ustxtxb_obs_1973_02_16_50_00015-00000_000.pdf

The Honorable Senator Oscar Mauzy 1338 Acapulco Dr. Dallas, Texas 75232 Dear Senator Mauzy: On June 8, 1971, Senate Bill 910 was passed. Our organization of 160 statewide members feel the bill should be amended to include the following points: 1.Release state funds to publish a book on knowledge needed to pass the examination that will be given later under the Federal Bill. Since the state will be responsible for implementing the federal exam and educational program, we feel the state should furnish a book so the exam can be passed. 2.Enlarge the board to 6 or more members instead of 4 and include members from areas being regulated-such as pest control operators, nurserymen, treemen and farmers because the bill affects all of them. In order for you to more fully understand what we are trying to accomplish, I would like the opportunity to talk with you. Please call or write –but let us hear from you. Sincerely, ‘,\(/..i .e;ZZ\(4.. . Pa-a./ Walter T. Williams, President Independent Pest Control Operators of Texas On Dec. 15, Mauzy responded to this letter, saying in part, “I am always available to meet with any of my constituents or any citizens of Texas to try to seek a legitimate legislative goal. However, I am not prepared to oppose or support legislation on the basis of anyone paying me any money or other thing of value. As a matter of fact, to do so would violate our Constitutional oath.” Williams apparently received some other letters from legislators who were irked by his phraseology. Some of them recall having received a second letter from Williams explaining the first letter, but the Observer was unable to locate a copy of the second letter. Rep. Joe Allen of Baytown recalls that the letter was apologetic or explanatory in tone and that it stated that the reference to “paying any reasonable amount” had reference to any legitimate expense a legislator might incur. A member of Rep. Mickey Leland’s staff recalls that what was apparently the second letter referred to paying for any legal expense a legislator might incur or for legal work he might find necessary in the course of work on the bill. Sen. Chet Brooks’ office, which is noted for its files, has no record of a second letter nor could some other members recall having received a second letter. But Williams did apparently try to straighten out the misunderstanding, at least with some legislators. February 16, 1973 Gammage hammered away at the notion, held by all the D.A.s who testified, that the death penalty is a deterrent to crime. And Harold M. Hyman, a professor of legal and constitutional history at Rice University and the author of ten books on criminal law history, was contemptuous of the deterrence theory. “Each decade almost has altered its views on appropriateness from the eye for the eye, to boiling and quartering, to burying the entrails and other parts of bodies in the mouths of victims in the sight of their families, to hanging, to the electric chair, to the gas chamber, to the current discussion involving the equality of remedies,” Hyman said. .”My review of the most cautious, wideranging and penetrating research is that the deterrent effect of capital punishment, over the centuries and including our own time, here and abroad, leads me to conclude that it fails to deter.” Alan Sager, a professor of political statistics at UT Austin, said he had reviewed the statistical studies of the non-deterrent effect of capital punishment. “They seem to prove conclusivOy to me that the death penalty has no deterrent effect,” he said. Some witnesses even strayed onto the subject of right and wrong. “Murder is outrageous,” said Wayne Oakes of the Texas Civil Liberties Union. “Public murder is intolerable. The taking of human life is a prerogative the state does not have.” The bills were sent to the subcommittee on criminal matters, the same committee that is looking at the penal code. Chairman Tati Santiesteban says the committee will see how the penal code fares in the full Senate before it resorts to the “one shot bills.” “I believe that there is no way, using the Supreme Court guidelines, to pass a constitutional death penalty bill,” Santiesteban told the Observer. He says, the way he reads the court’s decision, the bill would have to eliminate discretion by the district attorney in writing the indictment and by the jury as well. He explained, “The only bill that would pass would have to go something like this: If a man kills a police officer or a fireman while the officer is in the line of duty and the defendant knows he is a police officer or a fireman, then the man must be indicted for capital punishment and, upon finding the man guilty, the jury must assess the death penalty.” The members of the subcommittee are Gammage, Max Sherman of Amarillo, Ike Harris of Dallas and Bill Meier of Fort Worth. K.N. The American tax burden city, state and federal is below that of most other highly developed nations, including England, France, Austria, Germany, Italy, Canada and the Scandinavian countries. U.S. News and World Report Glad to pay INDEPENDENT PEST CONTROL OPERATORS OF TEXAS 4517 Yale P. 0. Box 94071 Houston, Texas 77018 Phone 692 7175