this report; and when our successors shall come from the people, they will be charged with their commands in reference to the future. For the present, your committee think they do not mistake either the sound principles that should govern us, or the wishes of those whose servants we are.

C. G. HAMMOND,

C. I. WALKER,
JNO. STOCKTON,

1

[No. 62.]

Report of committee on internal improvement relative to the Palmyra and Jacksonburg railroad.

The internal improvement committee, to whom were referred a "bill for the completion and purchase of the Palmyra and Jacksonburg railroad," and also a petition from the stockholders of the same company, beg leave respectfully to report:

That they have had the same under consideration and have made all due and suitable inquiries in relation to the whole subject. It will be seen by a reference to the report of the company, that the total cost of the road, without iron, from Palmyra to Clinton, a distance of sixteen miles, is $78,812 75, The total receipts for freight and passengers from August 11, 1838, to December 31, 1840, a period of two years and four months, is $23,503 91.

Amount expended in running the road and in small repairs, is $14,064 77, leaving a balance of $9,439 14, which was expended in principal repairs of the road, building of cars, purchase of horses, and payment of interest on the bonds. Taking the sum last mentioned as the average clear income of the road, it will be seen that it yields nearly six per cent upon its cost, When it is taken into consideration that the road has never been ironed, and that horse power alone has been employed on said road, and that the means of the company have never enabled them to transport but a part of the surplus products of that region; and that consequently a large amount of tolls have been lost to the company; it will appear evident that under a different state of things, the road would yield as great a revenue as any work in the state. Admitting the road to have cost the sum of $78,812 75, as set forth in the petition of the owners, which was referred to your committee, and they have not the slighest reason to doubt the correctness of that report, the cost to the state by the provisions of the bill,

should they be accepted by the company, would be about $80,000 00.

The following calculations will show the grounds on which your committee found their opinion, in recommending to your honorable body the sum to be paid as provided by the provisions of the accompanying bill. Original cost of the road,

Average per mile,

The cost of two miles which will be useless to the state, i. e., that por

tion from the crossing of the Southern road to Palmyra,

To which, add the amount necessary to prepare the road for iron,

road, one-fourth of the original cost, after deducting the above sums,

$4,925 79

$87,812 75

9,851 58

3,243 00

Add also for the natural decay of the

16,429 54

24,600 00

54,124 12

$24,688 63

Amount due the state,

Total,

Deduct it from the first cost of road, there re

mains,

If to the amount proposed by the bill to be paid to the company, is added the amount now owing to the state by them, the aggregate will be,

Add also for ironing,

Total cost of the road to the state,

$49,688 63

30,000 00

$79,688 63

Say in round numbers $80,000 00, which will, in the opinion of your committee, be the least expensive railroad in the state. Admitting that the tolls will be doubled, by the further transportation of the freight on the road now under consideration upon the Southern road, from the junction to Monroe, and you will have a clear income of nearly $9,000 00 upon a road that cost but $80,000 00. But from the best information in the possession of your committee, they are induced to believe that the business on the Palmyra and Jacksonburg road would be nearly if not quite doubled, if its capabilities were equal to the business wants of the commuuity, near to and through which the road passes. The reasons which induce your committee to be thus minute, are to show to the house that it would, as your committee believe, be wise in a financial point of view, the only light in which your committee would feel justified in recommending it to your favorable notice. There is still another inducement as your committee think, for the purchase, and that is the very remote prospect of the company being able to pay their liabilittes to the state. It may be objected, that it is hardly wise or prudent to invest more money in such

roads or in any way involve the state further in the transactions.

It will be perceived by the bill that the means of payment are within the control of the state, and are of a kind that in general are of but little profit to the state. In view of these facts your committe submit the whole matter to your consideration. ALFERD R. METCALF, Chairman.

[No. 63.]

Memorial of citizens of Allegan county relative to the apportionment of representatives.

At a meeting of the citizens of Allegan county, convened pursuant to previous notice, at the court house, in the village of Allegan, on Friday the 26th day of February, A. D. 1841, for the purpose of adopting such measures as they might deem expedient to secure the right of Allegan county to a representative in the legislature of this state, Elisha Ely, Esq., was called to the chair, and Henry H. Booth appointed secretary.

The object of the meeting was stated by D. B. Stout, and the report in the senate of Michigan, by the honorable Mr. Drake, chairman of the committee on the judiciary, on the subject of the right of Allegan county to a representative in the legislature, having been read by the secretary;

On motion of H. K. Clarke,

Resolved, That a committee of five be appointed by the chair, to draft a memorial to the legislature, and resolutions expressive of the views and feelings of this meeting, and report the same for their consideration.

H. K. Clarke, D. B. Stout, Alvah Fuller, John P. Allord, and Elijah G. Bingham, were appointed said committee.

The committee, by their chairman, H. K. Clarke, reported the annexed memorial.

On motion of Joseph Fisk,

Resolved, That the report of the committee be accepted.
On motion of A. L. Ely,

Resolved, That the report be unanimously adopted as expressive of the sense of this mecting.

On motion of D. B. Stout,

Resolved, That the proceedings of this meeting, with the memorial this day adopted, be signed by the chairman and secretary, and copies of the same be forwarded to Messrs. Deming and Barlow, members of the legislature, with the request that they be laid before the houses of which they are respec

tively members, and that copies be sent to the Detroit, Marshall and Kalamazoo papers for publication.

ELISHA ELY, Chairman.

HENRY H. BOOTH, Secretary.

To the honorable the Senate and House of Representatives of the state of Michigan:

The people of the county of Allegan, in convention assembled, at the court house in said county, on the 26th day of February, 1841, respectfully represent:

That the importance to their interests of the recognition of the claim to a separate representation in the legislature, which they have before asserted, fully warrants another attempt to exhibit the foundation of their claim to your honorable bodies. Nor is the equitable settlement of this question of importance only to the people of Allegan; for the same principles of faithful construction of the constitution, whence this claim is derived, may at no distant day become of vital importance to every county in the state. And that these principles will be admitted in the determination of this claim, they ought not to disbelieve, when they see so clearly recognized, the doctrine, that "the superiority of the constitution over all other laws, the very method of forming it, the manner of adopting it, equally admonish us of the impracticability of admitting for a moment the doctrine of expediency, in its construction. The known, the common definition of the words used in the constitution, must be absurd."

Approaching, then, the examination of our claims, as though it never had been before asserted, as though it had never received a legislative sanction, nor ever called forth in its favor, able opinions from the most eminent jurists in the state, we take it for granted, that the inquiry must be, not how plausible a pretext can be discovered for the rejection of this claim, but to what result will a candid construction of the constitution lead us.

Premising, that the convention which framed the constitution of the state commenced its session on the 12th day of May, 1835, that it adjourned on the 24th day of June, that the county of Allegan was organized on the 25th day of August, by the governor and council of the territory of Michigan, and that the constitution was adopted by the people to whom it was submitted, for their approval or rejection, on the first Monday in October, and the succeeding day in the same year; we quote from the fourth section of the fourth article, thus: "each organized county shall be entitled to at least one representative; but no county hereafter organized, shall be entitled to a separate representative, until it shall have attained a popu

lation equal to the ration of representation hereafte restablished."

The question now, manifiestly, is, is the county of Allegan properly included among those described in the first member of the sentence quoted, an "unorganized county!" or among those described in the latter, as an "organized county?" If an affirmative answer be given to the first of these questions, and a negative to the latter, our claim is established. If they cannot be so answered, our claim is baseless.

It needs no argument to show, that on the word "hereafter," depends the whole question. About the "known, common definition" of the word, there can be no dispute. The question, therefore, becomes one of time, and may be stated thus: when did the period commence, which is designated by the word "hereafter?" Was it from the moment, on the 12th of June, when the section under review was passed upon by the convention which framed the constitution? Was it when the members of the convention affixed their signatures to it, and adjourned? Was it when the constitution was adopted by the people, whose command had called it into existence? Or was it when it was submitted to the national legislature, and the state of Michigan became one of the great confederacy? The time indicated in the first of these questions, has, we believe, never been set up as that solving the question, though we see not why it may not be with as much force as that indicated in the second. And if either of the last two questions be decided in the affirmative, Allegan county was not "hereafter organized."

In disposing of the first two of these questions, we may properly ask, whether the constitution could be of any force at all, as the law of the land, until it was approved by the people? Was it possible, for instance, that the crime of treason, defined in the 16th section of the first article, could have been committed until the approbation of the people had given the constitution the authority of law? Is an act which has received the sanction of both your honorable bodies, of any validity as a law, until it has received the executive approval, or has been returned and received the vote made necessary to its passage, by his rejection? In the opinion of your memorialist, the necessary answers to these questions, irresistibly show that no part of the constitution could become operative, until the whole became so; and that the period designated by the word "hereafter," commenced with the operation of the constitution, strictly as such, and not before. The admission of any other construction, will launch us upon a shoreless sea of perplexity and contention, and plunge into the darkness of night the dividing point of time when the territorial government ceased, and the state government commenced.