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Show OLSON UTILITIES BILL LOSES MANY RADICAL PROVISIONS Sugar Corporations, Smelters and Coal Mines ! Drop Into Basket in Rapid ; Succession. WITH unerring precision the senate sen-ate swung the ax on the judiciary ju-diciary committee 's public utilities bill yesterday afternoon, after-noon, with the result that one by one , the radical provisions of the measure and the radical amendments proposed are rapidly being eliminated. Sugar corporations, smelting corpora- j tions and coal corporations dropped into i - the basket in rapid succession. Then . the monopoly clause was neatly sheared , on .the ground that existing statutes con- ferred all the power contained in the I proposed 'bill except that the power was not given to the public utilities commission. com-mission. More time was required to remove the plank carrying the provision that the burden of the expense of the commission should be borne by the public utilities regulated, but it "finally was chopped out. In its place was substituted a , state appropriation of $50,000 to cover the 'expense of the -commission for the coming bienninm. The test vote taken Wednesday with reference to placing the control of stocks and securities -with the commission commis-sion showed the more conservative element ele-ment to be heavily in the majority. The strength since has remained about the samp, with some one or two changing from one side to the other, according to his or their interpretation as to the direct di-rect results of the provision upon his or their particular territory. Olson Taken to Task. The arguments on the various provisions pro-visions and amendments were not so heated yesterday as on the previous day. Senator Olson was taken to task By some of his colleagues because of the interpretations placed on some of his assertions of the previous clay, upon which he assured them that anything said was not meant as a reflection upon the sincerity of any senator. Thereatter the atmosphere was not so heavily charged, but the fight was just as stubborn stub-born on practically every amendment. Several attempts were ma.de by the conservative con-servative element to limit the talks of tho leader of the extremists, but each attempt met. with failure. As a rule the senators expressed a desire to have each o,u est ion fully aired before taking any final action, and opposed any movement move-ment which might savor of ''gag" rule. Senator George Dern occupied the limelight lime-light for a time early in the session by replying to the implications voiced by Senator Olson 'the day previous. He took exceptions to the interpretation of Senator Sena-tor Olson as to the nature of the public utilities bill wanted by the people of the state. Recalls Platform Pledge. Senator Dern said: Our platform two years asro pledged a public utilities law, and on the strength of that pledge a bill was introduced. in-troduced. I am of the opinion that' a great many persons who voted for the Democratic party at. the recent election d Id not know all that was contained in that platform and those who voted for it because of the public pub-lic utilities provision expected no more than was contained in the bill offered at the Inst session. In my mind It would be just as reprehensible to go beyond the provisions pro-visions of the old bill as it would be to do less than was provided in the terms of f hat measure. Any other course would seorn to me to be nothing- more or less than obtaining office of-fice under false pretenses. It certainly certain-ly would lie extremely unwise to go from the most conservative to the most radical state in the union. T am in sympathv with many things Senator Olson said about monopolies, but I am reasonably sure that a pub-, lie utilities commission is pot the bndc to regulate them. A public utilities util-ities commission will have all it can do for the nxt two or three years to perform the duties necessary to the regub tion of t hose institutions which properlv com1 under the classification classi-fication of public utilities. Denies Objections. It would be impractical for any state commission to regulate prices . which are fixed by the world market. There is no question but that any of the industries which Senator Olson would bring- under the jurisdiction of the commission with this amendment iuuhi uit'u&e ui men eiiLne uuipui. outside of the state and frequently at a higher figure than could be obtained ob-tained here. The result would be that the people of the state would be compelled to pay the world's market price for commodities shipped in. We cannot confer authority upon any commission which will allow them to designate to whom and at what price the products of various industries may be sold. Furthermore, the. Democratic party believes in competition. The independent inde-pendent coal companies are agreeable to cos! corporations being: included in the bill because it is to their interest and not hcause they believe the general gen-eral public will be benefited. There are many persons who have purchased pur-chased or obtained title to coal lands in the state, and the owners are anxious anx-ious to develop those lands. Under the provisions of this bill those persons per-sons would be required to obtain a certificate of necessity before the development de-velopment could be begun, which, in effect, would mean the stifling of competition to the ultimate bene tit of the independent, coal companies now operating. I am strongly opposed op-posed to including' anything in this bill which is not generally recognized as a public utility. Senator J. H. Wootton expressed the opinion that the majority of the voters last election did not know what was in either platform. The people of Idaho, he said, had found that the commission stifled competition to the detriment of I the state's development. He questioned whether or not the people really wanted a commission, but if there was to be a commission lie wanted coal companies included. in-cluded. The inclusion of industries in the bill, Senator Frank Evans declared, would be in effect a pledge to the people that prices of various commodities would be reduced and that future coal shortages would be impossible. He emphasized that no commission could bring about such results re-sults and predicted that the whole proposition prop-osition would be nothing but failure. The propositions to include each of the three industries in the bill were voted upon separately and each was voted down 12 to 6 with one exception, and that remained the alignment throughout ti e afternoon. The one exception was on the inclusion of sugar corporations, i and the conservatives gained one vote. 1 Senator Walton deserting the extremist camp temporarily. As a rule the conservative con-servative was occupied by 'Armstrong, He van, Bradley, Clyde. Colton. Dern. Evans, Parker. Reynolds. SHringham and Punk ; Chez, Olson, Seegmiller, Stevens, Walton and Wootton voted together for a time, but Wootton toward the last expressed ex-pressed the fear that the bill might go through and decided to vote to make It as sane as possible. Extremists Protest. The elimination of the clause giving the commission power to regulate monopolies mo-nopolies was not accomplished without a struggle. Senator Colton assumed the position that the clause only provided indirectly in-directly for what the senate had just turned down, the extension of the jurisdiction juris-diction of the commission to private business. Senator Strlngham asserted that he would be In favor of the monopoly clause and including all private business clear down the lino to and including farmers. far-mers. He asserted that the farmers had effected organizations which were every bit as monopolistic as some of the big Institutions, but declared inasmuch as the proposition was to include only a few businesses he favored stopping at public utilities. Tiie amendment offered by Senator Armstrong to strike out the section providing pro-viding that the public utilities should bear the expense of the operation of the commission com-mission brought a howl from the extremists' ex-tremists' corner. The minority asserted that by assessing the expense against the public utilities the people who receive the benefit would be called upon to pay the addit lonal tax. The. contention of the majority was that the Idea was wrong in principle and that it gave the commission an unlimited taxing tax-ing power. They also argued that it would be no more right to ask the public pub-lic utilities to bear the expense than It would be. for farmers to bear the expense of the horticult ural commission or the dairymen to bear the expense of the food and dairy commission. Substitute Appropriation. It was set forth that the barbers bore the expense of the state board of barber examiners, but this was Immediately put i to rest when it was announced that the board was created at the request of the ' barbers and for their own protection. ; while the public utilities had not asked for and were not In favor of a commis- I sion. j j The result was that the provision was voted out of the bill and in Its place was substituted one carrying an appropriation of 50,000 from the state treasury to meet the expense. Senator Wootton at one point questioned ques-tioned the constitutionality of a provision forcing the utilities to pay for something they did not want and consequently drew several reams of legal opinions which kept him busy the remainder of the session. ses-sion. The first was a contribution from Senator Olson, furnished by Joseph L. Rawlins, to the effect that such an arrangement ar-rangement was permissible. "I also have some opinions on the subject," sub-ject," Senator Armstrong interrupted, "and I am anxious that you should see them, too," Preliminary to the discussion of the bill. Senator Wesley K. Walton asked permission to explain more in detail the operations of the land board in the state's younger days with reference to the sale of lands. He asserted that the board was composed of five members, including the secretary, the governor, secretary of state, attorney general and one other appointee. Under such an arrangement, he declared, it was practically impossible for the members to inspect every tract ! of land sold and, with the exception of the lands in the vicinity of Salt Lake, the lands were sold by the board upon the furnishing of affidavits by the purchasers that the lands were not of a mineral nature. na-ture. An attempt wprs made to hold a session ses-sion this morning to continue the discussion discus-sion of the bill, but the motion was voted down. The bill will be taken up again this afternoon as unfinished business. |