The Indiana Pi Bill is the popular name for bill #246 of the 1897 sitting of the Indiana General Assembly, one of the most notorious attempts to establish mathematical truth by legislative fiat. Despite its name, the main result claimed by the bill is a method to square the circle, although it does imply various incorrect values of the mathematical constant , the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter. The bill, written by a physician who was an amateur mathematician, never became law due to the intervention of Prof. C. A. Waldo of Purdue University, who happened to be present in the legislature on the day it went up for a vote. The mathematical impossibility of squaring the circle using only compass and straightedge constructions, suspected since ancient times, had been rigorously proven 15 years previously, in 1882 by Ferdinand von Lindemann. Better approximations of than those implied by the bill have been known since ancient times. Legislative history In 1894, Indiana physician Edward J. Goodwin (ca. 1825–1902) believed that he had discovered a correct way of squaring the circle. He proposed a bill to state representative Taylor I. Record, which Record introduced in the House under the long title "A Bill for an act introducing a new mathematical truth and offered as a contribution to education to be used only by the State of Indiana free of cost by paying any royalties whatever on the same, provided it is accepted and adopted by the official action of the Legislature of 1897". The text of the bill consists of a series of mathematical claims (detailed below), followed by a recitation of Goodwin's previous accomplishments: Goodwin's "solutions" were indeed published in the American Mathematical Monthly, though with a disclaimer of "published by request of the author". Upon its introduction in the Indiana House of Representatives, the bill's language and topic occasioned confusion among the membership; a member from Bloomington proposed that it be referred to the Finance Committee, but the Speaker accepted another member's recommendation to refer the bill to the Committee on Swamplands, where the bill could "find a deserved grave". It was transferred to the Committee on Education, which reported favorably. Following a motion to suspend the rules, the bill passed on February 6, 1897 without a dissenting vote. The news of the bill occasioned an alarmed response from Der Tägliche Telegraph, a German-language newspaper