CHAPTER they might do it, notwithstanding the liberal provision IV. already made for the holders of the certificates, without 1792. paying any thing more in the whole than had been originally promised. Of the interest of six per cent. originally payable on the certificates, there had been kept back from the holders, under the terms of the new funding system, two per cent. for ten years on the principal amount, while the over-due interest had only been funded at three instead of six per cent. Out of this reserved fund compensation was claimed for the army. late before this memorial was presented, and no action was had upon it at the present session.

The new election of president, to take place before the next session of Congress, suggested the necessity of providing by law for the formalities to be observed on such occasions. By an act upon this subject, each state was, within thirty-four days preceding the first Wednesday of December, 1792, and of every fourth year afterward, to appoint as many electors as it would be entitled to senators and representatives in Congress when the president and vice-president to be chosen should enter upon office. The electors, the method of whose choice and the place of whose meeting was left to the state Legislatures, were to assemble on the first Wednesday of De cember, and, having voted, were to sign three certificates of the result, to each of which was to be annexed a list of the electors, certified by the governor of the state Two of these certificates were to be sent to the Presi dent of the Senate, one by a special messenger, the other through the post-office; the third was to be delivered to the federal judge of the district; and in case neither of the others reached the seat of government by the first Wednesday of January, the Secretary of State was tc dispatch a special messenger to bring it. On the sec

IV.

und Wednesday of February the certificates were to be CHAPTER opened by Congress, and the successful candidates declared. This act is still in force (1853), but so amend. 1792. ed that the electors are now chosen on the same day throughout the Union: the Tuesday next after the first Monday of November in every fourth year.

The same act provided for filling temporarily the executive office, in case of the inability, resignation, removal, or death of both president and vice-president, the power to regulate this matter by law being conferred on Congress by the Constitution. This subject had been a good deal discussed in the former Congress. The Secretary of State, the Chief Justice, the President of the Senate, and the Secretary of the Treasury, had all been respectively proposed for that purpose. The present act selected the President pro tempore of the Senate, or, in case there were none, the Speaker of the House of Representatives, to act till the removal of the disability or a new election, to be held in such cases on the first Wednesday of December, after two months' notice of the vacancy given by the Secretary of State to the state executives. These provisions, contained in the bill as it came from the Senate, met with some opposition in the House. It was denied that the President of the Senate was an officer in the sense of the Constitution. The friends of Jefferson seemed to insist, almost as a personal matter, upon the claims of the Secretary of State to act as the temporary president. Considering that the contingency could not be foreseen, and was not likely to occur once in a century, it was somewhat hypercritically urged in reply, that to select any head of a department would be to give to the president the appointment of his own temporary successor. The objection to the Chief Justice was more solid. It was his duty : officiate in the Sen.

CHAPTER ate in case of the impeachment of the president, and he IV. might, by possibility, if acting president, be called upon 1792. to preside over his own impeachment. It was proposed

to substitute the senior associate justice of the Supreme Court; but finally the bill passed without alteration, and its provisions on this subject, as well as on others, stil! remain the law of the land.

The appropriations for the service of the year 1792 exhibited a great increase of federal expenditure. They embraced $611,270 46 for the civil list, diplomatic intercourse, and sundry claims, including the expense of ten cutters for the revenue department; $532,449 71 for the ordinary expenses of the War Department, including pensions and Indian affairs, with $673,500 for the new regiments; making, with $2,849,194 73, to which the interest already payable on the public debt was cal culated to amount, an expenditure for the year of $4,666,414 94-a far greater annual sum than the general government had ever yet paid, except by the as sistance of paper money or loans. A standing order adopted at this session, and ever since continued in force, required the Secretary of the Treasury, at an early day of each session, to communicate to the House an accu rate statement of the receipts of all public moneys, and the expenditures under each head of appropriation, with the unexpended balances of appropriations.

Pending the session of Congress, a Convention met in Kentucky to frame a Constitution for that new state. The master spirit of this body was George Nicholas, like most of the other inhabitants, an emigrant from Virginia -the same person who had moved, in the Virginia Legislature, for Jefferson's impeachment during the inva sion of Cornwallis, though subsequently and at present one of his political friends. The Constitution drafted by

IV.

Nicholas, and which seems to have been agreed to with- CHAPTER out much debate, vested the legislative authority in a Senate and House of Representatives. The representa- 1792. tives, never to be less than forty nor more than a hundred, were to be apportioned among the counties according to the relative number of their free white inhabitants above twenty-one years of age, to be ascertained by enumeration once in four years, and were to be chosen annually by the votes of the free white citizens, residents in the county for one year, or in the state for two years.

The Senate was to consist at first of eleven members; but for every four members added to the House, there was to be an addition of one senator. These senators, to hold office for four years, were to be chosen, not directly by the people, but indirectly through the medium of electors, according to a scheme borrowed from the Constitution of Maryland. These electors, equal in number to the representatives, to be chosen once in four years in the counties, were to meet in a body at the seat of government, there, by ballot, to make choice of the senators, who were empowered to fill any vacancies in their own body. At the same time and place, these same electors were to choose a governor, to hold office, for four years, with a qualified veto on all enactments, similar to that possessed by the President of the United States, and with a like appointing power.

No pecuniary qualification was required either in voters or officers, but representatives must be twentyfour years of age, senators twenty-seven, the governor thirty, and all of them citizens of the state for two years.

The judicial power, in matters both of law and equity, was to be vested in a supreme court, to be styled the Court of Appeals, and in such inferior courts as the Legislature might constitute. All the judges of all the courts

CHAPTER were to receive a compensation, not to be diminished JV. during their continuance in office; and, as well as the 1792. justices of the peace, were all to be appointed by the

governor for good behavior, but subject to removal on an address to that effect from two thirds of both branches of the Legislature. Sheriffs and coroners were to be chosen by the people of each county for terms of three years. The existing code of Virginia was to remain the law of the new state until altered by the Legislature.

A separate article on the subject of slavery provided that the Legislature should have no power to pass laws for the emancipation of slaves without the consent of their owners, nor without paying therefor, previous to such emancipation, a full equivalent in money; nor laws to prevent immigrants from bringing with them persons deemed slaves by the laws of any one of the United States, so long as any persons of like age and description should be continued in slavery by the laws of Kentucky. But laws might be passed prohibiting the introduction of slaves for the purpose of sale, and also laws to oblige the owners of slaves to treat them with humanity, to provide them with necessary clothing and provisions, and to abstain from all injuries extending to life or limb; and provision might be made, in case of disobedience to such laws, for the sale of the slave to some other owner, the proceeds to be paid over to the late master. The Legislature was also required to pass laws giving to owners of slaves the right of emancipation, saving the rights of creditors, and requiring security that the emancipated slaves should not become a burden to the county.

By a bill of rights prefixed, full freedom of conscience was provided for, and entire equality of all religions and modes of worship.