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[34]

In pursuance of this decision of the people in favor of a convention, the Territorial Legislature, on the 27th day of February, 1857, passed an act for the election of delegates on the third Monday of June, 1857, to frame a State constitution. This law is as fair in its provisions as any that ever passed a legislative body for a similar purpose. The right of suffrage at this election is clearly and justly defined. Every bona fideinhabitant of the Territory of Kansas' on the third Monday of June, the day of the election, who was a citizen of the United States, above the age of twenty-one, and had resided therein for three months previous to that date, was entitled to vote. In order to avoid all interference from neighboring States or Territories with the freedom and fairness of the election, provision was made for the registry of the qualified voters; and in pursuance thereof pine thousand two hundred and fifty-one voters were registered.

The great object was to convince these 9,251 qualified electors that they ought to vote in the choice of delegates to the convention, and thus terminate the controversy by the will of the majority.

The Governor urged them to exercise their right of suffrage; but in vain. In his Inaugural Address of the 27th of May, 1857, he informed them that, ‘Under our practice, the preliminary act of framing a State constitution is uniformly performed through the instrumentality of a convention of delegates chosen by the people themselves. That convention is now about to be elected by you under the call of the Territorial Legislature, created and still recognized by the authority of Congress, and clothed by it, in the comprehensive language of the organic law, with full power to make such an enactment. The Territorial Legislature, then, in assembling this convention, were fully sustained by the Act of Congress, and the authority of the convention is distinctly recognized in my instructions from the President of the United States.’ The Governor proceeded to warn them, clearly and distinctly, what would be the consequences, if they should not participate in the election. ‘The people of Kansas, then,’ he says, ‘are invited by the highest authority known to the Constitution, to participate, freely and fairly, in ’

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