STATE BOARD OF HEALTH.
The LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR announced the special order for this hour being Mr. Van Vorhis' bill [S. 93] to establish a State Board of Health, which the Senate proceeded to consider by sections.
Mr. BRISCOE offered an amendment, providing that two members of the Board from each political party shall be appointed by the Governor.
Mr. LANGDON believed in party responsibility so that if anything goes wrong, it can be fastened upon the party guilty. The public interest can be thus best subserved. The amendment, if enacted into a law, would create a hot-bed of rascality in such a nest, as Nationals, Democrat sand Republicans all together would make. He opposed the amendment.
Mr. WOODS, in most cases should object to such a scheme, but in this case he favored it. He was unalterably opposed to making the Benevolent Institutions political machines to be run by either party. Let this trading and swindling of the wards of the State be stopped. This bill will require $10,000 or $12,000 to pay the new officers created by it, and he desired Democrats as well as Republicans should have a share in the spoils of office.
page: 84[View Page 84]Mr. BRISCOE regarded it as strange that Republicans were not satisfied with the great success of their party; at least,enough so to admit Nationals and Democrats on this Board with those of their own political faith.
Mr. VAN VORHIS, as the author of the bill, would not object to the amendment. He proposed, as a substitute for the amendment, that the Board shall be composed of three members from each of the two political parties having the highest number of votes on joint ballot in the General Assembly; not desiring that anything of the kind shall go in the bill, but as a sort of compromise.
Mr. GRAHAM opposed anything of a political nature going in the bill.
The substitute was rejected.
Mr. WILSON moved, ineffectually, that the Board be selected, as far as possible, from diverse political parties.
The amendment (Mr. Briscoe's) was also rejected.
Mr. Menzies moved to strike out the clause in the second section, requiring the Board to examine into the purity of intoxicating liquors used as a beverage.
Mr. YANCEY opposed the amendment.
Mr. BROWN favored the pending motion. If the bill passes in its present shape a part of the duties of the Board will be to make an inspection of the stock in trade of wholesale and retail dealers in intoxicating beverages, and then give an opinion as to the effect this liquor will have on the health of those who drink it. It would create a sort of Smelling Committee, which he did not approve of, nor was there any necessity for such an examination.
Mr. HENRY desired the Board should report as the effect of intoxicating liquors upon the health of the people, and offered a substitute for the amendment, striking out the clause requiring an examination of such liquors.
Mr. MENZIES accepted the substitute for his amendment.
The substitute was agreed to.
Mr. SPANN moved to strike out all reference to requiring the recommendation of certain school books by the Board. The common people are already too much oppressed in the matter of school books--this monopoly is corrupt all along the line.
Mr. VAN VORHIS said this bill is drafted upon the experience of twenty-two States having similar laws, and is largely taken from the existing laws in Michigan, Kentucky and Massachusetts. This section is taken from the Michigan law, and does not give the Board the right to dictate what books shall be used in the Common Schools.
The motion was agreed to.
Mr. FOSTER moved an amendment requiring five members to constitute a quorum of the Board.
It was rejected.
Mr. Menzies moved to restrict the meetings of the Board to four times a year.
Mr. VAN VORHIS referred to times of epidemics or the prevalence of contagious diseases, when it would become necessary for the Board to meet on its own adjournment. He did not believe the Board would hold continual sessions just to get pay for tneir expenses, which is all that this bill allows.
Mr. WOOLLEN offered a substitute, allowing the Board to meet when and where it pleases in times of epidemics.
The substitute was adopted.
Mr. HENRY moved to fix the date of Board meetings the first Tuesday in January, April, July and October.
Mr. OWEN and Mr. SHAFFER considered it better to leave the dates of meetings to be fixed by the Board.
Mr. Henry would not object to the Board fixing the time, if it would arrange for certain days in each quarter; that everybody so desiring may know. He did not believe enacting laws so obscure as to make it necessary for the people to hunt up newspapers in order to be informed their contents.
Mr. VAN VORHIS opposed the amendment.
The motion was rejected.
Mr. CHAPMAN moved an amendment requiring Members of the Board to swear to an itemized account of their expenses.
Mr. BUNDY proposed a substitute embracing the amendment and adding thereto a proviso that the Secretary of the Board shall receive nothing for his expenses beyond the salary $1,500; pending which--
Came the recess till 2 o'clock.
