CRUDE LEGISLATION.

(Written by Charles Aldrich, September 1907.)

Much legislation has resulted from the erection of the Historical Building. A study of this legislation at this time discloses many crudities. Some of it is obsolete and some unnecessary. Much is awkward and clumsy. While the Curator of the Historical Department may justly be held responsible in a general way for this legislation, much of it was never approved by him but its passage could not be prevented. One may draft a bill in the form that suits his purpose or the general purposes sought, but when it passes into committees and then is subjected to thorough consideration in the legislature its form in the end cannot be predicted. The Curator has always felt it more important that the work upon the building be kept in motion than that his mere personal preference be followed or his opinions accepted. In one instance a bill for the promotion of the building was amended in a way he considered absurd and irrelevant. He appealed to the chairman of the committee to recommend the bill in the hope of a proper change in its construction. The chairman, who was friendly to the measure, objected that the proposition to that effect would result in a contest wherein the bill might be lost. His counsel that no change should be attempted, and later sessions relied upon for the correction of any injustice, was adopted, and the bill passed in its imperfect state. The writer hopes that the legislation resulting in our beautiful and commodious Historical Building when studied in future may be considered in the light of the above statement and that he may be exonerated from a portion of the blunders of hasty and ill-considered legislation.

The erection of the Historical Building went ahead until its completion and that, after all, was the matter of chief importance. Men who placed obstacles in its way doubtless acted unwittingly. In fact one of them years afterward was frank enough to confess that he had sinned through ignorance he did not know better." The legislation to which reference is thus made should be superseded by a brief and simple statute that may be readily comprehended.

NOTABLE DEATHS.

CHARLES ALVORD BISHOP was born near Waukesha, Wisconsin, May 22, 1854; he died while in attendance at the meeting of the Iowa State Bar Association at Waterloo, July 9, 1908, and was buried at Woodland cemetery, Des Moines, Iowa, July 14. His parents were Mathew Patrick and Roxanna (Alvord) Bishop. He gained his education in the public schools of Palmyra and La Grange, Wisconsin, and studied law in the office of Mr. Weed at Palmyra, being admitted to the bar at Waupeca, Wisconsin, in 1875. He came to Iowa in 1875, locating at La Porte, in Black Hawk county, entering into the law practice and becoming editor of the Review of that place. He was elected to the legislature from Black Hawk county in 1881, serving in the House through the Nineteenth General Assembly. He served on the committees on Judiciary, Insurance, Libraries, Institute for the Education of the Blind and Asylum for Feeble-minded Children. He continued both as lawyer and editor for eight years, when he went to Minneapolis, Minnesota, to devote his attention exclusively to the law. His associate was Judge Bagg of the Dubuque bar, who died shortly after the new venture began. Judge Bishop soon returned to Cherokee, Iowa, to publish the Times of that city, which, however, he disposed of in a few months, removing permanently to Des Moines. His career as a lawyer may be dated from his arrival at Des Moines in 1885. He entered the firm of Baker & Kavanaugh, which consisted of Hon. A. J. Baker, now of Centerville, Iowa, then Attorney General of Iowa, and Marcus Kavanaugh, now judge of the Cook county superior court of Chicago. Judge Kavanaugh retired when elected to the Polk county district bench and Judge Bishop joined the firm, which became Baker, Bishop & Haskins by the admission to the firm of Alvin A. Haskins, now deceased. Attorney General Baker's administration included among its tasks that of advising Governor Larrabee in carrying into effect the railroad legislation for which the Larrabee administrations are remembered. Judge Bishop, as assistant counsel, is to be given much of the credit to which the Attorney General's office is entitled. In the disposition of the Chester Tourney case Governor Larrabee relied solely upon Judge Bishop as counsel and in the trial work that ended with credit to both the client and attorney. In 1889 Judge Bishop was appointed by Governor Larrabee Judge of the Polk county district court, a vacancy existing by reason of the elevation of Judge Josiah Given to the supreme bench. He was defeated of election the next year. He was again appointed to the district bench in 1897 by Governor Drake to a vacancy occasioned by the resignation of W. A. Spurrier. The next year he was elected and served to March 3, 1902, when he resigned and entered the practice at Des Moines in the firm of Bishop, Dowell & Parish. Governor Cummins appointed him to the vacancy on the supreme bench made by the resignation of Judge C. M. Waterman in June, 1902. He was nominated and elected to fill out the term, then nominated and elected to serve for the current term ending January 1, 1911. Judge Bishop was one of the most gentle and affable of men. He was active and popular in fraternal societies and social clubs. He was a distinguished public speaker, in particular on memorial occasions, when some of his addresses have been almost classic in character. His record as a judge is most excellent. To the law he was devoted, caring but little for financial undertak

the Historical Department of Iowa.

ings or success along those lines. He was one of the largest hearted, most companionable of men, charitable toward all, censuring the wrong rather than the individual, tempering justice with mercy during his judicial career. Hence a model husband and father, not only loved by his family, his friends and his associates, but by all who really knew him. His modesty was proverbial. He might have been a member of the supreme court during Governor Larrabee's administration, but having some misgivings as to his own ability, he advocated the appointment of another and with his own hands wrote and delivered the commission that he himself might have retained. L. S.

STEPHEN N. FELLOWS was born May 30, 1830, in North Sandwich, New Hampshire; he died in Iowa City, Iowa, June 2, 1908. He attended Rock River Seminary at the age of eighteen for a short time, later taking the course and graduating in 1854 with the degree of A. B. from Asbury University, now De Pauw, Greencastle, Indiana. He at once came to Iowa and began work as professor of mathematics and natural science at Cornell College, Mount Vernon. In 1856 he joined the Upper Iowa Conference of the Methodist church, entering the ministry in 1860, when he ended his connection with Cornell College. He was elected to the principalship of the Normal Department of the Iowa State University in 1867, retaining his active connection with the institution for twenty years. He was president of the State Teachers' Association from 1869 to 1872. He served once as president of the Iowa State Temperance Alliance. He was the Iowa delegate to the Ecumenical Conference of the Methodist church at Washington in 1893 and a member of the Advisory Council of Religions at Chicago in 1893. He received the D. D. degree from Cornell College in 1891. He was a leading factor in the organization of the Indian Rights Association of Iowa. He was an effective preacher and successful pastor, one of the strongest and most telling advocates of temperance of his time, a force in the educational enterprise of his day and a writer of distinction. His most valuable book is a history of the Upper Iowa Conference of the Methodist Episcopal church.

"AUNT BECKY YOUNG"-Sarah A. Graham was born in Ithaca, New York, August 9, 1830; she died in Des Moines, Iowa, April 6, 1908. She was first married on August 22, 1849, to Abel O. Palmer, who died before her enlistment, in 1862, as an army nurse. In June of the latter year she served in hospitals in Baltimore, Bladensburg and Beltville, of which last she was placed in charge. She established and had charge of a hospital at Falls Church and was active and efficient in the service with the union army until the fall of Richmond. Besides the love of thousands of soldiers whom she aided, she received commendations from officials, including General Grant and President Lincoln. She was married to Mr. D. C. Young April 10, 1867, and the following year they removed to Des Moines, where Mr. Young survives. In the organization of the Iowa Sanitary Commission in 1898 Mrs. Young was a leading factor, serving as president and also as chairman of the purchasing and forwarding committees. Brief as were hostilities with Spain, this organization was thoroughly perfected and did measureless good.