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you deem it advisable, to confirm and adopt the
aforesaid alterations and amendments, as parts
of the constitution.
We submit for your consideration, copies of
a correspondence between the Clerk of the
Council, by our direction, and the Attorney
General, by which you will be informed, that
no legal provision exists for requiring or recei-
ving bonds from the lottery commissioners
for the faithful performance of their duty;—
that there are such various provisions relative
to the bonding of other officers, as to make it
cifficult to determine what the lawa really are;
—and that the abolition of the clause, formerly
existing in the constitution, which required a
property qualification in persons to be elected
or appointed to office, did not dispense with
such qualification required by act of assembly;
and that such a qualification is now required by
an existing act.
And we embrace this occasion to invite your
attention to a complaint which is often made of
great difficulty and perplexity in ascertaining
the existing operative provisions of our laws.
It appears to us that the difficulty we have men-
tioned, arises principally, if not entirely, from a
system or custom which seems to have long
prevailed in our legislation, of inserting as a
concluding section of most of our acts of as-
sembly, a provision, in general terms, repealing
all pre-existing repugnant or inconsistent laws;
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