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Show ' . ' L- FGrass RootsAmcrica ! Beware of the Federal I ' Cuspidor Inspector By Jerry Maran Reading some federal regulations is like atrip trough Alice's Wonder-and. Wonder-and. Things just get curiouser and curious -er. But the most curious of all is the absolute absurdity of some governmental gov-ernmental attempts to regulate everything from Washington, i The Occupational Sa fety and Health Act is a ease in point. It has i stirred massive protests pro-tests from small businessmen, busi-nessmen, farmers and small industries across i America. The griev-! griev-! .nces are entirely jus-Wied jus-Wied because this new law gives sweeping powers pow-ers of administrative Pardon to the Labor Uepartment. .fere's nothing wrong Congress establishing estab-lishing minimum safety standards, especially in industries which operate m more than one state. Bul this law ursurps the authority of local gov ernment, discriminates against small business and worse, it gives administrative ad-ministrative agents of the Labor Department the power to harrass and fine small businessmenthrough business-menthrough penalties assessed not by a court of law, but through administrative ad-ministrative action. The Federal Government, Govern-ment, it seems, is not content to burden business busi-ness with high taxes. It now wants to stick a bureaucratic nose into every cuspidor across nSn 1910.141 of the Act for example, declares de-clares (in sub-section 2 (i) that: "Expectorating upon the walls, floors work places, or stairs of any establishment shall not be permitted. For those who don t have a dictionary handy, that means you can't spit on the floor in places of business covered by this law If an employee doe's, the awesome power pow-er of the Federal Gov ernment is applied iiui against the offending employee, but against his boss, the owner of the establishment. What makes this law even more unjust is the fact that a financial penalty can be levied against the employer, even though, he takes immediate action ac-tion to correct any alleged al-leged violation brought to his attention, " says so in Section 1903. lo (b) and (c) entitled: "Proposed Penalties. In civilized societies, expectorating on the floor or anywhere else is not regarded as a nice habit. Most cities and towns have strict local lo-cal health ordinances against it. A considerate employer might even K a cuspidor handy .to discourage such unsanitary un-sanitary practices. But "Cuspidors," according to the language of the law "are considered un-des un-des rable, but, if used, they shall be of such construction that they are cleanable. They shall be cleaned at least daily when in use." No doubt the Labor Department will need an army of Federal cuspidor cuspi-dor inspectors if they hope to enforce this nonsense. non-sense. Aside from the unreasonable harrass-ment, harrass-ment, businessmen and individual citizens, too, will be taxed to support these brigades of expectoration expec-toration specialist on the federal payroll. We hope some of them check by now and then at the United States Senate chambers where, by long tradition, each senator is provided not only with a shiny cuspidor, but with a snuff box as well. It would serve the senators sena-tors right because they helped pass this ridicu-luous ridicu-luous extension of federal fede-ral authority in a field where' local ordinances have always proved sufficient. suf-ficient. It's difficult to believe a majority of the lawmakers law-makers leave their collective col-lective common sense at home when they congregate congre-gate in Washington. In any case, Congress should give small businessmen busi-nessmen the same privilege pri-vilege our legal system gives to hardened cri- minals: the right to be considered innocent until un-til proven guilty. The Occupational Safety and Health Act is totally out of step with America's tradition of justice. Under this administrative administra-tive law, a federal inspector in-spector can cite an employer em-ployer on the spot and recommend a financial penalty, too. That means anyone accused of violating vio-lating the law is presumed pre-sumed guilty until proven pro-ven innocent. If they can't just repeal the more ridiculous sections, sec-tions, Congress should at least give the businessmen busi-nessmen the protection of a court trial. |