USA > Rhode Island > Providence County > Providence > State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations at the end of the century : a history, Volume 1 > Part 41
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2 Secretary of state, attorney-general and general treasurer.
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In the castern district Durfee received 6,283 votes to 1,987 for Thomas Davis, the Demoeratie candidate. Hoppin's vote for Governor was 11,130, and Potter's only 2,729. The Know Nothing candidates for the other offiees were all eleeted by more than two-thirds of the popular vote over both competitors. The relative strength of the three parties on the vote for Lieutenant-Governor was as follows: Know Nothing, 9,733 ; Democratie, 2,705 ; Whig, 1,309. The new party eleeted nearly all of the members of both houses of the general assembly.
Laws were passed in 1855 to prevent the issuance of free passes by railroads and regulating the management of the roads in their publie relations; regulating the business of foreign insurance companies operating in Rhode Island; for the more effectual suppression of gambling houses and games of chance; providing for the taking a new valuation of the ratable property of the state ; providing for the better and more effective assessment and collection of taxes; authorizing the city of Providence to establish a sinking fund; and raising the salary of the Governor and Lieutenant-Governor to $1,000 and $500 respec- tively.
In the house, Mareh 1, 1855, Mr. Borden, Whig, of Tiverton, pro- posed two amendments to the constitution, the first to allow the general assembly to regulate the compensation of its members, and the second to abolish the registry tax and substitute a poll tax. Both propositions failed to seeure the necessary constitutional majority, the vote upon them being 33 to 16 for the first and 33 to 15 for the second proposi- tion.
At the January session in 1856 four proposed articles of amendment to the constitution, proposed by Senators William A. Piree of Johns- ton and Denison of Westerly, both American-Republieans, were adopt- ed by both houses, and a fifth-instituting an educational qualifiea- tion for voters-was rejected. The proposed amendments were: (1) Abolishing the registry tax; (2) assessing a poll tax; (3) requiring a residence of twenty-one years in this country of naturalized voters; (4) fixing the compensation of assemblymen at $2 a day. The next assembly, in the June following, accepted all of the propositions but the third. The remaining three propositions were submitted to the people on the day of the presidential election, and were all defeated, none of them receiving even a majority.
The important legislation of 1856 consisted of an aet ereating a state auditor ; an act coneerning truant ehildren ; a new militia law, provid- ing for the holding of an annual muster ; an amendment to the prohib- itory liquor law, allowing the appointment in each municipality of persons to sell intoxieating liquors for chemieal, sacramental and eulinary uses, as well as for medieinal and meehanieal purposes; an amendment to the marriage laws, dispensing with the former require- ment for the publication of the banns in religious meetings ; and an
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act dividing the town of Tiverton and incorporating the northern portion as the town of Fall River.1
The general assembly expressed its opinion of national matters this year by appropriate resolutions regarding "Bleeding Kansas," and Brooks's dastardly assault upon Sumner. At a public meeting, called in Providence, to voice popular indignation against the latter act, Charles S. Bradley and other leading Democrats made speeches ex- pressing their condemnation of club arguments, but they were not able to prevent many of the rank and file of their party from going over to the new anti-slavery party.2
The Know Nothings, now known as the American party, renomi- nated Governor Hoppin, with Nicholas Brown of Warwick for Lieu- tenant-Governor. The Democratic candidates were Americus V. Potter and Duncan C. Pell of Newport. The Whigs were no longer in existence, but some of the remnant of that party together with certain Free Soilers and anti-slavery Democrats, who were opposed to the Know Nothings, formed a straight Republican organization and nomi- nated Sylvester Robinson of South Kingstown for Lieutenant-Gover- nor. Hoppin, who was endorsed by the Republicans, received 9,865 votes to 7,131 for Potter. The totals of the three parties, as shown by the vote for Lieutenant-Governor, were: American, 7,882; Demo- cratic, 7,227; Republican, 1,306.
In the presidential campaign of 1856 most of the Americans joined the straight Republicans in supporting Fremont, although several influential members of the party-among whom may be mentioned Henry Y. Cranston, Charles C. Van Zandt, and ex-Governor William Sprague-favored Fillmore. The vote of the state was: Fremont, 11,467 ; Buchanan, 6,680; Fillmore, 1,675.
The "American Republicans" and the Republicans united on a state ticket, except for Licutenant-Governor, in 1857. They renomi- nated Governor Hoppin, and upon his declining named Elisha Dyer for first place. The Republicans nominated Thomas G. Turner of Warren for Lieutenant-Governor, while the American Republicans selected Stephen G. Mason of Smithfield for the position. Americus V. Potter and Isaac Hall of North Kingstown were the Democratic candidates. Dyer and the coalition ticket were elected by large major- ities, Dyer's vote being 9,591, and Potter's, 5,323. There was no choice for Lieutenant-Governor. The Republican vote was 5,781, the Democratic, 5,126, and the American Republican, 3,816. Turner was elected by the general assembly. The Americans and Republicans united upon congressional candidates, Nathaniel B. Durfee being nom-
1This year was the first in which a regular appropriation bill to cover the estimated expenses of the state government was passed .
2 The proceedings of this meeting were printed, under the title of The Outrage in the Senate.
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inated for re-election in the castern district, while William D. Brayton of Warwiek was their eandidate in the other district. The Democratie candidates in the two districts were respectively Ambrose E. Burnside of Bristol and cx-Governor Jackson, then a resident of Seituate. Durfee was elected by a majority of 3,467, and Brayton by 632. On January 9, 1857, James F. Simmons was elected to the United States senate to succeed Senator James. He received 63 votes in grand com- mittec. The Demoerats supported cx-Governor Jaekson, who received 21 votes.
The somewhat discordant elements in the composition of the Amer- iean Republican coalition were brought to view in the mayoralty election in Providence in 1857. Stephen T. Olney was the nominee of the caucus, after several ballots, in which young Thomas A. Doyle was his leading competitor. There were some charges of unfairness, and, according to the Democratic organ, the Post, which delighted to expose the troubles of its opponents, the question of locality was a factor in the case, the westsiders believing that the eastsiders were monopolizing too many of the offices. Mr. Doyle, who lived on the west side, ran as an independent and prevented an eleetion. A choice was not effected until the fifth trial, when William M. Rodman, the American Repub- lican candidate, had a clear field against John N. Francis, the Demo- cratic nominee. The fact that the Democratie vote increased in the course of this faetional contest from 556 to 1,771 showed that there was a large element professing the principles of the Democratic party in the city, notwithstanding the smallness of the party vote in recent years.
A large portion of the legislative sessions in 1857 were consumed in the revision of the laws. In considering the eriminal eode the house voted to make murder punishable by death in all cases, but the change was rejected by the senate, the vote standing 12 to 14. Real estate was made liable for debts ; grog shops and houses of ill-repute were to be proceeded against as common nuisances, unless abated within five days after complaint should be made against them; and the provision in the statute law, making drunkenness punishable as an offense, was stricken out. A motion by Mr. Knowles of Providence in the house to give widows with children one-half of their husbands' personal estate, and all of it where they were childless, was rejected. An act chartering the Woonasquatueket Railroad company, incorporated this year, contained the same phraseology regarding toll houses, toll gates, and the like, which was in evidenee in the first railroad charter in 1832, and which was inherited from the old turnpike and plank-road charters.
The panic of 1857 was for a short time very seriously felt in Rhode Island. Towards the elose of the year the Providence Journal pub-
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lished long lists of the factories in and near Providence which were closed or were running on short time. Its statements showed that, about Christmas time, at least three-fourths of the machinery of the cotton factories was idle.
Representative George L. Clarke of Providence introduced a bill at the January session in 1858, to restrict the amount of bank issues and require banks to make weekly reports. As finally adopted the act required banks to make detailed reports of their condition semi- annually, and to report their general condition to the secretary of state for publication in Providence newspapers fortnightly. Banks were forbidden, under severe penalties, to charge directly or indirectly more than six per cent. annual interest. An act was passed providing that no railroad should be allowed to lay rails through any Providence streets until consent thereto had been given by vote of the property electors of the city. Acts were passed for the better enforcement of sanitary measures and for the prevention of the spreading of infec- tious and contagious diseases in the cities of Providence and Newport. A committee was appointed to make inquiry and report on the feasi- bility of erecting a new State House at Providence. The Republican legislature of 1854 had hurriedly repealed the act passed by the Demo- crats the year before, authorizing the election of aldermen in the city of Providence by wards, instead of on a general ticket. The act then repealed was re-enacted by the Republicans this year, with the added provision that both aldermen and councilmen should be elected by a plurality vote. The Providence city charter was also amended-in accordance with the result of a popular vote of the city, asking for such action-so as to provide for the election of the city clerk, city treasurer, assessors of taxes, city solicitor, collector of taxes, city mar- shal, harbor master, overseer of the poor and superintendent of health by popular vote. A resolution presented by Representative Ellis L. Blake of Cumberland to abolish separate schools in Providence for colored children, failed of passage. The proposition had been brought forward at nearly every regular session for several years, but public opinion did not yet demand the change.
The American Republicans and straight Republicans held separate conventions in 1858, but finally ran a coalition ticket which was elected with little opposition. They renominated the ticket of the year before with the exception of the candidate for attorney-general, for which office Jerome B. Kimball of Providence was named in place of Charles Hart, who had resigned the office in January, 1858. The Democrats nominated Alexander Duncan, a wealthy landholder of Providence, but he declined and Elisha R. Potter was nominated in his place, with Ariel Ballou as the candidate for Lieutenant-Governor. Dyer received 7,934 and Potter 3,572 votes. On May 28, 1858, ex-Governor Henry
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STATE OF RHODE ISLAND AND PROVIDENCE PLANTATIONS.
B. Anthony was elected to the United States senate, receiving 92 out of 100 votes. George H. Browne, the Democratic candidate, had seven votes, and Elisha Dyer onc. The Republicans and Americans clashed over the legislative ticket in Providence, and it required eight elections to clect a full quota of officers. The Democratic state convention gave a qualified endorsement to the Lecompton (Kansas) constitution in its resolutions this year. A short time before the convention met a resolu- tion instructing and requesting Rhode Island Congressmen to oppose the admission of Kansas under that constitution-a resolution intro- duced by Senator Alfred Anthony of Johnston, a Douglas Democrat- passed both houses of the general assembly without opposition.
Lieutenant-Governor Turner was nominated by the American Re- publicans and the Republicans for Governor in 1859 and the two con- ventions agreed upon the same candidates for secretary of state and attorney-general. They made separate nominations for Lieutenant- Governor and general treasurer, the American Republicans naming Isaac Saunders of Scituate for the former office, while the Republicans named Thomas J. Hill of Warwick. Saunders received 5,570, Hill 3,317, and Fenner Brown, Democrat, 3,351 votes. Saunders and Samuel A. Parker, the American Republican candidate for general treasurer, were elected by the general assembly. Turner's majority for Governor was 5,378, Elisha R. Potter being the opposing candi- date. Jerome B. Kimball, the coalition candidate for attorney-gen- eral, was elected by a majority of 4,430 votes. As it was shown, how- ever, that he was not a qualified voter on the day of the state election, the grand committee decided that there was no election, and elected Charles Hart, one of the candidates who ran against him. Mr. Hart accepted the office, qualificd and immediately resigned. Mr. Kimball was then elected by the general assembly to the office for which he was chosen by the people. William D. Brayton was re-elected to Congress in the western district by 1,349 majority over Alfred Anthony, Demo- crat. In the eastern district there was no choice on the first trial, Christopher Robinson, American Republican, receiving 3,846; Thomas Davis, Republican, 2,450; Olney Arnold, Democrat, 1,507. A second election was held in June, when, Mr. Arnold having withdrawn, Mr. Robinson was elected.
The mechanics' lien law was amended by making vessels as well as real estate and chattels attachable for labor and material in their con- struction and repair. Representatives William Sanford of Providence and Sullivan Ballou of Smithfield, both American Republicans, intro- duced resolutions, respectively, at the January session, for the appoint- ment of a joint committee to consider the subject of amending the constitution, and for a constitutional convention. A joint special com- mittec was appointed to consider and report what if any amendments might be submitted to the people in April. There is no record of any
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report having been made. Mr. Sheffield of Newport introduced a bill in the house, which did not pass, to allow persons imprisoned for debt on actions for trover, to take the poor debtor's oath, after having been imprisoned for ninety days. A good deal of ill-feeling was exhibited in the assembly over the case of Ives against Hazard,1 which had been decided in favor of the plaintiff some years before. The defendant, Charles T. Hazard, petitioned for a rehearing, and a resolution revers- ing the decision of the Supreme Court was finally laid on the table by a vote of 36 to 31. The chief justice of the Supreme Court, Samuel Ames, was also the reporter of the decisions of the court, and he was openly charged in the assembly and in the public press with having unfairly reported the case. He asked for an investigation, and a joint special committee, of which Speaker Van Zandt-the leader in the house of the attack on the Supreme Court-was chairman, made a report, declaring that the chief justice had not compiled the report "in such a manner as to subject him to the censure of this house." This celebrated case brought up the question of the constitutional right of the general assembly to reverse a decision of the Supreme Court. While the assembly was unquestionably the court of last resort under the charter, a majority of the legal talent in the assembly as well as of. the other members of the Rhode Island bar, contended that the judicial functions of the assembly had been surrendered in framing the consti- tution. The Supreme Court was asked for its opinion upon the question, and it denied the right of the assembly to pass upon court decisions.
The John Brown raid, toward the close of the year 1859, caused great excitement in Rhode Island as elsewhere. Public meetings were held, and in some cases speeches of radical anti-slavery men were almost incendiary in character ; but many of the Republicans feared the effect of the John Brown act, and of its endorsement at the North, upon the South, and were ready to unite with the Democrats in a con- stitutional union movement. Meetings were held with this view early in 1860. The Republicans held their convention January 4, 1860, and nominated Seth Padelford of Providence for Governor and Stephen N. Mason of Smithfield for Lieutenant-Governor. The nomination of Padelford was unsatisfactory to many Republicans, because of his supposed radicalism, and a convention of the "bolters" held in Provi- dence on February 1, nominated Colonel William Sprague of Warwick
1 From the testimony it appeared that Charles T. Hazard of Newport had been deputed to purchase certain real estate in that city at a stipulated price by Robert H. Ives of Providence; that he bought it for himself and agreed to sell it to Ives at about 50 per cent. advance, and afterwards pleaded his wife's re- fusal to sign the deed; that Ives, holding his written promise, insisted upon his keeping his agreement, and brought a suit in equity, which the Supreme Court decided in his favor. The numerous pamphlets relating to this case are listed in Bartlett's Bibliography of R. I., p. 162.
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for Governor, and endorsed the other nominees of the regular conven- tion. Later in the month the Democratic state convention and a Young Men's convention met at Providence on the same day and nominated a "Union" ticket with Sprague for Governor, J. Russell Bullock of Bristol for Lieutenant-Governor, Walter Burges for attor- ney-general, and Bartlett and Parker, who had already held their offiees for several years, for seeretary of state and general treasurer. The combination was too strong for the Republicans, and the whole union ticket was elected, Sprague's vote being 12,278, and Padelford's 10,740. The Demoerats and Union Conservatives eleeted a majority of both houses of the general assembly, ineluding all of the Providenee assemblymen. Sprague had large majorities in both Providenee and Newport.
An interesting ineident of this campaign was a eampaign speech by Abraham Lincoln in Providenee on March 30. ' He was not then looked upon as a probable candidate for President, but his speech was an able and impressive one, and attraeted unusual attention, both in the Jour- nal and the opposition press. Later in the year, on August 1, Senator Douglas, then a nominee for President, partook of clams and addressed an admiring throng of 10,000 people at Roeky Point. The day before he spent in Providenee, where he was given a flattering reception by all parties. When the voters reached the ballot box, however, in November, the state went for Lincoln by a vote of 12,244 to 7,707 for Douglas.
In the senate, February 21, 1860, Mr. Burges, Demoerat, of Cran- ston, in behalf of a joint special committee, reported four pro- posed constitutional amendments. They were: to repeal the registry tax and substitute a poll tax ; to provide a regular salary for members of the general assembly, subjeet to deduetions for non-attendance; to relieve the Governor from presiding in the senate and make the Lieutenant-Governor its presiding offieer; and declaring that the general assembly continues to exereise the same power of granting new trials and rehearings that it possessed before the adoption of the con- stitution. The propositions were all rejeeted by the senate.
Aets were passed in 1860 to prevent the introduction of infectious and contagious disease among neat cattle; and submitting the ques- tion of the ereetion of a new State House to popular vote. The pro- posal was to erect a new structure in Providence at a cost of not more than one hundred and fifty thousand dollars. The proposition was overwhelmingly defeated, nearly every town outside of Providence, voting against it. An act for the abolition of colored sehools in Provi- denee was defeated in the house at the January session, by four major- ity. At the same session, Charles T. Hazard, the complaining litigant in the famous Ives vs. Hazard ease, was given leave to withdraw by a vote of 35 to 28 in the house. Mr. Van Zandt, who had strongly
PAWTUXET COVE LOOKING TOWARD THE NORTH.
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championed the petitioner's cause the previous year, favored the motion, declaring that he had been grossly deceived in the case. A proposed amendment to the laws governing the courts, by which the reportership was to be separated from the office of chief justice, was defeated in the house by a decisive vote.
The boundary dispute with Massachusetts, the mention of which carries us back to colonial days, was now in a fair way of settlement. For some twenty years or more proceedings in equity had been pending in the Supreme Court of the United States, during which time the state had from time to time employed some of its best legal talent to look after its interests. An agreement for an adjustment of the boundary was now made by the assembly in March, 1860, and was acceded to by Massachusetts in the following month. The change was consummated on March 1, 1862. The practical result was the cession of the town of Fall River, Rhode Island, to Massachusetts, in exchange for the greater portion of the town of Pawtucket, Massachusetts, and the western part of the town of Seekonk, in that state, which after its annexation became the town of East Providence. The inhabitants of the several towns subjected to the proposed transfer were generally in favor of the change.1 Further action was taken regarding the bound- ary at the January session in 1861, as considerable legislation was required to adjust legal conditions in the annexed portions to Rhode Island laws.
The assembly at this session restored the charter of the "Grand Lodge of Ancient Free and Accepted Masons of the State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations," which had been surrendered to the state in 1834. The first charters for horse railroads were granted at this session. They were for a road from Central Falls through Pawtucket to Providence, and two lines from Olneyville to Providence, by the way of Broadway and High streets, respectively. According to the census of 1860, Providence had 50,666 inhabitants. Smithfield had increased to 13,283, and Newport to 10,508. The great gains of North Provi- dence from 7,680 to 11,818, and of Cranston from 4,311 to 7,500 were chiefly due to their proximity to Providence.
1 A singular circumstance connected with this boundary settlement was the apparant unfamiliarity with local geography shown by the boundary committee which rendered a report at the January session in 1860. In giving a detailed ac- count of the accessions to or excisions from the various towns on the border in the adjustment of the line, no reference whatever was made to the town of Paw- tucket, which it was proposed to transfer almost bodily to Rhode Island. The committee speak of the proposed a cessions of territory "from the towns of Westport, Swanzey and Seekonk." The Massachusetts town of Pawtucket was severed from Seekonk in 1828, and had been a separate town for thirty-two years when this report was made, but the committee had presumably taken its bearings from old surveys, and they evidently considered the term "Paw- tucket " as only expressive of large twin villages in the towns of North Provi- dence, Rhode Island, and Seekonk, Massachusetts, separated from each other by the Seekonk river.
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The Republicans made a great effort to defeat the coalition against them in 1861. They nominated James Y. Smith of Providence for Governor, Simon Henry Greene of Warwick for Lieutenant-Governor, and Sullivan Ballou of Smithfield for attorney-general. The Demo- crats and Constitutional Unionists renominated Sprague and Burges and nominated Samuel G. Arnold of Middletown for Lieutenant-Gov- ernor. The coalition candidates were elected by majorities of from1,506 to 1,661. The vote for Governor was Sprague, 12,005; Smith, 10,326. William P. Sheffield and George H. Browne, the coalition candidates for Congress, were elected by moderate majorities over Christopher Robinson and William D. Brayton respectively.
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