cases will be tried, there will be a certain amount of injustice meted out, but which should not be. I am therefore opposed to the resolution and hope it will not pass.

Mr. T. HURLEY. I desire to have read for the information of the Convention the reconstruction acts of Congress. We will then know how far to go. [Mr. HURLEY here read the General Order of General Canby, convening the body.] I do not believe we have the power or authority to abolish any branch of the civil government of the State. We are simply here to frame a Constitution, which is to be submitted to the people for their acceptance or rejection. As regards the District Courts, they are perhaps as good as any other Courts in the State, but we should not abrogate them until we are prepared to substitute something better in their place. I therefore move that this subject be indefinitely postponed.

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Mr. J. M. RUNION. I will state for the information of the Convention, that I supposed we had just as much right to abolish these Courts as the Convention of 1865 had the right to pass them. Furthermore, I have consulted the constituents of my District, white and colored, and they are almost unanimous in favor of the resolution. They complain that much injustice has been practiced in those Courts.

Mr. F. L. CARDOZO. I will state for the information of the Convention, that when the Committee called upon Governor Orr to invite him to a seat here, the Governor referred to this subject, and said that the Convention of 1865, which met to frame a Constitution, in his opin... ion, transgressed its limits in regard to the Judiciary, when they said the Legislature should establish such Superior and Inferior Courts as they in their judgment should determine, and also these District Courts. The Governor thought it would have been much better if the Convention had only said such superior and inferior Courts as the Legislature might determine. I think if that Convention had ordered the establishment of any Courts, surely this Convention has just as much right to abolish. In conversation with the Governor, the latter said he thought the District Courts highly inappropriate, and altogether objectionable; that they did not accomplish their purpose. At the same time, in abolishing the District Court, that did not perhaps reach the trouble. It is not the form of the Court, but rather the spirit of the Judges. If these are disposed to do injustice, the form of the Court will not prevent them from doing so.

Mr. WM. J. McKINLAY. I doubt whether we have authority to act in this matter, we are here for a specific purpose, the framing of a Constitution and form of civil Government, and until the Constitution is rati

fied by the people and accepted, no ordinance can be passed that will have any effect. That is the view I take of the subject, and for the life of me I cannot see what the abolishment of the District Courts, whether they were to be condemned or approved, has to do with this clear line of duty. No ordinance,the Convention can adopt will have any effect until the Constitution is ratified by the people, and, therefore, this resolution can be of no possible use. The 'subject belongs exclusively to the Legislature.

Mr. B. F. RANDOLPH. I concur with the gentleman who last. addressed the Convention, in the opinion that we are here for a specific purpose, but we are also at the same time to do all in our power to relieve the State of any financial embarrassment which may seem fit. The District Courts are a great expense to the State and needless for the ends of justice. I am in favor of the resolution, but the question is whether we have a right to pass this ordinance. If it was so deter. mined, I would suggest the propriety of asking General Canby to issue. an order abolishing these Courts. As to whether the people of the State have obtained justice through these Courts, I would leave that to be determined by others better acquainted with their government.

Mr. NEAGLE. It is urged against this measure that we are working hastily, but that I look upon as no argument. I am of the opinion that the delegates to the Convention came here with their minds made up on that question. We have been considering the matter of District Courts ever since the Act was passed for the establishment of those Courts, and I believe our constituents have almost universally condemned them. I am credibly informed that they cost the State not less than $50,000, and some estimate it at over $80,000 or $100,000. We are oppressed by heavy taxation, and I am in favor of relieving the State Treasury as soon as possible of these useless Courts. We have been told that this Convention has no right to legislate; I want to know what is meant by the formation of a civil government of the State. We are here for a specific purpose, that is by others is urged to be the simple forming of a Constitution; my understanding is that we are here for a specific purpose, and that is to form a Constitution for the State of South Carolina, which shall be its organic law, and then to form a civil government also for the State of South Carolina. What good is there to form a Constitution and laws, and have no officers or government to carry those laws into execution? I take it for granted that the government of a State means its organic laws, its Constitution, its laws throughout for the regulation of the State and the citizens therein. We must have officers to execute those laws, and I consider we have a perfect right, a perfect

jurisdiction over every official position in this State. We cannot place any other construction upon the Reconstruction Acts of Congress. One gentleman on my right urges that no act passed by the Convention can have any effect until it is ratified by the people. I am prepared to admit that. I do not consider any act of this Convention can be enforced by the authority of the State until the Constitution is ratified by the people If that is ratified, then our laws are to be enforced. Who is to enforce those laws unless we have officers favorable to them? We are here to frame a Constitution, to establish a government, end unless we can make the machinery to put it in operation, we may as well go home. We must have the men and the machinery. I think we have a perfect jurisdiction over every Court, and every officer in the State.

Mr. A. G. MACKEY. I did not intend to obtrude on this Convention, but this is an occasion when I esteem it my duty to speak. I think this one of the most important actions that can come before the Convention, not so much in relation to the principle involved in the ordinance itself, which is simply the abolition of a court, of whose character and whose utility a very large number of people of all shades of political character are agreed, but because I think I see in this Convention a desire, in the introduction of an ordinance like that, not only to legislate upon matters not within its province, but also to hurry that legislation through in unseemly haste. In relation to the character of the District Courts, of the necessity of the abolition of those bodies, of their good or ill effects, I need not say anything. This, in my opinion, is neither the time nor the place to discuss these principles. The question is, what right has the Convention to pass any such ordinance? Is this Convention possessed of legislative powers outside of the specific purposes for which it was called together? That is the great question we have first to enquire into. Then, should we agree that we have such power, in the next place, is it the best way to exercise that power by thrusting through at once, without due consideration, one of the most important measures which can be submitted for its consideration and demand its action?

I contend that the Constitutional Convention of South Carolina was called under the Reconstruction Acts of Congress, and the order of the General Commanding convening this body for one specific purpose and no other. When called for a specific purpose, it is illegal and wrong to go beyond that purpose, or to enter into any other, which we are not authorized to review and consider.

I know if I were to say that a Constitutional Convention is possessed of legislative powers I should be, for the first time, in accord with what I believe to be the heretical side of the State. I know it has been gener

ally held that Conventions of the people were sovereign and unlimited in their power, so much so that it was not deemed necessary to refer their actions to the people for ratification, because it was said they were the people themselves. That is a doctrine I have not held, and a doctrine not sanctioned by any jurist of reputation in this country. It is generally conceded that Constitutional Conventions are called to make Constitutions, not laws. This in my opinion is the intention of this body. It is a Convention to make a Constitution. We have not even the power of declaring what shall be the Constitution of South Carolina. Our powers are limited here as they ought to be in every other State, namely, to the simple proposition of what we believe would be a proper form of Constitution ; and until the people shall ratify our action, it will be of no effect whatever. But even if we had the power of legislation we should not undertake to rush an ordinance through without the usual parliamentary form of a first, second and third reading, and giving to the body ample time to deliberate and form a correct judgment. Can we undertake to adopt an ordinance abolishing Courts which have been for two years in existence and in which the rights and property of citizens are in litigation? Have we a right, without referring our action to the people, to declare these Courts abolished, and in the language of the ordinance "that all processes and decrees, after the date of this ordinance, shall be null and void?” Called simply to frame a Constitution for the acceptance or non-acceptance of the people, have we the right to begin by declaring that we will change the whole Judiciary or to set it aside ?

The gentleman who preceded me said he knew the ordinance could have no effect until submitted to and ratified by the people. With such a view of the case, it is wholly unnecessary for us to pass any such ordinance. We have appointed a Committee on the Judiciary, to whom is to be submitted all these questions for examination and discussion. That Committee, after laboriously and faithfully investigating all the points, with all the lights and assistance of such legal counsel as they may call to their aid in making up their judgment, are to determine as to what Courts are necessary. Did we appoint a Committee on the Judiciary that it might be a mere shadow without the substance; that after having appointed this Committee over that part of the Constitution which relates to the Courts, we are to take away its work, commence ourselves as a Committee on the Judiciary, and without examination, without consideration, without legal advice or counsel pass an ordinance. which we all admit is a mere brutum fulmen—a harmless thunderboltwhich can have no effect until acted upon by the people? How much more rational, more prudent, more like a deliberative assembly, to say we

will touch none of these things. Let us confine ourselves wholly and solely to the framing of a Constitution to be presented to the people for their acceptance or rejection. Heaven knows that task is sacred enough to engage any set of men. We will give to each portion of the Constitution that due deliberation to which it is entitled. We will divide the questions which arise among the appropriate Committees, and let these at their leisure, uninfluenced by eloquence, or other considerations which might control them upon this floor, determine what is right or wrong, and present it here! Then, not now, will be time enough for us to talk about abolishing District or any other Courts. Then if we are to sub-mit this act to the people let us submit it not in the form of an ordinance, but as a part of the Constitution which has been referred to and will be reported upon by the Judiciary Committee, who will recommend whether or not District Courts, after the adoption of this Constitution, shall be abolished. That would be the proper course for the Constitutional Convention to take. But if we commence by passing ordinances now, we know not where we shall stop.

From all the information I have been able to obtain upon the subject of preceding Constitutional Conventions, and from a study of the ablest jurists upon the subject, I believe that a Constitutional Convention has no right to pass any other ordinance than such as has been committed to it by the people. In this case there is but one ordinance that this Convention can pass, and that is to levy and collect a tax to pay its own expenses. Its next and only other business is to frame a Constitution.

In conclusion, I move that this resolution be referred to the Committee on the Judiciary, and that the Committee on the Whole do now rise and report to the house that they have considered the subject, and recommend that it be referred to the Judiciary Committee.

The motion was agreed to, and the Committee rose. Dr. MACKEY resumed the Chair.

Mr. RUTLAND made the report of the Committee of the Whole, which was adopted.

Mr. C. C. BOWEN introduced the following Bill of Rights, which was referred to the Committee on Bill of Rights:

WHEREAS, the people of the State of South Carolina, by their delegates in Convention assembled, on the twentieth day of December, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty, did, by an ordinance commonly called the Act of Secession, lay violent hands upon the Government and rudely severed the ties which bound the said State, în common with other States, in a Union, by a social compact known as the "Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union," of the United States of America, whereby the State was rendered a Territory, and