ized; had elected Hon. M. L. SMITH Speaker, Hon. JAS. A. HOYT Clerk, and was ready to dispose of such business as might come before it. Received as information. PRESIDENT'S APPOINTMENTS. Secretary to the President-Leon M. Green. Journal Clerk-G. E. Moore. Bill Clerk-E. A. Perry. Doorkeepers-G. T. Hyatt, J. C. Johnson and T. A. Scott. Pages Jack Mullikin, Andrew Graham. Mail Carrier-N. O. Pyles. Laborers-Calhoun Butler, Albert Nance and Ernest Hargrove. Doorkeepers Hyatt, Johnson and Scott were presented at the bar of the Senate, and the oath of office was administered by the PRESIDENT. MESSAGE FROM THE GOVERNOR. John K. Aull, Private Secretary to the Governor, appeared upon the floor of the Senate and presented the Annual Message of His Excellency, GOVERNOR COLE. L. BLEASE, which follows: MESSAGE No. 1. Gentlemen of the General Assembly: It is with a great deal of pleasure that I welcome you to the session of 1913. Some familiar faces of your last body are not seen among your membership today. The changes have been many. The people of South Carolina have spoken, and we all must abide by their decision, whether it be for us or against us. But, coming fresh from the people, as you do, and having been re-endorsed by them recently, as I have been, it is encumbent upon us to lay aside any personal feelings we may have, and any political differences with each other, and join together in the effort to bring our most diligent and most thoughtful consideration to the solution of all public questions confronting us, and endeavor to do those things only which are for the best interests of all the people, both black and white, of our grand old Commonwealth. I am proud to say, notwithstanding I have just passed through one of the most bitter campaigns ever waged against a human being, that, as Governor, I have no ill will towards any man, save those who went out of their way to use as campaign material against me those things outside of the political record, commonly called falsehoods, in an endeavor to injure my personal reputation. That, however, should have no influence in our consideration of what is best for our State. Some of my friends were defeated; some of those who were not my political supporters were elected; but it was done by the sovereign people, and I have no complaint to make. Turning my back upon the past, my eyes are to the future, and it is my earnest desire to serve the people of my State with fairness and with justice, and to do that only which is the will of my Heavenly Father, and I pray to him daily to guide and direct me, that I may do that which is for the common good of the people of my State, and accomplish the purposes for which He has given me my life. For what I have done in the past, whenever it may have been, or wherever it may have been, I have no apologies to offer to any man or set of men, and no excuses to make. I beg leave to reiterate my inaugural address of 1911, my annual message of 1912, and each and every message which I have sent to the General Assembly since I have been Governor, and to ask you to read each one of them, and give them your careful consideration, laying aside any personal or political feeling that you may have towards me; and in the course of this message, in making certain recommendations for your consideration, I shall refer you to my message to the last General Assembly, in order that, if you desire the information, you may secure it, and, further, in order to save making this message too long and tedious. A WORD TO THE NEW MEMBERS. There has been, in the past, in vogue in the House of Representatives, a rule, or system, by which new members have been caught and sometimes deceived, viz.: Committeemen, when they go into their room for organization, are presented by some member with a resolution to the effect "that this committee discuss all measures before us among ourselves, that we take a vote in the committee room, that the minority shall be bound by the action of the majority, that the report shall be unanimous, and that the minority shall support, upon the floor of the House, whatever the Bill or appropriation may be, so as to present in the House an undivided committee." Now, new members, I warn you that you may not be caught by this little subterfuge in your committee room. Your constituents at home do not know of the discussions and the action in your committee room; these are not published and are not presented to the people. But your vote in the House is recorded in the public journals, and when you go home and your people say, "I see you voted for such and such large appropriation," you say, "Oh, yes, but I voted against it in the committee," your people cannot understand this, and your opponents turn it to your disadvantage, and they should; for it is not what you do in the committee, but it is what you do on the floor of the House and your votes in public session, that carry the appropriations and make the laws. The majority of your committee may be six; if it be a committee of eleven, the other five have their hands tied by those. six; when you go into the House an appropriation may carry by only three or four votes, and if those five minority members had stood on the floor of the House as they stood in the committee, that appropriation could not carry, or that Bill could not pass, and the people of South Carolina would be saved the increase in their taxes. Now, new members, you have been warned; it is a matter for you to act upon, and the final arbiter will be your constituents, who are looking to you to represent them and their interests. SOUTH CAROLINA PROSPEROUS. Our State has prospered wonderfully in the past twelve months. Four millions of dollars have come in as investments in cotton mills alone, as will be shown by the reports. The report of the Secretary of State will show a large increase in the investment of capital in many other enterprises of various kinds; and the receipts of his office from charter fees will give some idea of this era of prosperity upon which South Carolina has entered. I am delighted to say that not a State officer or a county officer in the entire State has been charged with being short in his accounts, or with any conduct unbecoming his position, so far as has been brought to my knowledge, with the lone exception of the State Bank Examiner, which case will be brought more directly to your attention later. All this is truly gratifying to me, especially in view of the fact that it was heralded throughout the country by certain newspapers that if Blease was elected the State would be financially ruined; that the Northern capitalists would not invest their money here, and that our people would suffer generally. More Northern capital has come into the State under my administration than under that of any other Governor, and the march of material progress has gone steadily forward. As evidence of this progress and prosperity, I desire to append herewith the following statistics gathered by the State Department of Agriculture: SOME STATISTICS OF PROSPERITY. Statistics gathered by the State Department of Agriculture tell a wonderful story of progress in South Carolina during the past year. The agricultural development of this State grew in the decade between 1900 and 1910 from $51,324,000 to $141,983,000-an increase of about $90,000,000. Commissioner Watson estimates that the corn crop from South Carolina this year will exceed the corn crop of last year by 2,000,000. The cotton crop will not be as large this year as last, but the increased price will bring even more than the bumper crop of 1911. Complete data secured by agents of the department on all manufacturing plants shows the capital invested this year to be $142,670,803 as compared with $130,481,627 in 1911. The total value of the manufacturing plants this year was $124,564,060 as compared with $117,979,385 last year. The increase in the value of the annual product this year amounted to $6,634,675. The total capital invested in the lumber and sawmills of the State for 1912 amounted to $17,462,158, an increase of $2,190,308 over 1911, which year showed a total capitalization of $15,271,850. More striking was the increase in the value of the annual production for 1912, which year showed a total production of $11,384,340, an increase of $2,701,730 over 1911, which totaled $8,682,607 as an output. OIL MILLS INDUSTRIES. For 1912 the total capital invested in the oil mills of the State was $3,673,106, a decrease of $167,260, as compared with the total invested capital of $3,840,360 for 1911. But the increase in the annual production for 1912 over 1911 was $434,132. This year showed an output of $13,217,083, while that of 1911 was $12,782,951. The decrease in the capital stock this year was caused by the burning of several mills and others going out of business. CIGARS AND TOBACCO. The concerns manufacturing cigars and other tobacco products show a capitalization of $396,701 for 1912, while for 1911 the total capital invested was $149,000, an increase of $247,702. The value of the output for 1911 was $849,626; for 1912, $891,078; increase in favor of this year of $41,452. STONE CONCERNS. The capitalization of all stone manufacturing concerns of the State, which include granite quarries, for 1912 is $428,466, an increase of $34,918 over 1911, which year showed a capitalization of $393,546. The annual production for 1912 was $586,356; 1911, $356,940; increase for 1912 of $230,416. FERTILIZER INDUSTRY. The fertilizer industry of the State shows an increase in capital for 1912 of $5,605,905 and a reduction in the output of $71,022. The capital for 1911 was $7,568,981; 1912, $13,474,868. The production for 1911 was $12,094,734; for 1912, $12,023,712. The reason of the large increase in capitalization and a decrease in the output is because the bumper crop in 1911 caused the fertilizer manufacturers to prepare for the future. Then the campaign for a decrease in the acreage of cotton was launched and the farmers of the State curtailed the number of acres planted in the fleecy staple; such a condition necessarily decreased the sale of fertilizer. |