the conviction that we have outgrown these limitations and that they ought to be at least partially relaxed.

The committee of Education (Article XI), of which Mr. Switzler, of Boone, was made chairman, proceeded with diligence to the discharge of the important duties assigned to it. The committee consisted of the following: W. F. Switzler, chairman; Jacob Pulitzer, of St. Louis, George H. Shields, of St. Louis, G. W. Carleton, of Pemiscot, H. V. McKee, of Lincoln, D. C. Allen, of Clay, and W. H. Letcher, of Saline. Afterwards Albert Todd, of St. Louis, was added. The free public school system stood in the front rank of the committee's deliberations. Provisions for the increase and preservation of state and county funds for its maintenance were topics of earnest thought and solicitude, and received recognition in the article on education adopted. Believing that higher education was positively essential to the most successful dissemination of the lower or common, and intermediate, the interests of the State University were not neglected nor undervalued. Among other things it was made the duty of the general assembly to "aid and maintain the State University now established with its present departments"-among its departments then and now being the Agricultural College and School of Mines, and the departments of law and medicine. Severally and collectively these are to be aided and maintained by the legislature, the policy indicated being among the sworn duties of the members of each house. The number of curators was fixed at nine, which being inlaid in the constitution is placed beyond the whims of biennial changes by the Legislature to subserve personal or party purposes, to which the number constituting the board was exposed during all the previous history of the institution.

The third section ordained that "Separate free public schools shall be established for the education of children of African descent."

On August 2, 1875, after the adoption of the constitution as a whole by a vote of yeas, 60; noes, none; absent, 8, the convention adjourned sine die. On October 30 of the same year the people ratified it at the polls: yeas, 91,205; against it,

14,517; majority, 76,688; and on November 30, 1875, it became the supreme law of the state and (with the exception of amendments since adopted) remains such to this day.

Three competent stenographers were employed by the convention to report in full its proceedings and its debates and it was done, but the Legislature has never made an appropriations for its publication. The report is on file in manuscript in the office of the Secretary of State.

W. F. SWITZLER.

The subject of this paper is the amendment presented by me, to the resolution presented by the Committee on Resolutions, in the Constitutional Convention of 1860-1861.

The amendment reads as follows to the fifth resolution: "And it is the opinion of this convention that the cherished desire to preserve the country and restore fraternal feelings would be promoted by the withdrawal of the federal troops from such parts of the seceded states where there is danger of a collision between the federal and state forces." This resolution was by common consent afterwards changed in phraseology to read as follows:

"And, in order to the restoring of harmony and fraternal feeling between the different sections, we would recommend the policy of withdrawing the federal troops from the forts within the borders of the seceding states where there is danger of collision between the state and federal troops."

Before proceeding to discuss the motives which prompted the presentation of this amendment, it may be well to allude to the two antagonistic constructions of the constitution of the United States in regard to the relations of the several states to the government of the United States.

The one may be considered as embodied in the speech of Edward Everett on the amendment of Mr. McDuffie, of South Carolina, to the constitution of the United States in March, 1826. (1) "The present government of the United States is a national government, not, (like the old one), a confederacy of states. The president is the president of the people; the representatives, the representatives of the people; the judiciary, the judiciary of the people; and the senate, the only

*Read before the State Historical Society of Missouri, at Columbia, February, 1906.

1. Abridgement of the Debates of Congress, page 85, vol. 9.

Though the pres

branch which represents the states as such. ent constitution was formed by compact between states equally sovereign, it is not itself a compact between states retaining an equal share of the sovereignity, as was the case with the former confederation."

The other doctrine is contained in the resolutions of the legislature of South Carolina, presented to congress January 11, 1833. (2) The fourth resolution proclaimed the following doctrine:

Resolved, "That each State of the Union has the right whenever it may deem such a course necessary for the preservation of its liberty or vital interest, to secede from the Union. And that there is no constitutional power in the general government, much less in the executive department of that gov ernment, to retain such state by force in the Union."

Let it be remembered that at this time there were no internal revenue taxes and the expenses of the government were borne by the levy of import duties. The state of South Carolina claimed the right to object to the payment of these import duties. This act of the state of South Carolina called forth the proclamation of President Andrew Jackson. (3) A majority of the convention of 1860 adhered to the doctrine announced in the proclamation as follows:

"The right of the people of a single state to absolve themselves, at will and without the consent of the other states, from these most solemn obligations, and to hazard the liberties and happiness of the millions composing the Union, can not be acknowledged. Such authority is believed to be utterly repugnant both to the principles upon which the general government is constituted and to the objects it is expressly formed to attain."

In view of the general character of Andrew Jackson, no one will accuse him of lowering the standard of the Union of States or of shrinking from a due enforcement of the laws. No one doubted that he had the right, in view of his constitutional

2.

Abridgement of the Debates of Congress, page 12, vol. 12.

3. Debates of Congress, page 13, vol. 12.

obligations, to exert the power of the government to protect his officers in the collecting of the duties, and leave to the judiciary the province of indicating the violations of law for treason.

Instead of sending his soldiers to South Carolina, he put his collectors on board of ships outside the harbors, and thus collected the duties.

The same state of affairs existed in 1860, except that there was a small number of soldiers at Fort Sumpter, who were powerless under existing circumstances to enforce the collection of customs, but were only a menace to the citizens of the insurgent state. I had kept in touch with the people of the South through a brother residing in Tennessee. I was informed that the people of the South were far from being a unit in favor of secession. Hence I was of the opinion that war might be averted by removing troops from places where there might be a pretext to attack them, and thus give the people an opportunity to recede from the position forced upon them by the leaders in this movement, so far reaching in disastrous results.

The convention had a right to hope and believe that the same result, which followed the action of General Jackson, would follow the action of congress, in the resolutions of Felix Grundy, who moved a substitute for the resolutions of John C. Calhoun. (4) One of these resolutions thus calmly announces the power of congress:

Resolved, "That attempts to obstruct or prevent the execution of the several acts of congress imposing duties on imports, whether by ordinances of conventions or legislative enactments, are not warranted by the constitution and are dangerous to the political institutions of the country."

The members of the convention well knew that the tiger, when he has once snuffed blood, becomes unrestrained, uncontrollable. We knew that when the "dogs of war" were unloosed, a terrible struggle would ensue.

The advice of the Missouri convention was not heeded by the general government. The appeal of Alexander F. 4. Debates of Congress, page 24, vol. 12.