thus elected, shall have such civil and criminal jurisdiction as shall be prescribed by law.

Section 16. The legislature shall pass laws for the regulation of tribunals of conciliation, defining their powers and duties; such tribunals may be established in and for any township, and shall have power to render judgment to be obligatory on the parties, when they shall voluntarily submit their matter in difference to arbitration, and agree to abide the judgment or assent thereto in writing. Section 17. The style of all writs and process shall be "the State of Wisconsin;" all criminal prosecutions shall be carried on in the name and by the authority of the same; and all indictments shall conclude against the peace and dignity of the State.

Section 18. The legislature shall impose a tax on all civil suits commenced or prosecuted in the municipal, inferior, or circuit courts, which shall constitute a fund to be applied toward the payment of the salary of judges.

Section 19. The testimony in causes in equity shall be taken in like manner, as in cases at law, and the office of master in chancery is hereby prohibited.

Section 20. Any suitor in any court of this State shall have the right to prosecute or defend his suit, either in his own proper person, or by an attorney or agent of his choice.

Section 21. The legislature shall provide by law for the speedy publication of all statute laws, and of such judicial decisions, made within the State, as may be deemed expedient. And no general law shall be in force until published.

Section 22. The legislature, at its first session after the adoption of this constitution, shall provide for the appointment of three commissioners, whose duty it shall be to inquire into, revise, and simplify the rules of practice, pleadings, forms and proceedings, and arrange a system adapted to the courts of record of this State, and report the same to the legislature, subject to their modification and adoption; and such commission shall terminate upon the rendering of the report, unless otherwise provided by law.

Section 23. The legislature may provide for the appointment of one or more persons in each organized county, and may vest in such persons such judicial power as shall be prescribed by law. Provided, that said power shall not exceed that of a judge of the circuit court at chambers.

ARTICLE VIII.

FINANCE.

Section 1. The rule of taxation shall be uniform, and taxes shall be levied upon such property as the legislature shall prescribe. Section 2. No money shall be paid out of the treasury, except in pursuance of an appropriation by law.

Section 3. The credit of the State shall never be given or loaned in aid of any individual, association, or corporation.

Section 4. The State shall never contract any public debt except in the cases and manner herein provided.

Section 5. The legislature shall provide for an annual tax sufficient to defray the estimated expenses of the State for each year, and whenever the expenses of any year shall exceed the income, the legislature shall provide for levying a tax for the ensuing year sufficient, with other sources of income, to pay the deficiency, as well as the estimated expenses of such ensuing year.

Section 6. For the purpose of defraying extraordinary expenditures, the State may contract public debts, (but such debts shall never in the aggregate exceed one hundred thousand dollars.) Every such debt shall be authorized by law, for some purpose or purposes to be distinctly specified therein; and the vote of a majority of all the members elected to each house, to be taken by yeas and nays, shall be necessary to the passage of such law; and every such law shall provide for levying an annual tax sufficient to pay the annual interest of such debt, and the principal, within five years from the passage of such law, and shall specially appropriate the proceeds of such taxes to the payment of such principal and interest; and such appropriation shall not be repealed, nor the taxes be postponed or diminished, until the principal and interest of such debt shall have been wholly paid.

Section 7. The legislature may also borrow money to repel invasion, suppress insurrection, or defend the State in time of war; but the money thus raised shall be applied exclusively to the object for which the loan was authorized, or to the repayment of the debt thereby created.

Section 8. On the passage, in either house of the legislature, of any law which imposes, continues or renews a tax, or creates a debt or charge, or makes, continues, or renews an appropriation of public or trust money, or releases, discharges, or commutes a claim, or demand of the State, the question shall be taken by yeas and nays, which shall be duly entered on the journal; and three-fifths of all the members elected to such house shall, in all such cases, be required to constitute a quorum therein.

Section 9. No scrip, certificate, or other evidence of State debt whatsoever shall be issued, except for such debts as are authorized by the sixth and seventh sections of this article.

Section 10. The State shall never contract any debt for works of internal improvement, or be a party in carrying on such works; but whenever grants of land or other property shall have been made to the State, especially dedicated by the grant to particular works of internal improvements, the State may carry on such particular works, and shall devote thereto the avails of such grants, and may pledge or appropriate the revenues derived from such works in aid of their completion.

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ARTICLE IX.

EMINENT DOMAIN AND PROPERTY OF THE STATE.

Section 1. The State shall have concurrent jurisdiction on all rivers and lakes bordering on this State, so far as such rivers or lakes shall form a common boundary to the State, and any other State or Territory, now or hereafter to be formed, and bounded by the same; and the river Mississippi, and the navigable waters leading into the Mississippi and St. Lawrence, and the carrying places between the same, shall be common highways and forever free, as well to the inhabitants of the State, as to the citizens of the United States, without any tax, impost or duty therefor.

Section 2. The title to all lands and other property, which have accrued to the Territory of Wisconsion by grant, gifts, purchase, forfeiture, escheat, or otherwise, shall vest in the State of Wisconsin. Section 3. The people of the State, in their right of sovereignty, are declared to possess the ultimate property, in and to all lands within the jurisdiction of the State; and all lands the title to which shall fail from a defect of heirs, shall revert or escheat to the people.

ARTICLE X.

EDUCATION.

Section 1. The supervision of public instruction shall be vested in a State superintendent, and such other officers as the legislature shall select. The State superintendent shall be chosen by the qualified electors of the State, in such manner as the legislature shall provide; his powers, duties and compensation shall be prescribed by law: Provided, that his compensation shall not exceed the sum of twelve hundred dollars annually.

Section 2. The proceeds of all lands that have been or hereafter may be granted by the United States to this State for educational purposes, (except the lands heretofore granted for the purposes of a university,) and all moneys, and the clear proceeds of all property that may accure to the State by forfeiture or escheat, and all moneys which may be paid as an equivalent for exemption from military duty; and the clear proceeds of all fines collected in the several counties for any breach of the penal laws, and all moneys arising from any grant to the State where the purposes of such grant are not specified, and the five hundred thousand acres of land to which the State is entitled by the provisions of an act of Congress entitled "An act to appropriate the proceeds of the sales of the public lands and to grant pre-emption rights," approved the fourth day of September, one thousand eight hundred and forty. one; and, also, the five per centum of the net proceeds of the public lands to which the State shall become entitled on her admission into the Union (if Congress shall consent to such appropriation of the two grants last mentioned) shall be set apart as a separate fund, to be

called "The School Fund;" the interest of which, and all other revenues derived from the school lands, shall be exclusively applied to the following objects, to wit:

1. To the support and maintenance of common schools in each school district, and the purchase of suitable libraries and apparatus

therefor..

2. The residue shall be appropriated to the support and maintenance of academies and normal schools, and suitable libraries and apparatus therefor.

Section 3. The legislature shall provide by law for the establishment of district schools, which shall be as nearly uniform as practicable; and such schools shall be free and without charge for tuition to all children between the ages of four and twenty years; and no sectarian instruction shall be allowed therein.

Section 4. Each town and city shall be required to raise by tax, annually, for the support of common schools therein, a sum not less than one half the amount received by such town or city respectively for school purposes from the income of the school fund.

Section 5. Provision shall be made by law for the distribution of the income of the school fund among the several towns and cities of the State, for the support of common schools therein, in some just proportion to the number of children and youth resident therein, between the ages of four and twenty years, and no appropriation shall be made from the school fund to any city or town, for the year in which said city or town shall fail to raise such tax; nor to any school district for the year in which a-school shall not be maintained at least three months.

Section 6. Provision shall be made by law for the establishment of a State university, at or near the seat of State government, and for connecting with the same, from time to time, such colleges in different parts of the State as the interests of education may require. The proceeds of all lands that have been, or may hereafter be, granted by the United States to the State for the support of a university, shall be and remain a perpetual fund, to be called "The University Fund," the interest of which shall be appropriated to the support of the State university; and no sectarian instruction shall be allowed in such university.

Section 7. The secretary of state, treasurer, and attorney general, shall constitute a board of commissioners for the sale of the school and university lands, and for the investment of the funds arising therefrom. Any two of said commissioners shall be a quorum for the transaction of all business pertaining to the duties of their office.

Section 8. Provision shall be made by law for the sale of all school and university. lands, after they shall have been appraised; and when any portion of such lands shall be sold, and the purchase money shall not be paid at the time of the sale, the commissioners shall take security by mortgage upon the lands sold for the sum remaining unpaid, with seven per cent. interest thereon, payable annually at the office of the treasurer. The commissioners shall be authorized to execute a good and sufficient conveyance to all pur

chasers of such lands, and to discharge any mortgages taken as security when the sum due thereon shall have been paid. The commissioners shall have power to withhold from sale any portion of such lands when they shall deem it expedient, and shall invest all moneys arising from the sale of such lands, as well as all other university and school funds, in such manner as the legislature shall provide, and shall give such security for the faithful performance of their duties as may be required by law.

ARTICLE XI.

CORPORATIONS.

Section 1. Corporations, without banking powers or privileges, may be formed under general laws, but shall not be created by special act, except for municipal purposes, and in cases where, in the judgment of the legislature, the objects of the corporation cannot be attained under general laws. All general laws, or special acts, enacted under the provisions of this section, may be altered or repealed by the legislature at any time after their passage.

Section 2. No municipal corporation shall take private property for public use, against the consent of the owner, without the necessity therefor being first established by the verdict of a jury.

Section 3. It shall be the duty of the legislature, and they are hereby empowered, to provide for the organization of cities and incorporated villages, and to restrict their power of taxation, assessment, borrowing money, contracting debts, and loaning their credit, so as to prevent abuses in assessments and taxation, and in contracting debts by such municipal corporations.

Section 4. The legislature shall not have power to create, authorize, or incorporate, by any general or special law, any bank or banking power or privilege, or any institution or corporation having any banking power or privilege whatever, except as provided in this article.

Section 5. The legislature may submit to the voters, at any general election, the question of "bank," or "no bank;" and if, at any such election, a number of votes equal to a majority of all the votes cast at such election on that subject, shall be in favor of banks, then the legislature shall have power to grant bank charters, or to pass a general banking law, with such restrictions, and under such regulations as they may deem expedient and proper for the security of the bill-holders. Provided, That no such grant or law shall have any force or effect until the same shall have been submitted to a vote of the electors of the State, at some general election, and been approved by a majority of the votes cast on that subject at such election.