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Date: Sun, 20 Apr 1997 16:56:16 -0700
To: (Recipient list suppressed)
From: Paul Andrew Mitchell [address in tool bar]
Subject: SLS: L&J: original 13th Amendment (fwd)
<snip>
>
>from http://ddmall.com/law/orig13th.html
>
>below is from a web site which contains the details of David Dodge's and Tom
>Dunn's research. About half way down the web page is this.....
>
>PARADISE LOST, RATIFICATION FOUND
>In 1789, the House of Representatives compiled a list of possible
>Constitutional Amendments, some of which would ultimately become our
>Bill of Rights. The House proposed seventeen; the Senate reduced the list
>to twelve. During this process that Senator Tristrain Dalton (Mass.)
>proposed an Amendment seeking to prohibit and provide a penalty for any
>American accepting a "title of Nobility" (RG 46 Records of the U.S.
>Senate). Although it wasn't passed, this was the first time a "title of
>nobility" amendment was proposed.
>
>Twenty years later, in January, 1810, Senator Reed proposed another
>"Title of Nobility" Amendment (History of Congress, Proceedings of the
>Senate, p. 529-530). On April 27, 1810, the Senate voted to pass this 13th
>Amendment by a vote of 26 to 1; the House resolved in the affirmative 87
>to 3; and the following resolve was sent to the States for ratification:
>
>"If any citizen of the United States shall Accept, claim, receive or retain
>any title of nobility or honour, or shall, without the consent of Congress,
>accept and retain any present, pension, office or emolument of any kind
>whatever, from any emperor, king, prince or foreign power, such person
>shall cease to be a citizen of the United States, and shall be incapable of
>holding any office of trust or profit under them, or either of them."
>
>The Constitution requires three-quarters of the states to ratify a proposed
>amendment before it may be added to the Constitution. When Congress
>proposed the "Title of Nobility" Amendment in 1810, there were
>seventeen states, thirteen of which would have to ratify for the
>Amendment to be adopted. According to the National Archives, the
>following is a list of the twelve states that ratified, and their dates of
>ratification:
>
>Maryland, Dec. 25, 1810; Kentucky, Jan. 31, 1811; Ohio, Jan. 31, 1811;
>Delaware, Feb. 2, 1811; Pennsylvania, Feb. 6, 1811; New Jersey, Feb. 13,
>1811; Vermont, Oct. 24, 1811; Tennessee, Nov. 21, 1811; Georgia, Dec.
>13, 1811; North Carolina, Dec. 23, 1811; Massachusetts, Feb. 27, 1812;
>New Hampshire, Dec. 10, 1812;
>
>Before a thirteenth state could ratify, the
>War of 1812 broke out with England. By the time the war ended in 1814,
>the British had burned the Capitol, the Library of Congress, and most of
>the records of the first 38 years of government. Whether there was a
>connection between the proposed "title of nobility" amendment and the
>War of 1812 is not known. However, the momentum to ratify the proposed
>Amendment was lost in the tumult of war.
>
>Then, four years later, on December 31, 1817, the House of
>Representatives resolved that President Monroe inquire into the status of
>this Amendment. In a letter dated February 6, 1818, President Monroe
>reported to the House that the Secretary of State Adams had written to
>the governors of Virginia, South Carolina and Connecticut to tell them that
>the proposed Amendment had been ratified by twelve States and rejected
>by two (New York and Rhode Island), and asked the governors to notify
>him of their legislature's position. (House Document No. 76) (This, and
>other letters written by the President and the Secretary of State during the
>month of February, 1818, note only that the proposed Amendment had not
>yet been ratified. However, these letters would later become crucial
>because, in the absence of additional information they would be
>interpreted to mean the amendment was never ratified).
>
>On February 28, 1818, Secretary of State Adams reported the rejection of
>the Amendment by South Carolina. [House Doc. No. 129]. There are no
>further entries regarding the ratification of the 13th Amendment in the
>Journals of Congress; whether Virginia ratified is neither confirmed nor
>denied. Likewise, a search through the executive papers of Governor
>Preston of Virginia does not reveal any correspondence from Secretary of
>State Adams. (However, there is a journal entry in the Virginia House that
>the Governor presented the House with an official letter and documents
>from Washington within a time frame that conceivably includes receipt of
>Adams' letter.)
>
>Again, no evidence of ratification; none of denial.
>
>However, on March 10, 1819, the Virginia legislature passed Act No. 280
>(Virginia Archives of Richmond, "misc.' file, p. 299 for micro-film): "Be it
>enacted by the General Assembly, that there shall be published an edition
>of the Laws of this Commonwealth in which shall be contained the
>following matters, that is to say: the Constitution of the united States and
>the amendments thereto..." This act was the specific legislated
>instructions on what was, by law, to be included in the re-publication (a
>special edition) of the Virginia Civil Code. The Virginia Legislature had
>already agreed that all Acts were to go into effect on the same day -- the
>day that the Act to re-publish the Civil Code was enacted. Therefore, the
>13th Amendment's official date of ratification would be the date of
>re-publication of the Virginia Civil Code: March 12, 1819. The Delegates
>knew Virginia was the last of the 13 States that were necessary for the
>ratification of the 13th Amendment. They also knew there were powerful
>forces allied against this ratification so they took extraordinary measures
>to make sure that it was published in sufficient quantity (4,000 copies were
>ordered, almost triple their usual order), and instructed the printer to send
>a copy to President James Monroe as well as James Madison and
>Thomas Jefferson. (The printer, Thomas Ritchie, was bonded. He was
>required to be extremely accurate in his research and his printing, or he
>would forfeit his bond.)
>
>In this fashion, Virginia announced the ratification: by publication and
>dissemination of the Thirteenth Amendment of the Constitution.
>There is question as to whether Virginia ever formally notified the
>Secretary of State that they had ratified this 13th Amendment. Some have
>argued that because such notification was not received (or at least, not
>recorded), the Amendment was therefore not legally ratified. However,
>printing by a legislature is prima facie evidence of ratification. Further,
>there is no Constitutional requirement that the Secretary of State, or
>anyone else, be officially notified to complete the ratification process. The
>Constitution only requires that three- fourths of the states ratify for an
>Amendment to be added to the Constitution. If three-quarters of the states
>ratify, the Amendment is passed. Period. The Constitution is otherwise
>silent on what procedure should be used to announce, confirm, or
>communicate the ratification of amendments
>
>.....The web site goes on with more important details of the amendment with a
>"scholarly" discussion on the impacts ratification of this amendment would
>mean .
>
>Steve
>
<snip>
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