Page:The autobiography of a Pennsylvanian.djvu/396

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AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A PENNSYLVANIAN

shall refuse ever to ride again to Gettysburg with a drawn sabre.” Two weeks later he was dead.

An official memorial service to the memory of Senator Quay was held by the senate and house on the evening of March 22d, at which I delivered the address which has been printed in various shapes since.

During these later days of the session I was receiving much encomium, even from the city dailies, for the reason that they did not like the legislators, and they watched with pleasure, while the analysis, which had formerly been applied to journalism, was now being applied to legislation. Cooper of the Media American wrote editorially:

“Governor Pennypacker has proved to be the wisest, most discriminating and at the same time most thoroughly honest executive that ever sat in the Pennsylvania gubernatorial chair.”

And Moser of the Collegeville Independent:

“Governor Pennypacker has been easily the most virile, the most capable and in many respects the most popular executive since the days of Andrew G. Curtin.”

The session of the legislature ended on the 13th of April. A Department of Health had been created, to which had been given very great authority and a power which extended to the person of the individual citizen and might even be regarded as an infringement of his personal liberty. The value and permanence of the legislation would depend mainly upon the manner in which the department should be organized. It was at first suggested to me that it should be placed in charge of Dr. B. H. Warren, but that thought I instantly dismissed. I then had an interview with Dr. Charles B. Penrose, who had been very much interested in the matter, and he named to me a gentleman connected with one of the schools in the western part of the state. I had a talk with this gentleman, but was still not satisfied. Then Dr. Penrose told me he thought Dr. Samuel G. Dixon, president of the Academy of Natural Sciences, would be

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