393]              Constitutional Reform Agitation,                 15

deemed expedient, just and proper, as may be best calcu-
lated, without the aid of the legislature, to ensure the
accomplishment of the desired results."⁵

The legislature, coerced by the state of public feeling,
and by the course pursued by the nineteen Democratic
senatorial electors, who refused to qualify and meet the
twenty-one Whig electors to elect the Senate,⁶ made many
of the desired changes in the constitution. The persistence
with which the nineteen " reform " electors pursued their
determination of electing a senate composed of a majority
in favor of reform, and the illegal and revolutionary man-
ner in which they endeavored to bring about a convention
for the purpose of forming a new constitution, produced
a reaction throughout the State in regard to the calling of
a convention. Public meetings were held in many of the
counties, and in the city of Baltimore, condemning the
course pursued by the " reform " electors as " disorganizing
and revolutionary."⁷ The changes made in the constitu-
tion by the " reform legislature" of 1836-37 served to
check for a few years the demand for a constitutional con-
vention.

The legislature in the effort to secure to Maryland the
growing trade of the West, and with the view of developing
the mineral resources of western Maryland, was induced to
make use of the capital and credit of the State in the aid
of various works of internal improvement. In the Decem-
ber session of the legislature of 1835-36, a measure was
introduced to grant heavy subsidies to the various pro-
jects of internal improvement in course of construction.
This measure was opposed in the legislature, and, with a
view of enabling the members to learn the sentiments of
their constituencies on the subject, was postponed until the
extra session held in May.

⁵ Scharfs History of Md., vol. iii, p. 189. See also Niles Register,
5th series, vol. 52, p. 124.

⁶ Steiner's Electoral College, Amer. Hist. Association, Rep. 1895,
p. 142.

⁷ McSherry's History of Maryland, p. 351.