Section 5. No money shall be drawn from the treasury but in pursuance of appropriations made by law; nor shall any appropriation of money for the support of an army be made for a longer term than one year; and a regular statement and account of the receipts and expenditures of all public money shall be published annually.

Section 6. It shall be the duty of the General Assembly to pass such laws as may be necessary and proper to decide differences by arbitrators, to be appointed by the parties, who may choose that summary mode of adjustment.

Section 7. All civil officers for the State at large shall reside within the State; and all district or county officers within their respective districts or counties, and shall keep their respective offices at such places therein as may be required by law.

Section 8. The Legislature shall determine the time of duration of the several public offices when such time shall not have been fixed by this Constitution; and all civil officers except the Governor and judges of the superior and inferior Courts shall be removable by an address of two-thirds of the members of both houses, except those, the removal of whom has been otherwise provided for by this Constitution.

Section 9. Absence on the business of this State or of the United States shall not forfeit a residence once obtained, so as to deprive one of the right of suffrage, or of being elected or appointed to any office under this Siate, under the exceptions contained in this Constitution.

Section 10. It shall be the duty of the General Assembly to regulate by law, in what cases, and what deduction from the salaries of public officers shall be made for neglect of duty in their official capacity.

Section 11. Returns of all elections for the members of the General Assembly shall be made to the Secretary of State for the time being.

Section 12. The Legislature shall point out the manner in which a man coming into the country shall declare his residence.

Section 13. In all elections by the people, and also by the Senate and House of Representatives, jointly or separately, the vote shall be given by ballot.

Section 14. No member of Congress, nor person holding or exercising any office of trust or profit under the United States, or either of them, or under any foreign powers, shall be eligible as a member of the General Assembly of this State, or hold or exercise any office of trust or profit under the same.

Section 15. All the laws that may be passed by the Legislature, and the public records of this State, and the judicial and legislative written proceeding of the same, shall be promulgated, preserved and conducted in the language in which the Constitution of the United States is written.

Section 16. The General Assembly shall direct, by law, how persons who are now, or may hereafter become securities for public offices, may be relieved or discharged on account of such securityship.

Section 17. No power of suspending the laws of this State shall be exercised, unless by the Legislature or its authority.

Section 18. In all criminal prosecutions the accused have the right of being heard by himself or counsel, of demanding the nature and cause of the accusation against him, of meeting the witnesses face to face, of having compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and prosecutions by indictment or information, a speedy public trial by an impartial jury of the vicinage, nor shall he be compelled to give evidence against himself.

Section 19. All prisoners shall be bailable by sufficient securities, unless for capital offences, where the proof is evident or the presumption great, and the privileges of the writ of habeas corpus shall not be suspended unless when in cases of rebellion or invasion the public safety may require it.

Section 20. No ex post facto law nor any law impairing the obligation of contracts shall be passed.

Section 21. Printing presses shall be free to every person who undertakes to examine the proceedings of the Legislature, or any other branch of the Government, and no law shall ever be made to restrain the right thereof. The free communications of thoughts and opinions is one of the invaluable rights of man, and every citizen may freely speak, write and print on any subject, being responsible for the abuse of that liberty.

Section 22. Emigration from the State shall not be prohibited. Section 23. The citizens of the town of New Orleans shall have the right of appointing the several public officers necessary for the administration and the police of the said city, pursuant to the mode of election which shall be prescribed by the Legislature: Provided, That the Mayor and Recorder be ineligible to a seat in the General Assembly.

Section 24. The seat of government shall continue at New Orleans until removed by law.

Section 25. All laws contrary to this Constitution shall be null and void.

ARTICLE VII.

Mode of Revising the Constitution.

Section 1. When experience shall point out the necessity of amending this Constitution, and a majority of all the members elected to each House of the General Assembly shall, within the first twenty days of their stated annual session, concur in passing a law, specifying the alterations intended to be made, for taking the sense of the good people of this State, as to the necessity and expediency of calling a Convention, it shall be the duty of the several returning officers, at the next general election which shall be held for Representatives after the passage of such a law, to open a poll for, and make return to the Secretary for the time being, of the names of all those entitled to vote for Representatives, who have voted for calling a Convention; and if thereupon, it shall appear that a majority of

all the citizens of this State entitled to vote for Representatives, have voted for a Convention, the General Assembly shall direct that a similar poll shall be opened, and taken for the next year; and if thereupon, it shall appear that a majority of all the citizens of this State entitled to vote for Representatives, have voted for a Convention, the General Assembly shall, at their next session, call a Convention, to consist of as many members as there shall be in the General Assembly, and no more, to be chosen in the same manner and proportion, at the same places and at the same time that Representatives are, by citizens entitled to vote for Representatives; and to meet within three months after the said election, for the purpose of readopting, amending, or changing this Constitution. But if it shall appear by the vote of either year, as aforesaid, that a majority of all the citizens entitled to vote for Representatives, did not vote for a Convention, a Convention shall not be called.

SCHEDULE.

Section 1. That no inconveniences may arise from the change of a Territorial to a permanent State Government, it is declared by the Convention that all rights, suits, actions, prosecutions, claims and contracts, both as it respects individuals and bodies corporate, shall continue as if no change had taken place in this Government in virtue of the laws now in force.

Section 2. All fines, penalties and forfeitures, due and owing to the Territory of Orleans shall inure to the use of the State. All bonds executed to the Governor or any other officer, in his official capacity, in the Territory, shall pass over to the Governor or to the officers of the State and their successors in office, for the use of the State, by him or by them to be respectively assigned over to the use of those concerned, as the case may be.

Section 3. The Governor, Secretary and Judges, and all other officers under the Territorial Government, shall continue in the exercise of the duties of their respective departments until the said officers are superceded under the authority of this Constitution.

Section 4. All laws now in force in this Territory, not inconsistent with this Constitution, shall continue and remain in full effect until repealed by the Legislature.

Section 5. The Governor of this State shall make, use of his private seal until a State seal be procured.

Section 6. The oaths of office herein directed to be taken, may be administered by any justice of the peace, until the Legislature shall otherwise direct.

Section 7. At the expiration of the time after which this Constitution is to go into operation, or immediately after official information shall have been received that Congress have approved of the same, the President of the Convention shall issue writs of election to the proper officers in the different counties, enjoining them to cause an election to be held for Governor and members of the General Assembly, in each of their respective districts. The election shall

commence on the fourth Monday following the day of the date of the President's proclamation, and shall take place on the same day throughout the State. The mode and duration of the said election shall be determined by the laws now in force: Provided, however, that in case of absence or disability of the President of the Convention to cause the said election to be carried into effect, the Secretary of the Convention shall discharge the duties hereby imposed on the President; and that in case of absence of the Secretary, a committee of Messrs. Blanque, Brown and Urquhart, or a majority of them, shall discharge the duties herein imposed on the Secretary of the Convention; and the members of the General Assembly thus elected, shall assemble on the fourth Monday thereafter at the seat of gov ernment. The Governor and members of the General Assembly, for this time only, shall enter upon the duties of their respective offices immediately after their election, and shall continue in office in the manner and during the same period they would have done had they been elected on the first Monday of July, one thousand eight hundred and twelve.

Section 8. Until the first enumeration shall be made, as directed in the sixth section of the second article of this Constitution, the county of Orleans shall be entitled to six Representatives, to be elected as follows: one by the First Senatorial District within the said county, four by the Second District, and one by the Third Distriet. The county of German Coast, to two Representatives; the county of Acadia, to two Representatives; the county of Iberville, to two Representatives; the county of Lafourche, to two Representatives, to be elected as follows: one by the parish of Assumption, and the other by the parish of the interior; the county of Rapides, to two Representatives; the county of Natchitoches, to one Representative; the county of Concordia, to one Representative; the county of Ouachita, to one Representative; the county of Opelousas, to two Representatives; the county of Attakapas to three Representatives, to be elected as follows; two by the parish of St. Martin, and the third by the parish of St. Mary; and the respective Senatorial Districts created by this Constitutior, to one Senator each.

Done in Convention, at New Orleans, the twenty-second day of the month of January, in the year of our Lord, one thousand eight hundred and twelve, and in the Independence of the United States of America, the thirty-sixth.

J. POYDRAS, President of the Convention.

J. D. DEGOUTIN BELLECHASSE, JAQUES VILLERE,

JOHN WATKINS,

SAMUEL WINTER,

of the county of Orleans,
JAMES BROWN,
JEAN-NOEL DESTREHAN,
ALEX. LA BRANCHE,

of the county of German Coast,
SIG. 5.