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stricts it by the provision, that grand juries shall not hereafter be drawn or summond unless the judge of the court shall so direct. This leaves the two systems in force, each to be tested by its own practical workings and merits.

10. Your committee, in unanimously recommending the passage of the bill, entertain no doubt of its adequacy to obviate the evils of the grand jury system, and meet the necessary wants of a more just and enlightened system of criminal jurisprudence. In the propriety of this recommendation, they are confirmed by the experience of other States, where, to some extent, the system of trial upon information has been adopted, and especially of the city of Detroit, where nearly all offences of the highest grade are now tried upon information under its new charter. In this city the new system has, by its practical workings, demonstrated its decided superiority over the old. It has worked its own way to universal favor, and that, too, under provisions of law less perfect and complete than those of the bill which was referred to your committee. We confidently believe that the complete success which has attended it in the metropolis of the State will attend it elsewhere, and that the passage of the bill to provide for the system will be signalized as an honor to the State, and and an era of progress in the history of its legislation. All which is respectfully submitted.

By direction of the Committee,

ALEX. W. BUEL.

1859.

No. 5.

[ No. 5. ]

REPORT of the Special Committee appointed to visit the Asylum for the Deaf and Dumb and the Blind, at Flint.

The committee on the Asylum for the Deaf and Dumb and the Blind, to whom was referred a resolution giving them authority to examine the same, with the view of as certaining the necessity of the appropriation asked for by the Trustees, respectfully beg leave to report:

That in pursuance of said resolution they have personally visited said institution, and examined the whole of the buildings connected therewith, in the presence of J. B. Walker, Esq., the Acting Commissioner, and Benjamin Pierson, Esq., one of the Trustees. The asylum is beau tifully located in the centre of about ninety acres of land, owned by the State.

The buildings erected are of brick, and from the thickness of the walls clearly indicate great strength and solidity.

The front shows a length of 200 feet.

The side elevation shows a distance of two hundred and seventy-six feet from one extreme to the other-thus oc

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cupying a square area containing more than one and onefourth acres.

The whole exterior line of the buildings, porticos, wings, projections and connections, measure one thousand eight hundred and thirty-four feet, or more than one-third of a mile.

The inside of the joint building, together with the wings are altogether unfinished.

The joint building, when finished, is intended for musicroom, library, Principal's office, family rooms for Principal and Matron, and Private rooms for Teachers and Assistants, and bedrooms for visitors. The right wing is designed for male pupils and the left wing for female pupils.

In the basement of each is a wash-room, an ironing and drying-room, and a bath-room.

The first floor of each will be occupied as a sitting and study-room.

In the second story will be a hospital and the necessary ante-rooms, and the balance of the second story, and all of the third story, will be occupied as pupil's clothes-rooms and dormitories.

The centre building basement will be occupied as a kitchen; the first story as a dining-room, and what corresponds with the second and third stories in the other building, is here thrown into one, and will be used as a Chapel. It is connected with the front building by brick walls from the ground to above the entrance to the Chapel. Above this there is no connection.

At the rear end the first story is connected with the first story of each wing, and the school wing, by a covered corridor, raised on arches so as to drive under.

The whole building, when completed, will be heated by steam and lighted by gas, thus avoiding the necessity of having any fire in the building.

The engine-house will be located in the rear of the

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