2 
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. 
