To raise up, to elevate, to advance higher and higher the characters of the whole citizenship of the State, is the highest duty, the wisest policy, and should be made the most vigilant purpose of its government. But our present Constitution neither guarantees, nor even renders practicable anything of the kind. For example, whilst it guarantees the lives and properties of its citizens by securing the swift interference of government in their behalf, in case they are wilfully attacked, it pays no attention to them if only their characters are assailed. If some poor creature steals a loaf of bread or a sack of flour, there stand the officers to arrest, and the Courts to punish him the instant they become aware of his crime, and without waiting for the owner to complain, and without suffering him to palliate the offense, even by his own forgiveness. But that other creature who inflicts an infinitely more wicked malicious and injurious crime against society, and is publicly engaged in destroying, or trying to destroy the good character of a citizen, is suffered to proceed with impunity, so far as any interference by government need be expected. We may defend our lives when attacked; we may defend our property when attacked; but when that is attacked which is more precious than both, then our present Constitution prohibits us from attempting any personal interference in any form, and it is prohibited by its own constitutional requirements from attempting any interference of itself. When our guarantees about juries and indictments originated in England, and were adopted in America, the honor of citizens was left to be legally protected by their own hands, and in what was called the "field of honor." Since then society has immeasurably advanced in intelligence and in the elevation of correct principles respecting human justice, and dueling has been wisely justly and effectually prohibited, both by the laws and by the enlightened sense of the community. But does any one suppose, or does any one desire that our sense of honor, and our appreciation of honor, in deportment and in speech, should be in any respect diminished, because dueling has ceased to be approved of as the means for its preservation? Because we cannot fight duels, are we to be now reviled and vilified and slandered with impunity, or are we now to remain compelled to have the reputations of those dear to us, or of ourselves, dependent only on the basis of a law suit, in which none are to feel interested but ourselves, or in which we are to seek dirty money as a compensation, or to pay it out to secure a conviction? This unsatisfactory, this insufficient, this contemptible contrivance was all invented and in full force when dueling was unpunished and still honorably prevailed. Now, since dueling is prohibited, we must have something to occupy the place it sought to fill, and to perform that duty which it sought to

enforce. Why should not the wanton public slanderer, or the attempting public robber of private reputation, (which is far more precious to all who have the sense of honor, than either property or life,) be instantly arrested by the prompt motion and direct interference of the officers of the courts, (as in case of the open and public commission of other crimes,) and be instantly compelled to prove the truth and the justification of his public accusations, or else sent instantly to jail, like lesser felons? When the sense of honor, and the appreciation of an honorable reputation in the private walks of life, shall be lost to any community, its total debasement and utter ruin must speedily and necessarily ensue. In my sincere opinion the murderers of human bodies are but harmless offenders when compared to the malicious and wanton public murderers of private reputations. And the consequences of murdering human bodies are less destructive to the true interests of society, and the true duty and dignity and welfare of its government, than the assassinations of the good and well-earned reputations of its citizens. I would compel the government and all its officers and servants to regard the honor and good name of all its citizens, young and old, male and female, as something more precious to acquire, and more important to preserve, and as something which government more appreciates, and will even more promptly and vigorously interfere to defend, than mere property, or even life itself. I would make good character more universally desired and appreciated, by continually showing to all the people that it is appreciated by the government, and is esteemed by all who are in any manner engaged in its service as the most priceless object of all else within its care. I would have the wanton public slanderer regarded by the common consent of the whole people, as even worse than the murderer caught in public with his bloody knife in his hands, or the yet more hideous incendiary caught at midnight setting on fire the peaceful dwellings of private families.

But as to the legislative invention to which I have referred (which it took me so many years to hit upon, and from which I anticipate greater blessings than I can now foresee), I have this humbling admission to make. It is simplicity itself, and almost any body else, it sometimes seems to me, would have found it out in one twentieth part the time it took me to do it. But there is some consolation in remembering that men who have spent their lives about other kinds of inventions, have sometimes ended by producing such simple contrivances to perform cheaply, perfectly, and securely all the work that is required of them, that almost any body who looks at it would be ready to exclaim that it is no discovery at all, and that it would have occurred to himself, if he had only put his mind on it, in less than ten minutes.

ITS COST.

On the material question of what it would cost the State to run it successfully, I would have to reply that it would cost almost nothing at all. The machinery I would recommend for making all our State laws could be run for one hundred years, without any necessity or excuse for its costing the State so much as is now paid for running our present legislative machinery during one session. Whilst (as I would be safe to guarantee), it would all be performed by the people's own representatives, as directly as it is at present, and would be performed better, wiser, safer, always with the utmost deliberation, and without so much as one tenth part of any of the risks, scandals, and perils, which naturally and necessarily surround our present constitutional machinery for making State laws.

OUR PRESENT LEGISLATURE.

In fact, our present legislative machinery is so very bad that whenever it is set in motion, our whole State is made to tremble; and not until its running is stopped by the termination of its sessions, can the State again acquire more repose. It seems to be generally supposed that all the faults and difficulties in our present Legislature are only attributable to its members. But I am certain it is chiefly owing to its constitutional organization. I see at this moment the whole of my fellow citizens stirred to the bottoms of their hearts to get better men into office, thinking that will afford them all the needed relief. I see even a "new party" organized and in the field, on the basis that we must have better men in the office, if we really desire a better government. Have the people of this State ever elected a bad governor? Not one. Have the people of this largest city in the State ever elected a bad mayor? Not one. Are not these two simple

facts of themselves alone sufficient to turn the minds of all intelligent citizens to look elsewhere for the true seat and fruitful source of all our most material public evils? In my opinion, no Legislature has ever assembled in this State without at least a good, fair working majority of its members being honest, practical, well-meaning men, and above the average for intelligence and ability.

But our Constitution has created but one legislative body for this entire State. Upon this one Legislature it reposes the duty of creating, changing, amending all other legislative bodies and legislative authority within the whole State, and leaves upon its one Legislature alone the authority and the absolute control of all the legislation of this vast State, local as well as general. There is no legislation existing, or possible to exist in the entire State, which is independent of it. All

our local governments are but its own creations, and remain but as wax in its legislative fingers. The people of the State have no rights of local government except such only as this one badly organized legislative body may choose to concede to them. Every town, village, city, district and county in the State, and all the people in them, are, by the Constitution itself, left completely at the mercy of this one Legislature! There is not one independent local government in this State, of any kind or discription. All the people, and all their invaluable privileges of local government, are indiscriminately subjected to this one Legislature. Three fourths, nay all, the local governments within this State, combined, or separately, have not so much as the authority to make a road or build a school-house, until they first get the permission of this one Legislature.

And think, for an instant, what a vast State it is; and how varied, how diversified, how different its local interests are. Our State is almost as extensive as the whole Atlantic seaboard from Maine to Florida. And almost as varied in its different employments, and in the different necessities of its people, as all those ten Atlantic States put together. And every day all its counties, and their towns and neighborhoods, are filling up with a rapidly increasing population. Are we not to have the liberty of independent local governments for them? In England, the invaluable right of independent local governments is one of the most esteemed guarantees of the whole English Constitution. And, throughout France, and throughout all Germany, the right of the people to independent local government, respecting all purely and only local affairs, is esteemed the most precious, the most necessary, the most indispensable legislative privilege enjoyed in either empire, not excepting those assumed by any or either of their imperial Parliaments themselves. Το secure this one privilege alone, for California, is worth in money-if it were possible to value in money what is invaluable—ten times the cost of a Constitutional Convention. With but one constitutionally created Legislature, how can any man, possessed of ordinary common sense, even suppose it possible that our legislation can be performed properly? Our political leaders (and the people are always to be held excusable for supposing their political leaders know what is best), in order to secure our State against the dangers which were soon discovered in such a legislative system, devised a Constitutional "Legislature Amendment" which our "statesmen" everywhere deemed wise, and which our people were ready to suppose advantageous because of the money it was thought to be certain to save.

This "Legislature Amendment" to our Constitution, which was to remove the evils of bad legislation, consisted of nothing at all ex

cept to prevent its attempting to perform its duties oftener than once in two years! Before that Legislature Amendment existed, members of the Legislature worked faithfully and earnestly (I mean a majority of them), to perform the necessary legislation of the country within four months every year. Since that Legislature Amendment to the Constitution, the members of the Legislature are compelled, by the Constitution itself, to attempt to perform an increased amount of legislation, reasonably approximating to double the amount required before, within one hundred and three working days; and in sessions to be held only once in two years.

Our Constitution requires no measures of legislation to be prepared or matured before the sessions commence, and authorizes every human being who gets into the Legislature to introduce bills ad libitum, and whether he knows what they contain or not, whether he himself can even explain what they contain or not, whether he knows whether they are necessary or not, or whether they would be injurious or not, or whether they would affect previous legislation or not; and, if they would, how or to what extent, or in what manner they would affect it. The Constitution compels all the members of one House and half of the other to be new men or newly selected for every session; and, as if the better to insure a prevalent lack of qualification to perform legislative business, the Constitution does not require any member to know any thing at all about the business of legislation, nor provide for any body to be present who has even any proper conception of its importance, or of its dignity, or of the necessity of the highest learning, the utmost care, the most searching examinations, and the most patient deliberations and discussions, which are always indispensable to its proper performance. Why, the Legislature of the State is the most supreme of all its tribunals. All the courts and all the officers of government throughout the State, and all the entire population of the land are subject to it. The courts of the Legislature are the supremest courts in the land. The rules which are to govern above all other rules in all the courts of justice themselves, from the least to the most supreme, and over all the officers and inhabitants in the land, are all to be first tried and determined upon by anticipation, and by the aid of two separate, supreme and independent courts, and by the advise and approbation of the supreme executive of the government. And yet, how unwisely, how unsafely, how insecurely, how recklessly have we provided for the exercise of this great and most important power to be exerted under our Constitution. We have not reposed it even as well, nor as safely as it is reposed in monarchical England; and yet, we are at liberty to repose it more perfectly-as much more perfectly as we could pos