History of the Constitutions of Iowa Part 1

History of the Const.i.tutions of Iowa.

by Benjamin F. Shambaugh.

PREFACE

To recur occasionally to the history and ideals of our pioneer forefathers will give us a more generous appreciation of the worth of our Commonwealth and a firmer faith in our own provincial character. It is believed that a more intimate knowledge of the political history of our own Commonwealth will not only inspire local patriotism, but give us a better perspective of the political life of the Nation.

This little volume was written for publication by the Historical Department of Iowa upon the request of Mr. Charles Aldrich. Since the work is intended as a narrative essay, it has been thought best to omit all foot-note citations to authorities. For the original sources upon which the essay is largely based the reader is referred to the author's collections of doc.u.mentary materials which have been published by the Iowa State Historical Society. Quotations used in the body of the text have been reprinted _literatim_ without editing.

The Convention of 1857 and the Const.i.tution of 1857 have been little more than noticed in chapters XIX and XX. An adequate discussion of these subjects would have transcended the limits set for this volume by several hundred pages.

The author wishes to express his obligations to his friend and colleague, Professor W. C. Wilc.o.x, of the University of Iowa, who has carefully read the proof-sheets of the whole volume.

BENJ. F. SHAMBAUGH.

UNIVERSITY OF IOWA JULY, 1902

_AN HISTORICAL ESSAY_

I

INTRODUCTION

Three score years and ten after the declaration went forth from Independence Hall that "all men are created equal," and fifteen years before the great struggle that was to test whether a nation dedicated to that proposition can long endure, Iowa, "the only free child of the Missouri Compromise," was admitted into the Union on an equal footing with the original States.

Profoundly significant in our political evolution are events such as these. They are milestones in the progressive history of American Democracy.

To search out the origin, to note the progress, to point to the causes, and to declare the results of this marvelous popular political development in the New World has been the ambition of our historians.

Nay more, the "American experiment" has interested the talent of Europe; and our political literature is already enriched by De Tocqueville's "_Democracy in America_," by von Holst's "_Const.i.tutional and Political History of the United States_," and by Bryce's "_American Commonwealth_." Ever since its adoption the Const.i.tution of the "Fathers" has been the most popular text-book of const.i.tution drafters the world over.

At the same time it is strangely true that the real meaning, the philosophical import, of this interesting political drama has scarcely anywhere been more than suggested. A closer view reveals the fact that all of the doc.u.ments themselves have not yet been edited, nor the narrative fully told. At present there is not a chapter of our history that is wholly written, though the ma.n.u.script is worn with erasures.

To be sure, Bancroft has written exhaustively of the Colonies; Fiske has illuminated the Revolution and portrayed the "Critical Period;"

Frothingham has narrated the "Rise of the Republic;" Parkman has vividly pictured events in the Northwest; McMaster has depicted the life of the people; von Holst has emphasized the importance of slavery; Rhodes has outlined more recent events; and a host of others have added paragraphs, chapters, monographs, and volumes to the fascinating story of the birth and development of a Democratic Nation. But where are the cla.s.sics of our local history? Who are the historians of the Commonwealths?

These questions reveal great gaps in our historical literature on the side of the Commonwealths. Nor have the omissions pa.s.sed unnoticed.

Bryce likens the history of the Commonwealths to "a primeval forest, where the vegetation is rank and through which scarcely a trail has been cut." And yet it is clearly evident that before the real import of American Democracy can be divined the forest must be explored and the underbrush cleared away.

This is not a plea for localism or particularism. On the contrary, it suggests the possibility of a broader view of our National life. It points to the source of our political ideals. For nothing is more misleading than the inference that the life of our people is summed up in the Census Reports, the Journals of Congress, and the Archives of the Departments at Was.h.i.+ngton.

The real life of the American Nation spreads throughout forty-five Commonwealths. It is lived in the commonplaces of the shop, the factory, the office, the mine, and the farm. Through the Commonwealths the spirit of the Nation is expressed. Every American community, however humble, partic.i.p.ates in the formation and expression of that spirit.

Thus the real significance of the Commonwealth in any philosophical consideration depends not so much upon its own peculiar local color as upon the place which it occupies in the life and development of the larger National whole.

It is so with Iowa. Here within the memory of men still living a new Commonwealth has grown to maturity, has been admitted into the Union, and now by common consent occupies a commanding position in National Politics. It is, moreover, from the view-point of these larger relations that the political and const.i.tutional history of Iowa will ultimately be interpreted. No amount of interest in merely local incident or narration of personal episode will suffice to indicate the import of Iowa's political existence. He who essays to write the history of this Commonwealth must ascend to loftier heights.

To narrate briefly the history of the Const.i.tutions of Iowa, and therein to suggest, perhaps, somewhat of the political ideals of the people and the place which this Commonwealth occupies politically in the progressive history of the larger Commonwealth of America, is the purpose of these pages.

II

A DEFINITION

Definition is always difficult; it may be tiresome. But when a term has come to have many different meanings, then no one who seriously desires to be understood can use it in the t.i.tle of a text without at least attempting a definition. This is true of the word "Const.i.tution," which in the literature of Political Science alone has at least three distinct meanings corresponding to the three points of view, that is, the philosophical, the historical, and the legal.

From the view-point of Political Philosophy the word "Const.i.tution,"

stands for the fundamental principles of government. It is the sum (1) of the general and basic principles of all political organization by which the form, competence, and limitations of governmental authorities are fixed and determined, and (2) of the general and basic principles of liberty, in accordance with which the rights of men living in a social state are ascertained and guaranteed. In short, it is the sum of the ultimate principles of government.

But from the view-point of Historical Politics this word has a different connotation. Consider, for example, the political literature that appears under such headlines as "Const.i.tutional History" or the "History of Const.i.tutional Government." Here Const.i.tution means not abstract philosophic principles of Government, but concrete political phenomena, that is, political facts. Our const.i.tutional historians do not as a rule deal directly with the ultimate principles of government; but they are concerned rather with their progressive phenomenal manifestations in the a.s.sembly, the court, the office, the caucus, the convention, the platform, the election, and the like. Thus Const.i.tutional History is simply a record of concrete political facts.

It is, however, in the literature of Jurisprudence that the term "Const.i.tution" is used in accordance with an exact definition.

Const.i.tutional Law, or the Law of the Const.i.tution, means a very definite thing to the Jurist. It stands (at least in America) for a written instrument which is looked upon "as the absolute rule of action and decision for all departments and officers of government . . . and in opposition to which any act or regulation of any such department or officer, or even of the people themselves, will be altogether void." In this sense a Const.i.tution is a code of that which is fundamental in the Law. To be sure, this code or text, as everybody knows, does not provide for all that is fundamental in government. It usually contains much that is temporary and unimportant. But to the American Jurist all that finds expression in the written doc.u.ment labeled "Const.i.tution" is Const.i.tutional Law. Accordingly, he defines the Const.i.tution as the written or codified body of fundamental law in accordance with which government is inst.i.tuted and administered.

It is as a code or text of fundamental law that the word "Const.i.tution"

is used in the t.i.tle of these pages. This is not a philosophical discussion of the ultimate principles of our government, nor an outline of our const.i.tutional history, but simply a narrative touching the written texts or codes that have served the people of Iowa as fundamental law during the past sixty years.

III

THE CONSt.i.tUTION MAKERS

Const.i.tutions are not made; they grow. This thought has become a commonplace in current political literature. And yet the growth of which men speak with such a.s.surance is directed, that is, determined by the ideals of the people. Members of const.i.tuent a.s.semblies and const.i.tutional conventions neither manufacture nor grow Const.i.tutions--they simply formulate current political morality. It is in the social mind back of the convention, back of the government, and back of the Law that the ideals of human right and justice are conceived, born, and evolved. A Const.i.tution is a social product.

It is the embodiment of popular ideals.

And so the real makers of the Const.i.tutions of Iowa were not the men who first in 1844, then in 1846, and then again in 1857 a.s.sembled in the Old Stone Capitol on the banks of the Iowa River. The true "Fathers" were the people who, in those early times from 1830 to 1860, took possession of the fields and forests and founded a new Commonwealth. They were the pioneers, the frontiersmen, the squatters--the pathfinders in our political history. Aye, they were the real makers of our fundamental law.

The first of the Iowa pioneers crossed the Mississippi in the early thirties. They were preceded by the bold explorer and the intrepid fur-trader, who in their day dared much, endured much, and through the wildernesses lighted the way for a westward-moving civilization.

Scarcely had their camp-fires gone out when the pioneer appeared with ax and ox and plow. He came to cultivate the soil and establish a home--he came to stay.

The rapidity with which the pioneer population of Iowa increased after the Black-Hawk war was phenomenal. It grew literally by leaps and bounds. Men came in from all parts of the Union--from the North-west, from the East, from the South, and from the South-east. They came from Maine and Ma.s.sachusetts, from New York and Pennsylvania, from Virginia and the Carolinas, from Georgia, Kentucky and Tennessee, and from the newer States of Ohio and Indiana. It is said that whole neighborhoods came over from Illinois.

In 1835 Lieutenant Albert Lea thought that the population had reached at least sixteen thousand souls. But the census reports give a more modest number--ten thousand five hundred. When the Territory of Iowa was established in 1838 there were within its limits twenty-two thousand eight hundred and fifty-nine people. Eight years later, when the Commonwealth was admitted into the Union, this number had increased to one hundred and two thousand three hundred and eighty-eight.

Thus in less than a score of years the pioneers had founded a new Empire west of the Mississippi. And such an Empire! A land of inexhaustible fertility! A hundred thousand pioneers with energy, courage, and perseverance scarcely less exhaustible than the soil they cultivated!

In the location of a home the pioneer was usually discriminating. His was not a chance "squatting" here or there on the prairie or among the trees. The necessities--water and fuel--led him as a rule to settle near a stream or river, and never far from timber. The pioneers settled in groups. One, two, three, or more families const.i.tuted the original nucleus of such groups. The groups were known as "communities" or "neighborhoods." They were the original social and political units out of the integration of which the Commonwealth was later formed.