Rule 70. There shall be printed, as of course, and without any special order, 1,000 copies of the Journal and of all reports of committees on the subject of Constitutional revision.

Rule 71. Six hundred copies of the Journal and six hundred copies of the reports as printed shall be bound and distributed as follows, viz.: To each member of the Convention, two copies; State library, five copies; the library of the Senate, five copies; the library of the Assembly, five copies; the office of each county clerk, one copy; and the remaining copies to such libraries and other institutions as shall be designated by the President or by the Convention.

Rule 72. The officers of the Convention appointed by the President shall perform such duties as he may prescribe, and for any breach of duty any such officer may be removed and his successor appointed by the President. The officers of the Convention appointed by the Secretary shall perform such duties as he may prescribe, and for any breach of duty any such officers may be removed and his successor be appointed by the Secretary.

Rule 73. After the fifteenth day of July, no further proposi tions for constitutional amendment shall be printed or referred as of course under rule 32, but all such propositions shall be referred without printing, to a select committee of five, to be appointed by the President, for examination and comparison with proposed constitutional amendments already introduced and referred.

If any such proposition shall be found to relate to a subject already under consideration by a standing committee, the select committee shall transmit the same without printing, directly to such standing committee for its information. Upon all other propositions so referred to such select committee it shall report whether in its opinion the same ought to be printed, and referred under rule 32. On the first day of August the call for proposed constitutional amendments, by districts, under rule 3, shall be discontinued, and thereafter no proposed constitutional amendment shall be introduced, except on the report of a standing or select committee.

Rule 74. After the 15th day of July, 1894, no member of this Convention shall receive pay for any day upon which the Convention is in session and he is absent without leave. After the

same date no member shall receive pay for any day of any calendar week, during which he is absent without leave from all the sessions of the Convention.

Rule 75. Whenever a committee shall have acted adversely on any proposed amendment to the Constitution, such committee need not report such adverse determination, unless requested, in writing, by the member introducing such amendment, so to do, and it was determined in the affirmative.

Rule 76. A minority report may be made at any time before the subject on which report has been made by a standing or select committee, has been finally disposed of by the Convention.

Rule 77. Hereafter the Convention may dispense with the reading of the Journal, and that amendments thereto may be made on the legislative day following that on which the printed Journal is placed on the desks of the members.

RIGHTS AND POWERS OF THE CONVENTION.

REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE ON JUDICIARY.

To the Convention :

The Committee on Judiciary return herewith the writ of prohibition issued out of the Supreme Court commanding the Convention "to desist and refrain from any further proceedings in the matter of proving, examining, investigating, deciding or judg ing upon the qualification or election of Herman F. Trapper, or abridging or intermeddling with the rights or privileges of said Herman F. Trapper as a member of said Convention or as a delegate of said Convention" and reports thereon:

The Convention has been created by the direct action of the People and has been by them vested with the power and charged with the duty to revise and amend the organic law of the State.

The function with which it is thus charged is a part of the highest and most solemn act of popular sovereignty and in its performance the Convention has and can have no superior but the People themselves.

No court or legislative or executive officer has authority to interfere with the exercise of the powers or the performance of the duties which the People have enjoined upon this, their immediate agent.

The Convention has been expressly authorized by the existing Constitution and the vote of the People to revise and amend the Constitution. It has also, by necessary implication, been endowed by the same Constitution and vote, with all the powers essential to the exercise of the powers expressly conferred.

Among the powers so conferred by necessary implication, are some of a judicial nature affecting the organization and existence of the Convention itself. Among these are the power to discipline its members, to repress disorder, to try, condemn and punish persons who disobey its process, and to judge of the qualifications and elections of its members.

These powers are not included among those conferred upon the judiciary in the general distribution of powers to the three great departments, for the purposes of the ordinary government of the State under the Constitution.

They are deemed to be inherent in the legislative bodies which emanate directly from the People, because necessary to their independence and effective action. They are conferred upon every such body by the simple act of its creation and without the necessity of an express grant.

This was the common law of England and of the Colony of New York on the 19th of April, 1775. It has always been the law of this State and universally throughout the United States.

A Constitutional Convention is a legislative body of the highest order. It proceeds by legislative methods. Its acts are legis lative acts. Its function is not to execute or interpret laws, but to make them. That the consent of the general body of electors may be necessary to give effect to the ordinances of the Convention, no more changes their legislative character, than the requirement of the Governor's consent, changes the nature of the action of the Senate and Assembly.

It is far more important that a Constitutional Convention should possess these safeguards of its independence than it is for an ordinary Legislature; because the Convention's acts are of a more momentous and lasting consequence and because it has to pass upon the power, emoluments and the very existence of the judicial and legislative officers who might otherwise interfere with it. The Convention furnishes the only way by which the people can exercise their will, in respect of these officers, and their control over the Convention would be wholly incompatible with the free exercise of that will.

by

4.
It
is
in a
the LENSES

That the Constitutional Conventions of this State do possess among these inherent powers the power to judge of the qualifications and elections, of their members, has been expressly declared by high judicial Legislatures of 1866, 1893 and 1894. It is in accordance with all approved text writers, and with the general usage of other States. We know of no authority whatever to the contrary. It is a necessary conclusion from the underlying principles upon which our government rests.

Our conclusion is,

That the people of this State have conferred upon the Convention the exclusive authority and have charged upon it the

duty, to judge of the qualification and election of Herman F. Trapper.

That the members of the Convention, by accepting the office, and by their oaths of office, have bound themselves to perform the duty, of passing upon the election of Mr. Trapper; and no other course is open to them, but to proceed with the performance thereof.

We report herewith, for the information of the Convention, a full statement of the law prepared by a sub-committee, and adopted by this committee.

Believing that the writ of prohibition heretofore issued ex parte, is the result of a misapprehension, we recommend that the views of the Convention, as embodied in the foregoing report, be transmitted by the Secretary of the Convention, to the Supreme Court, with a respectful remonstrance against its entertaining jurisdiction.

ELIHU ROOT,

Chairman.

REPORT OF THE SUB-COMMITTEE ADOPTED AND REPORTED BY THE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE.

To the Committee on Judiciary:

A question of high privilege is presented for the consideration of the Convention. Herman F. Trapper, who claims to be a duly elected member of this Convention, has applied to the Supreme Court, for a writ of prohibition whereby he seeks to restrain this body from taking any further action touching his rights to a seat in the Convention, and to require it "to refrain from any acts. interfering with or in any manner abridging the rights of the petitioner as a member of the said Convention, so long as the petitioner shall comply with the rules and regulations adopted for the government of the said Convention." He denies the jurisdiction of this body to determine the contest, which is now pending, with respect to his right to a seat in the Convention, on the ground that such determination involves a judicial act, and that the Supreme Court alone possesses the jurisdiction to decide all controversies relative to the elections, returns and qualifications of members of the Constitutional Convention.

The remedy to which resort has been taken to restrain the Convention from its contemplated action is a writ of prohibition,