[SEE JOURNAL, page 210.] REPORT OF MR. BURNETT, FROM THE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE. The committee on the Judiciary, to whom was referred sundry petitions, praying for an alteration of the act regulating marriages, have had the same under consideration, and submit the following REPORT: The petitioners complain that the second section of the act, which requires ministers of the gospel to file a copy of their credentials with the clerk of the district court of the county in which any marriage is to be solemnized, and have the same recorded, before they shall be authorized to solemnize marriages, is burthensome and expensive, and they ask to be relieved from the hardship of the law. Marriage, so far as its form and ceremonies are concerned, and its effect and consequences when performed, is regarded by the laws of our country as a civil contract. From the importance of the relations thus created, the Legislature has thought it to be wise and proper to require the contract to be solemnized by some public functionary. A number of civil officers are authorized by law to perform this service, and ministers of the gospel, though constituting no part of the civil authority of the State, have the power conferred on them, doubtless from the sacredness of their calling and the solemnity of the ceremony of celebrating marriages. It has also been thought proper by the Legislature, that record evidence should be preserved of all marriages solemnized in each county respectively, and of the authority to perform such solemnization. The propriety of this requisition of the law seems to be too obvious to require any argument from the committee for its support. If the record shows that a mar riage was celebrated by a particular civil officer or minister of the gospel, it might become a matter of importance or of interest to ascertain whether it was done by a person authorized by law. The records of the county will always show the authority of the civil officers; and the committee can see no reason why they should not be equally certain as to the qualifications of ministers in relation to their authority to perform civil rites. To exempt the ministers from having their credentials recorded at all, or to make their recording in one county answer for the whole Territory, as is asked for by some, would not, in the opinion of the committee, be expedient. True, it would relieve the minister from some trouble and a trifling expense, but it would impose a much greater hardship upon any one who might undertake to ascertain his authority from an authentic source. We are of opinion that the inconvenience and expense complained of are not so great as to be a grievance, and that whatever it may be, it is not expedient to grant the relief prayed for by altering the law as it now exists. T. P. BURNETT, Chairman. [SEE JOURNAL, page 277.] REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE OF THE TWO HOUSES RELATIVE TO THE CANCELLING OF BONDS, &c. The undersigned, a committee appointed by the Council and House of Representatives of the Territory of Wisconsin, under a joint resolution of the two Houses, "to examine, count and cancel all evidences of indebtedness in the territorial Treasury and Auditor's office, which the Secretary of the Territory is not instructed to pay," beg leave respectfully to REPORT: That they have attended to the duties assigned them in the said resolution and have cancelled one thousand eight hundred and five dollars and fifty-two cents of territorial scrip, six hundred thirty-eight dollars and thirty cents of Auditor's warrants, and three thousand nine hundred and twenty-three dollars and ten cents of territorial bonds, two of which bonds, Nos. 69 and 70 for one hundred dollars each, do not appear to have been put in circulation, amounting in the whole to the sum of six thousand three hundred sixty-six dollars and ninety-two cents. A list of the scrip, auditor's warrants and bonds, with the number, date, amount and the name of the person to whom payable is hereto annexed." All of which is respectfully submitted. JOHN CATLIN, ORSON SHELDON, MADISON, February 3, 1816, Committee. |