of the House; Matt Parrott was President of the Senate. F. M. Drake was inaugurated Governor.
The following were the most important acts of this session of the Legislature: an act imposing a collateral inheritance tax and providing for its collection; an act to define express companies and to provide for taxing the same. Also one declaring such companies common carriers and placing them under control of the Railway Commissioners. An act for the regulation and control of loan and saving associations; an act to prohibit the sale and manufacture of cigarettes in the State; an act authorizing the Executive Council to purchase a site and procure plans for the erection of a State Historical Building; an act to provide for the semi-centennial of the admission of Iowa into the Union; an act providing for the payment of the Commission selected to locate and mark the positions held by Iowa regiments at the Battle of Shiloh.
Much feeling had been aroused among the soldiers of Iowa over the action of the Commission appointed to superintend the erection of the Iowa Soldiers’ Monument, in selecting certain names and medallion portraits to be placed upon the monument, and the Legislature passed a joint resolution of instruction for the Commission which directed that no medallion portrait of any person living or dead should be placed upon the monument to exalt one soldier over another of equal or more deserving record, “that the Commission in place thereof shall have inscribed on the monument the name of each regiment and organization, the number of men enlisted and date of muster into service.”
The Legislature made an appropriation of $10,000 to enable Iowa to make preparations for participating in the Trans-Mississippi International Exposition to be held at Omaha in 1898. It was provided that the Executive Council should appoint a Commission of one from each Congressional District to collect and superintend the material for an Iowa exhibit. The Commission consisted of the
