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LEGISLATIVE PROCEEDINGS
HOUSE - THIRTY-FIRST DAY
CARSON, February 11
The House met at 10 A.M. Present, 18. Absent, Messrs. Clagett, Dixson, Gillespie, Phillips, Stewart and Ungar.
QUESTIONS OF PRIVILEGE
Mr. Heaton rose to a question of privilege, and said he was reported in the ENTERPRISE as having moved that the Committee of the Whole recommend the rejection of Miss Clapp's Seminary bill. That was a mistake. He said his motion was to refer the bill back to the Standing Committee on Colleges and Common Schools. [I; suppose that is true; I do not consider myself responsible for mistakes made when the House is full of beautiful women, who are: writing tender notes to me all the time and expecting me to answer them. In cases of this kind, I would just as soon misrepresent a member as any other way. - MARK] Mr. Heaton was easy on the reporters, but he was very severe on Mr. Gillespie. He said it would appear from the report that Mr. Gillespie included him among those members who had dodged the issue on the telegraph bill - whereas he was absent from the House, by permission of the Speaker, with the Prison Committee.
The Speaker said there was nothing incorrect about the report - that Mr. Heaton was shielded from Mr. Gillespie's insinuation by a preceding paragraph, which stated the fact that he had been excused from attendance.
Whereupon Jefferson's Manual arose the same being known on the credit accounts of the several saloons as "Young Gillespie" - and proceeded to waste the time of the House, as usual, in dilating upon some trivial distinction without a difference. [He was after the reporter of the ENTERPRISE, in the first place, but before I could catch his drift, he fell a victim to his old regular "parliamentary usage" dysentery, - passed his brains, and became a smiling, sociable, driveling lunatic. Consequently, I failed to find out what I had been doing to young Gillespie, after all. - MARK TWAIN.]
HOUSE - AFTERNOON SESSION
MESSAGE
A message was received from the Council, transmitting the following bills:
Council bill incorporating the Austin Christian Association. [The Speaker was at a loss to know what committee to refer a bill of such an unusual nature to - wherein his head was level. He finally referred it to the Lander delegation, two of the most faithful and consistent supporters of the Devil there are in the House. - MARK.]
Council bill for the relief of certain parties. Referred to the Committee on Claims.
At 5 P.M. the House adjourned until 6:30 P.M.
[While I was absent a moment, yesterday, on important business, taking a drink, the House, with its accustomed engaging unanimity, knocked one of my pet bills higher than a kite, without a dissenting voice. I convened the members in extra session last night, and deluged them with blasphemy, after which I entered into a solemn compact with them, whereby, in consideration of their re-instating my bill, I was to make an ample apology for all the mean things I had said about them for passing that infamous, unchristian, infernal telegraph bill the other day. I also promised to apologize for all the mean things that other people had published against them for their depraved action aforesaid. They reinstated my pet to-day, unanimously, thus fulfilling their contract to the letter, and in conformity with my promise above referred to, I hereby solemnly apologize for their rascally conduct in passing the infamous telegraph bill above mentioned. Under ordinary circumstances, they never would have done such a thing - but upon that occasion I think they had been fraternizing with Clagett and Simmons at the White House, and were under the vicious influence of Humboldt whisky. Consequently, they were not responsible, Sir - they were not responsible, either to anybody on earth or in heaven. - MARK TWAIN.]
[reprinted in Mark Twain of the Enterprise, edited by Henry Nash Smith, (Univ. of California Press, 1957), pp. 154-56.]
