RELOCATION OF COUNTY SEATS.
The SPEAKER announced the first thing in order to be the consideration of the subject pending at the adjournment yesterday, being Mr. Brazelton's bill [H. R. 91] to provide for the relocation of County seats, the question being on the motion to recommit it to the Committee on County and Township Business.
page: 108[View Page 108]Mr. BRAZELTON said: It was stated or insinuated by the gentleman from Marion (Mr. Wilson) on yesterday, that the mover of this bill appeared before the Committee when the same was considered. I confess that I did, as I had a right to do, and every member of this Committee will bear me out in saying that I did not in any manner urgently insist or antagonize their action in the least. I take it that this motion to recommit is simply a dilatory measure only. The gentleman from Marion said that the bill repealed certain law, and I answered that the bill does, but I understand that that law was enacted for the County which I have the honor to represent. As the law now stands, if every man, woman and child in the County desired to change the location of the County seat, they could not do it. Under the present provisions it would be removed three miles out into the woods. He continued at some length in opposition to the motion to recommit.
Mr. ADAMS stated that he would not have said anything on this question had h not been called out by the remarks made by certain members yesterday while discussing the subject. He thought that if it was a fair and honest bill gentlemen ought not to object to its going back to the Committee, so that persons might appear before the Committee who represented the opposition to the bill. He said the bill was introduced on the 10th day of January, and on the 15th of January it was reported back from the Committee. I am told by gentlemen that before they knew that the bill was before the House it had come back from the Committee. I say that it is but fair and equitable that these men should be allowed to go before this Committee and present their side of the question.
Mr. MOODY desired to know who should decide a question of relocation if 65 per cent. of the inhabitants of a County can not. This Committee has had the bill under consideration once, and it had better lie on the table than be recommitted. The House ought to act upon it now.
Mr. JEWETT spoke in opposition to the motion to recommit.
Mr. GORDON spoke in opposition to the bill and favored the motion to recommit.
Mr. HEFFREN favored his motion to recommit. There is no provision in the bill to contest a selection should one be carried by fraud.
Mr. WILSON also favored the motion to recommit.
Mr. WILLIAMS, of Knox, spoke in favor of recommittal and against the passage of the bill.
The motion to recommit was rejected by yeas, [?]8; nays, 61.
The bill was ordered engrossed for the third reading.
Then came a recess for dinner.
