors in attendance when the case comes up. When the court comes into the county, it can transact all the probate business in the county, making a fair average in two hours. Then, it can go on and attend to the district court business. So there will not be any delay such as contemplated by the gentleman from Salt Lake. Now, if this plan is to be adopted you might as well rip up this whole report from beginning to end, because we went upon the theory that we would give them a better class of judges and have them come if necessary once a month.

Mr. MURDOCK (Wasatch). I would like to ask the question of the gentleman from Salt Lake_what qualification he considers probate judges should have?

Mr. RICHARDS. I think they should be men of good sound judgment and experience and have some knowledge of law.

Mr. MURDOCK ( Wasatch). Do you think they should be admitted to the bar?

Mr. RICHARDS. Well, I would not say that it was necessary in every instance. Perhaps in a majority of cases I should say that was not necessary.

Mr. MURDOCK (Wasatch). Do you think it would be a proper thing to give a man that had no experience of law, of good judgment, probably a good shoemaker or a good farmer, jurisdiction in a case where the amount was a thousand dollars and in criminal cases up to a felony?

Mr. RICHARDS. Well, I am not prepared to say that I would. I do not presume that any such man would be elected to that kind of a position.

Mr. MURDOCK (Wasatch). In the system that you propose, would you not provide that the judge must be a member of the bar if you adopt that system?

Mr. RICHARDS. I do not know that I would provide that. I think that the judgment of the electors might be properly exercised on a matter of that kind.

Mr. MURDOCK (Wasatch). It appears to me unquestionably that this Convention should provide in the Constitution that a probate judge who is to have this extended jurisdiction that our friend proposes, in civil and criminal cases, would certainly have to have some qualification. This is a progressive age. In times past we had school teachers that had no particular qualification. If the school teacher was a moral man and had a little knowledge, he was engaged. But since that time we require that they shall have some qualifications.. There is a board of examination in every county, and we are more strict in the employment of school teachers than we were twenty years ago.

Now, the system which has been reported by the committee on judiciary provides for nine judges, paying them a salary of three thousand dollars each, a total of twenty-seven thousand dollars and it would give us an opportunity to increase those judges three, making twelve judges at a salary of three thousand each to equal the system which the gentleman proposes to give us in lieu of the one presented by the committee on judiciary. Now, it seems to me that if economy is an object, and good service, that we could accept the system providing for nine district judges, and if, in the opinion of our future Legislatures, nine judges are not sufficient, they can very easily increase the number to twelve, which would not be any more expensive than this system of twenty-two judges at five hundred dollars, and the others in proportion as I have stated. There is no doubt but what we will all concede that in all business enterprises and transactions we want to get the best. There is an old saying that a man wants but little here below and he wants that little good, and I think that is applicable to law. We want but little of it but what little we do get, we want good, and for one I am in favor of what law we get around in the outside rural districts, that we have the very best that is to be had in the Territory, and for that reason I believe that nine judges can give us about all that we will want. [Applause.]

Mr. IVINS. I just wanted to say, gentlemen, if the idea prevails that all the members of this committee have been consulted in regard to this question and approved it, it is an error, because I have been continually opposed to this experiment that we are about to try. I have done a little figuring myself, and I believe that from a standpoint of economy, the present system of probate courts will be far in advance of the system that is proposed. Now, some one suggests that a court beheld in each month in every county of these districts, a man would have to travel six thousand miles to hold a court in each of these counties in the five counties which embrace my district. That is out of the question entirely. I believe that a probate court should always be open. I have had considerable to do with the closing up of estates and I know that it will be a very great inconvenience if only once in a quarter people can reach a probate judge for the approval of papers and for consultation. There is never a day passes probably in any county in this Territory that the probate judge is not consulted. Executors and administrators of estates are not attorneys, and it is almost a necessity that they shall have the ear of the judge at the county seat at any day

when they chance to be there, especially people living away from it.

I feel very delicate about attacking this proposition that has been returned from the committee, because I am not {1409} altogether familiar with its details, but I can tell you that this is a question that the is worthy of serious consideration of the members of this committee, and personally, I believe, that from a standpoint of economy, we had better place a probate judge in each county. In the district in which my county is contained, we can pay five men six hundred dollars per annum each, and then the sum would only equal the amount we propose to pay to the district judge, and I am of opinion that that is double what those men are receiving to-day on an average_that is, the probate judges in that district; and there are competent men there, just as competent men for probate judges as we can get for district judge. We have to choose a district judge from that district, and really it appears to me that the expense attendant upon these district courts would be so much greater_a case comes before a probate judge_a criminal case; he can get out and empanel a jury right in the town where it is being tried, with little expense, and I apprehend, particularly if you are going to pay this man mileage who has got to travel these thousands of miles in order to hold his court, his mileage, if some mathematician will figure it up, it will be found to amount to considerable during the year. So that all things considered, I am in favor of the motion of the gentleman from Salt Lake, and if it should prevail, I would move to refer this matter all back to the committee with instructions to furnish us a probate judge in each county and four or five district judges, and we will get along with four less judges and with greater convenience to the people.

Mr. GIBBS. Would you recommend that the districts be conducted the same as they are now_the people go to the courts in place of the courts going to the people?

Mr. IVINS. That would be a question for after consideration, of course. I would not propose to destroy this whole plan without giving some other plan careful consideration. I should propose that the district courts went to the people occasionally, as often as necessity required, but I don't believe that we need a district court in Washington County once in two years on an average, if you will give us a good probate judge with jurisdiction in civil cases to a thousand dollars.

Mr. GIBBS. What would you do with your prisoners in the meantime?

Mr. IVINS. Why, we will send them before the probate court.

Mr. CREER. The chairman of the committee has remarked that the best legal talent obtainable here in Salt Lake City and probably elsewhere, were consulted by the committee before they framed this article upon this important matter. Now, I understand from one of my colleagues that the legal gentlemen of our district are in favor of the old system, but I want to say just a few words upon the matter of expenses. I do not propose to compute it by way of salaries, but I do say this from experience, that there is more expense incurred by appeals that are taken_it may not be so in Salt Lake City, but it is so in Utah County_more expense incurred in the courts by appeals from justices of the peace than would pay several of the judges' salaries. We have in a city of 3,000 inhabitants, had but one case appealed from the probate court to the district court in twenty years, so that it seems to me there is something in this matter suggested by my friend Mr.

Richards, from Salt Lake. By giving extended jurisdiction to the probate courts in civil cases and misdemeanors, and by cutting off the appeals from justices' courts_I suppose you mean also from cities as well as precincts_unless the validity of a statute or city ordinance will be in question, the cases will stop there; it seems to me this is a very important matter to consider, and I think that the proposition is worth our time in looking {1410} over this question as to the saving of expense, because if you cut down the jurisdiction of the justices of the peace to one hundred dollars, a great many more cases will be tried before the probate judge and will be better tried, not only in two or three counties, but a great many of the counties. We would have men that were competent members of the bar as probate judges. I believe that a probate judge should understand something about law. The surrogate branch is a branch that ought to be considered. This is worthy of consideration. I hope you will not bring this matter to a close to-night, there is not a full attendance in the committee, and we should not hurry it through. I speak from my own experience. There are two-thirds, I was going to say, of the cases that are tried by the justices of the peace in our county that are not properly tried, and when they are appealed they are reversed, there are so many mistakes made by justices of the peace; then by placing a competent man in each county it will obviate to a large extent that matter. It would curtail the expenses a great deal.

Mr. CHIDESTER. Mr. Chairman, I have been heretofore in favor of probate courts, but since this system has been reported from the committee I have been weaned somewhat from the old system, and have been inclined to be willing to try this new system, believing that the system could be changed by the Legislature, if it was found necessary. Now, our conditions are not similar to those in Washington County, as stated by Mr. Ivins. He says that they would not have any use for a district court there once in two years. We have as little use for a probate court, but we have grand larceny cases continually. [Laughter]. It is that kind of cases that we wish to handle, and I undertake to say that to give the probate judges jurisdiction in misdemeanor cases will not help us at all. I think that is a mere sham. The justices of the peace can handle them all right, and if they do not, why they will come to the district courts, and there are not many of them from our country that ever get in the district courts anyway. But, I find that the expense has been made by the traveling of witnesses and jurors, and if this old system is returned to, or if we establish probate courts, we have got then to reduce the number of district judges, and they will not be able to travel around these districts often enough so but what the criminals will have to lie in jail, or we will have to travel to the district courts. Already our county has been compelled to keep criminals until the expense has been enormous, and we have been almost unable to meet it, and I now believe that we can afford to try the new system, for I believe that the Legislature would be perfectly willing to modify it if they found that the judges could not travel around as contemplated, but if they can get around as the committee contemplates that they can in these districts_and I submit that in our district I believe they can; I am not speaking, however, for other districts, but if they can do that, I am satisfied that the expenses will be much less than to establish probate courts. Of course, as I said before, we have but very little probate business, and that may make some difference. The other counties may have more, but for all of that our probate judge perhaps receives over three hundred dollars. In figuring it up that was about what we estimated it at, and that is one of the smallest salaries received by probate judges, and if you establish twenty-seven probate judges and compel the people to run to the district courts again, then I say you might just as well return to the old system, and that is going to be expensive, that is going to compel the witnesses to travel and the jurymen to travel for the district court, and

there is thousands of expense {1411} which this new system will do away with.

Mr. EVANS (Utah). Mr. Chairman, this is once I am going to stand in straight with the committee that reported this article. I am generally on the other side. However, I am in favor
of trying this new system. There are two phases to be considered in this matter. One is economy, and the other is efficiency. I have gone over this thing carefully in my own mind with the best information that I have had at hand, in regard to the question of economy, and I am fully converted to the idea that the present system will be far cheaper than the old probate system that we are just going to leave behind us. I came here in favor of the plan proposed by the gentleman from Salt Lake, to retain the probate judges and to increase their jurisdiction and give them some criminal jurisdiction, but I have been forced from that position by argument that has been made to me by gentlemen of this Convention. I have figured that it would cost us upon an average of a thousand dollars to each county. Salt Lake, I have been informed before tonight, and it has been reiterated here to-night, that the probate judge here costs in the neighborhood of five or six thousand dollars. Perhaps in Ogden it costs from two to three thousand dollars, Utah County in the neighborhood of two thousand dollars, and taking it all in all, I have concluded that about an average of a thousand dollars to each county is correct. It has been suggested here to-night that the probate judges ought to be men learned in the law. It was suggested here that they would have in most cases a man who was competent. I want to ask you, gentlemen, what reason can be given, that if it is necessary that a man should be competent to transact the business of these larger counties, that it is not just as important that the business in the smaller counties should be transacted equally as well? It has been remarked here by the gentleman from Washington that perhaps every day the probate court should be consulted by some person, administrator, or guardian, or otherwise. If you are to expect such a system as that, can you confine the fees, or in other words the salaries of those probate judges, to five hundred dollars in these small counties, as we have been figuring upon? I don't think you can, and I say that it is important that this system, whichever way it shall go, should secure efficient service in carrying out the various operations of the law. I have figured that if we shall take off four judges, which I think would be the very least that we can take off, with their salaries as fixed now at three thousand dollars, amounting to twelve thousand dollars_taking that from the twenty-seven counties at one thousand dollars each, and I do not think that we can hope to place our probate judges_that is people to do the work, even as it is done now_at a less salary than that; it will be a saving to the district or to this Territory of fifteen thousand dollars. Then in addition to that we are providing now a new system, as I have understood it, that the county clerks shall be clerks of the district court, and if that shall be inaugurated, I believe there will be equally as great a saving in that point.

It has been referred to here by the gentleman from Salt Lake that they would gather together witnesses and they would gather together jurors, and they would remain there for days with nothing to do, making the comparison with the expenses accruing from that source_would be greater than the judges. I submit to you that that is not necessary. Those terms will be set. The jurors will be summoned there, witnesses will be summoned there; those cases that require the service of a jury may be taken up and disposed of, each in its turn, and then the jury discharged, and then the court will proceed to act upon equity cases, or take up its probate {1412} business and do away with that in its turn. Now, sir, I submit to you that these clerks may be properly

authorized to post up notices. These are orders that may be sent to the probate judge. It is not necessary that he should reside in the county while he does the signing. I submit to you also that bonds could be forwarded to him. It is so to-day in our counties; in every town outside of Provo in the county in which I live, we forward our bonds there by mail to the judge, and they are there filed, and it can be done in the other case. It would only be a question of a little trouble to him, perhaps, in preserving those bonds until he went to the county seat in the county from whence the bonds came, and there they would be placed upon file. I submit to you, sir, that it is important that these things should be tried properly. I venture the assertion now that if we were to go out in these out lying counties and go carefully into the record of the sales that have been made there of real estate, I would not miss it if I were to say that half of those sales were illegal and void, and it is only a question of time until these matters will be forced out into the poor counties as to-day they are being forced upon some of the populous counties. I have had the sad experience of being connected with a corporation myself that to-day is involved in litigation, and when we came to test our articles of incorporation, we found that we were not a corporation at all. This is the condition, and a great many of these things, when they are looked into and carefully examined, when they are placed upon the test and weighed in the balance, they are found wanting, and I say that we cannot afford to not undertake this system. I believe it presents the phase before this Convention that appeals to every judgment that it ought to be inaugurated and established. It is not as the laws of the Medes and Persians. We provide in our Constitution that the Legislature may reduce the number of judges or they may increase them if they shall find that the system is not a proper one, and they have the power to establish other inferior courts, and then they can establish probate courts and inaugurate the other system. But I believe we ought to give it a trial. I am in favor of it from first to last, so far as I have been able to comprehend it; there may be some minor changes. I say that I think it would have been much more prudent before we had spent perhaps a whole day upon this question, as we have done, that this amendment should have been introduced at the reading of the first section, and I hope that this committee will say to their sub-committee_the committee on judiciary, that they have drawn a good article and it will be passed upon by this committee as reported by them.

Mr. BUYS. Mr. Chairman, there are one or two things that have not been touched upon yet that I would like to call attention to. I am in favor of the system as reported by the judiciary committee. I want to call the attention of the committee to section 7. (Reads.) Now, if there is anything that is really necessary that should be done, that we cannot wait until the term comes around, a man can be appointed to look after this case. I do not think there is any necessity for having a probate judge in every county.

Mr. RICHARDS. Suppose that one party thinks it necessary that it should be done and the other party does not, then how are you going to get your judgment?

Mr. BUYS. Well, we can get it when the term comes around.

The amendment of Mr. Richards was rejected.
        
Mr. FARR. Mr. Chairman, I wish to offer an amendment to first section:

Until otherwise provided by law, the judicial power of the State shall be vested in a senate sitting as a court of impeachment, the supreme court, district court, and justices of the peace.

Mr. THURMAN. Mr. Chairman, I arise to a point of order. The amendment is not seconded.

The point of order was sustained. The committee then rose and reported as follows:

The committee of the whole has had under consideration the article on judiciary and has recommended that the same be placed upon the calendar for its third reading.

Mr. SQUIRES. Mr. President, I move that the judiciary article be made a special article for day after to-morrow.

The motion was agreed to.

On motion, the Convention then, at 10:08 p. m., adjourned.