INTRODUCTION. 



vote for all officers elected by the people, and may be chosen or appointed to 

 places of trust or profit ; but the governor must be a native citizen of the United 

 States, and a freeholder, aged not less than thirty years, and must have been an 

 inhabitant of this state five years previously to his election, unless absent on public 

 business ; and only freeholders can be elected senators. Elections are conducted 

 by ballot. The constitution guarantees the franchises of citizenship to every 

 member of the state, unless he be deprived of them by the law of the land or 

 the judgment of his peers. Among those franchises are trial by jury, the writ of 

 habeas corpus, liberty of speech and of the press, and free enjoyment of religious 

 profession and worship. The government can make no discrimination or pre- 

 ference of religion, nor any provision for an ecclesiastical establishment, and the 

 clergy are excluded from civil functions. A militia composed only of citizens 

 who are enrolled, and required to appear under arms twice in each year, con- 

 stitutes the only force within the state, relied on for public defence or mainte- 

 nance of the civil authorities ; but the constitution of the United States guarantees 

 to the state security against invasion and domestic insurrection. There are four 

 departments of the government: the legislative, executive, administrative and 

 judicial. The legislative power is absolute, except as restricted by the federal 

 and state constitutions. A senate and an assembly constitute the legislature. 

 The senate is composed of thirty-two members, who are elected by the people 

 in eight equal senatorial districts, and remain in office four years. One senator 

 is annually elected in each district. The assembly consists of one hundred and 

 twenty-eight members, who are elected by the people in counties, each of which 

 is represented in proportion to its population. The lieutenant-governor, elected 

 by the people, presides and has only a casting vote in the senate. A speaker 

 freely elected by the assembly presides in that body. Bills originate in either 

 house, and become laws when passed by both houses and approved by the gover- 

 nor, or when they receive the votes of two-thirds of the members present not- 

 withstanding the executive veto. Laws to create or alter corporations require 

 the assent of two-thirds of all the members elected in each house. 



