Rutland weekly herald. [volume] (Rutland, Vt.) 1859-1877, 1870-06-16

al. convention oily about Eve thousand
~ freemen of the state took interest,"
enough in the matter to 90 to the 1alio'
hoy and vote, and from this evidence
he came to the conclusion that
the neople did not desire these amend
ments. More than that, we do not nave
the weight of q majority OF the Councla
of Censors, even. on any one OF .ro
amendments. We then have them before
us condemned by the body which origin
ated them, and by the indifference OF the
people in the election OF their delegates.
He repeated what he said yesterday, that
we have as good a. code OF laws on our
statute books as any other state IN the
Union, and we could not better our laws
by raising the bugbear OF "tinkerlng the
laws. If we ever find bad law on our
statute books we speedily repeal it; and
he instanced several laws which had prov
ed failures, and said it is just such thinker
ing" that makes good laws, and the op-
portunity to reach them annually is one
of the inherent rights of the people, and
he protested against the abridgment OF
that right. The change proposed is only
the entering wedge for taking away the
power from the people and vesting it in
the executive of the state, and he warned
the people against making any such rift
in the organic law of the state,-it was
only tending to the one-man power, which
the people of Vermont did not very much
respect. He thought he could see that
those who favored this amendment would
also favor the last article, to abrogate the
Council of Censors, and thereby open a
seam that would be prolific of evil to the
State. The first thing we should know
we should be asked to reduce the number
of the representatives, and ignore the
rights of the small towns to the advan-
tage of the large towns,-an abridgment
of the rights of the people which he most
solemnly protested against.
Mr.. Harmon of Shelburne, only rose to
deny the charge made against the council
of censors, of bargaining and selling. lie
was a member of that council and voted
as he honestly thought in every instance,
and his constituents had sent him up to
this convention to carry out the opinions
he had expressed by his votes in the
council. He knew the majority of his
constituents were in favor of this amend
ment, and he believed that the small
towns were also in favor of it. He denied
that this was measure of the large
towns, and that the large towns were
seeking to Cypress the small towns by the
enactment of this amendment.
After some explanation between Mr..
Harmon and Mr.. Dillingham;, the COM
mittee voted on the resolution of Mr..
Carpenter of Readsboro, as follows -
ayes LOG, nays 105. So the com mittee
adopted the resolution, recommending to
the convention that it is expedient to
adopt the second article of amendment.
Mr.. Carpenter of Readsboro then. moved
that the committee rise and report pro-
gress.
The President having resumed the
chair, Mr.. Powers of Morristown reported
that the committee recommend to the
convention the'adoption of the second ar
ticle of amendment.
On the question being stated by the
chair. Will the convention adopt the
second article of amendment Mr.. Hyde
of Castleton called for the yeas and nays,
which were taken as follows: Yeas 11S,
nays lis.
So the second article of amendment, as
proposed by the Council of Censors, was
adopted.