770 



RHODE ISLAND. 



preme Court, Thomas Durfee, who resigned in 

 March and was succeeded by Justice Charles 

 Matteson, by election of the General Assembly ; 

 Associate Justices, Pardon E. Tillinghast, John 

 H. Stiness, George A. Wilbur, Charles Matteson, 

 promoted as above stated, Horatio Rogers, and 

 William W. Douglas. The two last named were 

 elected by the General Assembly on May 27, one 

 to succeed Justice Matteson and the other as the 

 additional justice authorized by an act of the 

 General Assembly passed on the same day. 



Finances. The following is a summary df 

 State finances for 1891 : Funded debt, Jan. 1, 

 1892, $1.283,000; sinking fund, Jan. 1, 1892, 

 at par, $1,049,763.68; State debt, less sinking 

 fund, $233,236.32. State debt, less sinking fund, 

 Jan. 1, 1891, $331,296.05; decrease past year, 

 $98,059.73; balance in treasury, Jan. 1, 1891, 

 $85,528.57; receipts, 1891, $1,202,263.13; total, 

 $1,287,791.70. Payments, 1891, $1,211,852.23. 

 Balance in treasury, Jan. 1, 1892, $75,939.47. 

 The total receipts for the year were greater by 

 $126,299.48 than the receipts for 1890, the in- 

 crease being mainly due to the refunding to the 

 State of $87,493.34 direct tax paid to the United 

 States during the civil war. A large increase of 

 expenditure was caused by the erection of new 

 buildings at the State Agricultural School, the 

 Soldiers' Home, and the State institutions at 

 Cranston. The State tax is still assessed on the 

 valuation of $328,530,559, made when the popu- 

 lation was about 235,000. Since that time the 

 population has increased to upward of 350,000, 

 while the present valuation, according to the 

 Board of State Valuation, is $396,794,552. Were 

 the State tax assessed on this latter valuation 

 the incre.-ise in receipts from that source would 

 be $126,000. The State is practically out of 

 debt, the funded debt being provided for. To 

 secure increased revenues the need of a new sys- 

 tem of taxation is imperative. 



Legislative Session. The adjourned session 

 of the General Assembly of 1890 began on Jan. 

 20 of this year and ended on May 1. An act 

 was passed at this session in the interest of em- 

 ployes, providing that " every corporation, other 

 than religious, literary, or charitable corpora- 

 tions, and every incorporated city, but not in- 

 cluding towns, shall pay weekly the employes 

 engaged in its businesss the wages earned by 

 them to within nine days of the date of such 

 payment, unless prevented by inevitable casu- 

 alty." A fine is imposed for violation of these 

 provisions. 



The Australian ballot system, which was first 

 introduced in State elections, and later, by an 

 act passed in June, 1890, extended to munici- 

 pal elections, was at this session further extend- 

 ed by a general law so as to apply to elections 

 for town officers in any town that by a majority 

 vote shall decide to accept the provisions of the 

 act. Towns that accept the Australian system 

 are required to bear the expense of providing 

 the official ballots. Two special acts were also 

 passed requiring the towns of Cumberland and 

 East Providence to use the Australian system. 

 An institution for the care and education of deaf 

 children, known as the Rhode Island Institute 

 for the Deaf, was established, and $50,000 ap- 

 propriated for land and buildings. Other acts 

 of the session were as follow : 



Kegulating the sale of coal by measure in baskets, 

 fixing the size of baskets for bushel and half-bushel 

 measures, and requiring all such to be scaled. 



Authorizing the city of Providence to borrow the 

 following sums : $700,000 to be expended for highway 

 work ; $2,000,000 to be expended on sewers, in addi- 

 tion to sums previously authorized for the same ob- 

 ject ; $500,000 for the purchase of land for parks and 

 the construction thereof; $300,000 for the purchase of 

 lots for school-houses and the building of school- 

 houses ; and $400,000 for improving the water supply, 

 in addition to sums previously authorized for tlio 

 same purpose. 



Granting to the city of Providence the right to 

 condemn the Hopkins Burial Ground for park pur- 

 poses. 



Authorizing the city of Woonsocketto borrow $400,- 

 000 for establishing and constructing a system of 

 sewerage, and $200,000 for enlarging and improving 

 its water- works. 



On April 17, in grand committee, Charles Mat- 

 teson was elected Chief Justice of the Supreme 

 Court, vice Thomas Durfee resigned. 



The General Assembly chosen at the April 

 election assembled at Ne'wport on May 26, and 

 adjourned on May 29, to meet at Providence on 

 July 21. On the first day of the session the re- 

 turns for State officers were opened, and no 

 election by the people was declared. The As- 

 sembly then elected Herbert W. Ladd to be 

 Governor; Henry A. Stearns, Lieutenant-Gov- 

 ernor; George II. Utter, Secretary of State; 

 Samuel Clark, General Treasurer; and Robert 

 Burbank, Attorney-General. On May 27 Albert 

 C. Landers was elected State Auditor. An act 

 was passed on the same day increasing the num- 

 ber of Associate Justices o'f the Supreme Court 

 from four to five, and Horatio Rogers and Will- 

 iam W. Douglas were elected to that office, one 

 of them being a successor to Justice Matteson, 

 who had been promoted to Chief Justice. The 

 control of the State Home and School was taken 

 from the State Board of Education and vested 

 in a board of seven persons, to be appointed by 

 the Governor with the approval of the Senate, 

 each holding office for three years. For the 

 purpose of securing a State exhibit at the World's 

 Columbian Exposition, $10,000 was appropri- 

 ated, to be expended under the direction of a 

 board of World's Fair managers. At the ad- 

 journed session this was increased to $25,000. 

 The session adjourned on Aug. 5, to meet on the 

 third Tuesday of January, 1892, at Providence. 



Education. For the school year ending 

 April 30, 1890, the Commissioner of Public 

 Schools reports the following statistics: Pupils 

 enrolled, 52,774 ; average attendance, 83,905 ; 

 average school year, nine months eight days; 

 male teachers, 174; female teachers, 1,204; aver- 

 age monthly wages male teachers, $89.48 ; fe- 

 male teachers, $45.40; paid for teachers' wages, 

 $549,367.38 ; total receipts for school purposes 

 during the year, $1,091,993.86; total expendi- 

 tures for school purposes, $917,990.26 ; number 

 of school-houses, 482 ; value of school property, 

 $2,739.672. There were 45 evening schools con- 

 ducted during the year for an average of 12 

 weeks, in which 7,623 pupils were enrolled, the 

 average attendance being 2,858. There were 125 

 male and 207 female teachers employed in these 

 schools. The annual census of children of 

 school age (between five and fifteen years of age) 

 taken in January, 1890, showed 43,163 attending 



