Rensselaer Republican, Volume 23, Number 44, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 2 July 1891 — INDIANA STATE NEWS. [ARTICLE]

INDIANA STATE NEWS.

Laporte has thirty-four saloons.; Andrews is overrun with burglars. Albion sighs to be in the circus belt. A military comoany is being talked of at Goshen. Lawrenceburg suffered 830,000 by the recent flood. y A black female ghost is troubling Memphis, Ind. _ =... Wheat harvesting in Harrison county began on the 15th. Watermelon crop is enormous in Gibson and Pike counties. The contract has been closed for a tin plate factory at Elwood. - Three hundred Rochester citizens have signed the temperance pledge. Southern Indiana’s peach cron will soon be ready for the market. » Yum, yum. A yellow catfish weighing fifty pounds was caught at Martinsville on aTrot line. Thirty-six coaches carried 2,400 picnickers from Fort Wayne to Warsaw Saturday Goshen confidently expects diretft railway connection with Toledo in the near future. - ■ Tobacco culture i& being given considerable attention in Johnson and Shelby counties. The Wells company, at Greenfield,began .the manufacture of stoves Tuesday afternoon, and satisfactory work was tinned out. A pole ICO feet in height has been raised at the prison north, from which will float the colors on national holidays. . Mrs. Jesse Caldwell, of Evansville, accidentally administered a fatal dose of opium to her four-year-old daughter. . A fire in the. casting hall and funnel room of the Diamond Plate Glass Works at Elwood, on the 20th, did 850,000 damage. Uriah Landmap was placed under restraint at Vevay during an attack of delirium tremens. He butted his brains out against the walk The residence of Wm. Gunter, near Warsaw, was almost, totally destroyed by lightning on the 34th. Loss, 82,000. An invalid daughter was killed. Stokes Brown, a blind organ grinder, of Madison, has been,, committed for grand jury action, charged with whipping his five-year-old step-son to death. The Elkhart county assessment is below the average, and the State tax commission has given warning that if other counties are advanced Elkhart will also be set forward. A miscreant poisoned a spring of water in Washington township, Gibson countys and Mrs. John Rabb drank of the water and died. Her little girl was dangerously poisoned, but recovered. The main building of the Creamery Package Manufacturing Co., at Portland, Ind., was destroyed by fire on the 33th. Loss. SIO,OOO. This is the largest cfeamei y package company in the world. The nine-year-old son of William Lesli, of Mentone, was capght by a belt in his father’s saw-mill and one arm was torn from his body and thrown some distance away. The lad lived but a few hours. Cora Belle Fellows, the young lady who left a good home in Washington to marry Chasta, the Indian, feeling that it was her mission in life to elevate the aborigines, is seeking a divorce from her husband. One childhas been born to the couple. An owl entered the bedroom of J R. Leonard, at Riceville, through an open window, and pounced upon the family cat, Her feline majesty made a desperate fight, and her caterwauling awakened Mr. Leonard. Between the two the owl wacaptured. William Summerville, cf Rush county, has a cherry tree thirty-six years old, one branch of which persists in ripening its fruit six weeks after the remainder of the crop has been gathered. The tree has never been budded nor grafted with a different kind of cherry. During a storm "which sweptrover DcarJ born county lightning struck the farmhouse of Alexandei- Conley, near Lawrenceburg, instantly killing Mrs. Conley and dangerously shocking'twoother members of the family. The electricity was attracted by the lightning rod. which extended but a few feet above the cap-stone of the high chimney. Patents were granted Indiana inventors Tuesday as follows: G. W. Ackerman, South Milford, plow attachment; Louisa Ashley, Lafayette, manufacture of mattresses; pillows, etc; E. Manlove, Bentonville, fence; L. C. Richardson, broom; G. W. Smith, Union City, electric light hanger; J. C. Thompson, North Salem, wire stretcher; C. G. Udell. North lodianapolis (2), combined coat and umbrella rack anJ table. J. F. Darnell, president of the Muncie nail-works, who has given the subject close attentioh, claims that natural gas is being constantly generated in the interior of the earth, and that its permancy is strictly dependent upon the manner in which it is handled and taken care of. He believes that the State should regulate ail drilling, and he asserts that thechief cause of the failure of wells is due to defective packing. GERMAN IN THE SCHOOLS. The much-talked-of “German-in-thc-public-schools case,” was decided by the Supreme Court to-day, says the Indianapolis News of the 23d. The decision was a .victory for the Germans who brought action against the Board of School Commissioners. Judge Howland's ..decision, was affirmed by Judges Miller, Elliott and Coffey. Judge Mcßride wrote a dissenting opinion, in which Judge Olds concurred. The question at issue was the construction of the law, which provides thatwhenever the parents or guardians of twentyfive children attending any school shall petition the Board of School Commissioners to that effect, the board shall provide for the teachingof German in such school, if the application is made before the sellers for the year are employed. At a proper time the parents and guardians of 112 children attending school No. 22 in th s city filed the request __ Under the system of grading established by the city school board, there are only the five first of the twelve grades taught ithe public schools that are taught at > 22. The board claimed right under poser to grade the schools and regulate

the course of study, to limit the study cl German to such grades as it deemed' proper.Jt, therefore, made an order that German should not be taught to children attending the public schools until they had reached the sixth grade. Theodore Sander and others, bringing suit, insisted that the law is mandatory and compels the board to provide for th* teaching of German in any school bulldin? where the parents or guardians of the requisite number of children petition therefor. Judge Howland, as Circuit Judge, declared this to be the law and issued a mandate compelling the board to provide foi the teaching of German in school No. 22. and from this decision the school boardappealed. Judge Miller, who wrote the opinion ol the majority of the Supreme Court, pointed out that German was one among a number of studies specifically provided for by legislative enactment. He held that the school commissioners’ power of regulating the grading of schools and the course of study must be exercised subject to the dominant law of the State. The argument of the commissioners that with their resources they could not* provide for the teaching of German for more than seven out of twelve years, the Court held was fully met by the reply of the appellees that the board had on hands, unappropriated, $40,000 more than would be upon the system of grading and" Rans fer the employment of teachers. Besides this $60,009 was appropriated for the teaching ~of musiy, drawing, manual training, physilfe, book-keeping geometry, English literature, genera his tory, algebra, Latin, and th" trainingschool for teachers, none of \ h Ji is expressly named in the statute, Lui, all are provided for in general terms. The Court held that it is incumbent upon the commissioners to provide for those studies expressly named in the statute and not inappropriate school funds for the teaching ol optional studies and then say they cannot comply with tho requirements of the statute.

As to the expediency of teaching German in the public schools it was not tho duty of the court to pass upon. The question of expediency was one for the Legislature. It was the court’s duty to construe, not criticise. “We do not desire,’ said the court, “that the construction ol this section of the statute shall be understood as a curtailment of the enlarged discretion given the board rof commissioners in the control, grading and management of- the public schools, except in so far as may be necessary to give full force, and effect to legislative enactment.” The court was not apprehensive that the board in its wisdom would not be able to devise means by which the law’ can be carried out in good faith without serious interference with the grading of the schools. Judge Mcßride, in writing the dissenting opinion, used vigorous language. He held that the construction of the law by his colleagues tended to undermine every vestige of authority on the part of the school commissioners to grade and establish and maintain a system of instruction in the chools. Petitioners could compel the eaching of German in a particular school or grade, regardless of the age or acquirements of the pupils attending. “Although the commissioners’ deliberate judgment,’’ he sxid, “may be that the beat interests of the schools requires the teachingof tha study only ro certain grades and to pupil who have reached a certain degree of proficiency, they may be compelled to change their system at the demand of the people, who ere charged with no duty or responsibility, who, while they may be as well or better informed and qualified to pass on such questions as tho members of the board, may on the other hand know as little of the management of schools as a babe does of logarithms.” Judge Mcßride held that the tendency to impalnwie efficiency of the public school system demandsearnestopposition. He held that German should be placed upon the same basis as other studies in the public schools, and be subject to the same regulations. Among other things hesaid that German is the noble language of a great people “It is not only commercially advantageous to our children, but introduces them to a literature singularly rich and strong. But neither GerinansTTfetieh, English, nor any foreign nationality can, as such, have any rights in our public schools. And anj legislation attemuting to recognize or confer any such right would be vqid. Th< constitution contemplates a school system for American citizens only, and such as will fit them for American citizenship.