EWING. 338 EXAMINATION. posits from it, and after the 'specie circular' of Secretary Woodbury was issued in 183b proposed a measure for its annulment. After the expira- tion of his Senatorial term in 1837 he resumed the practice of his profession, but in 1841 en- tered President Harrison's Cabinet as Secretary of the Treasury. In 1S49 Ewing again entered the Cabinet, this time as the first Secretary of the newly established Department of the Interior. In June, 1850, he was appointed by the Governor of Ohio a United States Senator, to serve the unexpired term of Thomas Corwin, who had resigned to enter Fillmore's newly constituted Cabinet as Secretary of the Treasury. He re- mained in the Senate until 1851. He was a del- egate to the Peace Congress at Washington in 1861, but unreservedly supported the Lincoln Ad- ministration during the Civil War. EXAMINATION (Lat. examinatio, from ex- aminare, to examine, from examen, tongue of a balance, from exigere, to weigh, from ex, out + agere, to lead). The process of testing a student or a candidate from some scholastic, professional, or other position, with the purpose of discovering either the proficiency that has been attained in certain lines of study and of knowledge possessed or the capacity for doing certain lines of work in the future. Both of these purposes may enter into an examination and usually should, for it is the minimizing of the latter purpose that has caused so much criticism of the scholastic cus- tom. The use of examinations as a test of fitness for civil service is discussed under the title Civil Service. Aside from the Oriental, especially Chinese, civilization, which has had no educational influence on the West, the use of examinations as a scholastic test seems to have begun in the mediaeval universities, where the conferring of the baccalaureate degree was conditioned upon the ability to define and explain terms before a company already possessed of the degree, and of the mastership or doctorate upon the ability to 'dispute' or to defend a thesis before a group or a faculty, each member of which was possessed of the degree sought. Since then examinations have become a practice of every part of the mod- ern educational system, both as a test of the com- pletion of the component part of the system, and as a test of fitness for admission into more advanced parts of the general system or into specific institutions. Ii is the confusion of the two purposes that has given rise to some of the most com- plicated problems of modern education, chiefly because the test of a completed portion of work can become, even if not necessarily so. largely an exercise in memory, while the test of ability to undertake other and more advanced lines of work may have little relation to the excellence of the memorizing activities or to the possession of mere information. The use of examinations in the former sense may be exl ended so as to furnish i te i of the standing or even of the financial sup- port to lie given to institutions. In this latter application it forms a feature of the public school em of the Stale .>f New Fork, and in a much more extended sense, though recently somewhat curtailed, of the elementary school system of Eng- land. When used as :i test of knowledge, espe cially whei sterior end is sought, exami nations may lead I" serious injury to educational work: the work of instruction becomes formal, the intellectual discipline is superficial, and the information acquired is soon forgotten. When the passing of examinations becomes a prominent motive, the higher purposes and aims in educa- tion are lost sight of. These difficulties in con- nection with the uses of examinations are met in different ways. In England the examination of schools by competent inspectors has been substi- tuted to a large extent as a test of the amount of governmental support granted. In the element- ary grade of the American public schools, the recommendation of the teacher, based upon an intimate knowledge of the work of the child, is a partial if not a complete substitute for the multitude of examinations formerly given. For the very burdensome college entrance examina- tion, both certification by schools and a combina- tion of secondary school finals and college en- trance examinations through a general board are being widely substituted. See Colleges, Ameri- can; Oxford University; Cambridge Univer- sity; National Education. Systems of. Consult: Hadley, The Education of the Ameri- can Citizen (New York, 1901); Latham, The Action of Examinations (Boston, 1886) ; Herbert, The Sacrifice of Education to Examination (Lon- don, 1889). EXAMINATION. In judicial proceedings, the process by which the testimony of witnesses is elicited and sifted. It is ordinarily conducted by the counsel for the parties, although the trial judge has the right to ask questions of a witness at any time. The first examination on behalf of the party calling the witness is known as the direct examination, that on behalf of the opposite party as the cross-examination, and any further questioning by the first party is called re-direct examination. As a rule, the party calling a wit- ness has no right to ask leading questions, that is, questions which suggest to the witness the answers which are desired by the examiner. It is the duty of the court to see that witnesses re- ceive decent and respectful treatment from coun- sel. For a further discussion, see Evidence : Wit- ness; Torture, etc.. and consult the authorities there cited; also Ballantine, Experiences of a Barrister's Life (New York, 1883). EXAMINATION, Physical. In legal pro- ceedings, the medical or surgical examination of a living person by judicial order or as a pari of legal proceedings to determine the existence nr the nature of a physical injury alleged to exist, or of a physiological condition upon which the rights of a party to the proceeding may depend. It is especially available in actions for persona] injury due to willful violence or to negligence, and in cases of abortion, malpractice, and rape. Whether a court of justice has the power to compel a party to an action to submit to a phys- ical examination is a question upon which judi- cial decisions are at variance. It has been answered in the negative by the United States Supreme Court and by courts of last resort in several of the States, while an affirmative in swer has been given by many Slate tribunals. The power lias Keen denied on the ground that the right of every individual to the possession ami control of his nun person is held sacred anil carefully guarded by the common law. That right, it is said, is as much invaded by a COIB pul-iuy stripping and exposure as by a blow. Other courts have affirmed the existence ol llu power, "ii I lie ground that the end of I
