86 The Financial History of Connecticut. 



3. The General Assembly. 



In framing the state constitution the Republicans provided that 

 beginning with the year 1819 the assembly should have but one 

 regular session annually to be held in May.^ The salaries of the 

 senators and representatives were at first the same as had been 

 received by the assistants and deputies before the adoption of the 

 constitution. 2 A comparison of the average annual expense of the 

 assembly for the two years ending April 9, 1819, with the average 

 for the two years ending March 31, 1821, shows the saving to the 

 state effected by this change. The average expense for the last two 

 years under the system of two sessions was $27,535.50; for the first 

 two years of the one-session system the average annual expense was 

 only $17,436.50, a decrease of ten thousand dollars a year. The 

 RepubHcans did not stop at this point, but in 1820 they reduced the 

 pay of the senators from three dollars a day to two dollars a day and 

 the daily pay of the representatives from two dollars to one dollar 

 and fifty cents. Both were allowed nine cents a mile for travel to 

 and from the place of holding the session.^ The economy of the 

 party is shown by the following comparison. The average annual 

 cost of holding two sessions from May 1, 1806, to April 9, 1819, 

 was twenty-two thousand one hundred twenty-one dollars. Under 

 the Repubhcan administration the average cost per annum from 

 April 10, 1819, to March 31, 1832, was reduced to fourteen thousand 

 three hundred sixty-eight dollars. The salaries of the legislators 

 established by the Republicans in 1820 remained unchanged through- 

 out the period, but an amendment to the constitution in 1828 in- 

 creased the membership of the senate (beginning in May, 1830) 

 from twelve to not less than eighteen nor more than twenty-four.* 

 Beginning with the May session of 1832, the senate consisted of 

 twenty-one members.^ This enlargement of the senate increased 

 the expenses of the legislature, raising the annual average for the 

 remaining fourteen years of the period (1832—1846) to eighteen 

 thousand sixty-two dollars. Even this is a smaller average than 

 the average incurred under the previous system of two sessions in 

 every year. 



The expenses of the convention that drew up the constitution in the 

 autumn of 1818 were eleven thousand three hundred thirteen dollars. 



1 Conn. Constitution, art. 3, sec. 2. 



2 Public Statute Laws, Oct. 1818, chap. 12, p. 329. 

 ^ Public Statute Laws, 1820, chap. 58. 



* Amendments to Conn. Constitution, art. i. 

 5 Public Statute Laws, May 1831, chap. 2. 



