USA > Kentucky > The history of Kentucky, from its earliest discovery and settlement, to the present date, V. 2 > Part 44
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In the later months of the winter of 1889-90, and the earlier spring, there appeared in virulent form the most insidious and fatal malady that has visited this country in its history. It suddenly manifested itself in many parts of the country as an epidemic infectious disease, characterized by inflammation of the membranes of the respiratory organs, often involving the gastric membranes. In its initial stages the symptoms are so nearly like those of ordinary influenza as to mislead the subject to treat with indiffer- ence what was deemed the trifling disorder of a day. It proved, however, far more serious than this, or even than a simple epidemic catarrh. There are observed often, subtle rigors, attended with hot and chilly sensations, alternately, accompanied with general prostration of the nervous and physi- cal energies. A burning dryness in the nose, throat, and chest, more labored respiration and diminished action of the organs of secretion are discernible. The symptomatic effects are varied-severe headache and greatly disordered stomach, with the usual appearances of an ordinary violent cold, are very common. The vitality of the internal organs affected directly by the irri- tated membranes is generally lowered, attended with more or less functional derangement. This condition, together with the general prostration, ren- ders the patient extremely sensitive to any exposure or neglect, and liable to dangerous relapses even when flattered with the promise of early conva- lescence. It is most fatal to the aged and to those suffering with constitu- tional debility.
The phenomena of this disease are so marked that we are enabled to identify and to trace it as an epidemic plague, which has scourged the people of both hemispheres for centuries past. As early as 1510, we have
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accounts of a great constitutional influenza, similar in its appearances and its fatalities, which had its origin in the Asiatic countries, and traveled westward to the Atlantic. The disease is accurately described by Dr. Syd- enham, as he observed its ravages among the population of London in 1675. In the year 1733 an epidemic of this distemper appeared simul- taneously in Brussels and London early in January. It was two weeks later in Paris, and a few days later in other parts of Europe, embracing every nation. It invaded the United States at the first approach of cold weather, in October following, and after traversing the North American continent, it appeared at Barbadoes, and in Mexico and Peru. In 1789 and 1807 similar outbreaks of the malady, after its ravages in the East, occurred at New York and Philadelphia, and spread westward and south- ward over the Americas. At intervals of ten to twenty-five years, it has repeatedly invaded the United States since, always visiting Kentucky.
In France, the name la grippe had been given this disease. The epidemic spread over Europe and reached the United States in violent and fatal type in 1843.
John Tyler, who succeeded to the presidency on Harrison's death, in 1841, had recently vetoed the bill for a United States bank, a measure sup- ported by the Whig party which had elected him. This act of alleged bad faith was the political sensation of the day, and public sentiment attached great odium to the man and to the act. Associating the plague of an epidemic with this visitation of political misfortune, the people in a vein of grim humor of revenge dropped the French " la " and substituted the word " Tyler." In this way the French " la grippe," was Americanized into "Tyler grippe ; " and the great scourge of 1843 was popularly known then, and since, as the "Tyler grippe," from the coincidence of the two events.
The grippe reappeared in the winter of 1890-91, and again in that of 1891-92, and on each return was attended with much the same phenomena and fatality as on the first visitation. An examination of the reports of the Health Officer for Louisville, for the three months from December I to March 1, 1891-92, shows that the number of deaths in the city was over four hundred above the normal rate ; or that number from the grippe alone. The proportion was greater in many other cities, and especially in the larger cities. This would give one death from the epidemic for every four hundred of the population of the city. If this ratio is applied to the entire population of the United States, it would give about one hundred and fifty thousand deaths in the whole population from grippe alone, directly and indirectly, during each of the three seasons of its prevalence. Deducting one-third from this yearly number for the greater immunity of the country districts from the scourge, and we still have an annual abnormal death rate of one hundred thousand resulting from this insidious and terrible epidemic. In no year of our history has there been a death rate of this
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magnitude from cholera, yellow fever, or any other of the fatal maladies, throughout the entire United States. And yet, with stealthy tread, it has come and gone with less of the sensation of dread alarm and consternation. In its incipient stages, the symptoms are deceptive and often fatally mis- leading. It is mistaken for and treated as a transient influenza. The ground-work is laid for a serious or fatal termination before the patient is aware of the presence of danger. Many who survive the direct attacks linger in feebleness and functional disorder until the warmth of the summer days brings relief and deliverance, or death ends the struggle in the form of consumption or other constitutional disease in sympathy. Many physi- cians insist that great injury is done in the frequent use of alcoholic stimu- lants during the period of its first invasion. While great mental and physi- cal depression exists, this would appear a plausible remedy ; but it results in the sudden irritation of the kidneys, liver and intestines, converting the temporary stages of congestion into an inflammation, and making it a dan- gerous agent. They may be used with better effect in the convalescent stages. In cases where it proved fatal it has been observed that inflamma- tion of the small air tubes in the lungs or disintegrating inflammation of the kidneys and liver was the direct cause of death. Fatalities may be mainly ascribed to neglect or improper treatment ; and should this dread scourge revisit our land, it is to be desired that physicians and people will have learned to profit by the experiences of the past.
On the 8th of September the Constitutional Convention convened at Frankfort. On the opening day George Washington, delegate from Campbell county, was made temporary presiding officer. The convention was then permanently organized by the election of Cassius M. Clay, Jr, of Bourbon county, to preside over its deliberations. The body continued in session until the 11th of April, 1891. The draft of the new instrument was submitted to the people, to be voted on for ratification, on the first Monday in August after adjournment. Wide and marked differences of opinion upon the merits of the changes made were entertained, and on the issues very able and animated discussions were frequent and general by the friends on either side. The popular vote was in favor of the adoption of the instrument as the fundamental law of the Commonwealth, by a very large majority.
As this constitutional change determined a period of forty years of most important events in the history of the country, it is worthy of more than passing notice from the student of political economy. It was an era of wonderful activity in intellectual life, in inventive art, in industrial enter- prise, in progress of sentiment, and in accretion of wealth. The changes in the new from the old Constitution of 1850, and the amendatory pro- visions added, may well illustrate the evolutions of the interval of time between. A committee, composed of Delegates Bennett H. Young, Curtis F. Burnam, William H. Mackoy, Robt. Rodes, Samuel J. Pugh, Frank P.
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Straus, H. R. Bourland, G. B. Swango, C. T. Allen, S. E. DeHaven and Wm. R. Ramsey, was appointed by the convention before its adjournment to prepare and publish an address to accompany the instrument in its dis- tribution over the State. This address ably and briefly sets forth the plea for the new constitution, and summarizes its most important features of reform. It is given in full as follows :
ADDRESS TO THE PEOPLE OF KENTUCKY. .
The convention to amend the present Constitution was called after twenty years of agitation and in obedience to a well-defined popular demand for a revision of your organic law. As your representatives, the members of this con- vention, after a session of one hundred and ninety-nine legislative days, have prepared, and now submit for your approval, the accompanying instrument. It is not assumed that it is perfect, or that it represents the views of each member on every subject : but after full discussion and mature deliberation, it is offered as the best judgment of the body.
In many portions of the State there has been severe criticism as to length of time consumed in the preparation of the instrument. A little investigation will show that some of these complaints are not well founded, and that in many States more time has been consumed in framing these most important of all laws.
The last convention in Illinois sat one hundred and fifty-three days, in New York nine months, in Ohio two hundred and fifty-three days, in California one hundred and sixty-seven days, and in Pennsylvania during an entire year, at a cost to that State of $1,000,000.
The last Legislature of Kentucky, in framing mere statutory laws, was in session one hundred and forty-nine days.
In dealing with these fundamental provisions of government, haste would have been unseemly, and it was due the people of the State that every delegate, on every question, should have ample time to express his opinions, and from such discussion to formulate those great and fundamental principles essential to the organic law of a State such as Kentucky.
The experience of forty years, gathered from the unparalleled changes in political and social life of this country, rendered many alterations in and additions to the Constitution not only important. but absolutely essential to good govern- ment. Notwithstanding this necessity for change and enlarged limitations of many general and special powers. a close comparison of the present and proposed Constitutions will show that a very large portion of the present Constitution passes into the new one substantially unchanged.
The sessions of the convention were marked by no partisan political discus- sions. All such questions were unknown and undiscussed, and as representatives of all the people of the State, the universal desire was to frame a Constitution which would secure the greatest good to the greatest number.
The first question which confronted every delegate was the inhibition of special or local legislation. The General Assembly of 1889-90 sat one hundred and forty-nine days, and passed local laws, including index, covering four thou- sand eight hundred and ninety-three pages, with a cost to the State in printing of $17,223.65. and in other respects $151,014.82. The average time and cost of the four preceding Legislatures had been but little better. The disapproval of every
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person in Kentucky suggested sharp and effective remedies for the evils of such a system of law making. Outside of all questions of economy, the demoraliza- tion of the Legislature and the inequality of laws so passed had produced the grossest wrongs, and the demand for a change on this subject was absolute and universal.
In the judgment of the delegates this has been thoroughly done. Legislative sessions have been limited to sixty days, and all special laws prohibited, where general laws can govern; and on a large number of subjects which conceru the general good, under the provisions proposed, a special law is rendered impossible.
Something of this tremendous evil will be appreciated when it is stated that the official report of the auditor shows that in the last ten years the General Assembly has been in session six hundred and eighty-nine days, or nearly one- fifth of that entire period, at an average daily cost of $1,068, and that, had the General Assembly been required to pass only general laws and been permitted to remain in session only sixty days, as required by the proposed Constitution, there would have been a saving to the State in money alone in this period thie sum of $424,164.
It is required in the new Constitution that all acts of incorporation shall be obtained hereafter under general laws, and that the expense of such incorpora- tions shall be paid by those who seek them and who secure benefit from them.
Another important matter is uniformity of laws applicable to counties, cities and towns; now, no two of these municipal divisions in the State operate under the same code of laws. The tax systems, judicial forms and remedies, and govern- mental agencies generally, were arranged to suit the caprice or whim of the member who happened to represent that particular locality. A false idea of what has been called legislative "courtesy " allowed any member to write the statutes governing his own constituency. We have prepared provisions requiring that all such communities shall be divided into classes and shall be governed by general laws applicable to every member of such class throughout the State.
Lotteries are inhibited, and all lottery charters now existing are revoked. These grants, in most instances secured by clandestine legislation, have inflicted upon the State great disgrace and upon its people incalculable loss. A single clause settles this evil, places Kentucky abreast of the best civilization of the age, and unites her in the effort to repress this unmitigated shame.
The ballot system under the new Constitution will be fully established. Kentucky enjoys the distinction of being the only civilized State which retains the viva voce system. Experience has demonstrated the evils of the viva voce system, and an official secret ballot. a barrier to bribe-givers and bribe-takers, the palladium of an honest and unbiased expression of popular will, as expressed at the polls, is made the only method of taking the sense of the voters of the Commonwealth.
The frequency of elections has been the cause of almost universal complaint. It is provided in this proposed Constitution that only one election of any kind can be held in the State or any part thereof in any one year.
The mode of revision has been held by many to be a question of supreme im- portance. Amendment to the present Constitution is impossible, and to call a new Constitutional Convention involves at least five years' delay and large ex- pense. To render change a practical political impossibility was the avowed pur- pose of the framers of the Constitution of 1849.
The sections on revision in the new instrument permit three-fifths of any Legislature to propose at a regular session two amendments; these may be on
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any subject, and, when ratified by a majority of the votes cast, become part of the Constitution. This plan avoids the expense of a convention, renders the instru- ment at all times capable of meeting the exigencies of the times, and yet it is so arranged that the Constitution can not be altered or amended without a sufficient period for reflection. This plan is in line with the experience and judgment of other States and covers the middle ground on this subject.
The greatest menace to freedom of the people of this country is the aggrega- tion of capital and the aggressions, consequent upon such aggregation, upon the rights of the individual citizen. Corporate wealth and influence have been most potent in all the phases of our political affairs, and this danger has aroused the fears of the ablest and most patriotic of our statesmen. The State can not afford to commit itself to any policy which would keep out capital, nor, on the other hand, can she afford to disregard the warnings of the times and remove all limi- tations upon this power. In the proposed Constitution will be found such pro- visions as, in the judgment of your representatives, carefully guard the people's rights, and yet. on the other hand. grant to corporate capital all those privileges and rights which will justify it in the development of the superb resources of the State.
Many and most serious difficulties have arisen from irrevocable grants made by the General Assembly. We have provided that all grants and charters of every kind shall in the future be held subject to the legislative will, and with the abso- lute right of repeal by the State. Such a provision in the past would have been of untold value to the citizens of the State; and while it has been in force under statutory enactment since 1856, unless where expressly waived by the term of the act itself, which was frequently done, it has been deemed of the greatest impor- tance to have it incorporated in the Constitution.
One of the most unfortunate features in the administration of Kentucky's government has been the inequality in taxation. Exemptions under one pretext or another have crept into hundreds of charters and acts, and the value of prop- erty thus relieved of its just proportion of taxation has reached appalling figures. The Constitution submitted to you confines this evil to much narrower limits, and, so far as practicable. puts all property upon the same basis for taxation. Should you accept this Constitution, all property-land, bank stock, and money-will bear its just share of governmental burden and assume its fair proportion of taxes, while securing the equal protection of law.
Unjust local taxation and the heavy increase of the debts of counties, towns, and cities have been recognized in every portion of the State as great evils, fre- quently destructive of the highest rights of property and leading to practical confiscation or absolute repudiation. A limit has been placed on all tax rates, and while it allows reasonable outlay in all matters requiring enterprise and development, it also places an impassable barrier against unwise or extravagant expenditures.
State, county and other governmental machinery has been left practically un- changed, but the number of magistrates lias been limited to eight in any county.
The number of grand jurors has been reduced from sixteen to twelve. This can not, in the least, impair the efficiency of the body or the administration of justice, and the saving in per diem alone by this change in ten years will equal the entire cost of the convention. The average cost of grand juries in the State for the preceding two years was $69,777 ; this change will save one-fourth of this amount, $17,500, per annum. A three-fourthis verdict of juries in civil cases has been allowed under legislative direction.
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ADDRESS TO THE PEOPLE.
A uniform system of courts has been devised. In some counties there are as many as four different kinds of courts, some of them with the same jurisdiction. The proposed change provides sufficient courts and removes the evil referred to. The number of judges will be only very slightly increased, but they will be more fairly distributed, and every county in the State will have at least three terms of Circuit Court in each year. It was thought wise to have only one court of last resort, and to provide that this shall consist of enough judges to dispatch all the business that may be brought before it. If five judges can not do the business, the General Assembly can increase the number to seven ; and these for many years will meet every possible demand. This number may be divided into sec- tions, and thus accomplish the work of two courts while maintaining the uniformity of decision of one.
In obedience to an almost unanimous public sentiment, the working of con- victs outside the penitentiary has been prohibited, and the General Assembly also required to establish and maintain a State Reformatory Institution for juvenile offenders.
The subject of Eastern Kentucky land titles has been one of grave import to the whole State. There are many Virginia grants one hundred years old and yet unrecorded, the land covered by which has been held under patents from this State in some instances a century, sold many times and taxes thereon paid all these long years by persons ignorant of an adverse claim. And yet these ancient grants re- main as a means of disquieting titles and a bar to the complete development and improvement of the richest mineral and timber districts in the State. Security of title is an essential in the progress of any country. Justice to the State and its long suffering people interested in this portion of the State requires a speedy and effective remedy. This has been given, and such provision has been made that in five years after the adoption of the new Constitution this great incubus upon the wealth and prosperity of the State will be in a fair way to be removed.
The condition of the State is now such that it is believed that railways can and will be built without the aid of local taxation, and, following the example of nearly all the other States of the Union, a provision has been inserted which for- bids cities, towns, counties, or parts thereof from voting a tax under any circum- stances in aid of such corporations.
Experience seems to have demonstrated the value and importance of a Rail- way Commission. Repeated efforts have been made by railroads to repeal the statute providing for this service, and it was thought wise to give more stability and consequently more efficiency to this commission ; and its members have been made constitutional officers, and thereby rendered not only more independent, but more fearless in the guardianship of public interest.
The cause of common school education, always of prime importance in this State, will, from the work of the convention. receive new strength. The direct tax coming to Kentucky from the general government, amounting to over $600,- 000, will become part of the school fund and will restore to this great cause that which nearly half a century ago was, by adverse legislation, taken from this noble work.
All that part of the old Constitution in conflict with the Federal Constitution in reference to slavery has been omitted.
The claim has been widely made that this proposed Constitution is not only of extreme but of unusual detail, and unnecessarily legislative in its provisions. An examination will show that in the present Constitution there are about twelve thousand five hundred and eighty words, and in this proposed one, about twenty-
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oue thousand words, and, therefore, it is only about sixty per cent. larger than that of 1849-50.
The subjects of railroads, municipalities, revenue and taxation, corporations and public charities, are covered by new articles. All these have been rendered necessary by the changed conditions of the State during the past forty years. Excluding these new matters, the proposed Constitution is shorter than the pres- ent one. The Constitution submitted for your approval is about the average length as that of Arkansas, Colorado. North and South Dakota, Washington, and shorter than that of Missouri, and ten per cent. shorter than that of Maryland.
We have enumerated in this address, necessarily brief, a few of the more impor- tant changes which, in the judgment of your representatives, were demanded by the present condition of the State, and requisite for the furtherance of its political and material welfare. The whole instrument is submitted with the confident belief that its provisions, while not without defects and those imperfections inci- dent to all such work, but susceptible of change at the will of the people by its open clause, will secure certainly a more effective government, a more uniform distribution of burdens, a more economical administration of all State, county and city affairs, and a more complete protection to the common welfare.
In 1860, David Dale Owen, in his report as state geologist, wrote that "no complete geological map of the entire State of Kentucky could be made until the surveys were completed of the Bluegrass rim marked by Muldraugh's Hill, from Hardin and Lincoln counties on the south-east, Big Hill in Madison county on the south, and Bath and Lewis counties on the east." This broken and abrupt division belt between the lower silurian and carboniferous and sub-carboniferous regions must be defined and accurately fixed. This result State Geologist Procter claims to have accomplished. He has been enabled to present a map with the geological outlines and features complete of the State, though it will require two or three years to finish the details of surveys of some thirty counties.
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