question. The ayes and noes shall be taken in
committee of the whole, in the same manner as
they are taken in Convention."
Mr. BOWIE. In committee of the whole ?
Mr. SOLLERS. In committee of the whole! I
do it from the best motive. We know that
much of the delay in the transaction of business
is to be attributed to the fact that gentlemen
speak more than twice on the same subject.
On motion of Mr. MERRICK, the Convention
passed to the Orders of the Day.
The President laid before the Convention a
report from the clerk of the levy court of Cal-
vert county, in obedience to the order of the
Convention of 15th November, containing a
statement exhibiting the aggregate valuation,
rate of tax, and each general expenditure, &c.,
Which was read and referred to the commit-
tee on Representation.
Also, laid before said Convention, a report
from said clerk, in obedience to the order of the
Convention of the 2nd of December, relative to
the fees and perquisites paid the Attorney Gene-
ral and his Deputies by Calvert county ;
Which was read and referred to the commit-
tee appointed on the Attorney General and his
Deputies,
THE ELECTIVE FRANCHISE.
The Convention resolved itself into committee
of the whole, Mr. BLAKISTONE in the chair, and
resumed the consideration of the report of the
Committee on the Elective Franchise.
The pending question was on the motion of
Mr. PHELPS, to amend the amendment offered by
Mr. CHAMBERS, of Kent, as a substitute for the
first section of the report, by inserting after the
words "Howard District," the following:
"And five days in the election district or ward
of the city of Baltimore."
Mr. RICAUD was entitled to the floor. He
said, he should not have undertaken to say one
word on this question, but for the peculiar circumstances
by which he was surrounded. As a
junior member of the delegation from the county
of Kent, he had found himself differing widely
not only from the Other members of that Dele-
gation, but from the party with which he hid
hitherto acted, and with which he hoped it might
still be his pleasure to be associated. Entertain-
ing, however, a conscientious difference of opin-
ion with them, he felt it to be his duty, candidly
and plainly to express his sentiments.
As regarded the constitutional power, he
thought that if there was a question easy of solu-
tion, it was that this Convention, called together
for the purpose of making an organic law, had
the right to throw around the elective franchise
such guards and restraints as they might think
best calculated to secure the safety of that valuable
right which it involved. He could not agree
with the gentleman from Prince George's coun-
ty, (Mr. Bowie,) that to impose such restrictions,
was to derrogate from the rights of the people as
to become usurpers of these rights.
Nor could he agree with the gentleman from
Queen Anne, (Mr. SPENCER,) that in this matter |
were involved the humble right of of humble in-
dividuals only. The rights of all were concern-
ed. It was as foreign to his (Mr. B's.) purpose,
to trample upon the rights of the humble as
upon these of the most exalted.
The language of the report of the committee
was such as, in the opinion of a majority of
the Convention, to make distinctions as to the
citizens of the State. It drew a distinction be-
tween the rights of the native citizen and those
of the foreign citizen. He was opposed to all
such distinctions, and doubted the policy of ma-
king them. His opinion was, that after a foreign-
er had resided amongst us for five years, and had
acquired the civil rights granted to him by the
laws of Congress, the very acquisition of these
rights, entitled him to his political rights, if he
was ever to be entitled to them. His attach-
ment to our institutions, if ever that attachment
was to exist at all, would by that time be such
as to authorise the extension of political rights
to him.
Other questions had been introduced—ques-
tions which, it seemed to him, were not germane
to the subject matter before the committee, and
which were calculated to increase, rather than
allay, the excitement which bad characteri-
sed the debate. Party politics had been in-
troduced ) Why should this be so ? Gentlemen
came into this body, not as Democrats, nor as
Whigs, but as representatives of the people,
elected to carry out their views in the formation
of such an organic law as would promote the but
interests of the State.
Mr. R. then proceeded to trace the action of
the State, from the Constitution of '76, on the
subject of the elective franchise. He followed
it through the imposition and subsequent revoca-
tion of the property qualification— illustrated the
operation of that law—explained the modifica-
tions which had from time to time been made in
the provisions regulating the elective franchise,
and the reasons which bad influenced the policy.
He denied that there was any authority in the
Constitution or the laws, for the qualification
(sleeping one night) which, gentlemen had said
the judges of election and the laws prescribed;
contended that the only requirement was a bona
fide intention on the part of the voter to remove
from one place to another; and referred to the
section of the elections laws which inflicted pains
and penalties upon any one who should reside
in one district, and should, without a bona fide
intention to remove: fraudulently attempt to
vote in a district to which he did not belong.
But if frauds were practised—if violations of
the elective franchise took place by which honest
voters were cheated out of their legiti-
mate rights, and if the elective franchise was the
great constitutional basis upon which rested the
liberties, the rights and the interests of every
man, how were these frauds to be prevented, or
these rights and liberties to be preserved by a
residence of fife days in the county or district ?
The very fact of prescribing remedy so slight
for an evil so serious, was, to his mind, sufficient
in itself to induce the Convention to vote down
the proposition. A man might have been a resi- |
