Cats in Topeka

Topeka, capital of Kansas, takes its pets seriously. Last spring its flower-lovers, incensed by damage to their gardens, began to petition the city commissioners for an ordinance restraining dogs from running loose in the city. Dog-lovers rose in hot defense. Caught between the two camps and facing an imminent city election, the commissioners sidestepped. They put the dog-flower issue on the ballot. Topekans promptly got so interested in the resulting wrangle that candidates for city offices were almost forgotten. The election went to the dogs.

Last week Topeka was in the midst of another pet controversy--this time over cats. Judge William Amos Smith, onetime Kansas attorney general and Supreme Court justice, has three children, seven cats. The children are all right with his next-door neighbor, Mrs. Archie Smith (no kin), but she objects decidedly to the cats. Protesting their "terrific odor," she lately went to the city commissioners. They decided to meet this issue squarely. In a stormy session they passed an ordinance forbidding Topekans to harbor more than five cats within 250 ft. of a dwelling. Fine for infraction was set at $50 a day.

Judge Smith knows what courts are for. Marching to the Shawnee County District Court, he charged that the ordinance was neither limited, specific nor reasonable as required by State law. The Court gave him a temporary injunction against the ordinance's enforcement. Last week, still harboring his seven cats, Judge Smith was planning to seek a permanent injunction at the District Court's September session.

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