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of the citizens entitled to vote; for better securing personal liberty, and easily and speedily redressing all wrongful restraints thereof; for more certainly obtaining returns of impartial juries; for dividing lands and tenements in sales by Sheriffs, where they will bear a division, into as many parcels as may be without spoiling the whole, and for advertising and making the sales in such manner, and at such times and places, as may render them most beneficial to all persons concerned; and for establishing schools, and promoting arts and sci

ences.

ARTICLE IX.

Members of the General Assembly, and all officers executive and judicial, shall be bound by oath or affirmation, to support the Constitution of this State, and to perform the duties of their respective offices with fidelity. ARTICLE X.

The General Assembly, whenever two-thirds of each House shall deem it necessary, may, with the approbation of the Governor, propose amendments to this Constitution, and at least three, and not more than six months before the next general election of Representatives, duly publish them in print for the consideration of the People; and if three-fourths of each branch of the Legislature shall, after such an election, and before another, ratify the said amendments, they shall be valid to all intents and purposes, as parts of this Constitution. No convention shall be called but by the authority of the People; and an unexceptionable mode of making their sense known, will be for them at a general election of Representatives, to vote also by ballot for or against a convention, as they shall severally choose to do; and if thereupon it shall appear, that a majority of all the citizens in the State having right to vote for Representatives, have voted for a Convention, the General Assembly shall accordingly at their next sessions call a Convention, to consist of at least as many members as there are in both Houses of the Legislature, to be chosen in the same manner, at the same places, and at the same time that Representatives are, by the citizens entitled to vote for Representatives, on due notice given for

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one month, and to meet within three months after they shall be elected.

SCHEDULE.

THAT no inconveniences may arise from the alterations of the Constitution of this State, and in order to carry the same into complete operation, it is hereby declared and ordained:

I. That the President, or in case of his death, inability, or absence from the State, the Speaker of the Legislative Council at that time, and in case of his death, inability, or absence from the State, the Speaker of the House of Assembly at that time, shall respectively, with the Privy Council, exercise the Executive Authority of this State until the third Tuesday in January next. If the death, inability, or absence of the President shall happen after the first Tuesday of next October, and before the first Tuesday in next January, then the Executive Authority shall devolve upon the person who was Speaker of the Council at the next preceding session of the General Assembly; and in case of his death, inability, or absence, upon the person who was Speaker of the House of Assembly at the said next preceding session.

II. That all persons holding offices to which, under this Constitution, appointments are to be made by the Governor, shall continue in the exercise of the duties of their respective offices until the first Tuesday of October, one thousand seven hundred and ninety-three, unless their commissions shall sooner expire by their own limitations, or the said offices shall become vacant by death or resignation, and no longer, unless re-appointed and commissioned by the Governor.

III. That justice shall be administered in the several counties of this State, until the period last mentioned, by the same justices, in the same courts and in the same manner as heretofore.

IV. That the Sheriffs elected at October next, shall hold their respective commissions two years and no longer, from that time, or until new Sheriffs are elect

ed

ed and appointed; and such persons shall not be again eligible until the expiration of three years after their commissions cease,

V. That the elections of Governor, Senators, and Representatives, shall be conducted by the same persons, and in the same manner, as is prescribed by the election Jaws of this State, concerning the election of members of the Council and of the House of Assembly; and the returns thereof shall be made respectively to the person exercising the Executive Authority, to the Senate, and to the House of Representatives.

VI. The first meeting of the Legislature under this Constitution shall be at the town of Dover.

Done in Convention, the twelfth day of June, in the year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and ninety-two, and of the Independence of the United States of America, the sixteenth. In testimony whereof, we have hereunto subscribed our names. THO. MONTGOMERY, President.

John Dickenson,
Robert Armstrong,
Edward Roche,
William Johnson,
Robert Haughey,
George Monro,
Robert Coram,

Kensey Johns,
Nicholas Ridgely,
John Clayton,
Thomas White,
Manlove Emerson,

(Attest.)

James Morris,
Richard Bassett,
Benjamin Dill,
Henry Molliston,
Andrew Barratt,
Isaac Cooper,
George Mitchell,
John W. Batson,
Rhoads Shankland,
Isaac Beauchan:p,
Daniel Polk.

JAMES BOOTH, Secretary.

MARYLAND.

A DECLARATION OF RIGHTS, and the Constitution and Form of Government, agreed to by the Delegates of Maryland in free and full Convention assembled.

A DECLARATION OF RIGHTS, &c.

HE Parliament of Great Britain, by a Declarato

Try Act, having assumed a right to make laws to

bind the Colonies in all cases whatsoever, and, in pursuance of such claim, endeavoured,, by force of arms, to subjugate the United Colonies to an unconditional submission to their will and power, and having at length constrained them to declare themselves independent States, and to assume government under the authority of the People:-Therefore, we the Delegates of Maryland, in free and full Convention assembled, taking into our most serious consideration the best means of establishing a good Constitution in this State, for the sure foundation and more permanent security thereof, declare,

I. That all Government, of right, originates from the People, is founded in compact only, and instituted solely for the good of the whole.

II. That the People of this State ought to have the sole and exclusive right of regulating the internal goverment and police thereof.

III. That the inhabitants of Maryland are entitled to the common law of England, and the trial by jury, according to the course of that law, and to the benefit of such of the English statutes, as existed at the time of their first emigration, and which, by experience, have been found applicable to their local and other circumstances, and of such others as have been since made in England, or Great Britain, and have been introduced, used, and practised by the Courts of law or equity; and also to all Acts of Assembly, in force on the first of June, seventeen hundred and seventy-four, except such as may have since expired, or have been, or

may

may be altered by acts of Convention, or this declaration of Rights-subject, nevertheless, to the revision of, and amendment or repeal by, the Legislature of this State: and the inhabitants of Maryland are also entitled to all property, derived to them from or under the charter granted by his Majesty Charles I. to Cæcilius Calvert, Baron of Baltimore.

IV. That all persons invested with the Legislative or executive powers of Government, are the trustees of the public, and, as such, accountable for their conduct; wherefore, whenever the ends of government are perverted, and public liberty manifestly endangered, and all other means of redress are ineffectual, the People may, and of right ought, to reform the old or establish a new government. The doctrine of non-resistance against arbitrary power and oppression, is absurd, slavish, and destructive of the good and happiness of mankind.

V. That the right, in the people, to participate in the Legislature, is the best security of liberty, and the foundation of all free government; for this purpose, elections ought to be free and frequent, and every man having property in, a common interest with, and an attachment to the community, ought to have a right of suffrage.

VI. That the Legislative, Executive, and Judicial powers of Government, ought to be forever separate and distinct from each other.

VII. That no power of suspending laws, or the execution of laws, unless by, or derived from the Legislature, ought to be exercised or allowed.

VIII. That freedom of speech and debates, or proceedings in the Legislature, ought not to be impeached in any other Court or Judicature.

IX. That a place for the meeting of the Legislature ought to be fixed, the most convenient to the members thereof, and to the depository of public records; and the Legislature ought not to be convened or held at any other place, but from evident necessity.

X. That, for redress of grievances, and for amending, strengthening, and preserving the laws, the Legislature ought to be frequently convened.

XI. That every man hath a right to a petition the

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