WRITINGS OF SAM HOUSTON, 1860
453
Secretary of State, Comptroller of Public Accounts, Auditor, Treasurer of the State, Superintendent of the Penitentiary, and all such like printing that may be ordered by the legislature, or either hours thereof, to be printed on the same size sheet and type as required for the journals; and one-fourth of a cent per page for each additional five hundred copies of said message and other documents; for printing two hundred copies of bills, resolutions or memorials, printed on pica type, the lines numbered on the margin, with a space between the lines of the size of pica, and on foolscap paper with four pages to a sheet, the sum of two dollars and fifty cents per page for the number of pages in one copy thereof; for printing Executive proclamations, advertisements and such like documents, fifty cents for square of ten lines for the first insertion that may be ordered; for the printing of proclamations and proposed amendments to the Constitution, the sum of fifty cents per square for each insertion, and such pub- lications shall not be inserted in any type larger than bourgeois, and each square shall contain not less than two hundred ems. The bid presented by John Marshall, and accepted by the Secretary of State, Comptroller and Treasurer, is in my opinion, in direct conflict with this section of the act in several particulars, the most important of which I will mention. That portion of the proposal which specifies the rates at which he will print reports and documents ordered by the legislature, is as follows : "I will print one hundred copies of reports and documents ordered by the Legislature, at one and a half cents per page; one cent per page for second and third hundred; one-half cent per page for fourth hundred, and one-third of a cent per page for fifth hundred, and for all over that number, one-fourth of a cent per page." A reference to the law given above, will show that no bid shall be accepted upon this class of work, at a higher rate than one- third of a cent per page for five hundred copies. The report of the Superintendent of the State Penitentiary before me, five hundred copies of which were ordered to be printed for the use of the Senate, may be cited to illustrate how far this bid accords with law. It is sixty-four pages long, and according to the con- tract will cost as follows :
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