Vermont Watchman And State Journal

From the N. Y. American.

FACTS RESPECTING THE RHODE-ISLAND CONTROVERSY.

To the end that all may understand what the quarrel really is, which has threatened bloodshed and anarchy in one of the Old Thirteen, we lay before our readers this brief exposition, copied from the statement submitted to the President of the U. S. on behalf of the constituted authorities of Rhode Island.

"That the people of Rhode Island have no fundamental law except the charter of King Charles the Second, granted in 1663, and the usage of the Legislature under it. Legislative usage under their charters has been decided by the Supreme Court of the U. S. to be the fundamental law, both in Conn., and R. I.

That, from the date of the Rhode Island charter down to the year 1841, a period of nearly two hundred years, no person has been allowed to vote for town or State officers unless possessed of competent estates, and admitted freemen in the several towns in which they resided.

That, since the statute of 1723, no person could be admitted a freeman of any town unless he owned a freehold estate of the value fixed by law. (now $134) or was the eldest son of such freeholder.

That, until the past year, no attempt has been made, to our knowledge, to establish any other fundamental law, by force, than the one under which the people have lived for so long a period.

That, at the January session of this Legislature in 1841, a petition signed by five or six hundred male inhabitants, praying for such an extension of suffrage as the Legislature might, in their wisdom, deem expedient to propose, was presented.

That, influenced by that petition, as well as by other considerations, the Legislature at that session, requested the qualified voters, or freemen, as they are called within us, to choose delegates at their regular town meetings to be holden in November, 1841, to frame a written constitution.

That the result of the last meeting of this legal Convention, in February, 1842, was the Constitution accompanying this statement, which, in case of its adoption by the people, would have been the supreme law of the State.

Most of the above facts are contained in the printed report of a numerous committee of the Legislature, at their session in March, 1842, which report was adopted by the Legislature.

That, in May, 1841, after said legal convention had been provided for by the Legislature, and before the time appointed for the choice of delegates by the qualified voters, (August, 1841,) a mass meeting was held by the friends of an extension of suffrage at Newport, at which meeting a committee was appointed to be called the State Committee, who were authorized by said mass meeting to take measures for calling a Convention for framing a Constitution.

That this Committee, thus authorized, issued a request for a meeting of the male citizens in the several towns to appoint delegates to the proposed Convention.

That meetings, of unqualified voters principally, (as we believe,) were accordingly holden in the several towns, unauthorized by law, and contrary to the invariable custom and usage of the State from 1663 down to that period. That the aggregate voters appointing the delegates to that convention, was, according to their own estimate, about 7,250; whereas, the whole number of male citizens, over twenty-one years of age, after making a deduction for foreigners, paupers, &c, was, also, according to their own estimate, over 22,000.

That this convention, thus constituted, convened in Providence, in October, 1841, and the constitution called the "People's Constitution," was the result of their deliberations.

That at subsequent meetings of portions of the people, December, 1841, by the authority of this Convention alone (elected, as delegates have been, by about one-third of the voters, according to their standard of qualification,) all males over twenty-one years of age were admitted to vote for the adoption of the people's constitution. That these meetings were not under presiding officers whose legal duty or legal right was to interpose any check or restraint as to age, residence, property or color.

By the fourteenth article of their constitution it was provided that. "This constitution shall be submitted to the people, for their adoption or rejection, on Monday the 27th of December next, and on the two succeeding days." * * "And every person entitled to a vote as aforesaid, who from sickness or other causes, may be unable to attend and vote in the town, or ward meetings assembled for voting upon said constitution, on the days aforesaid, is requested to write down his name on a ticket, and to obtain the signature upon the back of the same of a person who has given in his vote, as a witness thereto. And the moderator or clerk of any town or ward meeting, convened for the purpose aforesaid, shall receive such vote on either of the three next succeeding the three days before named for voting for said constitution."

During the first three days, about nine thousand votes were received from the hands of the voters in the open town meetings. By the privilege granted to every and all the friends of the constitution, of bringing into town meetings the names of voters during the three following days, five thousand votes more were obtained, making an aggregate of about fourteen thousand votes.

This constitution thus originating and thus formed, was subsequently declared by this convention to be the supreme law of the land. By its provisions, a Government is to be organized under it, by the choice of a Governor, Lieut. Governor, Senators and Representatives, on the Monday preceding the third Wednesday in April, 1842.

By the provisions of the "landholders" constitution, as the legal constitution is called, every white male citizen, possessing the freehold qualification, and over twenty-one years of age, may vote upon a residence of one year; and without any freehold, may vote, upon a residence of two years, except in the case of votes for town taxes, in which case, the voter must possess the freehold qualification, or be taxed for other property to the value of $150.

By the "People's Constitution," "every white male citizen of the United States of the age of twenty-one years, who has resided in the State for one year, and in the town where he votes for six months," shall be permitted to vote with the same exceptions as to voting for town taxes as is contained in the other constitution.

The provision therefore, in relation to the great subject in dispute, the elective franchise, is substantially the same in the two constitutions.

On the 21st, 22d and 23d March last, the legal constitution, by an act of the Legislature, was submitted to all persons who, by its provisions, would be entitled to vote under it, after its adoption, for their ratification. It was rejected by a majority of 676, the number of votes polled being over 16,000. It is believed that many freeholders voted against, because they were attached to the old form of Government, and were against any new constitution whatever. Both parties used uncommon exertions to bring all their voters to the polls; and the result of the vote was, under the scrutiny of opposing interests, in legal town meetings, that the friends of the People's Constitution brought to the polls probably not over 7,000 or 7,500 votes. The whole vote against the legal constitution was about 8,600. If we allow 1,000 as the number of freeholders who voted against the legal constitution, because they are opposed to any constitution, it would leave the number of the friends of the people's constitution 7,600, or one-third of the voters of the State under the new qualification proposed by the other constitution.

It seems incredible that there can be 14,000 friends of the people's constitution in the State, animated as they are by a most extraordinary and enthusiastic feeling, and yet, upon this trial, in the usual open and fair way of voting, they should have obtained but about 7,600 votes.

The unanimity of the subsequent action of the Legislature, comprehending as it did both the great political parties—the House of Representatives giving a vote of sixty in favor of maintaining the existing Government of the State, and only six on the other side, with a unanimous vote in the Senate—the unanimous vote in the Supreme Court, declaring this extraordinary movement to be illegal in all its stages, a majority of that court being of the democratic party, with other facts of a similar character, have freed this question of a mere party character, and enabled us to present it as a great constitutional question.

The respect for law and order, the peace of this whole Republic, and the cause of Liberty itself, are to be put at hazard on this single point in difference between the two parties in Rhode Island—WHETHER THE TERM OF RESIDENCE EXACTED OF NON FREEHOLDERS SHALL BE OF ONE OR TWO YEARS!

The free suffragers as they are called, insist that one year is a sufficient term: the Constitutional party contend for two: but Both concede UNIVERSAL SUFFRAGE. [NO: not to colored men]

And yet this is misrepresented into a question as between landholders clinging to aristocratic privileges, and a numerous and intelligent people, non landholders, whom it is attempted to deprive of just political rights.

The Rhode Island Rebellion. The New York Courier and Enquirer says there is one fact, in relation to that rebellion, that should never be lost sight of. When Dorr came to New York from Washington, he announced his determination not to proceed further in his Treason; and stated that the Executive of the Nation had promised him to procure an act of indemnity for all past offences committed by him and his friends! But this did not suit the views of certain [locofoco] demagogues in that city; and they by their infamous counsels and false promises of assistance, induced him to change his pacific purpose, and made him the Traitor and Outcast he has since become. They thus become solely responsible for the desperate civil war he contemplated; and on their heads would have been all the blood and misery which might have followed his rebellion, as on them now rests all the odium of this disgraceful transaction. Can any person conceive of a greater outrage upon honor and honesty, justice and humanity, than is exhibited in this cold-blooded, cowardly conspiracy against the lives and property of their fellow countrymen?

Alas.