Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1874-05-14

It'll reported on the Sanborn contracts, recit-
ing the circumstances under which they were
executed and the conclusions they had reached.
In the opinion of the committee a very large
percentage, if not all, of the $4,000 of
taxes collected by Sanborn were not proper
subject of contract under the law, and the
taxes should and would have been collected
by the officers Of the Revenue Bureau in the
ordinary discharge of their duties. Referring
to the conflict of testimony between the
Secretary, Assistant Secretary and the
Solicitor of the Treasury the committee say:
The disagreements and contradictions given,
by these gentleman, as appear
from the testimony, is a matter greatly de-
plored by the committee, as by it they are
unable to fix upon anyone, or anywhere, the
responsibility for the maladministration of
this law; and they look with serious appre-
hension upon the apparent efforts of these
gentlemen to transfer the responsibility each
from himself to the other. While the commit
tee, therefore, are unable to determine where
the responsibility rests, they cannot
in justice to themselves ignore the fact that
these three persons deserve severe condemna-
mitted this law to be administered" In view
of the facts presented the committee recon-
mended that the law of May s, 1872, be repealed
and that the contracts made Hereunder be re-
voked and annulled. They submitted the
draft Of a bill for that purpose.
Dispatches from Little Rock on the 5th say
that Chief-Justice Mcclure caused writ to be
served on that day upon Gems. Churchill and
Blocke, commanding them to produce the
bodies of Messrs. Bennett and Searle, Associate
Justices of the Supreme Court. These officers
replied that martial law prevailed in Pulaski
County, and they knew of no orders except
those which came from their superiors. a
duplicate seal of the State, ordered by Baxter,
was captured by Brooks forces on the morning
of the 18th.
The Comptroller of Currency has called
upon the National Banks for reports exhibit
ing their condition at the close of business on
Friday, May l.
An appeal has been published in Washing
ton urging immediate relief Of sufferers by the
floods in the Southern States, and stating that
over $4,000 people have been driven from
their homes and are now without food or shell
ter, and that to furnish these with provisions
alone will cost $25, 900 day.
Gold sold as low as 112 in New York on the
9th, and closed at 112I. The First Manhat-
tan Cooperative Boot and Shoe Manufactur-
ers' Association had failed.
A correspondent of the New Orleans Pea
yatae, in a letter published on the 9th, says the
country adjacent to the lower Mississippi is
submerged deeper than it was in 1867, and
that at the present time nearly 10000 people
are without food and shelter.
The captured Judges of the Arkansas Su-
preme Court reached Little Rock on the 9th,
having been surrendered to the United States
forces by the officer having them in charge.
The court Immediately assembled, and the
case of Brooks as. Baxter was submitted and
taken under advisement. One hundred and
sixty stand of arms loaned by Baxter to the
Industrial University at Fayetteville had been
seized by Brooks adherents.
News from the South on the 18th was to the
effect that the floods were subsiding. A Mem
phis dispatch says planter just arrived from
Chicot County, Ark, brought distressing
accounts of the suffering among the laborers
and their families in that vicinity Many of
upon the carcasses of cattle that had died from
starvation or been drowned in the overflow.
From a mass of correspondence received by
the Governor of Louisiana and the Re-
lief Committee of that State the follow
ing is selected as showing substantially the
purport of the whole: Mr.. Reddock, writing
from Cuba, Ouachita Parish, says: "All the
country for miles around is submerged.
Twelve farms are almost entirely under water
within three miles of this place, witha popula-
ton of 700 persons, from the breaking of the
Cuba levee. The levee broke April s, and the
current of water was so strong that it washed
away everything on my lot except my
dwelling house-a stone house. My corn,
horses and oxen are all gone. The
water in my dwelling is four feet deep,
and rushes through in such current as to
make it tremble like leaf But do not look
to me alone. There are 600 or 700 others
similarly situated within three miles. W. j.
Ellis has lost everything. The water On the
floor of his dwelling is five feet deep, and he
has not one pound of provisions on hand for
himself and fifteen freedmen, and no chance
of getting any in the neighborhood."
Four of the five Judges of the Supreme
Court of Arkansas met inside the brooks
line on the evening of the 7th and delivered
an opinion on the application of Brooks for a
mandamus against Henry Page, State Treas
urer who refused to pay Brooks warrant
The court decided that the Circuit Court of
Pulaski County had jurisdiction to render the
Judgment in the case of Brooks as. Baxter,
and that its judgment appeared to be regular
and valid. 1t therefore decided to award the
writ of mandamus as prayed for. On the 18th
of October last the same court decided that
the determination of the question whether the
person exercising the Office of Governor had
been duly elected vested solely in the General
Assembly, and that neither the Supreme Court
nor any other State Court had jurisdiction to
try suit in behalf of claimant. The
Bakeries claim that the decision rendered on
the It'll amounts to nothing, first, because a
legal court is composed of the full bench;
second, that the question of Governor is one
for the Legislature alone to determine. As
the time for the Legislature to meet was
drawing near men were coming in from all
sections Of the State, mostly as reinforcements
for Baxter, though Brooks received a few
men on the 9th.
A Little Rock dispatch of the Sth says that
on the night preceding a squad of Baxter's
men took passage on the steamer Halle to
intercept and capture 100 stand of arms be-
longing to the Industrial University, which
had been shipped on fatboat from Fort
Smith, in charge of six men, The Brooksites
started Col. j. BROKER, with his regiment OF