Mr. MAOVEAGH. Does not the law at present allow the issuance of a writ to be served on the agent of the foreign company wherever you find him in the State?

Mr. H. W. PALMER. I believe it does. Mr. MACVEAGH. And bring him to

your county?

Mr. H. W. PALMER, I believe so. Mr. MACVEAGH. You do not want him to open an office at Wilkesbarre before anybody takes out a policy of five hundred dollars in Luzerne County.

Mr. H. W. PALMER. You have to write and go down to Philadelphia to have it served. It would be a great deal better to have a responsible agent in that county whose representations would bind the company. A man can call his witnesses there to testify to what he said when he effected the insurance. It will be a great deal more convenient, and greatly facilitate the administration of justice. The fact is that most of the respectable insurance companies do have local agents in the counties; they cannot do much business without it; but this section affects this class of vagabond companies, who send out their vagabond agents with lies in their mouths to deceive the people.

Mr. BOWMAN. Mr. President: Just one word in connection with this section. I am opposed to it.

The PRESIDENT pro tem. The question now is on the amendment.

Mr. BOWMAN. I am aware that the question is on the amendment, and I am in favor of the amendment, and if that is voted in I may vote for the section, but for fear the amendment may be lost I wish to make one observation in answer to the gentleman from Luzerne.

I should like to know what difference it makes with a corporation only having a place of business, for instance the Lycoming Mutual at Muncy, going into the western part of the State, in every county, in every nook and corner, and taking insurances without having established in any single one of those counties an agency. Suppose that is so. The agent returns to his place of business; a loss occurs, and it becomes necessary to bring an action against that corporation. You have got to go into Lycoming county to commence your suit, provide for the service of the writ upon the agent; and the gentleman from Philadelphia (Mr. Woodward) tells you that you cannot get a service on the agent of a foreign company unless you can find him in the State; you

have got to find him in the county where you serve the process.

I think this is an unjust discrimination against foreign corporations; I believe it will work badly. They are bringing into our State a large amount of money. Why, sir, the taxes of the State to-day, its funds, are made up largely from this source. Three-fourths of the whole money paid into the Treasury of the State is paid by these corporations, and you wish now to exclude them, to turn them out of the State, and say that they shall not go into Forest county and effect an insurance upon half a dozen dwellings in that county, if there are so many-my friend from Clarion, (Mr. Corbett,) perhaps, would disagree with me in saying there are that many houses there [laughter]-but suppose they do effect a few insurances in that county or any other county without having established an agency there, which they certainly could not do practically, you would exclude them from effecting insurances there at all. I am opposed to it.

The PRESIDENT pro tem. The question is on the amendment.

The amendment was rejected; the ayes being nine, less than a majority of a quo

rum.

The PRESIDENT pro tem. The question recurs on the section.

Mr. MACVEAGH. I move to amend as follows: Strike out all after the word "in," in the first line, down to and including the word "of," in the second line; change the word "the" before "State," to "this;" strike out after the word "business," in the second line, down to and including the word "county," in the third line; and after the word "agent," in the third line, insert, "in the same." It will then read as follows:

"No foreign corporation shall do any business in this State without having a known place of business, and an author1zed agent in the same, upon whom process may be served."

ment of the delegate from Dauphin is beThe PRESIDENT pro tem. The amend

fore the Convention.

Mr. CORBETT. I ask for the yeas and nays upon it.

The yeas and nays were ordered, ten delegates rising to second the call; and being taken, resulted: Yeas, forty-seven; nays, forty-one, as follows:

YEAS.

Messrs. Achenbach, Addicks, Alricks, Bannan, Biddle, Bowman, Brodhead,

Brown, Calvin, Carey, Carter, Church, Clark, Corbett, Cuyler, Dallas, Darlington, Elliott, Fell, Finney, Fulton, Hall, Hemphill, Heverin, Hunsicker, Knight, Lamberton, Lawrence, Lear, Littleton, MacVeagh, Mann, Mantor, Minor, Niles, Reed, Andrew, Runk, Stanton, Stewart, Struthers, Temple, Wetherill, J. M., Wetherill, Jno. Price, Wherry, White, David N., White, Harry and Worrell47.

NAYS.

Messrs. Baer, Baily, (Perry) Bigler, Black, Charles A., Boyd, Buckalew, Campbell, Cochran, Corson, Cronmiller,' Davis, De France, Edwards, Ewing, Gibson, Guthrie, Hay, Kaine, Lilly, MacConnell, M'Clean, M'Culloch, M'Murray, Mott, Palmer, G. W., Palmer, H. W., Patterson, T. H. B., Patton, Purman, Purviance, John N., Purviance, Sam'l A., Reynolds, Ross, Russell, Simpson, Smith, H. G., Smith, Henry W., Turrell, Walker, Woodward and Wright-41.

So the amendment was agreed to. ABSENT.-Messrs. Ainey, Andrews, Armstrong, Bailey, (Huntingdon,) Baker, Barclay, Bardsley, Bartholomew, Beebe, Black, J. S., Broomall, Bullitt, Cassidy, Collins, Craig, Curry, Curtin, Dodd, Dunning, Ellis, Funck, Gilpin, Green, Hanna, Harvey, Hazzard, Horton, Howard, Landis, Long, M'Camant, Metzger, Mitchell, Newlin, Parsons, Patterson, D. W., Porter, Pughe, Read, John R., Rooke, Sharpe, Smith, Wm. H., Van Reed, White, J. W. F. and Meredith, President-45.

The PRESIDENT pro tem. The question now recurs on the section as amended.

Mr. WOODWARD. The adoption of that amendment brings the thing back to the act of Assembly. I believe the law now is just as it will be under this amendment of the gentleman from Dauphin, and, of course, the section, as a constitutional provision, is no longer of any value, and might just as well be voted down.

Mr. MACVEagh. I trust the section will be incorporated. It is one of the best safeguards in the Constitution.

The PRESIDENT pro tem. The question is on the section as amended, which will be read.

The CLERK read as follows:

"No foreign corporation shall do any business in this State without having a known place of business, and an authorized agent upon whom process may be

served."

Mr. HUNSICKER. I call for the yeas and nays.

Mr. BUCKALEW. If the gentleman who moved the amendment has no objection, I should like to add a word or two so as to make it read, "one or more known places of business."

Mr. CORBETT. I suppose there is no objection to that.

Mr. MACVEAGH. Not at all. I trust unanimous consent will be given to allow that amendment to be made.

Mr. HUNSICKER. I withdraw the call for the yeas and nays to allow that to be done.

Mr. BUCKALEW. I move then to amend so as to make the section read:

"No foreign corporation shall do any business in this State without having one or more known places of business, and an authorized agent or agents in the same upon whom process may be served.”

If you do not make this amendment, it will be argued that by the Constitution one place of business in the State is sufficient. I want to leave it in the power of the Legislature to require more.

The PRESIDENT pro tem. The question is on the amendment of the delegate from Columbia.

The amendment was agreed to.

The PRESIDENT pro tem. The question now recurs on the section as amended. The section was agreed to.

The CLERK read the next section as follows:

SECTION 6. No corporation shall engage in any other business than that exshall it take or hold any real estate, expressly authorized in its charter, nor cept what may be necessary and proper for its legitimate business; and the Leg islature is hereby prohibited from depriving any person of an appeal from any preliminary assessment of damages made by viewers or otherwise. The final determination of the amount of such damages shall in all cases of appeal be determined by a jury.

Mr. CUYLER. I should like to ask the chairman of the committee what is meant by "preliminary assessment of damages?"

Mr. WOODWARD. I am not responsible for this section. I suppose, however, that the word "preliminary" refers to those proceedings that are had before viewers appointed by the court; that that is a preliminary assessment as contrasted with the assessment by a jury on appeal.

Mr. DARLINGTON. I wish to ask the chairman of the committee whether he does not mean "by" instead of "in," in the second line, so as to read "expressly authorized by its charter?"

Mr. DE FRANCE. the meaning.

Mr. DARLINGTON. Then I ask for a division of the question, the first division to end with the word "business," in the fourth line.

The PRESIDENT pro tem. A division of the section is called for. The first division will be read.

The CLERK read as follows: "No corporation shall engage in any other business than that expressly authorized in its charter, nor shall it take or hold any real estate except what may be necessary and proper for its legitimate business."

The division was agreed to.

The CLERK read the next division, as follows:

"And the Legislature is hereby prohibited from depriving any person of an appeal from any preliminary assessment of damages made by viewers or otherwise. The final determination of the amount of such damages shall in all cases of appeal be determined by a jury."

Mr. DARLINGTON. I do not know whether this is intended to apply to assessments of damages on common roads or not. The language is certainly broad enough to cover that case. If it is intended to give to every man a jury trial who is dissatified with the assessment of the jury, then I think it will be found inconvenient, and I think it will be found quite inconvenient, too, to require in all cases that the assessment of damages shall go before a jury. There are charters of established incorporated companies in which assessments of this kind are final, and I am not aware that they are not just as well done by the jury appointed by the court as they would be by a jury chosen by ballot. I am opposed, therefore, to the whole of this provision. The division was agreed to.

porations. I see it every day. The larger stockholders are accustomed, for the thousand and one reasons that they give, to pass the dividends, and then, in the current language of the day, the smaller stockholders are smoked out or are sweated out. The corporation is driven along one, two or three years without making any dividend, and the smaller stockholders who live upon the proceeds of the money thus invested, or expect to do so, are debarred from any return from that source, and as a consequence are obliged to sell out to the larger holders. The effect of it is very injurious. I hope the amendment will prevail.

The PRESIDENT pro tem. The amendment is before the Convention.

The amendment was rejected, there being nineteen ayes, less than a majority of a quorum.

The PRESIDENT pro tem. The seventh section of the article will now be read. The CLERK read as follows:

SECTION 7. Any general banking law which shall be passed shall provide for the registry and countersigning by an of ficer of the State of all notes or bills designed for circulation and that ample security to the full amount thereof shall be deposited with the State Treasurer for the redemption of such notes or bills.

Mr. CAREY. Mr. President: This seems to me to be a very unnecessary section. The Federal government has taken the whole matter of circulation into its own hands, and we shall never again have any State circulation, and even if we ever should have, there are laws on the statute books now that provide for all that is here contained. It is hardly worth while to burden the Constitution with a provision so entirely unnecessary as this is.

Mr. DALLAS. Mr. President: I do not know how the phraseology of this section

Mr. BRODHEAD. I offer the following amendment, to come in at this point as a new section:

"All corporations, except banking companies, shall divide their net earnings at least once in each year, and when such earnings shall have been invested in improvements, the stock of the corporation

seems to me objectionable in form to say that "any general banking law which shall be passed shall," &c. Being a restrictive clause, I think it should read in this way: "No general banking law shall be passed which shall not provide." I move an amendment to an amendment to make it read in the manner which I have indicated.

The PRESIDENT pro tem. The question is on the amendment of the gentleman from Philadelphia (Mr. Dallas.)

The amendment was rejected, there being, on a division: Ayes, twenty-one, less than a majority of a quorum.

ferred to the national banking act; but that we are ever to come back to the irredeemable currency and shinplasters of State circulation seems to me so improbable that I cannot agree to put a provision in the Constitution to lengthen this long

Mr. COCHRAN. I see no good reason why a section of this kind should not be passed. It is true that at present we have a national currency; but the policy establishing it may continue or may not, and if that system should be done away with and at any time we should return to a system of State currency, why should we not provide in this section the principle upon which that currency shall be established? There is no reason in the world that I can see for voting it out, for I do not understand that any member here has objected to the principle upon which the currency shall be founded, a principle which provides security for the holders of the circulation when it shall be issued. Why, then, should not the section pass? I cannot see the reason why we should reject it.

Mr. MACVEAGH. I do trust this Convention will not decido to put everything in the Constitution that they think might be useful to put in a statute in case any statute on that subject should ever here after be passed. We certainly do not want to go that far. If there is one thing absolutely certain, as it seems to me, it is just what the gentleman from Philadelphia (Mr. Carey) has suggested to us, that the American people will never hereafter consent to be shaved by small brokers in country towns and cities in order to get currency that will pass in the different portions even of the same State, as well as in different States. And that in these days of travel and intercourse the idea that a man who wants to go from New York to San Francisco shall stop at each city and town in order to change his currency and get bills that will circulate there, and pay a percentage upon it is, it seems to me, so utterly beyond the reach of possibility that we ought not to put a provision in the Constitution guarding against it. There are already on the statute books of half a dozen States half a dozen general laws on this subject. The banking law of New York for St ate banking is almost perfect, and in many of its features it is the basis of the national banking law, and many of its features would even be now an advantage trans

contingency.

The PRESIDENT pro tem. The question is on the section.

The section was agreed to.

Mr. HARRY WHITE. I offer the following as a new section to come in at this point:

"The Legislature shall have the power to alter, revoke or annul any charter of incorporation now existing and revokable at the adoption of this Constitution, or any hereafter conferred by or under any law, whenever, in their opinion, it may be injurious to the citizens of this Commonwealth, in such manner, however, that no injustice shall be done to the corporators."

I offer this amendment as a new section for the reason that this provision is found in the old Constitution, being the amendment of 1857. This section was prepared as just read and approved by the Committee on Legislation. When the report of the Committe on Legislation was under consideration, it was rejected for the reason that it was more proper to be in the report of the Committee on Corpora tions. As chairman of the Committee on Legislation, I assented to that disposition of it at that time for that reason. This is the exact language of the amendment to the Constitution of 1857, with the exception that it saves the power to the Legislature to revoke such incorporations as may have been granted between 1857 and this time.

Mr. WOODWARD. I wish the gentleman would withdraw that amendment until we get through the remaining sections.

Mr. HARRY WHITE. I thought this was the proper place right here.

Mr. WOODWARD. Any place is proper. Let us get through with what the committee of the whole adopted, and then the gentleman can move his amendments. I have several amendments to move at the proper time.

Mr. HARRY WHITE. I defer to the chairman of the committee and withdraw it at this time.

The PRESIDENT pro tem. The amendment is withdrawn. The eighth section will be read.

The CLERK read as follows: