Tri Weekly Argus (Newspaper) - January 20, 1848, Madison, Wisconsin HOLT BE JUST FEAH MOT THURSDAY IAN 1848 CONVENTION PAPER NO Convention THE ARGUS TUESDAY January 18 1818 Prayer by the Read The journal of yesterday was read The following petitions were ted on subject of homestead tions lo wit By ilr Chase inhabitants of Fond du Lac By Messrs Davenport Sanders und Jackson from inhabitants ol Racine county Which were referred to the tee of the whole Mr Pr miss presented a strance from SHIM ry inhabitants ol Dodge county on thi same subject Which was i eft rred to the same Mr Sunders a petition from of Racine on the subject of school lands Which was referred to the committee education and scl ool Case from tie select committee lo whom bad been referred the subject of the contested election made a report See of the Mr Chase moved that the same be laid upon the table rnd ordered printed Which was agree I to Mr Reed from tlu committee on that subject reported the following resolutions which read io Resolved That he Congress of the United S be is ted up m the admission of this state into Union so to alter the provisions the act of entitled An act to a certain qi to aid in the improvement of the Fox and Wisconsin nid to connect the a canil ii the Territory of t iat price of the lands reserved to the Slates shall be reduced to the min mum price the public lands That the legislature of this state shall muk provisions by law for the sale the 1 granted to state in aid ot said improvements ject to the same lights of pre-emption to the settlers and are now allowed by law to on thv public j Mr Chaso fiom the commit ice on Banks Banking and Incorporations re- ported No 19 Article or Incorporations Which a- read and second times ordered Mr from the committee on j General Provisions reported No 20 Artu it OP Amendments WHS iead the first and secoi d and ordered The an ment of the named poisons on the on Revision and Ar- to Dunn King Larrabee ton and Lovell ns ere introduced and as to By Mr Lakin Resolved That on Tuesday ning January A D 1848 ibis convention die By Mr Resolved That this convention il- low Horatio Tuttie two dollars and fitly cents day as c for his dining the setting of the con- vention Foote That he committee on Miscellaneous PHA be instructed to report a by which the ernor may hv in case of emergencies ne the legislature nt any o her imc thru tit it prescribed in the constitution 1 that in case ot in- vasion or danger net of contusions c at tlie seat of tV may t i liUe manner con- nt suitable place in the d the on by in enquire into the f1 ot in a coat of orms for the state and lo report such as they deem proper if in opinion ii is expedient for this convention to adopt any By Mr Lewis Resolved That a respectful address be presented to the people of this tory with the constitution that shall le approved by this and that a committee of five members be ed to draft and report the same to th s convention By Mr Sanders Whereas door-keeper elected this convention has vacated his office and lelt the convention without anyo ficer to perform the duties fir he was appointed therefore Resolved That Daniel N be door-keeper pro lem Mr Sanders moved a suspension f the 5th rule for the adoption of the lasl named resolution now Which was disagreed to No Article on Internal ments was then taken and read the thirl lime And the question been on of the article And was decided in the affirmative Arid the ayes and noes being required by rhe rules Those who voted in the were Messrs Bishop Biggs nell Carter Chase A- G Colt Cotion Davenport Dunn Fagan Featherstonhaugh Fenton Fitzgerald Foils Foole Fowler Gale Harrington Harvey Hollen faeck Jackson Judd Kilbourn King Larrabee Latham Lewis Lyman McClel an O'Connor Pentony Karnsey Koot Seagel jr Secoi Turner Vanderpool Warden Wheele and Those who voted in the negative were Castleman O Cole Doran Fox Kennedy Lakin Lovell Nichols Mr President Reed Richard son Rountree Mr LOVELL moved that the ar cle on apportionment be taken up i was agreed to and the question be on ordering the same to be engrossed for a third leading Mr CflASE moved thai it mitted to the of whole which was agreed to The convention then resolved itself into committee of the whole for the ther of the article an Mr WHEELER in the chair CASE moved so to amend as t give to the county of tw i senators in place of one and of the house instead of five Mi C remarked that by article as led by the tee had a i fraction of about To remedy this proposed reduce the representation one in thi house and increase it one in sennit which would add one to the total cf units of representation for that If that motion did not prevail he shout I feel to move thai one to the representation then appo Honed to that county in the house Mr LOVELL remarked by adopting this amendment it would come necessary to run through whole article and change the tation of county in the The amendment involved necessity of an apportionment M L went into a series of calculations to s low the difficulty of making the p amendment without tt e apportionment The coun y w s under represented in the senate and ovi r represented m the house The com- which the article we e in some men ure in g the over in house i- of senate by the y Iho senatorial districts FO i not n lines fore uith the nan e di winch y d no n nil e i should be in Umn i- of a and in tl e of would be dif I- cuh to make an equitable division of the county inio senatorial out dividing some of the districts Mr CASTLEMAN would state some reasons why the amendment of his col- league should prevail He had no doubi but the committee with whom the article originated had very ties upon them arid it would not be strange if they had overlooked some circumstances which ought to weigh in favor of proposition He had conversed with members on the subject and so far as he had done they generally agreed that was entitled io she now asked for But to those with whom he had riot conversed privately he wished to stale facts in case county had nearly would call u that in round numbers The ratio of tation in Senate was about with one they would have a fraction unrepresented in the Senate of about With five members of the House they would be over represented in body aboul 600 Deduct from the and it would leave unrepresented in either Nearly enough to entitle them to two members of Nearly all counties which had fractions unrepresented in the Senate were com- by members ot the House Th's he thought was j an undue preponderance in one branch of the legislature The ment did riot propose io a from any other county but only to add one member to the Senate If ibis were ilone the counly would ihen be over represented about 1500 The question was simply whether the county should be over represented 1500 or sented The counties preferred to have unrepresented fractions in both Houses compensated dy tation in the House because those counties being settled rendered it necessary each representative to interests oj a large area of country and il was therefore an will them to have their consist of the greatest ber practicable and under circum- stances he was not disposed to object to policy but in the more compact and settled as in the case of Waukesha there could no objections to making up iu the Senate the fractions d in the House Mr JUDD spoke Mr KING remarked that the tion before convention was one of figures and of a dry one but if Would listen moment he would endeavor to place the question 111 its true light It was impossible with the contemplated size of ine two houses to apportion to iwo and five representatives The was between giving to tt one senator and live lives or two senators and four Air K then proceeded to show by figures the resul s arid beatings of the two alternatives Mr CHASE believed amendment would only open the i door for r alterations The of Washington county was unfy about 300 belou that of VV It this alteration were made lo Waukesha the same alteration would have io be made to accomodate Washington county This would so tar the senatorial lhat would have as strong a chum for another senator as had then and so in Every member added lo the senate would reduce tauo of and originate a new claim in some quarter fur an additional senator bete and some would be lelt the largest The must By the appui made by the H liad en upon lie thought they con- tent to bear it The county would be well represented in numbers and be had it would be ably ed and suffer no serious inconvenience from the loss of her unrepresented tion Mi KILBOURN thought the vention not be deterred from jing by any such considerations as had been by the gentleman from Fond du Lac If apportionment was unjust they should go to Work and by proper amendments obviate the in- justue as far as it could be done He found that by setting off the riton into two grand divisions one of them containing a population of 000 have but while the oi her with a population of only 000 have ten senators He could not see by what rule gentlemen could reconcile such an apportionment with the p of justice After g the as nearly equal as possible among the smaller di- visior s of the State he thought should endeavor to equalize the senta ion still further by taking larger divisions of country and consolidating their fractions If the two great sions of the State to which he had ded were tu be equally represented in the he could not complain but he could not consent that a population of should have a majority in the senate over a population of The latger division of the country had an representation cf six in the House Tins would them a of the aggregate tion und he would not con plain if the rights of people were not ised 1.1 the senate The proposition of the gentleman from Mr would not equalize the tation in the senate of the two great di- visions to which he had alluded for this would require the addition of two or three members but it would make ii so t early equal m the senate lhat countering the over representation in the he would be satisfied Mr CASTLEMAN here gave some calculations in reply to the remarks of Mr JUDD and Mr CHASE Mr CHASE said the gentlemen from Milwaukee and Waukesha had both misunderstood his remarks He did nol mean that any needless injustice was done io Waukesha but thai if sha taken from extreme wing opposite position some other county ii be left in the same position which before occupied The was inseparable from a definite ratio of representation and the varying population of country They might remove by amendment the hardship from one county but it would then rest upon some other it from that and u would rest upon some other and so might follow up the inequality with interminably without possibility of destroying it Mr GrIFFORD ed with the committee on the subject the ar- ucle was and endeavored to secure of two tors nd four representatives to kesha but finding the majority of tbe committee inflexible upon thai point he favored the present arrangement Still he preferred two senators and four and as proposition had been offered by his colleague he should vole tor H Mr here addressed the Mr KILBOURN by arithmetical leu Iat Mr LOVELL defend d the report of by a series of calculation 3 The was ihen taken on the amendment anil in the ive 20 in the affirmative and the FEATHERSTONHAUGH moved so to amend as to give to and one- Mi F remarked lhat the report of the committee pin these two counties gave them one and he asked i h it they might ba and have a on fourth page
