sembly, by an Act passed in 1696 arranged that the two Houses are to sit separately, except when for some special purpose they are convened in Grand Committee.

Again, an obvious defect in the Charter was remedied by an Act, authorizing a Lieutenant Governor, or senior Senator, to discharge the duties of Governor, in case of a vacancy, by non-election, death, or resignation, or by absence or inability.

Again, Joseph Wanton having been chosen by the freemen of the State as Governor of Rhode Island, was deposed by the General Assembly, in defiance of Electors, and the whole British Parliament. He protested against the Act, was re-elected - and again deposed, by a body of men, who claimed, and exercised, greater than the power of Majesty. Without at all questioning the wisdom or justice of these provisions, we can see that the Charter interposed no check upon the General Assembly-not even in the first year of its bridal favor. It is in vain to defend such Acts on the ground of right. The power to do right against authority, contained within itself also, in like manner, the power to do wrong. But perhaps, by these extensions of prerogative, the Assembly only intended to cover that singularly elastic phrase, which gave them power over "all other matters and things."

But tracing the Records of Legislative Proceedings downwards, we find an Act, which by no possibility, could be distorted into any thing else than gross and palpable outrage of the very principle upon which the State was founded that principle which Rhode Islanders have always cherished with such fond and jealous love-the right of "freedom in religious concernments." By an Act of the first of March, 1663-4, the rights of Suffrage were more expressly guarded; but probably sometime between the years 1719 and 1730, the shameful clause was added,

"Roman Catholics only excepted." The effect was to exclude Roman Catholics from the polls-to cut off their sacred right of Suffrage. And that not only in defiance of usage which had become hallowed by association, with the name, history, and character of Roger Williams-of the spirit of our institutions, and the habits of our people; but in the very teeth of that clause of the Charter which expressly provides, that "No person within the said colony, at any time hereafter, shall be in any-wise molested, punished, disquieted, or called in question, for any differences of opinion in matters of Religion, who does not actually disturb the public peace.'

Again, and that in modern times, has this right been openly violated, in the banishment of the Reverend William Fuller, for the flagrant sin of denouncing rum-selling and rum-drinking-in both of which conditions of being, without doubt, the Authorities were interested. Mr. Fuller was a well educated and regularly ordained minister; and preached to the entire satisfaction of his hearers, at Washington village, until his doctrines came to have too many home truths; and he was officially ordered to leave the town. He obeyed peaceably, leaving also the State. He has since supplied for some time the pulpit of the first Presbyterian Church in the city of Utica. In this open war upon the right of conscience- the single right that should be, by the Charter, preserved inviolate, we see a deep and fearful meaning. If a right which is so carefully guarded be thus made the subject of wanton outrage, what is to become of those rights which are secured by no constitutional bonds? Will the power which illegally infringed that, be too generous to touch these? The generosity and the justice of tyrants are found where the rainbow touches earth. They may seem close at hand. You can almost touch them. You fly to grasp the

good they promise,

You still pursue. It recedes as you approach. And when you reach the very spot where it glimmered in false brightness, it is gone.

CHAPTER III,

GROUNDS OF COMPLAINT.

BEFORE entering on the subject of the present Chapter I would bespeak the Reader's courteous attention to a number of facts. Dry details they may be, and wholly devoid of interest in themselves, yet not insignificant to us, and to our labors; for they are the very basis of the whole superstructure we are about to rear. Attention, then, kind Reader, and gentle patience; for the question which is now pending and the movement which is now going on, is not one of mere local interest a question where the rights of a Party are held at issue: it is not whether the people of a few miles of territory, shall be bondmen, or freemen; but it embodies a principle which knows no geographical divisions no social distinctions the progress of which no waters can check, and no mountains can arrest principle which is yet destined to peryade the wide. earth until the souls of all mankind are aroused as one soul—and every condition of being - Capitalist and Operative, Governor and Governed, Tyrant and Slave is mingled, and, as it were, melted into one, by the all-subduing, all-engrossing fire of true liberty!

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But I proceed to enumerate some of the abuses, of which the Suffrage Party of Rhode Island com

plain. In the first place, they object to a landed, or other property qualification, as degrading to man, setting, as it does, a given portion of earth above the character of manhood; so that man, instead of having dominion over all the earth, as was at first wisely appointed, is made subject to a small portion of earth, itself. It, moreover, excludes from the right of franchise a large majority of the people, otherwise well qualified, who have the common interests, and do all the duties of good citizens; and yet are excluded from exercising the rights of citizenship. It is often said that the necessary amount of landed property may be acquired by any one. This, I think, is assuming too much; at least, for the present day. The wisest and best of men are not always worldly-wise, even to the small degree necessary to attain and hold $134 in real estate, over and above a comfortable living; and misfortune, not unfrequently, arrests, not only the most prudent foresight, but destroys at a blow, the fruits of long periods of the most successful industry. But let us suppose that a laboring man gathers together the required amount, over and above what is demanded by the immediate necessities of himself and family. To invest this sum in land, is not only exceedingly difficult, but is, in many cases, the most unwise and unprofitable investment that can be made.

A ludicrous, and yet true illustration of this longvexed question, may be found in the works of Franklin. Speaking in reference to this subject, he says, "Suppose the property-qualification to be twenty dollars. A man going to the polls to deposite his vote, not being found to be worth that sum, his vote is rejected. On turning away, he meets a man who, probably for some interest in the election, gives him a jackass worth the required sum. He then returns to the polls, and finds his vote accepted. Now, in whom does the right of Suffrage exist in the man,

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or in the jackass?" And, I may ask, will their mantle of False Republicanism, though garnished with quotations from Jefferson, and all the most glowing patriotic speeches "THE COMMON WEAL"-"OUR COUNTRY'S GOOD" and all the minor gems of Fourth-of-July bombast, will that mantle yet a great while hide the long ears of such as place the prerogatives of manhood, not merely in brute animals, but in insensible dust - in barren sand and gravel? I think not. The external signs of the species, begin to be discoverable, even now.

It is a singular fact that the Charter Party boldly deny the principle upon which the General Government was originally founded that of THE SOVEREIGNTY OF THE PEOPLE which also must include Free Suffrage; and yet they claim to be Republicans! They bind their fellow men in the bonds of slavery, and then insult them in the desecrated name of Liberty! Will it be thought too strong language to say disfranchised men are enslaved? I turn to the defence of that term, so applied. In looking over the "Proceedings and Debates of the Convention of 1787," which met for the purpose of framing the Constitution of the United States. I find, in an address of Martin Luther, delivered before the Legisture of Maryland, relative to the Proceedings of the Convention, the following passage, which speaks so directly to the point, I cannot refrain from a long quotation. There we find that the principle of man's natural right to, and fitness for self-government, insisted upon as the very Palladium of Rights, and Corner Stone of Republican Liberty. And should not we faithfully treasure up the rich and noble thoughts that fell from the lips of those good old Patriots, like fruits fully ripe, not merely to nourish the then-present generation; but, planted in the soul, to bring forth new fruit, until, reproducing themselves continually, they should rise in prouder strength