Exemption of Personalty.

We have been furnished with the following points of interest, decided by Judge Duer, Ordinary of this county, upon the application of the widow and minor children for exemption of personalty:

1st.  Where a year’s allowance has been set apart by appraisers, under and by virtue of the 2530th section of Irwin’s Revised code, it does not defeat the widow and children’s right to have $1000 of the personal property of the decedent debtor set apart for their dole use and benefit, under the present Constitution, which declares that “each head of a family, or guardian or trustee of a family of minor children shall be entitled to an exemption of realty to the value of $2000 in specie, and of personalty to the value of $1000 in specie, both to be valued at the time they are set apart.”
2d. That by this provision of the Constitution it was intended to enlarge the exemption provisions in favor of families, and to invest them with that amount of property, which, at the time of the application, belonged to the estate of the debtor, and that no act of the Legislature, either prior or subsequent, can defeat this plain, unqualified and unconditioned provision of the Constitution.
3d. That where the administrator has sold the personal property of the estate, the widow and minor children have the right to have $1000 in specie (or its equivalent) in the hands of the administrator set apart for their sole use and benefit, the same being under the 2211th section of the Code defined to be personalty, or personal estate, which also includes promissory notes and choses in action.
4th.  That when application has been properly made, under the act passed at the last session to carry out this provision of the Constitution, and the applicant, by her petition and in her schedule filed, has prayed to have money in the hands of the administrator set apart, he having sold the personal property of the estate, that it is his duty to pay the same over, as directed under the order of approval granted by the Court of Ordinary, and that creditors have no right to object to his compliance with said order, they having failed to object at the hearing of the application.
5th. That all acts done by administrators and others, under the Constitution and laws of the State, so long as the same are of force, will be held valid so far as to protect them from liability to creditors, even though the Supreme Court of the United States should thereafter declare that provision of the State Constitution null and void which provides that “no court or ministerial officer shall ever have authority to enforce any judgment, execution or decree against the property thus set apart.”
6th. The marriage of the widow before exemption is set apart deprives her of her interest in the property thus set apart as effectually as her intermarriage afterwards.  She may, however, claim benefits of this constitutional provision out of the property of her living husband. –Col. Enquirer.

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Our Grave-yards have become a theme of much censurable gossip, of late, particularly among strangers who have chanced to visit them, and see their deplorable condition.  It is with a sense of deep humiliation that we again and again revert to this matter.—In the past, appeal after appeal has been made to the decency and common respect, to say nothing of the sympathy, of our people, through the columns of this paper, in behalf of the beloved dead, but to no purpose.  It is true, that beautifying and adorning a grave yard cannot benefit its tenants, they lie unconscious of the willow that weeps over their charnel house, or the beautiful rose that blooms upon the bosom of the same, or the towering monument or humble head-board upon whose tablet affection has inscribed the endearing words “Sacred to the Memory.”  Ah!  How can we cherish their memory with sacredness, and suffer the last traces of their sleeping dust to vanish from our sight?  The little evergreen planted by the hand and watered with the tears of affection, after struggling to lend its feeble influence to keep alive the recollections of those whose sacred ashes rest beneath its folds, withers and dies from neglect and exposure.  Time with her effacing finger wipes out the last traces of the spot once hallowed in our memory as the grave of a dear departed loved one.

A gentleman from Middle Georgia, visited the grave yards in and around this place, a few days since, remarked to us that he did not know what sort of a people we were—professing Christianity, and to be governed and controlled by the rules and customs of civilized society, and even making pretensions to refinement, to let our grave yards grow up in bushes and briers, so that no one can pass through them without being stripped of their clothing; running across one grave to get to another, while rottenness and decay constitute the principal feature of the whole, not even an enclosure, of any sort, around the sacred premises.—“Why,” says he (addressing himself to us,) “you, as a public journalist, ought to speak of these things freely to your readers—it’s a disgrace to any enlightened community.”  We told him we had done so repeatedly, but without availing anything whatever.  “Well,” says he “I will assist you.”  Thus the conversation ended.  That gentleman is now a citizen of this place.

In conclusion, we would say that our appeals heretofore have been to the people irrespective of sex, but we now turn to the ladies particularly, as you love the memory of your departed loved one, whose bones mingles with the clay of Georgia, Virginia, Tennessee, Mississippi, or any other State, clime or country, as you respect the grave as the final abode of all mankind; as you respect the laws of humanity, decency and the principles of our holy religion; and as you respect the popular opinion of the world, and especially of all good people, give us a helping hand in this, our humane effort, to clean up, enclose and beautify the grave yards in our midst.  Much has been done, and is still being done by your sex towards furnishing our fallen braves a decent burial place, where their memory might be perpetuated, turn your eyes to the graves of those who sleep in our very midst, and say will you allow their memory to be forgotten and their graves to become extinct?  We await your response.