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Show H TOO MANY LAWS TO ENFORCE THIS nation as a whole, and almost every state in it this one not excepted suffers j from too much law making. Senotor Root told H the American Bar Association that in Ave years B from 1909 to 1913, inclusive, Congress and the H State Legislatures passed 62,014 laws. No one H knows how many thousands of laws were in force H before 1909, but the 62,014 new ones repealed H many of those previously in force, and amended H many more, with no end of resulting confusion. M Relatively few of the laws are vicious enough to M work direct harm, but hundreds of them are harm- H ful indirectley, for they are unnecessary, inconsis- H tent, and impossible to enforce. H Next Monday the Utah legislature will go into m session for a sixty days term. Of course the ma- H jority of the legislators, and especially the new M ones, will want to go on record as doing some- B thing. There are other senators and representa- m tives who are chronic bill spinners, who through H force of habit reel them off by the rod, and the H legislator who keeps a cool head, and has a club M ready to kill new and needless legislation, is about M the greatest benefactor the state has. H We do not mean to assume that all new legis- H lation is bad, or that the door should be closed H hard and fast against all new bills, but each leg- H islator should wait to become fully convinced that M there is need for a certain measure before intro- H ducing or supporting it. It is the history of each H succeeding session of the legistature that the time H . of the assembly is, largely taken up in the con- H sideration of silly and unimportant measures, H without which the state is better off, and the H slaughtering or side tracking of these redundant H bills forms no small part of the work of the lcgis- H v lature. H , Be moderate and considerate, Mr. Lawmaker, LHHIIIIIIIIfl H i , and do not permit your anxiety to do something H to lead you into doing a lot of useless and sense- H less bill writing. |