brethren, to open and adjourn the court. An adequate, fixed, but moderate falary shall be fettled on them during their continuance in office. The prefident and privy council shall appoint the fecretary, the attorney-general, registers for the probate of wills, and granting letters of administration, registers in chancery, clerks of the courts of common-pleas and orphans courts, and clerks of the peace, who shall be commiffioned as aforesaid, and remain in office during five years, if they behave themselves well; during which time the faid registers in chancery and clerks shall not be justices of either of the faid courts of which they are officers, but they shall have authority to fign all writs by them issued, and take recognizances of bail. The justices of the peace shall be nominated by the house of affembly, that is to say, They shall name twenty-four persons for each county, of whom the prefident, with the approbation of the privy-council, shall appoint twelve, who shall be commissioned as aforesaid, and continue in office during seven years, if they behave themselves well; and in case of vacancies, or if the legislature shall think proper to increase the number, they shall be nominated and appointed in like manner. The members of the legislative and privy councils shall be justices of the peace for the whole state, during their continuance in trust; and the justices of the courts of commonpleas shall be confervators of the peace in their respective counties.

13. The justices of the courts of common-pleas and orphans courts shall have the power of holding inferior courts of chancery as heretofore, unless the legislature shall otherwise direct.

14. The clerks of the fupreme court shall be appointed by the chief justice thereof, and the recorders of deeds by the justices of the courts of common-pleas for each county severally, and commiffioned by the president under the great feal, and continue in office five years, if they behave themselves well.

15. The sheriffs and coroners of the respective counties shall be chofen annually as heretofore; and any person having served three years as theriff, shall be ineligible for three years after; and the prefident and privy-council shall have the appointment of fuch of the two candidates returned for the said offices of sheriff's and coroners, as they shall think best qualified, in the same manner that the governor heretofore enjoyed this power.

16. The general assembly by joint ballot shall appoint the generals and field-officers, and all other officers in the army or navy of this state. And the prefident may appoint during pleasure, until otherwise directed by the legislature, all necessary civil officers not herein before-mentioned.

17. There shall be an appeal from the supreme court of Delaware in matters of law and equity, to a court of seven perfons, to confift of the prefident for the time being, who shall prefide therein, and fix others, to be appointed, three by the legislative council,

council, and three by the house of assembly, who shall continue in office during good behaviour, and be commiffioned by the prefident under the great feal; which court shall be styled, The Court of Appeals, and have all the authority and powers heretofore given by law in the last refort to the king in council, under the old government. The secretary shall be the clerk of this court, and vacancies therein occafioned by death or incapacity, shall be fupplied by new elections in manner aforefaid.

18. The justices of the fupreme court and courts of commonpleas, the members of the privy-council, the secretary, the trustees of the loan-office, and clerks of the courts of commonpleas, during their continuance in office, and all perfons concerned in any army or navy contracts, shall be ineligible to either house of affembly; and any member of either house accepting of any other of the offices herein before mentioned (excepting the office of a justice of the peace) shall have his feat thereby vacated, and a new election shall be ordered.

19. The legiflative council and assembly shall have the power of making the great feal of this state, which shall be kept by the prefident, or in his abfence by the vice-president, to be used by them as occafion may require. It shall be called, The Great Seal of the Delaware State, and shall be affixed to all laws and commiffions.

20. Commissions shall run in the name of The Delaware State, and bear teft by the president. Writs shall run in the fame manner, and bear test in the name of the chief justice, or justice first named in the commiffions for the several courts, and be sealed with the public feals of fuch courts. Indictments shall conclude, Against the peace and dignity of the state.

21. In cafe of vacancy of the offices above directed to be filled by the prefident and general affembly, the prefident and privycouncil may appoint others in their stead, until there shall be a new election.

22. Every person who shall be chosen a member of either house, or appointed to any office or place of trust, before taking his feat, or entering upon the execution of his office, shall take the following oath, or affirmation if confcientiously scrupulous of taking an oath, to wit,

"I, A. B. will bear true allegiance to the Delaware State, fubmit to its constitution and laws, and do no act wittingly whereby the freedom thereof may be prejudiced."

And also make and subscribe the following declaration, to wit, "I, A. B. do profess faith in God the Father, and in Jesus Christ his only Son, and the Holy Ghost, one God, blessed for evermore; and I do acknowledge the holy fcriptures of the Old and New Testament to be given by divine inspiration." And all officers shall also take an oath of office.

23. The 23. The prefident when he is out of office, and within eighteen months after, and all others, offending against the state, either by mal-adminiftration, corruption, or other means, by which the fafety of the commonwealth may be endangered, within eighteen months after the offence committed, shall be impeachable by the house of assembly before the legislative council; such impeachment to be prosecuted by the attorney-general, or fuch other perfon or persons as the house of assembly may appoint, according to the laws of the land. If found guilty, he or they shall be either forever disabled to hold any office under government, or removed from office pro tempore, or fubjected to fuch pains and penalties as the laws shall direct. And all officers fhall be removed on conviction of misbehaviour at common law, or on impeachment, or upon the address of the general affembly.

24. All acts of affembly in force in this state on the fifteenth day of May laft (and not hereby altered, or contrary to the refolutions of congress, or of the late house of assembly of this state) shall so continue until altered or repealed by the legislature of this state, unless where they are temporary, in which case they shall expire at the times respectively limited for their duration.

25. The common law of England, as well as so much of the statute law as have been heretofore adopted in practice in this flate, shall remain in force, unless they shall be altered by a future law of the legislature; such parts only excepted as are repugnant to the rights and privileges contained in this conftitution and the declaration of rights, &c. agreed to by this convention.

26. No person hereafter imported into this state from Africa ought to be held in slavery under any pretence whatever, and no negro, Indian, or mulatto flave, ought to be brought into this state for fale from any part of the world.

27. The first election for the general affembly of this state shall be held on the twenty-first day of October next, at the court houses in the several counties, in the manner heretofore used in the election of the assembly, except as to choice of inspectors and affeffors, where affeffors have not been chosen on the fixteenth day of September instant, which shall be made on the morning of the day of election, by the electors, inhabitants of the respective hundreds in each county; at which time the sheriffs and coroners for the faid counties respectively are to be elected; and the present sheriffs of the counties of Newcastle and Kent may be re-chofen to that office until the first day of October in the year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and seventy-nine, and the present sheriff for the county of Suffex may be re-chosen to that office until the first day of October in the year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and feventy-eight, provided the frecmen think proper to re-elect them at every general election ;

and

and the present sheriffs and coroners respectively shall continue to exercise their offices as heretofore, until the sheriffs and coroners to be elected on the faid twenty-first day of October shall be commiffioned and sworn into office. The members of the legislative council and assembly shall meet for transacting the bufiness of the state on the twenty-eighth day of October next, and continue in office until the first day of October which will be in the year one thousand seven hundred and seventy-seven; on which day, and on the first day of October in each year forever after, the legislative council, affembly, sheriffs, and coroners, shall be chosen by ballot in manner directed by the feveral laws of this state, for regulating elections of members of affembly, and sheriffs and coroners; and the general assembly shall meet on the twentieth day of the same month, for transacting the business of the state; and if any of the faid first and twentieth days of October should be Sunday, then, and in such case, the elections shall be held and the general assembly meet the next day following.

28. To prevent any violence or force being used at the faid elections, no persons shall come armed to any of them; and no muster of the militia shall be made on that day, nor shall any battalion or company give in their votes immediately succeeding each other, if any other voter who offers to vote objects thereto; nor shall any battalion or company in the pay of the continent, or of this or any other state, be suffered to remain at the time and place of holding the faid elections, nor within one mile of the said places respectively, for twenty-fours before the opening faid elections, nor within twenty-four hours after the fame are clofed, so as in any manner to impede the freely and conveniently carrying on the faid election: Provided always, that every elector may in a peaceable and orderly manner give in his vote on the faid day of election.

29. There shall be no establishment of any one religious sect in this state in preference to another; and no clergyman or preacher of the gospel of any denomination shall be capable of holding any civil office in this ftate, or of being a member of either of the branches of the legislature, while they continue in the exercise of the pastoral function.

30. No article of the declaration of rights and fundamental rules of this state, agreed to by this convention, nor the first, second, fifth (except that part thereof that relates to the right of fuffrage), twenty-fixth and twenty-ninth articles of this conftitution, ought ever to be violated on any pretence whatever. No other part of this conftitution shall be altered, changed or diminished, without the consent of five parts in seven of the affembly, and feven members of the legiflative council.

Friday, September 20, 1776.

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MARYLAND.

(98)

MARYLAND.

A DECLARATION of RIGHTS, and the CONSTITUTION and FORM of GOVERNMENT agreed to by the Delegates of Maryland, in free and full CONVENTION affimbled.

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A DECLARATION of RIGHTS, &c.

HE parliament of Great Britain, by a declaratory act, hav

ing affumed a right to make laws to bind the colonies in all cafes whatsoever, and in pursuance of such claim endeavoured by force of arms to subjugate the united colonies to an unconditional fubmiffion to their will and power, and having at length constrained them to declare themselves independent states, and to affume government under the authority of the people: Therefore, we, the delegates of Maryland, in free and full convention assembled, taking into our most serious confideration the best means of establishing a good constitution in this state, for the sure foundation and more permanent security thereof, declare,

1. That all government of right originates from the people, is founded in compact only, and instituted solely for the good of the whole.

2. That the people of this state ought to have the fole and exclusive right of regulating the internal government and police thereof.

3. That the inhabitants of Maryland are entitled to the common law of England, and the trial by jury according to the course of that law, and to the benefit of fuch of the English statutes as existed at the time of their first emigration, and which by experience have been found applicable to their local and other circumstances, and of fuch others as have been fince made in England, or Great-Britain, and have been introduced, used, and practised, by the courts of law or equity; and also to all acts of affembly in force on the first of June seventeen hundred and feventy-four, except fuch as may have fince expired, or have been, or may be altered by acts of convention, or this declaration of rights, fubject nevertheless to the revision of, and amendment or repeal by, the legiflature of this state; and the inhabitants of Maryland are also entitled to all property derived to them from or under the charter granted by his Majesty Charles I. to Cæcilius Calvert, baron of Baltimore.

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4. That