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diminished during their continuance in office, but they shall receive no other fee or reward.

3. They shall be obliged to give their opinion upon important questions of law, and upon solemn occasions, when required by the governor, council, senate, or house of representatives.

4. All judicial officers, except justices of the peace, shall hold their offices during good behaviour, but not beyond the age of seventy years.

5. Justices of the peace and notaries public shall hold their offices during seven years, if they so long behave themselves well, at the expiration of which term, they may be re-appointed, or others appointed, as the public interest may require.

6. The justices of the supreme judicial court shall hold no office under the United States, nor any state, nor any other office under this state, except that of justice of the peace.

ARTICLE 7.

Military.

§ 1. The captains and subalterns of the militia shall be elected by the written votes of the members of their respective companies. The field officers of regiments by the written votes of the captains and subalterns of their respective regiments. The brigadier generals, in like manner by the field officers of their respective brigades.

2. The legislature shall, by law, direct the manner of notifying the electors, conducting the elections, and making the returns to the governor of the officers elected; and, if the electors shall neglect or refuse to make such elections, after being duly notified according to law, the governor shall appoint suitable persons to fill such offices.

3. The major generals shall be elected by the senate and house of representatives, each having a negative on the other. The adjutant general and quartermaster general shall be appointed by the governor and council; but the adjutant general shall perform the duties of quartermaster general, until otherwise directed by law. The major generals and brigadier generals, and the commanding officers of regiments and battalions, shall appoint their respective staff officers; and all military officers shall be commissioned by the governor.

4. The militia, as divided into divisions, brigades. regi

ments, battalions, and companies, pursuant tothe laws now in force, shall remain so organized, until the same shall be altered by the legislature.

5. Persons of the denominations of quakers and shakers justices of the supreme judicial court, and ministers of the gospel, may be exempted from military duty; but no other person of the age of eighteen and under the age of forty-five years, excepting officers of the militia, who have been honourably discharged, shall be so exempted, unless he shall pay an equivalent, to be fixed by law.

ARTICLE 8.

Literature.

A general diffusion of the advantages of education being essential to the preservation of the rights and liberties of the people; to promote this important object, the legislature are authorized, and it shall be their duty, to require the several towns to make suitable provision, at their own expense, for the support and maintenance of public schools; and it shall further be their duty to encourage and suitably endow, from time to time, as the circumstances of the people may authorize, all academies, colleges, and seminaries of learning, within the state: provided, that no donation, grant, or endowment, shall at any time be made by the legislature, to any literary institution now established, or which may hereafter be established, unless, at the time of making such endowment, the legislature of the state shall have the right to grant any further powers to alter, limit, or restrain, any of the powers vested in, any such literary institution, as shall be judged necessary to promote the best interests thereof.

ARTICLE 9.

General Provisions.

§ 1. Every person elected or appointed to either of the places or offices provided in this constitution, and every person, elected, appointed, or commissioned, to any judicial, executive, military, or other office under this 'state, shall, before he enter on the discharge of the duties of his place or office, take and subscribe the following oath or affirmation: "I, do swear, that I will support the constitution of the United States and of this state, so long as I shall continue a citizen thereof. So help me God."

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I, do swear, that I will faithfully discharge, to the best of my abilities, the duties incumbent on me as

according to the constitution and the laws of the state: so help me God:" provided, that an affirmation in the above forms may be substituted, when the person shall be concientiously scrupulous of taking and subscribing an oath.

The oaths or affirmation shall be taken and subscribed by the governor and counsellors before the presiding officer of the senate, in the presence of both houses of the legislature, and by the senators and representatives before the governor and council, and by the residue of said officers before such persons as shall be prescribed by the legislature; and whenever the governor or any counsellor shall not be able to attend, during the session of the legislature, to take and subscribe said oaths or affirmations, such oaths or affirmations may be taken and subscribed, in the recess of the legislature, before any justice of the supreme judical court; provided, that the senators and representatives first elected under this constitution shall take and subscribe such oaths or affirmations, before the president of the convention.

2. No person holding the office of justice of the supreme judicial court, or of any inferior court, attorney general, county attorney, treasurer of the state, adjutant general, judge of probate, register of probate, register of deeds, sheriffs or their deputies, clerks of the judicial courts, shall be a member of the legislature; and any person holding either of the foregoing offices, elected to and accepting a seat in the congress of the United States, shall thereby vacate said office; and no person shall be capable of holding or exercising, at the same time, within this state, more than one of the offices before-mentioned.

3. All commissions shall be in the name of the state, signed by the governor, attested by the secretary or his deputy, and have the seal of the state thereto affixed.

4. And in case the elections required by this constitution, on the first Wednesday of January, annually, by the two houses of the legislature, shall not be completed on that day, the same may be adjourned from day to day until completed, in the following order: the vacancies in the senate shall first be filled; the governor shall then be elected, if there be no choice by the people; and afterwards, the two houses shall elect the council.

5. Every person holding any civil office under this state may be removed, by impeachment, for misdemeanor in office; and every person holding any office may be removed by the governor, with the advice of the council, on the s

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dress of both branches of the legislature. But before such address shall pass either house, the causes of removal shall be stated and entered on the journal of the house in which it originated, and a copy thereof served on the person in office, that he may be admitted to a hearing in his defence.

6. The tenure of all offices, which are not or shall not be otherwise provided for, shall be during the pleasure of the governor and council.

7. While the public expenses shall be assessed on polls and estates, a general valuation shall be taken at least once in ten years.

8. All taxes upon real estate, assessed by authority of this state, shall be apportioned and assessed equally, according to the just value thereof.

ARTICLE 10.
Schedule.

§ 1. The first legislature shall meet on the last Wednesin May next. The elections on the second Monday in September, annually, shall not commence until the year one thousand eight hundred and twenty-one, and in the mean time the election for governor, senators, and representatives, shall be on the first Monday in April, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and twenty; and at this election the same proceedings shall be had as are required at the elections provided for in this constitution, on the second Monday in September, annually, and the lists of the votes for the governor and senators shall be transmitted, by the town and plantation clerks, respectively, to the secretary of state, pro tempore, seventeen days at least before the last Wednesday in May next: and the president of the convention shall in presence of the secretary of state, pro tempore, open and examine the attested copies of said lists, so returned for senators, and shall have all the powers, and be subject to all the duties, in ascertaining, notifying, and summoning, the senators who appear to be elected, as the governor and council have, and are subject to, by this constitution: provided, he shall notify said senators fourteen days at least before the last Wednesday in May, and vacancies shall be ascertained and filled in the manner herein provided: and the senators to be elected on the said first Monday of April shall be apportioned as follows:

The county of York shall elect three; the county of Cumberland shall elect three; the country of Lincoln shall

elect three; the county of Hancock shall elect two; the county of Washington shall elect one; the county of Kennebec shall elect three: the county of Oxford shall elect two; the county of Somerset shall elect two; the county of Penobscot shall elect one.

And the members of the house of representatives shall be elected, ascertained, and returned, in the same manner as herein provided at elections on the second Monday of September: and the first house of representatives shall consist of the following number, to be elected as follows:

County of York. The towns of York and Wells may each elect two representatives; and each of the remaining towns may elect one.

County of Cumberland-The town of Portland may elect three representatives; North Yarmouth, two; Brunswick, two; Gorham, two; Freeport and Pownal, two; Raymond and Otisfield, one; Bridgton, Baldwin, and Harrison, one; Poland and Danville, one; and each remaining town, one.

County of Lincoln.-The towns of Georgetown and Phipsburg may elect one representative; Lewiston and Wales, one; St, George, Cushing, and Friendship, one; Hope and Appleton Ridge, one; Jefferson, Putnam, and Patricktown Plantation, one; Alna and Whitefield, one; Montville, Palermo, and Montville Plantation, one; Woolwich and Dresden, one; and each remaining town, one.

County of Hancock.--The town of Bucksport may elect one representative; Deer Island one; Castine and Brooksville, one; Orland and Penobscot, one; Mount Desert and Eden, one; Vinalhaven and Isleborough, one; Sedgwick and Bluehill, one: Gouldsborough, Sullivan, and plantation, No. 8 and 9, north of Sullivan, one; Surry, Ellesworth, Trenton, and plantation of Mariaville, one: Lincolnville, Searsmont, and Belmont, one: Belfast and Northport, one: Prospect and Swanville one: Frankfort and Monroe, one: Knox, Brooks, Jackson, and Thorndike, one.

County of Washington.--The towns of Steuben, Cherryfield, and Harrington, may elect one representative: Addison, Columbia, and Jonesborough, one: Machias, one: Lubec, Dennysville, plantations No. 9. No. 10, No. 11, No. 12, one: Eastport, one: Perry, Robinson, Calais, plantations No. 3, No. 6, No. 7, No. 15, and No. 16, one,

County of Kennebec.--The towns of Belgrade and Dearborn may elect one representative: Chesterville, Vienna, and Rome, one: Wayne and Fayette, one: Temple and Wilton

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