Jasper County Democrat, Volume 21, Number 96, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 1 March 1919 — STATE NEWS ITEMS [ARTICLE]

STATE NEWS ITEMS

The Doings of Hoosierdom Reported by Wire. COLLEGES GET STATE CASH s / Hundreds of Thousands in BacH Appropriations Due Purdue and Indiana Universities —Tax Reform Bill May Be Amended. Indianapolis, Feb. 28. —The Purdue and Indiana university demands that a recent decision of the supreme court be adhered to by the state and payments made to the schools aggregating hundreds of thousands of dollars In back appropriations, as well as $120,QOO annually hereafter fyr Purdue and $65,000 for Indiana annually finally has resulted In a compromise agreement between the governor, boards of trustees of the institutions and a subcommittee of the house ways and means committee and the senate finance committee. The compromise will mean that tin* state will pay onehalf of. the sums the court decision said were due the institutions under old appropriation acts, that the 7-cent educational law levy of several years ago was supposed to have mpde inoperative. When tile news that the compromise had been arranged was received in the house of representatives it instantly became apparent that there would be some opposition to the plan and that the house might refuse to concur In the plun. It Is reported that there is a plan on foot to re-amend the state tax reform fill! in the senate.

Senator Joseph M. Cravens, Democrat of Madison, who was made the target of attacks by Republicans in an effort to unseat him on charges that he had not been elected, lias won his fight in the senate and was-seated by the body. Thereupon he Introduced his expense accounts, in connection with the attempt to unseat him —and asked the senate to pay them. The state senate, sitting as a committee of the whole, will take up the tax reform measure at- two o’clock Monday afternoon. The senate adopted a motion made by Senator Kiper to this effect, following remarks by Lieutenant Governor Bush, who declared: “If is your duty to make a good bill out of If, or kill it. I bellevq that some wise tax legislation should be passed.” The senate passed, 33 to 8, the bill fathered by Senator Duncan providing flint primary elections be held in March instead of May; the Rutts bill to make uniform tlie law for transfers of shares of stocks in corporations; and the Dill providing for the erection of a marker on the site of the Gen. W. H. Harrison encampment at Raccoon creek, in Park county. The Beardsley bill, increasing tax on pleasure automobiles 100 per cent and on trucks 200 per cent came tip for third reading and was made on order of special business for 11 o’clock this morning. The house killed Hie bill providing for inspection of masonry construction when it came up for second readifig and passed the measure fixing the compensation and describing the duties of certain state and county officers, when it came up as special order of business. /

Representative Adams called up the bill regulating egg traffic and which would prevent fraud and misrepresentation by dealers. t Several senate Dills have* just been handed down and referred to committees of the house after first reading. One of these was the Southworth bill, to provide for the organization, operation and supervision of fire insurance rate-making bureaus and to prohibit discrimination in such rates. Ahother was the Duffey bill, to change the name of the state tuberculosis hospital at Rockville, to the Indiana State Tuberculosis sanatorium and to create a id-partisan board of control therefor by adding a member to the board of three trustees, which now operate the institution. Another was the Duncan bill to reimburse Putnam county for money expended in the apprehension of prisoners * escaped from the Indiana state farm at Putnamvijle. The State Bankers’ assoclatiop bill Introduced by Senator Batnura to provide a specific statute and penalties for burglary by the use of explosives, was handed down in the house and read the first time. Another measure was that introduced by Senator Furnas to legalize the old Hoard claim against the state for S(JO,000. The house bill, introduced by Representative Axby, to give widows and orphans of soldiers of the world war the same privileges of all kinds now enjoyed by relatives of soldiers of former wars; was read a second time in the house and sent to engrossment. The Jinnett bill< to provide for the eradication of harmful barberry, was read a second time and sent to engrossment by the house.