§ 25. A majority of each House shall constitute a quorum to do business. Each shall be the judge of the elections, returns, and qualifications of its own members; shall determine the rules of its own proceedings and choose its own officers, except that the Lieutenant-Governor shall preside over the Senate. In his absence, the Senate shall choose a temporary President.

§ 26. For any speech or debate in either House, the members shall not be questioned in any other place.

§ 27. Each House must keep a journal of its proceedings, and publish the same, except such parts as may require secrecy. The doors of each House must be kept open, except when the public welfare may require secrecy. Neither, without the consent of the other, can adjourn for more than two days.

§ 28. Every bill must be printed, and a copy laid upon the table of each member or otherwise furnished to him, at least twenty-four hours before its final passage; and no amendment shall be made within that time. But these restrictions may be waived by unanimous consent.

present plan fails in this respect entirely, since it is now possible for one party, with a majority in the whole State of only one hundred and twenty-eight, to elect every member of the Lower House.

3. It will encourage a higher tone in public men. It must be admitted that those who most strive to be popular, the time-serving, the timid, are now most likely to be elected. By the adoption of this plan, the independent citizen will lose nothing by his independence, and, if he has impressed himself upon the minds of thinking men, he will be likely to have a voice in the public councils.

4. The localization of candidates, which now leads to so much inconvenience, will have to give way to a more general and liberal plan. Parties may often be, as now, divided in part territorially. Yet in a portion of the State, where a party is in a hopeless minority, there may be as able men belonging to it as in any other; but, under our present method, their voices never can be heard in the legislative councils. There may be as able Democrats in St. Lawrence as in New York, and as able Republicans in New York as in St. Lawrence; but at present the State can not have the services of one of them at the capital. Surely this is wrong.

5. The practical working of the plan would probably be this: There are seven hundred and fifty thousand voters in the State. Any citizen, be he in New York, in St. Lawrence, or in Chautauqua, who has the confidence of twenty-five hundred voters, living anywhere in the State, might be made their representative; and, if the votes were equally distributed, there would be three hundred representatives. The number would be less as the distribution became unequal.

6. By thus giving representation to the minority, we avoid the necessity of provisions so common in Constitutions, and so inadequate at best, requiring a two-thirds or three-fifths vote in certain cases.

§ 29. A private or local statute must embrace only one subject, and that must be expressed in the title.

30. A special statute can not be passed to create or change a corporation, and all statutes for the creation, modification, or regulation of corporations, must be general in their provisions.

§ 31. Every statute which imposes, continues, or revives a tax must, without reference to any other statute, state distinctly the tax and the object to which it is to be applied.

§ 32. Every statute which makes a new appropriation, or continues or revives an appropriation, must distinctly specify the sum appropriated, and the object to which it is to be applied, without referring to any other statute to fix the sum.

§ 33. No bill can be passed without the assent of a majority of all the members elected to each House; the question upon the final passage must be taken immediately upon its last reading, and the yeas and nays must be entered on the journal.

§ 34. The enacting clause of all bills shall be, "The People of the State of New York, represented in General Assembly, do enact as follows"; and no law can be enacted except by bill.

§ 35. Every appointment to a civil office in this State, of a member of either House of the General Assembly, made by the Governor, during the term for which such member was elected, shall be void.

§ 36. No person holding an office under the United States can hold a seat in the General Assembly. And, And, if any person after his election as a member thereof is elected or appointed to an office under the United States, his acceptance thereof shall vacate his seat.

37. The members of the General Assembly shall receive for their services such compensation as may be fixed by law. But no such law can take effect until the first day of January succeeding its enactment; except that the General Assembly, at its first session after the adoption of this Constitution, may fix the compensation of the members for that session.

ARTICLE II.-THE EXECUTIVE DEPARTMENT.

§ 38. The executive power of the government of this State shall be vested in a Governor, who shall hold his office for two

years.

A Lieutenant-Governor shall be chosen at the same time and for the same term.

§ 39. No person shall be eligible to the office of Governor or Lieutenant-Governor, except a citizen of the United States, of the age of at least thirty years, who has been for five years next before his election a resident within this State.

§ 40. The persons respectively having the highest number of votes for Governor and for Lieutenant-Governor, shall be elected; but in case two or more have an equal and the highest number of votes for Governor or for Lieutenant-Governor, the two Houses of the General Assembly at its next annual session shall forthwith, by joint ballot, choose one of those persons.

41. The Governor and Lieutenant-Governor shall at stated times receive for their services a compensation to be established by law, which shall neither be increased nor diminished after their election and during their continuance in office.

42. The Governor shall be commander-in-chief of the military and naval forces of the State. He shall give to the General Assembly, by message, at every session, information of the condition of the State, and recommend such measures as he may judge expedient. He may on extraordinary occasions convene both Houses, or the Senate alone. He shall take care that the laws are faithfully executed.

43. The Governor shall nominate, and with the consent of the Senate appoint, all officers of the State, civil or military, whose appointments are not herein otherwise provided for. But the General Assembly may vest the appointment of such inferior officers as it may think proper, in the Governor alone, in the courts of law, or in the heads of such executive departments as it may from time to time establish.*

*The unity of the Executive should not be a question with those who are conversant with the existing governments of the State and city. Intelligence, honesty, singleness of purpose, and responsibility, are the requisites for an executive officer. Intelligence and honesty are better obtained when the attention of the electors is concentrated upon a single person than when it is distracted with the choice of several. Singleness of purpose in the execution of the laws can not be secured if there are many minds tending in different directions, and many wills to thwart each

§ 44. The Governor shall have power to grant reprieves, commutations, and pardons, after conviction, otherwise than upon impeachment, for all offenses except treason, upon such conditions and with such limitations as he may think proper, subject to any regulation which may be provided by law respecting the manner of applying therefor. Upon conviction for treason, he shall have power to suspend the execution of a capital sentence until thirty days after the opening of the next session of the General Assembly, which may dispose thereof in its discretion. He shall annually report the particulars of his action in each case of reprieve, commutation, or pardon, in such manner as may be prescribed by law.

45. The Governor shall have a qualified negative upon legislation as follows: Every bill which passes the General Assemby shall be presented to him. If he approve, he shall sign it, and it shall then become a law. If he does not approve the bill, he shall return it, with his objections, to the House where it originated, which shall enter the objections at large on its journal, and reconsider the bill. If, thereupon, two thirds of the members present, being a majority of all the members elected to that House, agree to its passage, it shall be sent, with the objections, to the other House, by which it shall likewise be reconsidered; and, if there approved by a like vote, it shall then become a law. A bill not returned by the Governor within ten days (excluding Sundays) after it has been presented to him, shall at the end of that time become a law, in like manner as if he had signed it, unless the General Assembly by adjournment prevent its return, and then it shall not be a law, unless signed by him within ten days after such adjournment.

§ 46. In case of the impeachment of the Governor, or his removal from office, or his death, resignation, absence from the other. Responsibility divided among many is dispersed, and practically lost, as our experience demonstrates.

The people, those who desire good laws, faithfully administered, have as much as they really care for and as much as they can do well, when they elect their sole responsible Executive and their whole legislative body. It is only the politicians who want a great many officers elected by the people, that they may trade upon the nominations in their party conventions. The question is simply between the real good of the people and the seeming good of the politicians. There ought to be no doubt which shall win.

State, or other inability to discharge the powers and duties of the office, those powers and duties shall devolve upon the Lieutenant-Governor for the residue of the term, or until the disability ceases. But when the Governor, with the consent of the General Assembly, is out of the State in time of war, at the head of a military force thereof, he shall continue commanderin-chief of all the military forces of the State.

§ 47. The Lieutenant-Governor shall be President of the Senate, but shall have only a casting vote therein. If, during a vacancy in the office of Governor, the Lieutenant-Governor be impeached, or removed, or die, resign, be absent from the State, or become otherwise unable to discharge the powers and duties of the office of Governor, the President of the Senate shall take upon himself those powers and duties until the vacancy is filled or the disability cease.

ARTICLE III.-THE JUDICIAL DEPARTMENT.

§ 48. The judicial power of the government of this State shall be vested in one Supreme Court, and in such inferior courts as the General Assembly may from time to time establish.*

49. The Judges, both of the Supreme and the infe

*The plan of electing the Judges by popular vote, for short terms, has been found to be fruitful of evils. A worse plan could scarcely be contrived to degrade the judiciary and render justice uncertain. There is no occasion to enumerate these evils; we have only to look about us to see them. There must be a change.

What shall the change be? Two or three conditions are essential. In the first place, the police justices and Judges of other inferior criminal courts can not continue to be elective, without throwing the city of New York into a condition of practical anarchy. In the next place, the Judges of the higher court can not continue to be elective by districts, without leaving the city of New York under the control of the most corrupt political machinery. In the third place, the tenure of the office must be changed, if we would have an independent judiciary.

The best of all practicable schemes should seem to be that of the Federal Constitution-Judges appointed by the Executive, and holding during good behavior. If experience is worth anything, it proves that.

There does not appear to be any good reason why the details of a judicial establishment should be settled by the Constitution. They may safely be left to the legislative department, if provision is made for the permanence and independence of the tribunals when once established. The wants of the people from time to time, as population increases and business takes new channels, will be in this manner best consulted.