Proceedings of the Nebraska State Bar Association (Volume 9)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1916. Excerpt: ... SATURDAY AFTERNOON SESSION December 30th. President Dryden called the meeting to order at 2 p. m. and, in introducing the first number on the program, said: The Association is very fortunate in having a representative from the Supreme Court to address us at this convention in the person of Judge Charles B. Letton, and it gives me great pleasure to introduce him to you. He will speak on The Authorship of the Slocumb Law. We are glad to know from whence it came, and, thank God, we are glad to know whither it has gone. (Applause.) Judge Letton: Much has been said and written in recent years with regard to the authorship of the Nebraska high license liquor law, commonly known as the Slocumb law. Its. authorship has been variously ascribed to Charles B. Slocumb of Jefferson county, who introduced the bill in the legislature of 1881, and to John H. Ames of Lincoln. It is credited to the latter by Wilbur F. Bryant in the Nebraska Reports, 65 Neb. 524, and by Albert Watkins in the Morton History of Nebraska, the latter going into detailed statement of fact. The real fact is that neither of these gentlemen was the author of the law, though each had a hand in its preparation. The statute was, as most legislation of permanent value is, a growth or evolution, and the new provisions in it were designed, as all legislation should be, to remedy defects in the former law. The idea of applying by petition to a governing board or tribunal for permission to sell intoxicating liquors, which board had discretion to grant or refuse the privilege as it might deem it best for, or obnoxious to, the public welfare, was a part of colonial legislation in Virginia, over 200 years ago and even forty years before, the evils of unrestricted liquor selling were recognized and the sale ...