USA > Connecticut > Connecticut in transition: 1775-1818 > Part 28
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Despite the leadership of Treadwell, Terry and Pitkin, Federalists "could not prevent the complete severance of church from state, the constitutional guaranty of the rights of conscience, or the recognition of the absolute equality before the law of all Christian denomina- tions." 29 Republican and sectarian had forced the hand of the Standing Order.
The article on education, with minor verbal changes, was accepted as submitted by the committee.30 The charter of Yale as modified by an agreement with the corporation in pursuance of the act of the Gen- eral Assembly of 1792 was confirmed. The school fund was declared a perpetual fund whose income could be used only in supporting and encouraging the public or common schools, and never diverted to other uses. Certainly this was not unfriendly legislation on the part of men who had been arraigned as plotters against the college and schools.
The ninth article, dealing with impeachment, was accepted as recom- mended by the committee.31 It was very similar to that provided for in the national constitution.
The tenth article included important general provisions of diverse nature. An oath of office for executive officials and members of the
29 Trumbull, Historical Notes, p. 56.
30 Journal, p. 54; Baldwin "Ecclesiastical Constitution of Yale College," in New Haven Hist. Soc., Papers, III, 415.
31 Journal, P. 54.
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COMPLETION OF THE REVOLUTION
General Assembly was formulated. Annual town meetings were pro- vided for the election of selectmen and police officers. A long section guaranteed the rights and status of all existing corporations. All judicial officers were to hold until the following June, unless they resigned or were removed according to law. The secretary and treasurer were to serve until their successors were selected. Military officers were to con- tinue until regularly removed. All laws not inconsistent with the con- stitution were to be in force until their expiration or repeal. These were temporary provisions in order to smooth the transition from the old to the new government. The validity of all bonds, debts, contracts, per- sonal or corporate, suits, actions and the like was guaranteed. This clause set at ease those who feared or who gave credence to Federalist claims that a constitution would mean an overthrow, a repudiation of debts, and an invalidation of all legal agreements. A fourth section ordained that no judge of the superior or supreme courts, member of Congress, federal office-holder, state treasurer, secretary or comptroller, sheriff or deputy sheriff should be eligible to the General Assembly. Henceforth this body could not be described as a set of office-holders, or its independence questioned.32
Article eleven, describing the method of amendment, was adopted as reported. Whenever a majority of the House deemed it necessary to alter the constitution, they might propose such alterations as they saw fit. These were to be published and continued until the next General Assembly when, if they were approved by two-thirds of both Houses, copies were to be sent by the secretary to the various town clerks, who were to submit them to the electors in freemen's meeting. If the pro- posals were approved by a majority vote, they became part of the organic law.33
32 A motion by McClellan, that no federal officer should be eligible to a judge- ship, was defeated. A proposal that "no clergyman or preacher of the gospel of any denomination, shall be capable of holding any civil office in this State, or of being a member of either branch of the Legislature, while he continues in the exer- cise of the pastoral or clerical functions," was laid on the table. Journal, pp. 26, 54, 55.
33 Journal, p. 55. The method of amendment was made intentionally difficult. Up to 1891, Judge Baldwin points out that but 28 out of 96 proposed amendments passed. While in his opinion most of the the amendments have been of negative value, the difficulty in driving them through has made for a permanence of the constitution, to the point of weakness. Experience has belied the prediction of the contemporary Scottish traveller. New Haven Hist. Soc., Papers, V, 227, 242-245; Loomis and Calhoun, Judicial History, p. 58.
Duncan, after stopping a few days in New Haven, wrote: "It does however
256
CONNECTICUT IN TRANSITION: 1775-1818
September 12 and 14 were given over to a consideration of the whole constitution.34 A last futile stand was made by the radical Republicans to district the state and render worthless the judiciary clauses. The independent judiciary was secured by a vote of 114 to 53. Timothy Pitkin moved to strike out the whole clause on religion, changing his motion to refer to the first section. On a call for a yea and nay vote, it was defeated by 114 to 79. A similar motion with regard to the second section was defeated by 114 to 72. These votes and motions displayed Congregational Federalism at its worst. Nathaniel Terry made a last assault on the single session plan, but the Assembly was opposed to two annual sessions. Lest the radical and reactionary elements continue the discussion indefinitely, Pierrepont Edwards's resolution calling for a final vote on the constitution at 5 p.m., September 15, was adopted. The cloture went into effect; and the constitution as returned by the en- grossing committee was read through and approved by a vote of 134 to 61.
This was not a strictly party vote.35 There were at least seventy-one Federalists in the convention, so that some ten or eleven must have voted for the constitution. A few more must have so voted, for several Republicans voted "nay." Nathaniel Terry, Henry Terry, Judge Mitch- ell, William Todd, John McClellan and R. Pierpont were among some of the best-known Federalists who favored the new instrument of gov- ernment. James Stevens, Robert Fairchild, the assistant secretary, and Alexander Wolcott, who proved an obstructionist in his consistent voting against the more moderate of his party, were the most prominent Republicans who opposed the constitution.36 All of the Federalists who
seem ominous of evil, that so little ceremony is at present used with the constitu- tions of the various States. The people of Connecticut, not contented with having prospered abundantly under the old system, have lately assembled a convention, composed of delegates from all parts of the country, in which the former order of things has been condemned entirely, and a completely new constitution manu- factured; which, among other things, provides for the same process being again gone through, as soon as the profanum vulgus takes it into its head to desire it. A sorry legacy the British Constitution would be to us, if it were at the mercy of a meeting of delegates, to be summoned whenever a majority of the people take a fancy for a new one; and I am afraid that if the Americans continue to cherish a fondness for such repairs, the highlandman's pistol with its new stock, lock and barrel, will bear a close resemblance to what is ultimately produced. This is uni- versal suffrage in its most pestilent character." Travels, II, 335.
34 Journal, pp. 61 ff.
35 Cf. Trumbull, Historical Notes, p. 58.
36 John M. Niles of the Hartford Times wrote: "The deliberations and con- clusions of a majority of the convention were not such as to commend themselves
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COMPLETION OF THE REVOLUTION
lived in the past voted against the constitution as a sacred duty. In gen- eral the members of both parties followed their party counsels on this question which alone marked the division between parties.
The chart will give an idea of the sectionalism of the vote, as it shows how the delegates of each town voted .* Seventy-six towns were represented by men in favor of the constitution. The delegates of thirty- two towns were opposed; of eleven towns divided. The delegate from one town failed to vote.
It was then resolved that the constitution should be signed by the president, countersigned by the clerks, and deposited with the secretary of state. Seven hundred copies were ordered to be distributed to the town clerks who were to submit the constitution to the electors on the first Monday in October. It was finally agreed that a majority vote of the electors should suffice for ratification, after motions for three-fifths, four-sevenths, and five-ninths had failed. A slight amendment was made the next day, September 16, by which the powers of government were continued in the hands of the governor, lieutenant governor and Gen- eral Assembly until the following May, in order that there be no inter- regnum. A vote of thanks expressed the general satisfaction with Gov- ernor Wolcott as moderator. With that the convention adjourned on September 16.37
The constitution which resulted from their three-weeks deliberation was bound to win the support of all fair-minded men.38 It did not satisfy several Republican extremists, nor the reactionary third of the members. It was essentially a compromise, although its principles were distinctly those of moderate Republicans. Its mere phraseology evidenced the inbred conservatism of even the so-called liberal members. Changes were few, but invariably for the best. The old rights of the towns were guaranteed. Representation remained the same; the state was not dis- tricted. The offices remained pretty much as of old. Christianity was
to the enlarged comprehension, the progressive republican mind, and high expecta- tions of Wolcott. ... The Constitution as presented, he discovered as defective, as unjust, as founded on no basis of republican equality, as avoiding in important par- ticulars accountability and responsibility, as a mere embodiment of the charter of 1662, which, though liberal in its day, was not adapted to present circumstances and the changed condition of the country and times in 1818." Stiles, Windsor, p. 835.
* The chart to which this sentence refers is omitted from the present edition, as it was from the original .- Editor.
37 Journal, pp. 71-72. The Convention cost the state $11,313.25, according to the treasury debenture. Mercury, Nov. 10, 1818.
38 Cf. Baldwin in New Haven Hist. Soc., Papers, V, 227; preface of Revised Statutes (1821).
258
CONNECTICUT IN TRANSITION: 1775-1818
honored; the quasi-legal connection between Congregationalism and the state was severed. There was no display of anticlericalism; the one measure aimed at the ministry was laid upon the table. Education was secured. The powers of government were divided; the judiciary was made independent. In a word, the governmental institutions and prac- tices of the past were revised, brought up to date, and set forth as the organic law of the state, instead of being left undetermined in the shadowy background of usage and statutory provisions. The arrange- ment of the constitution as a state document is confused, but its lan- guage is simple and has required little interpretation by the courts.39 Such was the constitution submitted to the freemen at their town meet- ings.
Ratification by the voters remained in doubt until the last. So many Democrats were ill pleased with the constitution that its acceptance de- pended upon Federalist votes. Some of the delegates did not feel called upon to argue its merits before their constituents. This was especially true of the Federalists, who voted in convention in accord- ance with their own views rather than those of their party. Gen. Nathaniel Terry used his great political influence to win Federalist votes and to swing Hartford for the constitution. Seth P. Beers, a leading Tolerationist lawyer, thought that Terry did more than any other in- dividual to secure its ratification.40
Federalists argued that ninety days was a short time in which to evolve a system of government breaking so radically with the past.41 Time enough had not been given to its consideration, for it must be re- membered that under it their children's children must live. This instru- ment of government was drawn in three weeks, by partisans in the heat of factional strife. If it was in any way moderate, that was due to the watchfulness of Federalist leaders. They alone prevented the gerry- mandering of the state. It was intimated that under the constitution innovations would continue until Democrats had their will. Passage by a bare majority, they argued, was not right, for it left a strong minority with too little protection. The militia were advised to look well into a constitution which in case of war gave so much authority over them
39 The bill of rights has required more interpretation than all other articles combined. Loomis and Calhoun, Judicial History, p. 58.
40 Trumbull, Historical Notes, p. 59.
41 The Crisis, p. 16; Courant, Sept. 15, 22, 29, Oct. 6; Conn. Mirror, Sept. 21, Oct. 5; Conn. Journal, Sept. 15, 22, Oct. 6, 1818; Trumbull, Address, pp. 12 ff. Rob- bins wrote: "Should it be adopted, I shall view the event as a great frown of heaven." Diary, I, 759.
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COMPLETION OF THE REVOLUTION
to the federal executive. Hartford papers charged New Haven leaders with a selfish localism in favoring the constitution simply because it made New Haven a capital. They were charged with already boasting that the city's business would increase and property values rise twenty- five per cent, and with contending that for these reasons property own- ers and merchants should support the constitution. Then, there was an attempt to capitalize sympathy for Governor Treadwell, who was said to have been treated unfairly, if not worse, by the aggressive majority of the convention. This may have had considerable influence with the old element which Treadwell represented. The one clause in the con- stitution which Federalists defended was that establishing an independent judiciary, which they could honestly maintain had been incorporated because of Federalist support.
Tolerationists were won by the religious provisions. Republicans were not as ardent supporters as one might expect. They were disap- pointed in the failure to district the state, a principle for which they had long contended. It was not done until 1827. They were afraid of the judiciary. On the whole, they regarded the constitution as better than no constitution. Furthermore, there was the amending clause in which they lodged future hopes.42
October fifth told the tale. A heavy vote was cast in all towns; only Burlington failed to make a return. For the constitution, there were 13,918 votes to 12,364, or a majority of 1,554 votes out of a total of 26,282.43 The closeness of the vote is evidence that the constitution did
42 Conn. Herald, New Haven Register, and Mercury-issues of Sept. 29.
43 Journal (appendix), pp. 117-118; Conn. Journal and Mercury, Oct. 13. The following table gives the vote by counties; one town is missing in Hartford County, and the town of Litchfield cast a tie vote.
VOTES
TOWNS
COUNTIES
For
Against
For
Against
Hartford
2,234
2,843
5
12
New Haven
2,385
1,572
12
5
New London
1,740
792
10
4
Fairfield
1,836
1,019
15
2
Windham
1,777
1,671
9
6
Litchfield
2,027
2,779
5
16
Middlesex
1,05I
786
5
2
Tolland
868
902
5
5
13,918
12,364
66
52
260
CONNECTICUT IN TRANSITION: 1775-1818
not command the full reform electorate. Federalists complained that there was no majority, for the state had over thirty thousand freemen; and that there were more than 1,554 new voters, the purity of whose votes was dubious. The returns were made to the October session of the General Assembly, which declared that the ratified constitution was the supreme law of the commonwealth.44
The vote by towns is interesting. By looking at the chart and com- paring the vote with that cast in 1817, it will be seen that in general the towns voted according to party. The number of bolters or independent voters was seldom sufficient to throw a Wolcott town against the con- stitution. On the other hand, the constitution was ratified by towns not in the reformers' list. Federalist losses are readily seen along with the more state-wide Toleration strength. A comparison with the re- ligious chart will make clear the importance of the dissenters' vote, for where dissent thrived, the town was for ratification. New Haven County offered a surprise, in that only five of its seventeen towns regis- tered against the constitution. The city of New Haven gave a two to one vote in favor of the constitution. Apparently there was some truth in charges that selfish localism had won the day. Fairfield and New London as dissenting counties gave the heaviest majorities for the con- stitution by towns; only six of their thirty-one voted "nay." Litchfield and Hartford counties gave heavy Federalist majorities, while Tolland went Federalist by a small vote. The hostility of the purely agricultural towns can only be ascribed to the unreasoning conservatism of the Connecticut countryman, which time has scarcely weakened.
As evidence of the party character of the vote, sixteen towns re- pudiated their delegates who had favored the constitution. Of those towns whose delegates were divided in the convention, six refused to follow Republican extremists in their opposition, while the rest failed to support their Federalist delegates who had favored the constitution.45
The adoption of the constitution was a cause of satisfaction. Re- publicans considered it their work, and claimed the credit. While not al-
44 Journal (appendix), pp. 119-121; Conn. Journal, Oct. 13.
45 The following towns repudiated their delegates who voted no: Hartford, East Windsor, Enfield, Granby, Simsbury, Guilford, Lisbon, Trumbull, Columbia, Hampton, Lebanon, Norfolk, Plymouth, Roxbury, Washington and East Haddam.
East Hartford, Greenwich, Stratford, Ashford, Middletown and Stamford reprimanded the bolting Republicans by voting for the Constitution. Six towns- Wethersfield, Pomfret, Woodstock, Cornwall, Harwinton, and Winchester-whose delegates were divided, voted down the constitution.
LITCHFIELD
WIEN DE
MIDDLESEX
NEW LONDON
NEW
HAV
FAIRFIELD
VOTE ON CONSTITUTION BY TOWNS
Against
For.
-
No vote.
-
Tie vote
261
COMPLETION OF THE REVOLUTION
together pleased, they regarded it as a written safeguard of their rights, civil and religious.46 Its adoption brought political quiet, for, as Judge Trumbull wrote, it "quieted the minds of those who wished for an enlargement of the right of suffrage, and for greater freedom in re- ligion." 47 The spirit of bitterness aroused by the partisanship of pam- phleteers died down. Men repented the violence of the past. As Hol- lister, who hesitated to treat this period in 1855, wrote:
Gradually too most of them [partisans] learned to reverence the old Charter, for the good it had done during a hundred and fifty years of hard and honest service, while at the same time they spoke, some loudly, and others in a more subdued tone, in praise of the constitution, which gave equal rights, ecclesiastical as well as civil, to all inhabitants of the state.48
Right-minded Federalists, even opponents of the constitution, coun- seled its acceptance. The party officially condemned the revolution in its manifestoes to the voters, in a vain attempt to make an issue of the question. This was impossible. The party was dying and the constitu- tion vote sounded its knell.
The years 1818-1819 witnessed the completion of the revolution.49
46 "There seems to be great rejoicing of Democracy and triumphings of the wicked at the adoption of the new constitution. They evidently consider it a tri- umph over righteousness," wrote Robbins. Diary, I, 759. The Mercury (October 13) wrote editorially: "Connecticut has now a Constitution, founded on sound and liberal principles. The rights of all are secured; and the humble Christian is now permitted to worship his God without fearing the lash of civil persecution." Bar- stow in his History of New Hampshire (p. 426) wrote that all men of independent and enlightened views rejoiced at this sundering of church and state in Connecticut.
47 Judge Trumbull, a displaced judge and despiser of reform, declared: "The formation and adoption of the new Constitution has quieted the minds of those who wished for an enlargement of the right of suffrage, and for greater freedom in religion. All male citizens above twenty-one years of age may now vote at our elections and the small nominal superiority which the Congregationalists had over the other denominations, arising solely from their being a majority, is now removed; and all are placed on a perfect level. Whether these provisions are wise or unwise, and whether it was discreet to cause such changes in our political institutions, is not now to be questioned. All agree that the Constitution must be implicitly obeyed, as the supreme law of the land." Address (1819), p. I. Cf. Church, Historical Ad- dress, p. 67.
48 Connecticut, II, 516.
49 Church Ms. "In the great revolution which immediately followed the retire- ment of Governor Smith, and of which his rejection was the first great wave, Con- necticut abdicated her Christian standing. The ancient spirit which had shaped her institutions, and linked her, in her corporate capacity, to the throne of the Almighty for almost two hundred years, was then expelled, and the State ceased henceforth, to wield power as a religious trust. New and alien principles obtained the ascend-
262
CONNECTICUT IN TRANSITION: 1775-1818
Governor Wolcott in October advised a revision of the laws in con- formity with the constitution. The code appeared in 1821. A new plan of taxation as suggested by the governor and the committee of investi- gation was adopted. Property was henceforth taxed according to its value, not its estimated productivity. Poll taxes were lessened; burdens were equalized; and professional skill and personal initiative were no longer penalized. Agriculturalists were less apt to emigrate. In a word, taxes were equalized and fairly apportioned.
Supplementary laws were passed. An act provided for the admission of freemen and for the canvassing of votes. A new election law was passed. A judiciary act followed. School funds were ordered appor- tioned to the districts on the basis of children of school age, not on that of taxable wealth. Within a short time not only the Episcopalians but the Methodists had their colleges. Marriages were recognized if performed by other than Congregational ministers or those in legally established societies or by magistrates. This democratic legislation completed the reform movement.
The greatest single result of the reform movement, which culmi- nated in the written constitution, was after all the severance of the union of church and state.50 The divorce redounded to the advantage of both. No longer could there be a "religious test" for office-holders. Religion was made purely voluntary. A man might belong to any church or no church; he might contribute to the support of religion or not, as he pleased. No longer were men legally dissenters or "certificate-men." No longer was there a tithe which men must pay or, as the New Haven Register charged, see even their Bible seized and sold.51 Yet religion
ancy, and the divine life, imbreathed into the Commonwealth, by its godly found- ers, was no longer the controlling law. The multiplication of Christian sects un- doubtedly rendered a strict adherence to the original constitution both unwise and impossible, but could not justify such a total departure from the old foundations. Schisms in the Church can never necessitate the apostasy of the State." Eulogy in Andrews, John Cotton Smith, p. 40. Treadwell's life "involves that of the last days of the Puritan dynasty, and of a revolution which although bloodless, and for the most part peaceful, produced a change in the political aspect of the Commonwealth as marked and real, as those which overturn the most powerful empires." Olmstead, Treadwell, pp. 3-4.
50 Tudor, Letters, p. 93; Wilson, Travels, p. 104; Hetrick, Canterbury, p. 8; Peck, Burlington, p. 18; Pease and Niles, Gazetteer, p. 19; Gold, Cornwall, p. 135. Cf. Rev. Washington Gladden, "Anti-Papal Panic," Harper's Weekly, July 18, 1914. 51 Conn. Mirror, Oct. 26, 1818.
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COMPLETION OF THE REVOLUTION
was not destroyed, as the Standing Order had predicted, when the Gospel should be left to voluntary support.
The abolition of the tithe at first embarrassed the finances of the Congregational societies, but they managed to support their ministry through the income from the church and glebe lands early donated by the state and never confiscated under the plea of separation by the American "Jacobins." Moreover, there was a revenue from the rental of pews, popular subscriptions, bequests to the society fund, and in some parishes dividends from bank stock. In an occasional society the tithe system was voluntarily retained for a time.52
Episcopalian congregations contrived to sustain themselves by sub- scriptions and pew rentals. Methodists and Baptists suffered, as many of their members had seceded from the regular societies for financial or administrative reasons rather than because of religious convictions. Their growth slackened. Too often luke-warm members forsook the contribution box even while retaining membership in the society. Yet there was little real hardship under the voluntary system.
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