PREFACE.

Recognizing the importance of the work of revising the Con. stitution of the State of New York and the value to the Convenin of having at hand the essential historical facts and fundasantal principles of American government and also the results Constitutional revision in our great Republic, the compiler presents in these volumes, in convenient form, the complete stricture of the government of the United States and the Constitutions of the forty-four States of the union, together with the Delaration of Independence and Articles of Confederation.

Fully realizing, also, the great need of data regarding the
origin and development of constitutional government, together
sith the different lines along which it has progressed in sister
States as well as our own, the compiler has endeavored to make
this work as complete and, at the same time, as concise as the
gropar exemplification will permit.

The Constitutions herein were in force in the several States
January 1, 1894, and all were approved as official by the Secre.

taries of State.

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Vany of the most valued provisions of the Constitutions of our States had their origins in the charters under which the English colonies were originally governed. In many cases these charters contained rights and privileges more liberal than those under otich British subjects were governed at home. The attempts Lade by the crown to annul these charters, or to substitute others less favorable to the liberties and less congenial to the tib unists' views of self-government, were the causes of the earliest eristaores of which nearly all the colonies complained. The original ebarters were so admirably suited to the wants of State