01-14-13 Council Agenda & Packet

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itL. 1y1J�4 Nr 'fir# RESOLUTION NO. A RESOLUTION OF THE COMMON COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF SOUTH BEND,INDIANA, DECLARING MARCH 23RD OF EACH YEAR AS SCHUYLER COLFAX DAY IN SOUTH BEND,INDIANA,IN RECOGNITION OF HIS PUBLIC SERVICE CAREER,_HIS DETERMINED DEDICATION TO CIVIL RIGHTS AND THE PASSAGE OF THE 13TH AMENDMENT fit the South Bend Common Council notes that on March 23, 1823, Schuyler Colfax was born in New York City, five (5) months after his father, Schuyler Colfax, Sr.& died of tuberculosis, and notes that his grandfather fought closely with George Washington in the American Revolution; and �%i�eexeaac Schuyler Colfax attended public schools until the age of ten (10), when he was forced to leave school and work as a retail clerk to help support his mother,his grandmother and himself; and Ofic in 1834, Schuyler Colfax's mother, Hannah Stryker Colfax and his step-father, George W. Matthews were married, and they moved to Indiana in 1836 where Schuyler Colfax began working in his step-father's store and at a village post office to help support his mother; and W it is reported that Schuyler Colfax would sit on barrels while working, and would read newspapers and borrowed all books possible to educate himself. At the age of 16 years he wrote articles and sent them to Horace Greeley, the editor of the New York Tribune, who published his writings about the Indiana legislature and Indiana politics. This resulted in a close friendship between them which lasted the rest of their lives; and in 1841, Schuyler and his mother and step-father moved to South Bend when his step- father was elected as the Whig candidate to be the St. Joseph County Auditor and hired young Schuyler as his deputy. At the age of 19, Schuyler was hired by.the Indiana Whigs to serve as editor of The South Bend Free Press, a paper he later purchased in 1845 and renamed it The Saint Joseph Valley Reporter which Harriet Beecher Stowe later called it a"morally pure paper"; and in 1848, Schuyler Colfax served as a delegate to the Whig Convention. In 1849, he led the opposition to a provision in the new Constitution for the State of Indiana which barred African- Americans from settling in the state or from purchasing property; and Offewars anti-slavery Whigs like Schuyler Colfax sought to build a new party which eventually merged as the Republican Party and he worked to have a "firm anti-slavery plank in their platform"when he arrived as a new Congressman in the House of Representatives in 1855; and