of its own.14 An injunction restraining,
inter alia, the election commissioners
appointed by the convention from di-
recting the elections was granted. The
court pointed out that, the constitu-
tional convention not being provided
for in the existing Constitution as a
mode for revising or amending its pro-
vision, the Act of 1872 "necessarily be-
came the channel of their authority,"
and that the power of the legislature to
pass that law "carries with it of neces-
sity that to frame and declare the terms
of the law." The court said: "When
the people voted under this law, did they
not vote for delegates upon the express
terms that they should submit their work
to the people for approval? Did not
every man who went to the polls do so
with the belief in his heart that, by the
express condition on which his vote was
given, the delegates could not bind him
without his subsequent assent to what
the delegates had done? On what prin-
ciple of interpretation of human action
can the servant now set himself up
against the condition of his master and
say the condition is void? Who made it
void? Not the electors; they voted upon
it. The people required the law, as the
act of the existing government, to which
they had appealed under the Bill of
Rights, to furnish them legal process to
raise a convention for revision of their
fundamental compact, and . without
which legal process the act of no one
man could bind another. This law, be-
ing unrepealed, and being acted upon
by the people, became their own dele-
gation of authority — the chart of the
14 In W. dodd, revision and amendment
of state constitutions 83 n. 20 (1910), the
author suggests that the action described in
the text was taken "because the regular elec-
tion machinery of Philadelphia was admittedly
corrupt, and there was strong reason to sus-
pect that it would be employed fraudulently
to defeat the proposed new constitution."
350
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delegates to guide and control them in
the duties they were elected to perform
as the servants of the people. Without
this legislation the convention had not
existed; and to exist on terms not found
in or contrary to the law is to seek for a
grant of powers to be found nowhere
else, except in a state of revolution."
The claim was also made that the con-
vention refused to submit the judiciary
article of the new Constitution sepa-
rately to a vote of the people, although
one-third of its members required such
submission. The court held that if the
convention "did this wrong, no appeal
is given to the judiciary, and the error
can be corrected only by the people
themselves, by rejecting the work of the
convention" (p 56) .
To the same effect, though without
a decision on the merits, is Woods's
Appeal, 75 Pa. 59 (1874).
See the dissenting opinion of Bennett,
J., in Miller v. Johnson, 92 Ky. 589, 18
S.W. 522, 15 L.R.A. 524 (1892), hold-
ing invalid changes in the Constitution
made by a constitutional convention
after its work had been approved by the
people, where these changes, in disre-
gard of the requirements of the statute
providing for the calling of the conven-
tion, were never submitted to or voted
upon by the people.
* * *
In Bass v. Albright, (1933; Tex. Civ.
App.) 59 S.W.(2d) 891, the court dis-
cussed the question whether an ordi-
nance, dealing with the terms of the
district courts of Texas and adopted by
the constitutional convention of 1875,
would be valid, if it had not been sub-
mitted to the people for ratification,
although the question seems purely
academic, since in fact, the ordinance
had been so submitted, together with
the new Constitution. The court said:
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