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for a school teacher, parent or guardian to inflict physical punishment; prohibiting any kind of employment of a child under sixteen years; to prohibit vendors of goods from accepting any rebate or discount from any manufacturer or wholesaler from whom he buys the same, and to prohibit the establishment of any price or schedule of prices for any kind of commodity or service (the bill, however, naively exempting labor unions from the operation of the act); to prohibit treating in saloons; for the su pervision and inspection of all bakeries, and many others id omne genus that might be enumerated.

It is to be said, to the credit of the legislature, that most of these bills failed of passage; but the fact that they were introduced, and that they were treated as of sufficient importance to print, and that every session of late years has witnessed a flood of similar bills intended to reform the qualities of human nature, to change the rules of business, and to correct every kind of misfortune, shows how persistent is the tendency.

What ways are there of combating it? There is one that is peculiarly open to lawyers. The profession of the law has at all times stood for a healthy conservatism. Every lawyer is educated to reverence and respect the foundations on which our system of jurisprudence has been built; he believes that in the rivalries and competition of life the law should favor no man or class of men; each should work out his own career, with consistent regard for the rights of his fellows. He believes in orderly and temperate processes by which to check the evils engendered in the race of life. His profession is a force in public affairs. He keeps in touch with popular intelligence, and to a large extent moulds public opinion toward the preservation of what is good. No other order of intelligence can influence and control the public will, and direct its expression along safe and careful lines, as can the members of the bar. If they will exert the influence which is legitimately theirs, law-making can to a degree be confined to proper purposes, and the legislative tinker, whose ambition it is to patch up nature and put all of men's doings under the approval or ban of some law will cease to flourish.

A few of the laws passed at the last session are of special interest to lawyers, and deserve to be first mentioned. One act provides for thirty days' grace after the maturity of a debt secured by chattel mortgage, during which time the mortgagee

may delay taking possession without surrendering his lien and thus subjecting the property to the claims of other creditors.

Another important act, which works a very proper change in the common law as to the liabilities and mutual relations of joint debtors, permits a creditor to release one or more of such joint debtors without affecting the liability of the remaining debtors for their proportionate part of the debt. At common law a discharge and acquittance of one was a release of all. This inflexible rule interfered greatly with the freedom with which a creditor might contract with his debtors, and it will probably be found wise that the rule has been abolished.

Colorado has entered the list of states that have adopted a parole system for convicts. This may no longer be considered an experiment in penal legislation, as twenty-five states of the Union have provided for conditional pardons, or paroles, or indeterminate sentences in some form or other. This is in accord with modern notions on the subject of punishment of criminals and has the approval of a large majority of the publicists who have specially made a study of the subject. As there is nowhere any agitation for the repeal of such laws, we think it may be assumed that the experience in those states where they have been adopted has been favorable. Our act was prepared by the State Board of Charities and Corrections, after a painstaking examination and comparison of similar laws in other states, and provides in substance for the sentencing of criminals for maximum and minimum terms. The minimum term must be served, after which the governor, under rules and regulations which he shall prescribe, may issue a parole. While under parole the convict remains technically in legal custody, and for any violation of its terms, upon request of the commissioners of the penitentiary, the Governor may order his return for the serving out of his original sentence.

A committee of the American Bar Association, specially appointed for the purpose of investigating the practical workings of parole statutes, reported at the last meeting that they were promotive of the most beneficent results. They say "it is gratifying to learn that the idea that penal statutes are purely punitive is rapidly passing away, and that with the growth of civilization has come the belief that for the protection of society against offenders more is to be gained by parole and similar acts, which lead the convict to expect speedy liberty, and if he is true to

himself, rehabilitation in society, than by stripes and bonds or solitary confinement."

Another act practically abolishes appeals from the Court of Appeals to the Supreme Court; that is to say, an appeal to or writ of error from the Court of Appeals in any controversy not otherwise within its final jurisdiction is a waiver by the appellant or the plaintiff in error of the right of appeal to the Supreme Court; likewise the appellee or defendant in error may transfer the cause on motion to the Supreme Court, but if he fails so to do, and submits to the jurisdiction of the Court of Appeals, its decision concludes the controversy.

The statutory new trial in actions of ejectment, which has been heretofore allowed as of course upon the payment of costs, has been abolished. The expediency of this change in the law is in our judgment doubtful. Almost all the ejectment cases which come before the courts in Colorado involve mining claims. In most of them the validity of the discoveries and locations is in question, and the proofs rest largely in parol. In advance of the trial it is frequently difficult to forecast what particular attacks will be made upon such titles; and the opportunities for surprises in the proofs are so great, that it is questionable whether important interests, involving frequently very large values, should be settled by one trial of the issues.

An act regulating the admission of evidence in civil actions provides that any party may be called as a witness at the instance of his adversary, who is not thereby concluded by such testimony, but may treat it as if given under cross-examination.

Another act is intended to protect municipalities against exaggerated and fictitious claims for damages by providing that due notice of such claims must be given in writing within thirty days after the injury is received.

The historical integrity of the jury system did not appeal to the last legislature. The time-honored principle of unanimity in rendering a verdict has been overthrown. Jurors in civil cases may now find a verdict by the concurrence of three-fourths of their number. Inasmuch as the requirement of unanimity has been considered by most jurists as of the very essence of the jury system, sanctioned by that philosophy of the human mind which has made the system an institution of the Anglo-Saxon people, which at all times they have been jealous to protect by constitutional guarantees, the result of this very doubtful experiment will be watched with great interest by the members of the bar.

Passing now to laws that have attracted general attention, although it can not be said that they have a special interest for lawyers, is an act that authorizes towns and cities to control public utilities by purchasing or erecting water works, gas works, electric light works and telephone plants. All franchises given to others for such enterprises must be upon the express condition that the municipality may have at any time the right to purchase or condemn them, and at a price that shall be exclusive of the value of the franchise so conferred, and all renewals or extensions of existing franchises shall be subject to such conditions.

The last legislature can certainly make no boast of consistency as one of its virtues. An excess of humanity, which might have been exercised better in a different direction, has made it a penal offense to dock a horse's tail. The principal effect of another act, openly avowed as such, is to license and legalize prize fights. It is true they are called "sparring exhibitions with gloves of not less than five ounces each in weight," but as this is the only restriction imposed, no amount of refinement can distinguish such encounters from the ordinary and common prize fight.

The business of insurance received some attention. One act was passed that estopped companies from writing policies and accepting premiums and afterwards in case of total loss pleading in defense that the property was overvalued. It was made the duty of insurance agents to inspect the property on which they write risks, give a correct description of it in their policies, and the amount of insurance written was to be conclusively deemed the true value in case of total loss. This act, however, was vetoed by the executive on the ground that it placed a premium on incendiarism. Another act was approved and has become a law that prohibits foreign companies from writing risks within the state, except through local agents, regularly commissioned and licensed, who shall receive the commissions thereon. It also prohibits the transfer to or reinsurance of risks with companies that have not obtained permission to transact business within the state.

Another act authorizes railroad companies, whether organized under the laws of this or a foreign state, to purchase connecting lines of road, in or without the state, provided the same are not parallel or competing, and to hold and own the stock and bonds of such connecting lines. A much needed provision

was also made by which corporations whose term of existence has, or is about to expire, may revive the same for another twenty years by a vote of stockholders.

Among other laws of general interest which deserve to be mentioned, but which would make this address of too great length to state in detail, are acts to reduce the legal rate of interest on school, county and municipal warrants, from eight to six per cent.; to submit a proposition for amending the Constitution so as to permit six amendments to be submitted at each biennial period; a new mechanics' lien law; amending the law limiting the time within which suit may be brought on judgments rendered outside the state; restoring a limitation on county tax levies; reducing the rate of interest on tax certificates; to abolish the use of emblems on official ballots.

The legislature yielded to the insistent clamor of labor agitators by the passage of two acts, which in our judgment constitute an unwarranted interference in the relations between employer and employé. By the terms of one of these laws, no individual or corporation engaged in any business can make any contract with another for the performance of work or services of any kind, and the payment therefor, in whole or in part, in goods or rent or any kind of property, except legal tender money. All contracts to accept anything else than money in payment for work performed or services rendered are void, and the parties to the same are guilty of a misdemeanor. By the terms of another law, the period of employment of workingmen in all underground mines or smelting institutions shall be eight hours per day; and penalties are imposed which seem to deny the right of any one to work in a mine or smelter exceeding eight hours per day.

Each of these acts may be said to be an insulting attempt to limit the right of contract between parties who are under no disabilities, and where the subject of the contract is not public in its character, but purely personal to the parties themselves. Why should not a laborer be permitted to sell his labor for what he pleases, goods or money, just as his employer sells his iron and coal for cash or on credit, as he deems it to his best advantage? If a man is sui juris, and engaged in a lawful industrial pursuit, why put a badge of slavery on him by assuming that he is unable to manage his own affairs, and requires legislative tutelage? If that kind of legislation can be justified, as an exercise of the police power of a state, then all contracts between employer and employé can be regulated, limited and controlled.

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