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457] The Constitution. 79
commissioner of lotteries was to be elected by popular
vote. After the first day of April, 1859, no lottery schemes
could be operated, nor any lottery ticket sold within the
State.39
A new feature in the constitution of 1851 was the pro-
vision for a general corporation law, and the prohibition
against the chartering of a corporation by special act;
except for municipal purposes, and in cases where, in the
judgment of the legislature, the object of the corporation
could not be attained under general laws.40 The old sys-
tem of chartering corporations by special act gave greater
facility for corruption, and consumed much of the limited
time of the legislature.
The liability clause of the constitution relative to banks,
prohibited the legislature from granting thereafter any
charter for banking purposes, or to renew any charter, ex-
cept on the condition that the stockholders and directors
of the bank should be liable to the amount of their respect-
ive shares of stock. A further restriction upon the char-
tering of banks was that no director or other officer of a
bank should borrow any money from that particular
bank.41
There was considerable opposition to this liability clause.
It was claimed that the effect of the restrictions on the
banks, and the double liability of the stockholders would
seriously cripple the State's industrial activities/2 The lia-
bility clause as originally introduced in the convention by
Mr. Sollers, of Calvert county, made the stockholders and
directors responsible in their individual capacities for the
full amount of the bank's liabilities. Mr. Sollers also made
it a penitentiary offence, and the forfeiture of a bank's
charter forever, for the officers of a bank to have any
dealings with the bank with which they were connected,
except in the matter of salaries.43
39 Const. 1851, art. vii, sec. 5.
40 Art. iii, sec. 47; Act 1852, ch. 23.
41 Art. iii, sec. 45. 42 Baltimore American, May 17, 1851.
43 Debates, vol. ii, p. 761.
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