

MISSISSIPPI. 



527 



The population of the city of Minneapolis 

 is 46,887, that of St. Paul 41,498, Winona 

 10,208. 



The second centenary of the discovery of 

 the Falls of St. Anthony was celebrated at 

 Minneapolis on the 4th of July. 



MISSISSIPPI. The Legislature of Missis- 

 sippi began its regular biennial session on the 

 8th of January, and brought it to a close on the 

 6th of March. It was occupied with the trans- 

 action of business fifty-three days. A United 

 States Senator was chosen to succeed Mr. 

 Blanch K. Bruce, for the term beginning March 

 4, 1881. The Democrats held a caucus on nine 

 successive evenings, and took forty-nine ballots 

 before they could agree on a candidate. Those 

 highest in favor on the early ballotings were 

 E. Barksdale, O. R. Singleton, and E. C. Wal- 

 thall. Later, the name of J. Z. George was 

 introduced, and took a high place. Finally, 

 Mr. Barksdale withdrew his name, and General 

 George was nominated. The ballot in joint 

 session of the Legislature, which resulted in 

 a choice, was taken on the 22d of January. 

 There were one hundred and twenty-seven 

 votes for J. Z. George, fourteen for A. M. West, 

 four for B. K. Bruce, one for E. 0. Walthall, 

 and one for T. W. Harris, and General George 

 was elected. 



The Hon. J. A. P. Campbell, who had been 

 commissioned in 1878 to revise and codify the 

 laws of the State, submitted the result in the 

 form of the "Revised Code." In an accom- 

 panying report he said : 



I have taken as the basis of my action the existing 

 statutes, and have presented them, for the most part, 

 making only such changes as experience has suggested. 

 to be necessary, and adding such new provisions as 

 appear to be required to complete the statutes and 

 make them an harmonious and efficient body of laws, 

 plainly expressed, conveniently arranged, and easily to 

 be understood by those for whom they are designed as 

 rules of action. Many of our statutes have existed, in 

 the language in which they are now, since 1822, and 

 some of them since long prior to that. Much of the 

 Code of 1857 was transferred from the Code of 1822, 

 and, in turn, was copied into that of 1871. While 

 there has been growth, by addition to the statutes, in 

 successive years, there have been preserved, unchanged 

 for more than fifty years, the most important provisions 

 affecting the affairs of the living, and the administra- 

 tion of the estates of the dead. Amid revolutions and 

 changes of the Constitution, the statutes have remained 

 unchanged. Generally, suited to any Constitution 

 likely to be accepted by the people, a change of the 

 Constitution requires no change in the great body of 

 the statutes. Secession required only "the substitu- 

 tion of "Confederate" for " United,'* before States, 

 and the statutes harmonized with the new conditions. 

 The Constitution of 1869 (a faithful copy of that of 

 1832, with few changes and a few additions) neces- 

 sitated little other change in the statutes it found in 

 force, than to make the Probate Court Law a part of 

 the Chancery Court Law. The Code of 1871, under 

 the Constitution of 1869, retained nearly all of the 

 articles of the Code of 1857, and the very few omitted, 

 except the chapter on slaves, free negroes, and mulat- 

 toes, were probably left out by inadvertence. Of the 

 twenty-nine hundred sections into which the Code of 

 1871 is divided, about twenty -six hundred were copied 

 from the Code of 1857. 



The fidelity of the copy to the original is not appar- 



ent to the casual observer, only because the excellence 

 of the Code of 1857 is obscured by the derangement 

 and confusion of that of 1871. 



Imbued with the spirit of conservatism, apparent in 

 the history of legislation in this State ; firmly con- 

 vinced of the error of sudden and violent changes in 

 the laws generally understood and acquiesced in ; be- 

 lieving that a rule, not the wisest and best, but which 

 is understood and accepted, is more desirable than a 

 better one not demanded by the popular will, and ap- 



Erised that through successive generations little change 

 as been demanded or made in the statutes familiar to 

 the great body of the people, and affecting their every- 

 day life, I have faithfully preserved the main body of 

 these statutes, which have proved their excellence by 

 long toleration by those who could have changed but 

 chose to preserve thcm^ and have endeavored to per- 

 fect the system by judicious pruning and careful graft- 

 ing, guarding against a spirit of change, and never 

 changing, except cautiously, and thereby surely to im- 

 prove. ... 



I have introduced changes which will lead to great 

 saving of money in the conduct both of public and 

 private matters ; have called to my aid the bench and 

 oar of the State in my effort to improve the machinery 

 for the assertion of rights and the redress of wrongs 

 through the courts ; have endeavored to provide for 

 increased efficiency of the laws for the prevention and 

 punishment of crimes ; have had in view the great 

 agricultural interest of the country, and tried to pro- 

 mote it by drawing together and reciprocally protect- 

 ing land-owners and laborers, and hope, by the aid 

 afforded me, I have succeeded in so improving the 

 statutes of the State as to make them acceptable to the 

 intelligent, and worthy of the people on whom they are 

 to operate. 



Much time was occupied throughout the ses- 

 sion in considering the Code, and it was finally 

 adopted without material change. 



On the second day of the session Governor 

 Stone submitted a message vetoing a bill passed 

 near the close of the session of 1878 "relative 

 to excessive charges and unjust discrimination 

 by railroad companies." The bill declared all 

 railroads to be public highways, and all trans- 

 portation companies to be common carriers ; 

 prohibited the consolidation of parallel and 

 competing lines and discriminations in dealing 

 with customers, and fixed maximum charges 

 for the transportation of cotton. The general 

 ground of the veto was that the act was in 

 violation of the provision of the Federal Con- 

 stitution which forbids the passing of laws that 

 impair the obligation of contracts. The Gov- 

 ernor said : 



As this provision of our State and Federal Constitu- 

 tions admits of but a single construction, it is only 

 necessary to present such argument as will show con- 

 clusively that the rights and powers conferred upon a 

 corporation by its charter are contracts between the 

 State whose Legislature granted the charter, and the 

 corporation accepting it ; that certain rights were con- 

 ferred upon every corporation operating a railroad ki 

 this State by its charter; and that tluT effect of this 

 legislation is to divest them of those rights. To ac- 

 complish this I submit a few legal and judicial authori- 

 ties, and contrast them with the provisions'of the bill 

 under consideration, and those of the various railroad 

 charters in the State. The parties in support of the 

 principle here maintained are numerous, out I have 

 sought in vain for a single decision in any of the books 

 holding a contrary view on the subject. 



After quoting numerous authorities and state- 

 ments of principle, he concluded as follows : 



