the chief executive officials, and the courts of justice, with provisions
regulating the electoral franchise;
Provisions creating, or directing the creation of, a system of local government for cities and rural areas;
Miscellaneous provisions relating to law and administration, including the militia, revenue and taxation, state prisons and hospitals, agriculture, banking and other corporations, railways, labour questions;
Provisions for the amendment of the constitution;
A schedule prescribing the method of submitting the draft constitution to the vote of the people, with temporary provisions regulating the mode of transition from the old constitutional arrangements to the new ones.
The method of amending the constitution varies in detail from state to state, but that most usual is for the legislature to propose amendments, often by a prescribed majority, and for these amendments to be voted on by the people. Such amendments have latterly come to include many matters not strictly constitutional, and so to constitute a species of direct legislation by the people similar in principle to what is called in Switzerland the Referendum. Some states have recently allowed a prescribed number of voters to propose, by what is called the Initiative, amendments which are submitted to the vote of all the citizens without the intervention of the legislature.
Two remarkable changes have passed over the state constitutions. In the earlier days of the republic they were comparatively short and simple instruments, confined to the definition of civic rights and the establishment of a frame of government. They have now become very long and elaborate documents, seven, eight or ten times as long as the Federal Constitution, and containing a vast number of provisions on all sorts of subjects, many of them partaking of the nature of ordinary statutes passed by a legislature rather than safeguards suitable to a fundamental instrument. And secondly, whereas in earlier days the constitutions were seldom changed, they are now frequently recast or amended. Only Maine and Massachusetts and a few of the newer states live under original constitutions, and only Massachusetts is under a constitution older than the 19th century. Some have recast their constitutions seven or eight times. Some provide for the revision of the constitution at stated intervals. Notwithstanding the facility and frequency of amendments, the variations between one constitution and another are less conspicuous than might have been expected. There is, however, a distinction of type and character between those of the western and southern and those of the eastern states, the former being generally more prolix, more prone to go into details, more apt to contain new experiments in legislation.
Comparing the old constitutions with the new ones, it may be said that the note of those enacted in the first thirty or forty years of the republic was their jealousy of executive power and their careful safeguarding of the rights of the citizen; that of the second period, from 1820 to the Civil War (1861-65), the democratization of the suffrage and of institutions generally; that of the third period (since the war to the present day), a disposition to limit the powers and check the action of the legislature, and to commit power to the hands of the whole people voting at the polls.
§ 5. In every state the legislature consists of two houses. This remarkable feature, originally due to the practice that had State Legislatures. prevailed in some colonies, and to the example of Great Britain, soon became universal, and the belief in its necessity has passed into a fundamental dogma, the idea being that a single chamber would be either hasty, or tyrannical or unscrupulous—perhaps all three—so that there must always be a second chamber to keep the first in order. The smaller house is called the Senate, the larger one is (usually) called the House of Representatives, sometimes, however, the Assembly—sometimes the House of Delegates. Both are chosen by popular vote, almost universally by the same voters, and usually in single-membered districts, and at the same time. The senatorial districts are, of course, larger than the house districts. A senator is usually chosen for a longer term (often four years) than a representative, and, in most cases, whereas the house is elected all at once, the senate is renewed only partially at each election. In some states by law, and in all by custom also, a member must reside in the district which he represents.
Universal manhood suffrage, subject to certain disqualifications (e.g. certain crimes or receipt of poor relief), is the rule in the great majority of states. Certain terms of residence within the United States, in the state, and in the voting district are generally prescribed, the periods varying from state to state. Nine states allow voting rights to aliens who have declared their intention to become citizens, and in some they can as taxpayers vote on financial matters submitted to a special vote. Kansas grants them a full municipal suffrage. Fourteen prescribe some sort of educational qualification. Five states—Wyoming, Colorado, Utah, Idaho and Washington—give the suffrage for all elections to women.[1] In 1905 women could vote at school elections in twenty-four states. Of late years seven Southern states, beginning with Mississippi (constitution of 1890) and including Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama and Louisiana, have so altered their constitutions as to exclude from voting the great bulk of their respective negro populations, by means of educational tests, property qualifications, a combination of both, or by other means, while various ingenious devices have been employed to admit a large part, at least, of the illiterate whites. In 1910 Oklahoma adopted provisions of the same kind. The suffrage for legislature elections generally determines that for all other elections within the state, and as a rule it carries with it eligibility to office. And by the Federal Constitution it is also the suffrage for Federal elections, viz. elections of representatives in Congress and of presidential electors.
Elections are now practically everywhere conducted under that system of secret voting, which is called in America “the Australian ballot,” and which is very similar to that used in the United Kingdom since 1872. There used to be a good deal of fraud practised at elections, including “personating” and “repeating,” as well as a good deal of bribery in a few states and in some of the larger cities. Legislation has reduced these evils in recent years; and efforts have been made to prevent the excessive expenditure of money at elections, and the making of contributions to party “campaign funds” by wealthy corporations who desire to secure some benefit for themselves. Another evil which has not yet been dealt with is the large number of posts for which the voter is expected at an election to select the best men. This, of course, does not apply to elections to a legislature; but in city elections, and to some extent in state elections and county elections also, it creates great difficulties, for how is the average citizen to know (especially in a large city) who are the fittest men out of a long list of candidates for perhaps ten or twenty offices, all of which have to be filled by election at the same time? The perception of these difficulties has evoked a movement for what is called “a short ballot.”
The number of members of the legislative chambers varies from state to state. Delaware with 17 senators and 35 representatives, has the smallest; Minnesota, with 63 senators, has the largest Senate; and New Hampshire (a small state) has, with its 390 representatives, the largest House. The New York houses number 51 and 150 respectively; those of Pennsylvania, 50 and 204; of Illinois, 51 and 153; of Ohio, 34 and 118; of Massachusetts, 40 and 240. In all states, members of the legislature receive a salary, which is the same for both houses, some states fixing an annual sum, but most preferring a per diem rate, while the maximum is generally determined by a limitation on the length of the session.
It has become the wish of the people in most places to have sessions both short and few. Whereas formerly legislatures met annually, regular sessions are now biennial except in New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Georgia and South Carolina—all original states. In Alabama the legislature meets regularly once only in four years, though it may be convoked in the interval.
The Senates act as courts for the trial of state officers impeached by the house (in imitation of the British House of Lords Powers and Functions of the State Legislatures. and the Federal Senate), and have in some states the function of confirming or refusing appointments made by the governor. Otherwise the powers and procedure of the two houses are everywhere substantially identical, though it is worth noting that whereas every house chooses its own Speaker, the president of
- ↑ Woman suffrage amendments to state constitutions have been rejected by the people in at least twelve states and in two territories. State organizations of women to oppose the extension of the suffrage to women exist in Illinois, Massachusetts, New York and Oregon; possibly in other states also.
