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By the new constitution of Pennsylvania the Governor and Supreme Judges can not be re-elected.

In a number of States suffrage was formerly limited to "white" persons, but the Fifteenth Amendment to the Constitution, renders this limitation inoperative. Twenty-five States require the voter to be a citizen of the United States; the remaining twelve make the legal declaration of intention to become a citizen sufficient. A residence of one year in the State is generally required, though a number make six months sufficient; and Kentucky requires two years. Georgia, Nevada, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire, make the payment of taxes a requisite for voting, except in certain cases. The same is the case in Delaware, for those over twenty-two years of age. In Connecticut, those can not vote who are "unable to read an article in the constitution or any section of the statutes of the State;" and in Massachusetts, those "unable to read the constitution in the English language, and write their names, unless prevented by physical debility, or over sixty years of age when the constitution was adopted." Fifteen States exclude from suffrage those who are insane; ten, those who are idiotic; seven, those who are "non compos mentis," or "of unsound mind;" eight, those under guardianship; seven, those who are paupers; one, those supported in an alms-house or asylum.

These particulars give a general idea of the sphere of the State governments, and show in what respects their constitutions differ. It will be seen that, ordinarily, the citizen has a more direct and personal relation to the laws of the State than to those of the nation. For many years prior to the recent war we were conscious of our relation to the nation chiefly by our Congressional and Presidential elections. Taxes were paid to the State officials; and the laws which regulated the daily life of the people came from the State legisla

tures and not from Congress. But during the war the nation became to every man a distinct reality.

In general, the State governments have to do with matters that are local and municipal, in distinction from those which are general and national. The wellbeing of the people is, of course, dependent upon both governments, though State legislation bears more directly than national upon their prosperity and happiness. There are some matters, controlled by the States, in regard to which uniformity is desirable; as, for example, the descent of property. It is unfortunate that a will, made and executed according to the forms of law in one State, should subsequently be found to be invalid because the death of the testator had occurred in another State, to which he had removed.

The American people, thus, constitute one nation with whom is the sovereignty; but they have a government which is two-fold-exists in two departments. To each of these departments the nation has committed certain governmental trusts. It might have distributed these trusts differently; given more to the one and less to the other. The nation may alter the distribution when it pleases; for, strictly, the sovereignty does not belong to the government of a nation, but to the nation itself, which has established the government. The people are undoubtedly competent to change the character of the government, and give it such form as they may think will most promote their interests. But as the people of the United States are also the people of the States severally, we may rest satisfied that no change will ever be made which the people of the States do not believe will be for their common good.

THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE.

IN CONGRESS, JULY 4, 1776.

THE UNANIMOUS DECLARATION OF THE THIRTEEN UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.

WHEN, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume, among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that, to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; that, whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute a new government, laying its foundation on such principles, and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate, that governments long established, should not be changed for light and transient causes; and, accordingly, all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object, evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such a government, and to provide new guards for their future security. Such has been the patient sufferance of these colonies, and such is now the necessity which constrains them to

alter their former systems of government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these States. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his assent to laws the most wholesome and neces sary for the public good.

He has forbidden his governors to pass laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operations till his assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of representation in the legislature—a right inestimable to them, and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his

measures.

He has dissolved representative houses repeatedly, for opposing, with manly firmness, his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused, for a long time after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the legislative powers, incapable of annihilation, have returned to the people at large for their exercise; the state remaining, in the meantime, exposed to all the dangers of invasions from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavored to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the laws for the naturalization of foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new appropriations of lands.

He has obstructed the administration of justice by refusing his assent to laws for establishing judiciary powers.

He has made judges dependent on his will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries. He has erected a multitude of new offices, and sent hither swarms of officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, standing armies, without the consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the military independent of, and superior to, the civil power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his assent to their acts of pretended legislation:

For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us; For protecting them, by a mock trial, from punishment for any murders which they should commit on the inhabitants of these States; For cutting off our trade with all parts of the world; For imposing taxes on us without our consent;

For depriving us, in many cases, of the benefits of trial by jury; For transporting us beyond seas to be tried for pretended offenses; For abolishing the free system of English laws in a neighboring province, establishing therein an arbitrary government, and enlarging its boundaries, so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these colonies;

For taking away our charters, abolishing our most valuable laws, and altering, fundamentally, the forms of our governments;

For suspending our own legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated government here by declaring us out of his protection, and waging war against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burned our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large armies of foreign mercenaries to complete the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of cruelty and perfidy, scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow-citizens, taken captive on the high seas, to bear arms against their country, to become the executioners of their friends and brethren, or to fall themselves by their hands.

He has excited domestic insurrection among us, and has endeavored to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers the merciless Indian savages, whose known rule of warfare is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes, and conditions.

In every stage of these oppressions we have petitioned for redress in the most humble terms; our repeated petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have we been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We have warned them, from time to time, of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them, by the ties of our common kindred, to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our con

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