Western Reserve chronicle. [volume] (Warren, Ohio) 1855-1921, 1856-05-21
REPORT OF THE MAJORITY OF
JOINT COMMITTEE OF THE GENE.
RAJ ASSEMBLY, UPON THE A.
MENDMENTS OF THE CONSTITU, ,
TI0N.

The majority of the Joint Committee
feel no hesitation in declaring their de-
cided conviction that the present Consti
tuition is, in many of its provisions, not
well calculated to secure the important
interests and promote the prosperity of
the State. These defects spring chiefly
from one source: That source is legisla-
ting in the Constitution.
Ina great and growing State. like ours,
whose resources are yet but partially de-
velOped-whose great interests are not
yet settled or known-the pursuits of
whose people are constantly and rapidly
changing i. is impossible for human sa-
gacity to foresee what Legislation may be
necessary to develop those resources
promote thosein erests-and protect those
pursuits. He, therefore, who assumes to
be able to decide for years TO come, what
laws the people, through their represen.
taiives, shall enact for the public good,
or what they shall not enact, arrogates
to himself acknowledgements,
which we have been taught to ascribe to
Deity alone. 1t is common error into
which legislative bodies, and especially
into which constitutional conventions fall
TO imagine that they are the last assem-
blage of wise men that tn. world viii
ever produce and, that coming genera
tiOns will be unable TO understand theil
own wants, foster their own interests, OF
secure their own rights, without their aid
This idea leads them to prescribe wha
laws shall, and what shall not, be passed
by the legislature.
Not content with providing for The
structure of the government, and declar
ing the great leading principles of natura
and political rights which is the solC
legitimate purpose of a Constitution, they
seek TO regulate the detailed action of tn,
government throughout all coming time
As a necessary consequence OF thi
error, the people soon find themselves
fettered in their actions-prevented, by
the Constitution, from removing obstacle:
to their prosperity-from passing laws tC
foster new interests-check growing
abuses-and protect new and important
rights. This state of things begets the
necessity of amending the Constitution;
for the people will manage their affairs
as they think best; and it is right they
should do so.
! The Legislation introduced into the
first Constitution of the State, especially
that which tied up the hands of the leg
islature in regard to the Judiciary Sys-
tenn, made it necessary to amend or
change that Constitution. The people
called a Convention to take off the fet.
tiers thus unwisely imposed upon the ac-
ton of their representatives But the
Convention, while they removed one
shackle, imposed ten in its place; so that
the Legislature can with difficulty now
frame any bill to secure right, redress
or prevent wrOng-promoie an interest
or extend a relief, without infringing
some real or supposed provision of the
Constitution.
No just and equal system of taxation
can be framed that will not be claimed
by portion, at least, of the members of
the General Assembly, to be violation
of the Constitution. For it is so difficult
to reconcile with each other its various,
contradictory, and vague provisions on
this subject, that even the courts of last
resort are divided in opinion as to its true
construction.
Under the present Constitution, no law
can be passed TO provide for the special
wants of one city or the municipal cor.
poration, growing out of its local situa-
ton or peculiar business or interests,
without extending the provisions of the
law to all other cities of the same class,
or corporations of the same kind, how
ever unlike their locations, business, in
terests, and wants. Nor can relief be
granted, involving the least extension of
corporate powers, to any incorporated
company, however urgent the demand
or proper the relief asked for, without
granting the same relief, and though il
might be improper to grant it if asked.
While the Committee are fully aware
Of the propriety of conferring all the cor-
porate powers. and prescribing all regu-
latiOns applicable alike to any class of
by general and uniform
laws, they cannot be insensible to the
gross absurdity aud serious lnconven-
fence of prohibiting the application of
special remedies, to special evils, or the
grant of peculiar powers to accom-
plish peculiar purposes.
The various shifts and devices resort
ed to by the first Legislature under the
new Constitution, composed as it was of
its friends, to avoid the effect of these
provisions, show but too plainly their ut
er absurdity.
In prescribing biennial instead of an
suol sessions of the General Assembly,
he Convention, while they sought TO j