Good, J. L., of Boone; Grote, J. F., of Crawford; Hazen, J. B., of Lee; Hinkhouse, R. W., of Cedar; Jackson, A. E., of Tama; Johnson, J P., of Webster; Bird, J. W., of Cerro Gordo; Crow, W. G., of Wapello; Whittier, Lyman, of Monona; Bowen, D. H., of Allamakee. CODE REVISION COMMITTEE, DIVISION NUMBER 4. Brinton, M. H., Chairman, of Hamilton; Johnston, C. F., of Franklin; Dowell, C. C., of Polk; Funk, J. H., of Hardin; Ray, W. G., of Poweshiek; Morrison, J. D., of Grundy; Porter, C. R., of Appanoose; Garner, J. A., of Mahaska; Hauger, W. E., of Black Hawk; Hinman, S. N., of Wright; Huntley, L. D., of Lucas; Loomis, A. M., of Jones; McAchran, W. H., of Davis; Scott, D. H., of Monroe; Parker, John, of Mills; Power, J. T. P., of Lee; Sullivan, T. J., of Clayton; Wheeler, J. R., of Harrison; Williams, S., of Fremont. CODE REVISION COMMITTEE, DIVISION NUMBER 5. Weaver, H. O., Chairman, of Louisa; Mayne, Samuel, of Kossuth; Early, Chas. L., of Sac; Bell, W. B., of Washington; Tibbitts, O. O., of Bremer; Martin, W. B., of Adair; Potter, L. F., of Pottawattamie; Lowry, J. J., of Howard; Klemme, W. H., of Winneshiek; McQuin, B. M., of Benton; Miller, D. C., of Buena Vista; Miller J. H., of Warren; Frazee, John, of Chickasaw; Prentis, P. L., of Ringgold; Merriam, Frank, of Delaware; Smith, P. A., of Greene; Spaulding, E. C., of Floyd; Marti, Chris., of Scott; Watters, H. B., of Muscatine; Wilson, J. L., of Clinton. Mr. Morrison of Keokuk moved that a committee of three be appointed to notify the Governor that the House is organized and ready for any communication which he may have to make to them. Also, that a committee of three be appointed to notify the Senate that the House is organized. Adopted. The Speaker appointed as a committee to notify the Governor, Messrs. Morrison of Keokuk, Clark and Lowry. Also, as the committee to notify the Senate, Messrs. Scott, Cook and Jackson. Mr. Wilson offered the following resolution: WHEREAS, N. A. Merrell, of Clinton county, who was a member of this House at the last regular session in the Twenty-sixth General Assembly, has recently departed this life, therefore be it Resolved, That the Speaker appoint a committee to draft and report to this House such resolutions as will fittingly commemorate the life and public services of the deceased. Adopted. The Speaker appointed as such committee, Messrs. J. L. Wilson, P. A. Smith, W. B. Bell. Mr. Manahan offered the following resolution, and moved its adoption: Resolved, That the Sergeant-at-Arms be requested to arrange the curtains of the House chamber and windows so that the light will be admitted from the top. Adopted. The committee to notify the Senate relative to House organization, reported duty performed and were discharged. Committee from the Senate appeared to inform the House that the Senate was organized and ready to receive any communications which the House may have to make. The committee to notify the Governor that the House was organized, reported duty performed and were discharged. Mr. Cornwall offered the following resolution and moved its adoption: Resolved, That the committee on the distribution of the proposed Code Revision of the regular session of the Twenty-Sixth General Assembly be instructed to reintroduce the same into this House, making the same distribution of said work among the subdivisions of the Code Committee as was made at the regular session. The following communication from the Governor was then received: STATE OF IOWA, MR SPEAKER-I am instructed by the Governor to present to the honorable, the House of Representatives, a communication in writing, together with sundry reports. MESSAGE. To the General Assembly of the State of Iowa: W. S. RICHARDS, Acting Private Secretary. The span of years allotted to a generation has passed away since last the General Assembly of Iowa was called together in extraordinary session. Fortunately, no questions so momentous and all-pervading as those which confronted the people and their representatives at that session, and the called session of the year preceding, are now dominant in the public mind. Then the life of the Nation was in peril. Multiplied thousands of Iowa's brave men were absent from their homes contending for the life and the integrity of the republic. Members and people were alike oppressed with anxiety for both country and loved ones; for the later session was held at the darkest hour of the conflict. Now, in a time of peace, with the fearful struggle of those days long since closed and closed aright, you are assembled to pass in review the statutes of the commonwealth, and to put in concise form the laws which are to begin to have force substantially with the commencement of the state's second half century. A learned and industrious commission has prepared a revision of existing statutes, and put them, with such changes and modifications as to the commission seemed advisable, in codified form, in which shape the result of their labors has been before you for more than a year. An opportunity has thus been afforded the members of the General Assembly, and to some extent the people at large, to familiarize themselves with the new measures proposed, with the enactments the omission of which is contemplated, with the amendments which are suggested to existing statutes, and with the form which it is proposed to give the body of our statute laws. Therefore, the members of the General Assembly come together prepared, I doubt not, with the aid of the mature deliberation they have been enabled to give to the work, promptly to expedite the business for which the session has been called. It is gratifying to know that many of the existing laws of this commonwealth have been so founded in wisdom as to commend themselves to statesmen and publicists of not only our sister states, but other lands. Our state officers receive not a few testimonials to this effect. I may mention the legislation pertaining to railroads, to insurance, to dairy interests, and to oil inspection. Let us hope that the matters you have in hand will show a still stronger development of legislation thus found to commend itself. During the year past, our public institutions were visited by an unusual number of casualties through the power of the elements. On the 27th day of March, a severe rain storm did extensive damage to roofs at the School for the Deaf. The repairs necessitated a draft on the appropriation made for "providential contingencies," amounting to $397.03. On the 11th day of August the oldest building at the Anamosa penitentiary was destroyed by fire. It contained the dining room, kitchen, chapel and library. The damage amounted to $13,200. The departments destroyed were furnished with temporary quarters, and nothing has been drawn from the appropriation on account of this disaster. It will not improbably, however, call for action on your part. On the 21st day of the same month a tornado took off the roof of a wing of the main building of the Normal school and otherwise injured the structure, inflicting damage the repairment of which cost $541. Again on the 29th day of the same month, lightning struck the main building of the Institution for Feeble Minded Children at Glenwood, set it on fire, and notwithstanding the extraordinary efforts on the part of the officers and employes, the citizens of Glenwood, and the fire department of Council Bluffs, the edifice was destroyed, except the foundation walls and a portion of the walls of the west wing. Most of the contents of the building were likewise destroyed. A contiguous structure belonging to the institution was also damaged by water, and the rain considerably injured other property which had been removed from other buildings in apprehension of their destruction. The damage done was the most extensive ever suffered by any institution in the State. The building itself had cost, with its contents, rather more than a $100,000, and the whole damage is estimated at $125,000. An extraordinary emergency therefore confronted the Board of Trustees. The dining room, kitchen, school department, the rooms of seventy-five employes, and those of seventy children had disappeared. It should be remembered that prior to the catastrophe the institution was crowded beyond its capacity, and now a large part of the facilities which before were thus inadequate was gone. The members of the Board came before the Executive Council and represented the situation in which they were placed. The appropriation for meeting providential contingencies amounted to only $10,000, of which sum several hundred dollars had already been expended, and it was manifest that there was not enough of that appropriation remaining to provide for any considerable part of the repairs absolutely indispensable for the maintenance of the institution. It was, moreover, clearly a matter of economy for steps to be taken to preserve the yet standing walls which it was believed could be utilized in rebuilding. The Executive Council, feeling that an occasion had arisen for which adequate provision had not been made, unanimously determined to take the responsibility of authorizing the expenditure of $25,000, and afterwards of $15,000 more, in the work of rebuilding; the same being thought to be imperatively necessary for the maintenance of the institution and the preservation of the State's property. For this action on the part of the Executive Council I ask the approval of the General Assembly. A special report of the Trustees of said institution and Dr. Powell, its Superintendent, is herewith submitted. Fortunately, none of the calamities recited were attended with loss of life, or even personal injury This will be regarded as the more remarkable when it is taken into consideration the kind of unfortunates that are being cared for in the institution at Glenwood. The State long since ceased paying premiums of insurance upon its property. Indeed, it never did pay out much for such purpose. But, the need of some sort of provision for meeting the contingencies of fire and other elemental disasters becoming manifiest, the General Assembly began several years ago the practice of making an appropriation for "providential contingencies." I find that the amount thus appropriated, down to the present time, aggregates $134,000, while there is a total of drafts on these appropriations amounting to $63,678.19, making the excess in amount appropriated over the expenditures $70,321.81. Had the appropriations been cumulative as the first ones were, the unexpended balance of each appropriation being good for succeeding terms, there would have been, as appears above, a sum ample for making all the repairs at Glenwood that could not wait for the meeting of the General Assembly. In view of the experience of last year, I submit that prudential considerations require that the State should purchase insurance for its property, or else that provision be made either for the establishment of an insurance fund, or for the adoption of other adequate provision to meet extraordinary emergencies. I would also recommend a consideration of the propriety of making all State edifices hereafter constructed substantially fire proof. This, while lessening the risk, would obviate the danger of horrors such as have befallen public institutions-none of them, fortunately, in our own State. A report made to me by the Auditor of State, which is herewith submitted, makes an unpleasant showing of the finances. It appears that, owing to drafts, amounting to $569,259.18 on the special appropriations made at the regular session of the present General Assembly, there was a net floating indebtedness on the second day of the present month of $397,075.70, there being $593,459,10 of warrants outstanding, with $196,383.40 of cash in the treasury. The Auditor estimates that the receipts for the current year will be $2,137.445.68, and that the ordinary expenditures will be $1,723,086.34, while there may be drawn during the year $519,968.07 of the remaining special appropriations made at the last session. Should they all be drawn, which, however, is not probable, the indebtedness at the close of the present year will be in the neighborhood of $500,000. In view of this showing, I recommend that all of last session's special appropriations, any part of which is yet undrawn, be reviewed by the General Assembly, and wherever the same can be done without injury, the expenditure be deferred until the year 1898. And similar examination into all public expenditures might be made, with a view to reduction wherever practicable. Thus may be effectively inaugurated a movement which shall lead eventually to the cancellation of all indorsed warrants, and, let me express the hope, to an abandonment of the practice of indorsing warrants "not paid," a practice not in conformity with sound business principles, even in the matter of running into debt. On the 29th day of June last, I received the resignation of Hon. A. T. Meservey as a member of the Board of Trustees of the Agricultural College for the Eleventh Congressional District. Upon being advised that the Board had elected as Mr. Meservey's successor, the Hon. Hiram C. Wheeler, of the county of Sac, I issued a commission to that gentleman to hold, as provided by the statute, until the next meeting of the General Assembly. It is now incumbent upon you to elect a Trustee for the remainder of the unexpired term. It is unnecessary for me to remind the General Assembly that the people of the state are expecting the session to be of brief duration, and I doubt not that you are, as their representatives, in full sympathy with that feeling. Permit me to express the hope that your deliberations will eventuate in a Code of Laws that will give satisfaction to the people, while it will anew commend the legislation of this great Commonwealth to approval beyond our borders. January 19, 1897. F. M. DRAKE. REPORT OF AUDITOR. STATE OF IOWA, OFFICE OF AUDITOR OF STATE, Hon. F. M. Drake, Governor: DEAR SIR-Complying with your request of the 13th inst., for a financial statement, I have the honor to submit herewith a statement of the receipts and disbursement from January 4, |