and absolute property is vested in the owners according to the nature of their respective estates.1

ELECTORS.

40. Every male citizen of this state, or of the United States, of the age of twenty-one years or upwards, who shall have been a resident in this state one year, and of the county in which he offers to vote five months, next before the election, shall be entitled to vote for all officers that now are or hereafter may be elective by the people :2 Provided, however, that no person in the military, naval, or marine service of the United States, shall be considered a resident in this state, by being stationed in any garrison, barrack, or military or naval place or station within this state; and no pauper, idiot, insane person, or person convicted of a crime which excludes him from being a witness, unless pardoned and restored by law to the right of suffrage, shall enjoy the right of an elector."

41. Electors shall in all cases, except treason, felony, or breach of the peace, be privileged from arrest during their attendance at elections, and in going to and returning from the same.

DISTRIBUTION OF THE POWERS OF GOVERNMENT.

42. The government of this state shall consist of three distinct branches-the legislative, judicial, and executive; and no person or persons belonging to, or constituting one of these branches, shall exercise any of the powers properly belonging to either of the others, except as herein expressly provided.5

1 Const. N. Y. Art. I, 13.

2 Each state makes its own regulations as to age, time of residence, pre-payment of taxes, property qualifications, etc. And these regulations are so many and various that I shall not here attempt to compile them; but refer the reader to the several constitutions themselves.

3 See Const. N. J. Art. I.; N. Y. Art. II.;-similar provisions are

common.

Very nearly universal.

5 This division is made by all the constitutions.

THE LEGISLATIVE POWER.

43. The legislative power of the government of this state1 shall be vested in a Legislature, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives."

44. Senators and representatives shall be elected by and from among the qualified electors in each of the several counties of this state.3

45. Each house shall be the judge of the elections, returns, and qualifications of its own members; and a majority of each shall constitute a quorum to do business; but a smaller number may adjourn from day to day, and may be authorized to compel the attendance of absent members, in such manner, and under such penalties as each house may provide.

46. Each house shall choose its own officers, determine the rules of its proceedings, punish its members for disorderly behaviour, and may, with the concurrence of twothirds, expel a member.

47. Each house shall keep a journal of its proceedings, and from time to time publish the same; and the yeas and

The common form is-'The legislative power of this state shall,' etc. In one or two instances we have 'The supreme legislative power within this state,' etc.: which is so far from expressing the truth, that it conveys a false idea: for when we consider, that in every constitution, the people reserve to themselves that paramount, supreme and uncontrollable legislative power, by which they ordain and establish, and change or abolish, their organic law, and that all other legislative bodies must legislate subordinately thereto, it is clearly perceived that not even 'the legislative power of the state' is in any case vested in any representative legislature.

2 This clause is expressed in a varity of forms; but always to the same purpose,-the division of the legislative body into two distinct branches; the one called the Senate; the other, the House of Representatives, the Assembly, the General Assembly, the House of Delegates, or the House of Commons; and both together styled the General Assembly, the Legislature, the General Court, the Senate and General Assembly, or the Senate and Assembly.

3 The number and apportionment of senators and representatives, their several qualifications for and terms of office, and the times of their election, are generally fixed by the constitution. But in these particulars, hardly any two of the constitutions agree; and each must be consulted as occasion may require.

nays of the members of either house, on any question, shall, at the desire of one-fifth of those present, be entered on the journal.

48. Neither house, during the session of the legislature, shall, without the consent of the other, adjourn for more than three days, nor to any other place than that in which the two houses shall be sitting.'

49. The legislature shall have power to make all such laws and ordinances as they shall deem proper; provided they be not repugnant to this constitution."

50. All bills and joint resolutions shall be read three times in each house before the final passage thereof; and no bill or joint resolution shall pass unless there be a majority of all the members of each body personally present and agreeing thereto; and the yeas and nays of the members voting on such final passage shall be entered on the journals.

51. To avoid improper influences which may result from intermixing in one and the same act such things as have no proper relation to each other, every law shall embrace but one object, and that shall be expressed in the title.

52. No act shall ever be revised or amended by mere reference to its title; but the revised act or amended section shall be set forth and published at full length.5

53. The legislature shall not pass any ex post facto law, or

1 Nos. 45, 46, 47 and 48, are (with one or two trivial exceptions) substantially the same in all the constitutions.

2 See Const. Geo. (of 1798–1839) Art. 1, 22; Mass. Pt. II, Ch. 1, Sec. 1, Art. 3-4; New Hamp. Pt. II; Me. IV, III, 1. The power to make laws, vested in each state-legislature, is a general power, to be exercised at the discretion of the legislature, subject to the checks, restraints and limitations, contained in the constitution. The subjects over which it extends, are not enumerated and specified, as they are in the federal constitution. In the state constitutions, we look only for express limitations; in the federal constitution, only for express and specific grants, of legislative power.

3 Const. N. J. Art. IV, 4, 6. Provisions more or less stringent, and designed as checks upon hasty legislation, are common to all.

A very common but not universal provision.

5 Also common but not universal.

law impairing the obligation of contracts,' or depriving a party of any remedy for enforcing a contract, which existed when the contract was made.'

54. No divorce shall be granted by the legislature.

55. Every bill which shall have passed both houses, shall, before it become a law, be presented to the governor. If he approve, he shall sign it; but if he shall not approve, he shall return it with his objections to the house in which it shall have originated, who shall enter the objections at large upon their journal, and proceed to reconsider it. If, after such reconsideration, two-thirds of that house shall agree to pass the bill, it shall be sent with the objections. to the other house, by which likewise it shall be reconsidered, and if approved by two-thirds of that house, it shall be a law. But in such cases the votes of both houses shall be determined by yeas and nays, and the names of the persons voting for or against the bill shall be entered on the journals of each house respectively. If any bill shall not be returned by the governor within ten days (Sundays excepted) after it shall have been presented to him, it shall be a law in like manner as if he had signed it, unless the legislature, by their adjournment, prevented its return, in which case it shall be a law, unless sent back within three days after their next meeting.

56. The house of representatives shall have the sole power of impeachment; but the senate shall have the sole power to try all impeachments; and when sitting for that purpose, they shall be on oath or affirmation. When the governor is tried, the chief justice shall preside; and no person shall be convicted without the concurrence of twothirds of the members present.

57. Judgment in case of impeachment shall not extend further than to removal from office, and disqualification to hold and enjoy any office of honor, trust, or profit, under

1 Universal.

2 Const. N. J. Art. IV, Sec. VII-3.

* Common to many of the constitutions; qualified in some, and omitted in others.

This or a similar provision will be found in all.

this state; but the party convicted shall, nevertheless, be liable and subject to indictment, trial, judgment, and punishment according to law.1

58. The senators and representatives shall receive a compensation for their services, to be ascertained by law, and paid out of the treasury of the state. They shall in all cases except treason, felony, and breach of the peace, be privileged from arrest during their attendance at the session of their respective houses, and in going to and returning from the same; and for any speech or debate in either house, they shall not be questioned in any other place.2

59. No senator or representative shall, during the time. for which he was elected, be appointed to any civil office of profit under the authority of this state, which shall have been created, or the emoluments whereof shall have been increased, during such time; and no person holding any office under this state, or under any other government or state, shall be a member of either house during his continuance in office."

60. No money shall be drawn from the treasury but in consequence of appropriations made by law. And an accurate statement of the receipts and expenditures of the public moneys shall be attached to and published with the laws at every regular session of the legislature.*

THE JUDICIAL POWER.

61. The judicial power of this state shall be vested in one supreme court, in county courts, justices of the peace, and in such other courts inferior to the supreme court, as the legislature may from time to time establish by law."

THE EXECUTIVE POWER.

62. The supreme executive power shall be vested in a

1 The several provisions relating to impeachment, and to what officers shall be liable thereto, are not uniformly the same in all the constitutions. 2 Substantially the same in all.

3 Variously qualified in the different constitutions.

4 Common to most if not all.

5 Concerning the judicial power, little or nothing can be extracted from the several state constitutions which is common to all alike.