Rensselaer Republican, Volume 14, Number 20, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 2 February 1882 — FRETS GRAVEL ROADS. [ARTICLE]

FRETS GRAVEL ROADS.

A Complete Digest of the Free Gravel Road Law, by Thomas T. Moore, a Greenoastle Lawyer. Id central and southern Indiana,such are the vicissitudes of climate that ordinarily for four months of the year the inhabitants not resident on some line of railway are completely mudlocked and cut off from business, save in the immediate vicinity of their residence. The fact, coupled with timidity of capital, and the unfriendly feeling toward corporations. caused the Legislature to make provisions by law for building free Macadam and gravel roads, and for acquisition by purchase of such toll roads as desire to sell to the public. Much of the law on the statute books on the subject of taxation , for gravel roads, only provides for the taxation of property to assist corporations in building such roads where a certain part of the capital stock or necessary expenses had been first subscribed therefor. Such, notably, are the acts of March 6.1865, March 9, 1867. March 11,1867, and May 14, 1869. The act of Marcn 13,1875,replied most of the foregoing, together with the act of March 6,1865. These were afterward in a great measure revived as to exisiting corporations by the act of March 2, 1877. The act of March 6, 1865, provided for the assessment of lands to build gravel,gravl and also prrvided that all roads built under the provisions of that act should become toll free after twenty years. This seems to be the first act that in any way provided for free gravel roads. It seems that the only acts now in force providing for {building, and purchasing roads on the acts of March 3. 1877,March 24,1879, March 3,1881, and April 9,1881. The law now in force, it seems, provides for two methods of obtaining free gravel roads. The first is by building them; and, second, by purchasing those roads already built and operated as toll roads by corporations. The act of March 3, 1877, provides the method for building free gravel roads, and the provisions of said act are in substance as follows: Whenever five or more of the land owners whose land will be assessed for the cost of the improvemep t shall file with the county Commissioners a petition for the paving, macadamizing or graveling of any of the State or county roads in this State, or any part of such roads, within the limits of their respective counties, and shall also file therewith a bond with one or more responisble freehold sureties, to whom the petitioners shall be responsible prorata, conditioned for payment of the expenses of the preliminary survey and report, if the proposed improvement shall not be finally ordered the Beard of Commissioners shall ap-

point three disinterested freeholders of the county as viewers, and acompetent surveyor or engineer, to proceed upon a day named by the Commission era to examine, view, lay out, or staigh ten said road as in their opinion public utility and convenience shall require. The County Auditor is to notify said viewers and surveyor of the time and place ot their meeting, and is also to give notice by publication in a newspaper printed is soid county, for three consecutive weeks next prior to said notice shall state tha time and place of said meeting; the kind of improvement asked for; the place of beginning, intermediate points —if any—and the place of termination. Be. 3rd, provides the manner in which the survey shall be made, and Sec. 4th provides that the viewers and engineer shall report to the Commissioners; and, provides, further, that no land shall be assessed for the purposes of &ai d act that does not lie within two miles of the proposed improvement, and that lands once assessed for any improvements made under the provisions of this act, shall not be reassessed unless the prior assessment shall not be deemproportionate to the whole benefit reresuiting to said land; and that where lands are liable to be assessed under said act for the construction of two or more roads the viewers shall take into consideration that fact in assessing benefits. Upon a favorable report by said viewers the Commissioners shall, if in their opinion public utility requires it, enter on record an order that the improvement be made, the width and extent of the same, and the lauds that shall be assessed for said expenses; but such order shall not be made until a majority of the resident land owners of the county, whose lands are reported as benefitted, and ought to be assessed, and also the owners of a majority of the whole numbor of acres of land that are reported as benefiitted aud ought to be assessed, shall have subscribed the petition mentioned in the 2nd section of said act. The Commissioners shall then appoint a Competent engineer to supeimend said work who shall, with the approval of said

Commissioners, make contracts therefor; and said improvement shall be let in sections of not less than one-half mile, to the lowest and best bidder,who shall give reasonable security. The Commissioners, when any such improvement shall be ordered, shall immediately appoint tbree disinterested freeholders of the county, who shall upon actual view of the premises apportion the estimated„expenses of said improvement upon the real estate embraced in the order of said Board, according A o the benefit derived therefrom, and report tbe same to the County Auditor; and in making said assessment and apportionment tney shall take into consideration previous assessments on such realty under the provisions of the act for the improvement of any road, etc. The same sec., Sec. 6, provides for hearing and adjusting complaints and exceptions to said apportionment,after proper notice thereof, given by the Auditor by publication. Section Seventh of said act, which was amended by act of March 3, 1881, provides that for the purpose of raising the money neccessary to meet the expenses of said improvement, the Commissioners of the county are authorized to issue the bonds of the bounty, matuiing at annual intervals after two years, and not beyond eight yearfi, and that said assessment shall be divided in such manner as to meet the payment of said bonds, and go placed i upon the duplicate for taxation against the land assessed, and collected in the same manner, as other taxes. The Commissioners haveJpoWer to receive subscriptions and donations in money or property for such improve-

ment, and said road when completed is to be toll free. The most emportant section in said act is the 9th section. It provides that where a road to be improved begins or ends in a city or incorporated town the authorities of said city or town may upon the recommendation of the Commissioners, agree to pay, in the bonds of said city or town,in the manner and proportion described in Bee. 7, in addition to the amour t to be assessed upon the real property of such city or town by virtue of the provisions of such act au amount not exceeding one-fifth of the entire cost of said road; provided, that the entire amount to be assessed by virtue of said act for said purposes shall not in any one year exceed fifty cents on the one hundred dollars of the taxable property in said city or town. In this connection it may be well to notice Sec. 60, of the general laws lor the incorporation of cities—lst Davis, Ind. Statutes, page 298—which provides th§t an incorporated city snail have power to borrow money to subscribe to the stock of any plank, macadamized,gravel road,or railroad running through or into said city. The act of April 9th, 1881“ provides the manner in which existing toll roads may be purchased by the county and become toll free. It provides that whenever the County Commissioners are petitioned therefor by fifty freeholders, citizens of the county, they shall submit to the voters of the county, at any regular spring or fall election, or at any special election that may be called by said Board, when no spring or fall election is near at hand, at each voting place in the county, the question of purchasing any turnpike or toll road in said county. At least twenty days notice shall be given of such election by publication and posting notices, and at such election each voter who is in favor of such purchase shall inscribe on his ballot: “Purchase of toll road—yes;” and each voter who is opposed thereto shall inscribe on his ballot! “Purchase of toll road—no” The vote on the question shall be certified by the proper officers of the election to the County Commissioners; and if at such election a majority of those voting on said question are in favor of said purchase the Commissionera may make said purchase; but not otherwise. If such election shall result favorably to the purchase of said road, Commissioners shall, at their first term thereafter, make an order to that effect on their journal, aud thereupon three competent,disinterested free holders and householders, for each road to be purchased, residents of said county, shall be appointed in the following manner: one by the Commissionesrs, one by the Judge of the Circut Court of said county, and one by the directors of the road to be Durcbased. These appraisers, after qualifying before some officer authorized to administei oaths, shall, within twenty days after their appointment, personally examine, inspect and appraise said road in the manner provided by said statute, and shall make a return thereof to said Commissioners within thirty days after their appointment. If the Commissioners shail deem such appraisment reasonable, they may submit to the directors of said road a proposition to purchase the same at a price not exceeding said appraised value; but they may reject said appraisment if they deem it excessive, and order a new appraisment. If the proposition as made by said Commissioners is accepted by I the directors of said road, said Commissioners shall thereupon purchase aud take conveyance thereof from said owners, and upon the execution of such conveyance said road shall be declared a free road. Any turnpike so purchased shali be paid for out of any money in the county treasury unappropriated, but no county sh»'ll, under this act, purchase any turnpike while in debt for one previously purchased. If there is no money in the treasury, it provides that the Commissioners may issue the bonds of the county, payable in installments, or at intervals, not exceeding, in all, the period of eight years, therefor; and such bonds, with interest, shall be paid in such installments as the Board may deem best, by a special tax levied for that purpose at the time the general yearly tax levy is made. All lands assessed for the purpose of free gravel roads under the act of March 3d, 1877, shall be exempt from taxation for the purpose of purchasing toll roads. All suen roads, after purchase, are to be kept in repair the same as other free turnpikes, under the provisions of the act of March 24th, 1879. The act of March 24tb, 1879, provides that the County Commissioners, by virtue of their offices, are constituted a Board of Turnpike Directors, under whose management and control all the free turnpikes in such county shall be vested ex clusively. It is made their duty to divide the coufity into three districts as nearly equal in number or miles of free gravel roads as practicable, and each director shall have the personal supervision of one of such districts under the regulations agreed upon by said Board. After defining the powers and duties of such Directors, it provides that for the purpose of keeping said road in repair the auditor may levy a tax on all the taxable property in the county, such sum not tr exceed one mill for every ton miles of free turnpike completed in said county. The receipts thereof shall constitute a turupike fund in the treasury of the county. It also provides for the application of the two days’ labor on the road, but this part will now, perhaps, be inoperative, since the act of 1881. These acts are all. doubtless, to some extent, modified by Sec. 1 of Article 13, of the Constitution of the State of Indiana, which section limits the right of politic aland municipal corporations so that such corporations, except in time of war for public defense, may not become indebted in any manner to an amount exceeding two per centum on the value of the taxable property within such corporation. There are* other minor provisions in the law of free gravel roads, but space will not permit me to give them.

THOS. T. MOORE.

The Indian -, Princess, Sarah Winnemucca, the heroine of the Bannock war, was married on the 6th to L; H. Hopkins.formerly of the United Stales army. Since the war, in which she rendered signal service to the troops and settlers, she has lived quietly at Carson City, Nevada, where the old chief, Winnemucca dted a few months ago. She has a good English education and resembles a Mexican rather than an Indian girl.