Daniel, Davis, of Washington, Dent, Duvall
Earle, Ecker, Edelen, Galloway, Harwood
Hodson, Hopkins, Hopper, Jones, of Somer
set, Keefer, Kennard, King, Lansdale, Lee
Marbury, Markey, Malhugh, McComas
Mitchell, Miller, Morgan, Mullikin, Murray
Negley. Nyman, Parker, Parran, Pugh, Pur
nell, Robinette, Russell, Sands, Schley
Schlosser, Smith, of Carroll, Smith, of Wor
cester, Stirling, Stockbridge, Swope, Thurs
ton, Todd, Turner, Wickard, Wooden—59
On motion of Mr, STIRLING, it was
Ordered to be entered upon the journal
that Mr. Cushing was detained from his seat
on account of indisposition.
INTEREST AND USURY LAWS.
Mr. BELT. I move that the rules be sus
pended in order to enable me to make a report
from a committee, so that the house may be
pat in possession of it, and that it may be
printed.
The motion was agreed to, and the rules
suspended accordingly.
The report was received, read the first time,
and ordered to be printed, as follows :
The committee heretofore appointed to con-
sider and report upon section 49. of article 3,
of the present constitution, having reference
to interest and the usury laws, beg leave to
report their unanimous recommendation, that
the following section be added to the article
on the legislative department.
Sec. —. The legal rate of interest in this
State shall be six per centum per annum, ex-
cept in cases where a different rate may be
agreed upon between contracting parties; and
in all cases of private contract, the rate of
interest agreed on, or contracted for, shall be
recoverable; and the general assembly shall
pass all laws that may be necessary to carry
this section into effect.
EDWARD W. BELT,
Chairman of the Committee.
JUDICIARY DEPARTMENT.
The convention then resumed the considera-
tion of the report of the committee on the
judiciary department, which was on its second
reading.
The pending question was on the amend-
ment submitted by Mr. DANIEL, to wit :
Insert as an additional section, the fol-
lowing :
"Sec. 10. The testimony in equity cases
shall be taken in like manner as in cases at
law."
Mr. DANIEL. I wish to say a few words so
as to place myself right upon this subject,
Since I had the honor to introduce this amend-
ment, I have been examining the debates of
the New York constitutional convention upon
this subject That convention was composed
of some of the ablest lawyers of New York,
of whom Charles O'Conor was one, Mr. Tall-
madge another—Charles O'Conor standing |
pretty much at the head, if not at the head
of the bar in this country, I think. And 1
- find that this very proposition I have submit-
ted here was introduced by Mr. Charles
O'Conor, and was incorporated unanimously
into the constitution of New York. I beg
leave to read a few remarks of some of the
able lawyers who advocated this proposition.
1 will first read some of the names of the
lawyers to show some of the lawyers in that
New York convention: Messrs. Tallmadge,
Shepherd, Harrison, Shaw, Witbech, O'Con-
or, Taggart, Bouch, Worden, Marvin and St.
John. All of these gentlemen reported sys-
tems of judiciary; and in a great many of
those reports was reported some section of
this sort making proceedings in equity similar
to those at law. A very full discussion was
had. I will show that the very proposition
I have submitted here was introduced into
that convention by Mr. Charles O'Conor, and
unanimously incorporated into the constitu-
tion of New York. '
1 read now some of the remarks of Mr.
Stetson on this proposition. He said :
"But first he would here express his heart-
felt thanks to the honorable gentleman from
New York, (Mr. O'Conor,) who has so ably,
eloquently and triumphantly vindicated the
principle of the union not only of the equity
and law jurisdiction in one, but of the uni-formity
of practice and proceedings upon the
two remedies. There should be a similarity
of proceedings in all cases, and whether pro-
ceedings should assume the form of equity
proceedings, or the simple and well known
proceedings of an action on the case, was of
comparatively little importance His impres-
sion had been that the better method would
be to assimilate all actions and proceeding's to
the simple form of an action on the case as
now used. That the multitude of civil actions
now in use, should be abolished, and one
plain, simple remedy provided in all cases.
On this subject he did not know but he stood
alone in his profession, and it was highly
gratifying to him to find in the honorable
gentleman from New York so able a champion
of that principle. The gentleman and myself
desire to arrive at the same result, and it mat-
ters but little by which course of proceeding
we shall so arrive at it, whether by the sim-
ple action on the case, or by a plain, concise
and simple bill in equity."
Mr. Jordan, another very able gentleman,
a lawyer from New York, makes use of these
remarks, upon the discussion of this ques-
tion :
"Although the senior of the honorable gen-
tleman from New York (Mr. O'Conor) in
years, be would not pretend to the same
amount of practical experience and accuracy
of observation; yet he had seen enough to
convince him that if the one or the other must
fall, he would cling to the common law; its
remedies were bounded by right lines, it did |
