People's Pilot, Volume 3, Number 2, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 30 June 1893 — Page 8 Advertisements Column 2 [ADVERTISEMENT]

Judge Caprou, of Marshall county, special judge at the May term of the Pulaski county circuit court has rendered a decision of especial interest to all fanners whose lands are subject to drainage. The question waa whether the commissioners have the right to allow the auditor, sheriff and the printers certain fees before a ditch has been completed. The Judge held that they had nothing whatever to do with fees in ditch cases, and only in fees which should be allowed and taxed against the land owners were those of the surveyor, viewers and reviewers and laborers who assisted the viewers to make'out the ditch to be assessed. This lets out the auditor, sheriff and the printers. The interpretation is that the law contemplates the auditor shall give legal notice and all other work in connection with the ditch as part of his duties, for which lie receives a salary and no fees. It, las been the aim of these officials for several years past to inluce some poor and unsuspecting farmers to get up a petition 'or a ditch. Hundreds of dollars would then be assesssed against and owners and these crafty officers would pocket the illegal fees and not a spade full of dirt would ever be thrown out. It is estimated that for ten years oast illegal fees have been collected to the Amount of $75,000. —Goodland Herald.

No country newspaper can be of any value to the community in which it is established if its editor is constantly seeking to secure the personal friendship of certain individuals whose fealty must be purchased at the cost of intelligent and independent action. No individual’s interests should count against those of the public. A newspaper man, if he be true to his constituency, must labor for what he believes to be the greatest good for the greatest number and let individuals take care of themselves. It is an old and true maxim that “the character of a man can be judged by his associations.” It is equally certain that you can judge of a newspaper’s usefulness in a community by the class /Of enemies it has arrayed against it. An honest, upright citizen las nothing to fear, and nothing \o lose, from the course of a fearess newspaper. But the shal-ow-pated tricksters and shysters, and the people who want the earth and if they got it would begrudge the balance of humanity standing room have everything to fear from an institution conducted in the interests of the whole community. An army of such “enemies” are powerless before a fearless man who speaks for the rights and interests of the many as against the selfishness of the few.—Ex.

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