History of the Constitutions of IowaShambaugh, Benjamin Franklin
History
History of the Constitutions of Iowa
Shambaugh, Benjamin Franklin
Constitutional history -- Iowa; Constitutions -- Iowa
Article III. contains ten sections bearing upon a variety of subjects.
Section 1 indicates in detail how claims are to be made and recorded and
the boundaries thereof designated. No person was allowed to hold more
than four hundred and eighty acres. Section 2 provides that "any white
male person over the age of eighteen can become a member of this
association by signing the laws rules and regulations governing the
association," that "actual citizens of the County over the age of
seventeen who are acting for themselves and dependent on their own
exertions, and labour, for a lively hood, and whose parents doe not
reside within the limits of the Territory can become members of this
association and entitled to all the privalages of members," but that "no
member of the association shall have the privalege of voting on a
question to change any article of the constitution or laws of the
association unless he is a resident citizen of the county and a
claimholder, nor shall any member be entitled to vote for officers of
this association unless they are claim holders."
The same section provides that "any law or article of the constitution
of this association may be altered at the semianual meetings and at
no other meetings provided, however, that three fifths of the members
presant who are resident citizens of the county and actual claim holders
shall be in favour of such change or amendment, _except that section
fixing the quantity of land that everry member is entitled to hold by
claim and that section shall remain unaltered_."
By the same article semi-annual meetings of the Association are provided
for in section 3. Section 5 declares that "all persons who have resided
within the limits of the County for Two months, shall be recognized and
considered as citizens of the County." Another section stipulates that
"members of the association who are not citizens of the County shall be
required in making claims to expend in improvements on each claim
he or they may have made or may make the amount of fifty Dollars within
six months of the date of making such claim or claims and fifty Dollars
every six months there after until such person or persons becomes
citizens of the county or forfeit the same." The 10th section relates to
the procedure of the Claim Court. Finally, in section 11 the members
pledge their "honours" for the "faithful observance and mantanance" of
the Constitution by subscribing their names to the written document.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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