Democratic Sentinel, Volume 22, Number 30, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 20 August 1898 — Contributory Negligence. 1 [ARTICLE]

Contributory Negligence. 1

Thp answer to a complaint that the owner of a cistern had negligently alloweda boy to fall into it rt%.mtly set UP tfe fact that When the plaintiff fell in v l# and a pegrp bpy were trying to drojvn a stray cat'in the cistern after they had removed the cover, “making a. fine opening for. the cat, also for ;the plaintiff.” The plaintiff’s own negligence is alleged as follows: “The plaintiff was guilty pf gross and willful neglect ip thus tackling that pat by himself on the top of said cistern near to said opening without having first put the pat in a bootleg, head down, according to the established and recognized rules of procedure among all intelligent boys engaged in the honorable enterprise of drowning stray eats in the wells and cisterns of the neighbors nud their parents. The. defendant says the plaintiff was guilty of gross and willful neglect in not letting the negro boy first try his band on the pat, and the defendant says the negro boy was guilty of criminal neglect ip this, that be saw the great danger to which the plaintiff was exposed in his fight with the cat on the top of the cistern In time to haye avoided danger, but negligently failed to take a hand against the eat.*’—Omaha Bee. The eligibility of a woman to election as a county clerk Is sustained in State, Crow vs. Hottetfer (Mo.), 38 L- R. 4- 208, where the Constitution provides that no person shall be chosen to office “who Is not a resident of the United States and who shall not have resided -in this State one year,” although masculine pronouns are used in respect to the subject of. officers. The annotation to this case makes an elaborate review of the decisions as to the right women Htr hold office. The memory Is a treasure to whom we must give funds, if we would draw the assistance we need.—Rowe. ■. —J Pon’t dp things so you’jl, ha VO to do them over to-moirow.