Magic, Inc

by Robert A. Heinlein

  But let us stipulate, for the sake of argument, that the Little People do exist. Is that any reason to pay them blackmail? Should the citizens of this commonwealth pay cumshaw to the denizens of the underworld-' He waited for his pun to be appreciated. It wasn't. -for that which is legally and rightfully ours? If this ridiculous principle is pushed to its logical conclusion, the farmers and dairymen I am proud to number among my constituents will be required to pay toll to the elves before they can milk their cows!'

  Someone slid into the seat beside me. I glanced around, saw that it was Jedson, and questioned him with my eyes. Nothing doing now,' he whispered. We've got some time to kill and might as well do it here' - and he turned to the debate.

  Somebody had gotten up to reply to the old duck with the Daniel Webster complex. Mr Speaker, if the honoured member is quite through with his speech - I did not quite catch what office he is running for! - I would like to invite the attention of this body to the precedented standing in jurisprudence of elements of every nature, not only in Mosaic law, Roman law, the English common law, but also in the appellate court of our neighbouring state to the south. I am confident that anyone possessing even an elementary knowledge of the law will recognize the case I have in mind without citation, but for the benefit of-'

  Mr Speaker! I move to amend by striking out the last word.'

  A stratagem to gain the floor,' Joe whispered.

  Is it the purpose of the honourable member who preceded me to imply-'

  It went on and on. I turned to Jedson and asked, I can't figure out this chap who is speaking; a while ago he was hollering about cows. What's he afraid of, religious prejudices?'

  Partly that; he's from a very conservative district. But he's lined up with the independent oilmen. They don't want the state setting the terms; they think they can do better dealing with the gnomes directly.'

  But what interest has he got in oil? There's no oil in his district.'

  No, but there is outdoor advertising. The same holding company that controls the so-called independent oilmen holds a voting trust in the Countryside Advertising Corporation. And that can be awfully important to him around election time.

  The Speaker looked our way, and an assistant sergeant at arms threaded his way towards us. We shut up. Someone moved the order of the day, and the oil bill was put aside for one of the magic bills that had already come out of committee. This was a bill to outlaw every sort of magic, witchcraft, thaumaturgy.

  No one spoke for it but the proponent, who launched into a diatribe that was more scholarly than logical. He quoted extensively from Blackstone's Commentaries and the records of the Massachusetts trials, and finished up with his head thrown back, one finger waving wildly to heaven and shouting,' "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live! '

  No one bothered to speak against it; it was voted on immediately without roll call, and, to my complete bewilderment, passed without a single nay! I turned to Jedson and found him smiling at the expression on my face.

  It doesn't mean a thing, Archie,' he said quietly.

  Huh?'

  He's a party wheel horse who had to introduce that bill to please a certain bloc of his constituents.'

  You mean he doesn't believe in the bill himself?'

  Oh no, he believes in it all right, but he also knows it is hopeless. It has evidently been agreed to let him pass it over here in the Assembly this session so that he would have something to take home to his people. Now it will go to the senate committee and die there; nobody will ever hear of it again.'

  I guess my voice carries too well, for my reply got us a really dirty look from the Speaker. We got up hastily and left.

  Once outside I asked Joe what had happened that he was back so soon. He would not touch it,' he told me. Said that he couldn't afford to antagonize the association.'

  Does that finish us?'

  Not at all. Sally and I are going to see another member right after lunch. He's tied up in a committee meeting at the moment.'

  We stopped in a restaurant where Jedson had arranged to meet Sally Logan. Jedson ordered lunch, and I had a couple of cans of devitalized beer, insisting on their bringing it to the booth in the unopened containers. I don't like to get even a little bit tipsy, although I like to drink. On another occasion I had paid for wizard-processed liquor and had received intoxicating liquor instead. Hence the unopened containers.

  I sat there, staring into my glass and thinking about what I had heard that morning, especially about the bill to outlaw all magic. The more I thought about it the better the notion seemed. The country had gotten along all right in the old days before magic had become popular and commercially widespread. It was unquestionably a headache in many ways, even leaving out our present troubles with racketeers and monopolists. Finally I expressed my opinion to Jedson.

  But he disagreed. According to him prohibition never does work in any field. He said that anything which can be supplied and which people want will he supplied - law or no law. To prohibit magic would simply be to turn over the field to the crooks and the black magicians.

  I see the drawbacks of magic as well as you do,' he went on, but it is like firearms. Certainly guns made it possible for almost anyone to commit murder and get away with it. But once they were invented the damage was done. All you can do is to try to cope with it. Things like the Sullivan Act - they didn't keep the crooks from carrying guns and using them; they simply took guns out of the hands of honest people.

  It's the same with magic. If you prohibit it, you take from decent people the enormous boons to be derived from a knowledge of the great arcane laws, while the nasty, harmful secrets hidden away in black grimoires and red grimoires will still be bootlegged to anyone who will pay the price and has no respect for law.

  Personally, I don't believe there was any less black magic practised between, say, 1750 and 1950 than there is now, or was before then. Take a look at Pennsylvania and the hex country. Take a look at the Deep South. But since that time we have begun to have the advantages of white magic too.'

  Sally came in, spotted us, and slid into one side of the booth. My,' she said with a sigh of relaxation, I've just fought my way across the lobby of the Constitution. The "third house" is certainly out in full force this trip. I've never seen em so thick, especially the women.'

  She means lobbyists, Archie,' Jedson explained. Yes, I noticed them. I'd like to make a small bet that two thirds of them are synthetic.'

  I thought I didn't recognize many of them,' Sally commented. Are you sure, Joe?'

  Not entirely. But Bodie agrees with me. He says that the women are almost all mandrakes, or androids of some sort. Real women are never quite so perfectly beautiful - nor so tractable. I've got him checking on them now.'

  In what way?'

  He says he can spot the work of most of the magicians capable of that high-powered stuff. If possible we want to prove that all these androids were made by Magic, Incorporated - though I'm not sure just what use we can make of the fact.

  Bodie has even located some zombies,' he added.

  Not really!' exclaimed Sally. She wrinkled her nose and looked disgusted. Some people have odd tastes.'

  They started discussing aspects of politics that I know nothing about, while Sally put away a very sizeable lunch topped off by a fudge ice-cream cake slice. But I noticed that she ordered from the left-hand side of the menu - all vanishing items, like the alcohol in my beer.

  I found out more about the situation as they talked. When a bill is submitted to the legislature, it is first referred to a committee for hearings. Ditworth's bill, A B 22, had been referred to the Committee on Professional Standards. Over in the Senate an identical bill had turned up and had been referred by the lieutenant governor, who presides in the Senate, to the Committee on Industrial Practices.

  Our immediate object was to find a sponsor for our bill; if possible, one for each house, and preferably sponsors who were members, in their respective houses, of the committees concerned.
All of this needed to be done before Ditworth's bills came up for hearing.

  I went with them to see their second-choice sponsor for the Assembly. He was not on the Professional Standards Committee, but he was on the Ways and Means Committee, which meant that he carried a lot of weight in any committee.

  He was a pleasant chap named Spence - Luther B. Spence - and I could see that he was quite anxious to please Sally - for past favours, I suppose. But they had no more luck with him than with their first-choice man. He said that he did not have time to fight for our bill, as the chairman of the Ways and Means Committee was sick and he was chairman pro tem.

  Sally put it to him flatly. Look here, Luther, when you have needed a hand in the past, you've got it from me. I hate to remind a man of obligations, but you will recall that matter of the vacancy last year on the Fish and Game Commission. Now I want action on this matter, and not excuses!'

  Spence was plainly embarrassed. Now, Sally, please don't feel like that. You're getting your feathers up over nothing. You know I'll always do anything I can for you, but you don't really need this, and it would necessitate my neglecting things that I can't afford to neglect.'

  What do you mean, I don't need it?'

  I mean you should not worry about A B 22. It's a cinch bill.'

  Jedson explained that term to me later. A cinch bill, he said, was a bill introduced for tactical reasons. The sponsors never intended to try to get it enacted into law, but simply used it as a bargaining point. It's like an asking price' in a business deal.

  Are you sure of that?'

  Why, yes, I think so. The word has been passed around that there is another bill coming up that won't have the bugs in it that this bill has.'

  After we left Spence's office, Jedson said, Sally, I hope Spence is right, but I don't trust Ditworth's intentions. He's out to get a stranglehold on the industry. I know it!'

  Luther usually has the correct information, Joe.'

  Yes, that is no doubt true, but this is a little out of his line. Anyhow, thanks, kid. You did your best.'

  Call on me if there is anything else, Joe. And come Out to dinner before you go; you haven't seen Bill or the kids yet.'

  I won't forget.'

  Jedson finally gave up as impractical trying to submit our bill, and concentrated on the committees handling Ditworth's bills. I did not see much of him. He would go out at four in the afternoon to a cocktail party and get back to the hotel at three in the morning, bleary-eyed, with progress to report.

  He woke me up the fourth night and announced jubilantly, It's in the bag, Archie!'

  You killed those bills?'

  Not quite. I couldn't manage that. But they will be reported out of committee so amended that we won't care if they do pass. Furthermore, the amendments are different in each committee.

  Well, what of that?'

  That means that even if they do pass their respective houses they will have to go to conference committee to have their differences ironed out, then back for final passage in each house. The chances of that this late in a short session are negligible. Those bills are dead.'

  Jedson's predictions were justified. The bills came out of committee with a do pass' recommendation late Saturday evening. That was the actual time; the statehouse clock had been stopped forty-eight hours before to permit first and second readings of an administration must' bill. Therefore it was officially Thursday. I know that sounds cockeyed, and it is, but I am told that every legislature in the country does it towards the end of a crowded session.

  The important point is that, Thursday or Saturday, the session would adjourn sometime that night. I watched Ditworth's bill come up in the Assembly. It was passed, without debate, in the amended form. I sighed with relief. About midnight Jedson joined me and reported that the same thing had happened in the Senate. Sally was on watch in the conference committee room, just to make sure that the bills stayed dead.

  Joe and I remained on watch in our respective houses. There was probably no need for it, but it made us feel easier. Shortly before two in the morning Bodie came in and said we were to meet Jedson and Sally outside the conference committee room.

  What's that?' I said, immediately all nerves. Has something slipped?'

  No, it's all right and it's all over. Come on.'

  Joe answered my question, as I hurried up with Bodie trailing, before I could ask it. It's OK, Archie. Sally was present when the committee adjourned sine die, without acting on those bills. It's all over; we've won!'

  We went over to the bar across the street to have a drink in celebration.

  In spite of the late hour the bar was moderately crowded. Lobbyists, local politicians, legislative attaches, all the swarm of camp followers who throng the capitol whenever the legislature is sitting - all such were still up and around, and many of them had picked this bar as a convenient place to wait for news of adjournment.

  We were lucky to find a stool at the bar for Sally. We three men made a tight little cluster around her and tried to get the attention of the overworked bartender. We had just managed to place our orders when a young man tapped on the shoulder of the customer on the stool to the right of Sally. He immediately got down and left. I nudged Bodie to tell him to take the seat.

  Sally turned to Joe. Well, it won't be long now. There go the sergeants at arms.' She nodded towards the young man, who was repeating the process farther down the line.

  What does that mean?' I asked Joe.

  It means they are getting along towards the final vote on the bill they were waiting on. They've gone to "call of the house now, and the Speaker has ordered the sergeant at arms to send his deputies out to arrest absent members.'

  Arrest them?' I was a little bit shocked.

  Only technically. You see, the Assembly has had to stall until the Senate was through with this bill, and most of the members have wandered out for a bite to eat, or a drink. Now they are ready to vote, so they round them up.'

  A fat man took a stool near us which had just been vacated by a member. Sally said, Hello, Don.'

  He took a cigar from his mouth and said, How are yuh, Sally? What's new? Say, I thought you were interested in that bill on magic?'

  We were all four alert at once. I am,' Sally admitted. What about it?'

  Well, then, you had better get over there. They're voting on it right away. Didn't you notice the "call of the house ?'

  I think we set a new record getting across the street, with Sally leading the field in spite of her plumpness. I was asking Jedson how it could be possible, and he shut me up with, I don't know, man! We'll have to see.'

  We managed to find seats on the main floor back of the rail. Sally beckoned to one of the pages she knew and sent him up to the clerk's desk for a copy of the bill that was pending. In front of the rail the Assembly men gathered in groups. There was a crowd around the desk of the administration floor leader and a smaller cluster around the floor leader of the opposition. The whips had individual members buttonholed here and there, arguing with them in tense whispers.

  The page came back with the copy of the bill. It was an appropriation bill for the Middle Counties Improvement Project - the last of the must' bills for which the session had been called - but pasted to it, as a rider, was Ditworth's bill in its original, most damnable form!

  It had been added as an amendment in the Senate, probably as a concession to Ditworth's stooges in order to obtain their votes to make up the two-thirds majority necessary to pass the appropriation bill to which it had been grafted.

  The vote came almost at once. It was evident, early in the roll call, that the floor leader had his majority in hand and that the bill would pass. When the clerk announced its passage, a motion to adjourn sine die was offered by the opposition floor leader and it was carried unanimously. The Speaker called the two floor leaders to his desk and instructed them to wait on the governor and the presiding officer of the Senate with notice of adjournment.

  The crack of his gavel released us
from stunned immobility. We shambled out.

  We got in to see the governor late the next morning. The appointment, squeezed into an overcrowded calendar, was simply a concession to Sally and another evidence of the high regard in which she was held around the capitol. For it was evident that he did not want to see us and did not have time to see us. But he greeted Sally affectionately and listened, patiently while Jedson explained in a few words why we thought the combined Ditworth-Middle Counties bill should be vetoed.

  The circumstances were not favourable to reasoned expostulation. The governor was interrupted by two calls that he had to take, one from his director of finance and one from Washington. His personal secretary came in once and shoved a memorandum under his eyes, at which the old man looked worried, then scrawled something on it and handed it back. I could tell that his attention was elsewhere for some minutes after that.

  When Jedson stopped talking, the governor sat for a moment, looking down at his blotter pad, an expression of deep- rooted weariness on his face. Then he answered in slow words, No, Mr Jedson, I can't see it. I regret as much as you do that this business of the regulation of magic has been tied in with an entirely different matter. But I cannot veto part of a bill and sign the rest - even though the bill includes two widely separated subjects.

  I appreciate the work you did to help elect my administration' - I could see Sally's hand in that remark - and wish that we could agree on this. But the Middle Counties Project is something that I have worked towards since my inauguration. I hope and believe that it will be the means whereby the most depressed area in our state can work out its economic problems without further grants of public money. If I thought that the amendment concerning magic would actually do a grave harm to the state-'

  He paused for a moment. But I don't. When Mrs Logan called me this morning I had my legislative counsel analyse the bill. I agree that the bill is unnecessary, but it seems to do nothing more than add a little more bureaucratic red tape. That's not good, but we manage to do business under a lot of it; a little more can't wreck things.'