the duties of their respective offices with fidelity. These oaths I have just taken in your presence. In general terms they prescribe and limit my official duties.

The necessity and propriety of the first arises from the nature and character of our complex system of government, State and Federal. The Federal Constitution was framed in convention by delegates from the several States, and afterwards ratified by conventions of said States. The States therefore being parties to said Constitution, it was necessary and proper that they should be bound by the most solemn obligation to observe and keep the same. Hence they agreed that all their officers, Executive, Legislative, and Judicial, should be bound, by oath or affirmation, to support the Constitution which they, through their delegates, had thus framed and afterwards ratified.

It is a matter of just pride to the people of Delaware that all her officers thus designated have faithfully kept and performed the obligation thus imposed upon them. None of them have ever been unfaithful to the Federal Constitution or the Union between the States thus made. I propose, however, briefly to advert to some of these duties particularly mentioned in the Constitution of the State, the performance of which is thereby required of the Governor of the State, and to indicate my views in respect to the same. Before I do so, however, it is but proper that I should express my gratitude to the people of this State for my elevation to the chief executive office in their gift. As a return for the honor conferred it will, throughout my term of office, be my aim so to discharge the duties connected therewith, that there shall be no just cause for the expression of regret by any one who had assisted in my election to said office. While adverting to the duties imposed upon me by the Constitution, I shall, according to custom and appropriate to the present occasion, briefly state my views upon some matters, both Federal and State. I do this with no desire to dictate what should or should not be done to remedy any supposed existing evil or to provide for any future public good. I offer them to the consideration of the General Assembly, that it, as the law-making power of the State, may, as relates to State affairs, supply such necessary legislation as the public interests, in its opinion, may demand.

By Article 3, Section 8, of the Constitution of the State it is provided that the Governor "shall appoint all officers whose

offices are established by this Constitution or shall be established by law, and whose appointments are not herein otherwise provided for."

APPOINTMENTS TO OFFICE.

Rotation in office, unless in very exceptional cases, I regard as a cardinal principle applicable to the subject of appointments by the Governor. That this principle should be respected by me was made manifest by the convention which nominated me. That convention passed a resolution condemning reäppointments in respect to certain offices. I believe that their action was wise, and that the reäppointment of incumbents at the expiration of their original terms, generally, is not only improper, but unfair to others having equal qualifications and equally worthy of recognition by the appointing power. I shall deem it my duty during my term of office to make no reäppointments where the nature of the office and the public interests do not justify the same. All citizens having the proper legal and personal qualifications have an equal right to official recognition by the appointing power in the selection of officers to perform public duties. Capacity, honesty and fidelity in applicants for office are the main requisites that should be regarded by the appointing power. I have sufficient acquaintence with my fellow citizens of this State to know that many such persons can be found in each county of the State to meet these requirements without confining the appointments which I shall make to any very limited number of my fellow citizens, and from this belief and knowledge I shall conform my action in this respect to the principle enunciated by the convention which nominated me.

In adopting this as a principle which will govern my official action, I shall not only carry out the views I have long entertained and publicly expressed upon this subject, but at the same time shall reflect, as I believe, the opinions and wishes of the citizens generally of the State. In determining whom I shall appoint to office I shall make all proper and needful investigation as to qualification, and shall be governed by the considerations herein mentioned. I deem it proper, however, to say, that while I shall pay great respect and deference to the opinions of my fellow citizens generally, my action in this respect will not be determined by the number of signers to the petitions of applicants for office, nor the number of letters which may be addressed to me in their behalf.

Recommendations will be weighed and properly considered. Solicitations for recommendations of applicants for appointments too often are annoying to the parties solicited, and in some cases to the public generally. Recommendations are often too inconsiderately made, and generally very easily obtained. Having knowledge of these facts from my experience and observation in private life as a citizen, and from the experience of others, as made known by themselves, it will be impossible for me to be unmindful of such considerations in the discharge of my official duty in this respect. While I cannot hope to please all who may feel an interest in the matter of appointments, or to escape the censure of many in respect thereto, I wish it to be distinctly understood that I alone shall be responsible for the appointments which I shall make. I enter upon the discharge of the duties of my office with the consciousness of being perfectly free and uncommitted to any person in respect to any appointment to be made during my term of service. While I may, and doubtless will, make mistakes in the discharge of my duty, I shall have the proud consciousness that such mistakes will not have been intentionally made.

THE PARDONING POWER.

By the ninth section of said article of the Constitution it is provided that the Governor "shall have power to remit fines and forfeitures and to grant reprieves and pardons, except in cases of impeachment. The care with which, in the opinion of the framers of the Constitution, this power should be exercised is evidenced by the requirement that "he shall set forth, in writing, fully, the grounds of all reprieves, pardons and remissions, to be entered in a register of his official acts, and laid before the General Assembly at their next session." There will have to be strong mitigating or extenuating circumstances which the ordinary courts of justice cannot properly consider and weigh in their verdicts and judgments, and which ought to be considered and weighed as meriting Executive clemency, to cause me to exercise the power thus conferred. He who knowingly and willfully violates the law of the State, and who, after a fair and impartial trial by a jury of his countrymen, in which there has been neither mistake of law or fact committed, can have but little claim to the interposition of the exercise of this power by the Chief Executive of the State. Laws are made to be observed, not to be violated, and he who willfully and knowingly violates them, does

so with a knowledge that the law ordains the punishment of his act. These considerations will influence me in respect to my action in the exercise of the power thus vested in me under the Constitution of this State. These are the only matters in respect to my official duties enjoined upon me by the Constitution to which I deem it necessary at the present time to invite public

attention.

CONVENTION AND CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENTS.

The subject of a Constitutional Convention has for years been a matter of more or less public agitation and discussion. My views upon the subject of a Constitutional Convention are well known. As a member of the Constitutional Convention of 1852, I assisted in framing the Constitution agreed upon by that body. Not only did I support it in Convention, but in public addresses before the people I advocated its ratification. My efforts and the efforts of others to secure its adoption by the people were unsuccessful. The views I then entertained, however, in respect to the necessity and propriety of a change in the fundamental law of the State have not been altered. The changes therein I then advocated I favor to-day as Governor of the State. I wish to say, however, if the General Assembly shall, in their wisdom, see proper to provide for the calling of a Convention, and for the submission to the people of any Constitution which may be framed by such Convention, I, as an earnest advocate of Constitutional reform by means of a Convention and the adoption of a new Constitution in lieu of the existing one, would suggest that all the proceedings of the General Assembly in relation thereto should be had in strict accordance with Article IX of the present Constitution of the State, and that all the requirements of said article should be scrupulously observed. My reason for this suggestion is based upon a belief that opposition will be made to the adoption of any Constitution that may be framed, and in order that as little cavil and objection may be made as possible, it is proper that no steps which might in the least be considered revolutionary be taken to hasten that which must surely come. It is true that the people are sovereign, but sovereignty in government is unknown to American law. Such sovereignty, in the language of another, belongs to governments different from ours and beyond the waters. It cannot exist in the free governments of America. The Constitution is the fundamental law of the State.

It cannot be changed in any respect by the Legislature, which is its creature and wholly subordinate to it, and any attempt to override it would not only be a dangerous but pernicious precedent. If, therefore, the Legislature of Delaware sees proper to pass an act submitting the question of an alteration of the Constitution of the State to the voters, I hope that in all legislation in respect thereto it will have a just regard for the present Constitution of the State, and that all measures looking thereto will conform to its requirements. If, however, the General Assembly, at its present session, shall not consider it wise and proper to call a State Convention for the revision of the present Constitution, it is in their power, and I think they should exercise it, to take the initiatory steps for its amendment in the mode prescribed in the ninth article thereof. That article says, that "the General Assembly, whenever two-thirds of each house shall deem it necessary, may, with the approbation of the Governor, propose amendments to this Constitution, and at least three, and not more than six, months before the next general election of representatives, duly publish them in print for the consideration of the people, and if three-fourths of each branch of the Legislature, after such an election and before another, ratify the said amendments, they shall be valid to all intents and purposes as parts of this Constitution."

DISTRICT REPRESENTATION.

Whatever mode of amendment to the Constitution of the State may be adopted, in my judgment, the time has arrived when a change should be made in the manner of electing the Senators and Representatives in the General Assembly. Under our Constitution they are at present, as is well known, elected by the voters of the several counties throughout the counties respectively. The question presents itself to the mind of every thinking man, Is such a provision, under existing circumstances, right? Does it meet the wishes and expectations, the desires and the sense of justice of the people of the State? The voting population of the several counties of the State are greatly disproportionate. Ought not the wrong of unequal representation of the people in the General Assembly to be remedied as far as practicable? Equal representation could be more properly secured under election by districts than under the existing system. Is not the former system of election of representatives in the General As