Library Collections: Document: Full Text

SEC. 4. It is hereby made the duty of the Superintendent, or party having charge of any person under confinement to receive, if requested to do so by the person so confined, at least one letter in each week, without opening or reading the same, and without delay to deposit it in the post-office, for transmittal by mails, with a proper postage stamp affixed thereto.

SEC. 5. It is hereby made the duty of the Superintendent, or party having charge of any person confined on account of insanity, to deliver to said person any letter or writing to him or her directed, without opening or reading the same; Provided, This letter has been forwarded by the Visiting Committee.

SEC. 6. In the event of the sudden and mysterious death of any person so confined, a coroner's inquest shall be held as provided for by law in other cases.

SEC. 7. Any person neglecting to comply with, or willfully and knowingly violating any of the provisions of this act, shall, upon conviction thereof, be punished for a term not exceeding three (3) years, or by a fine not exceeding one thousand (1,000) dollars, or by both fine and imprisonment, in the discretion of the court, and by ineligibility for this office in future, and upon trial had for such offense, the testimony of any person, whether insane or otherwise, shall be taken and considered for what it is worth.

SEC. 8. At least one member of said committee shall visit the asylum for the insane every month.

SEC. 9. That there shall be allowed as salary of such Visiting Committee the sum of five dollars per day for the time taken in visiting such insane asylums, and the same mileage as is now by law allowed members of the General Assembly. And the disbursing officer of such insane asylum shall pay the per diem and mileage allowed such Visiting Committee under the provisions of this act, and each member of such Visiting Committee shall certify under oath to such disbursing officer, the number of days he has served and the number of miles traveled.

SEC. 10. This act being deemed of immediate importance, shall take effect and be in force from and after two weeks publication in Daily Iowa State Register and Leader, newspapers published in Des Moines.

Approved, April 23d, 1872.

CHAPTER XLVI.
Educating the People.

The surest guarantee for the enforcement of any law is the nice of the people in its defense. Although confident the influence of the four thousand books which I had sold in Iowa, would be in the support of the new law, yet, since the territory thus canvassed was but a moiety of the entire State, I deemed it important to enlist the agency of the Press of the State in its behalf.

After the Committee had refused me a hearing at their first meeting, and while I was waiting at Mount Pleasant to make a second attempt to present the Governor's letter of introduction at their second meeting, the editors of Iowa held a mass-meeting of two days in that city, during which time they allowed me a hearing of ten minutes in defense of the law.

Thus I hoped to secure their aid in educating the masses into the importance of the new law.

Several, I am happy to say, volunteered me the use of their columns in helping on this reform.

The Mount Pleasant Journal had hitherto been committed to the interests of Dr. Ranney, regarding the law as an unnecessary act of legislation. I prepared an article in defense of the law, and sought the advice of some of the leading and most influential men in Mount Pleasant, who were my patrons, as to its publication.

They assured me it was of no use to try to get any article of that kind into the Journal, for said they:

"The Journal is governed by a ring, and therefore 'tis of no use to try; but the Press is governed by principle, and will therefore publish your article."

I accordingly went to the Press and read my article asked them if they would publish it.

They refused, saying:

"We have just refused an article from the Trustees condemning the law, and now it will not do to publish yours in favor of it. Perhaps at some future time we may open up columns to a discussion of both sides, but at present must decline."

I told them they would disappoint some of their patrons to refuse, for they have told me:

"You were governed by principle, and would therefore publish it, while the Journal was governed by a ring and therefore they would not." Still they refused.

I then took the article to the Journal office and said:

"I have been told by leading men in this city that you were governed by a ring and therefore would not publish my article; but that the Press was governed by principle and therefore would. I have asked them to publish it, but they cannot be prevailed upon to do so; and now I wish to test these papers to see which is governed by a ring, and which by principle!"

I then read them my article and said:

"Will you publish this article or not?"

"Yes, we will publish it!"

They did so, and also afterwards published "My Visit to Mount Pleasant Asylum," and several papers in Iowa reprinted these articles, as their editors had volunteered to do.