The call for an election of delegates to a constitutional convention had already been issued, when Walker reached Kansas. The free-State people were incensed because the appointment of delegates had been made on the basis of a defective census and registration; and even the assurance of the governor, in his inaugural, that the constitution would be submitted to a popular vote, failed to overcome their distrust. They therefore took no part in the election of delegates. This course was unfortunate, for it gave the control of the convention wholly into the hands of the pro-slavery party, with consequences that were far-reaching for Kansas and the nation.[622] But by October the free-State party had abandoned its policy of abstention from territorial politics, so far as to participate in the election of a new territorial legislature. The result was a decisive free-State victory. The next legislature would have an ample majority of free-State men in both chambers. It was with the discomfiting knowledge, then, that they represented only a minority of the community that the delegates of the constitutional convention began their labors.[623] It was clear to the dullest intelligence that any pro-slavery constitution would be voted down, if it were submitted fairly to the people of Kansas. Gloom settled down upon the hopes of the pro-slavery party. When the document which embodied the labors of the convention was made public, the free-State party awoke from its late complacence to find itself tricked by a desperate game. The constitution was not to be submitted to a full and fair vote; but only the article relating to slavery. The people of Kansas were to vote for the "Constitution with slavery" or for the "Constitution with no slavery." By either alternative the constitution would be adopted. But should the constitution with no slavery be ratified, a clause of the schedule still guaranteed "the right of property in slaves now in this Territory."[624] The choice offered to an opponent of slavery in Kansas was between a constitution sanctioning and safeguarding all forms of slave property,[625] and a constitution which guaranteed the full possession of slaves then in the Territory, with no assurances as to the status of the natural increase of these slaves. Viewed in the most charitable light, this was a gambler's device for securing the stakes by hook or crook. Still further to guard existing property rights in slaves, it was provided that if the constitution should be amended after 1864, no alteration should be made to affect "the rights of property in the ownership of slaves."[626]