to take up the precious time of the House with a set speech on this occasion; that he did not speak by note, and trusted the House would bear him with patience even if he wandered widely. The present question, he said, had often been agitated on the floor of this House. From 1801 until the present day, it has been presented to the legislature, and its friends had gradually increased, and it now came before this House under more favourable auspices than it ever had done before. The bill had been passed at the last session by both Houses, and at the present session it had again passed the Senate, and he understood that only a single no was heard in that honourable body when the vote was taken.

Mr. Kennedy said that he did not claim any honour for having brought the subject before the legislature, for it was not due to him, it was due to another; * for in the year 1817, = often as he had read the constitution, he was not aware that any citizen of Maryland was rendered ineligible to office, on account of his religious principles.

S

It is true that in 1818 a bill similar to the present, was brought before this House by him, and was rejected, it was again brought forward in 1819 and 1820, and a bill to abolish the religious test entirely, passed both branches of the legislature in 1822, that bill he should long remember, for it left him at home; yet he did not regret the course he had then pursued―nor would he regret it if it had even exiled him from public life forever.

Mr. Kennedy said and challenged contradictions on this point, that Maryland was the only state in the Union where Jews were excluded from "participation in civil office, with the rest of their fellow citizens on account of their religious belief." That in Massachusetts where a convention was called a few years ago, the chief alteration made in their constitution, was an entire abolition of the religious test. That the Constitution of the United States recognized the

* We understand Mr. Kennedy here alluded to the late much respected and worthy Jeremiah Sullivan, Esq., formerly of Baltimore City, who first mentioned the subject to him.

same principles, and that this had been done by an unanimous vote of those sages and patriots who framed the constitution.

Mr. Kennedy said that the sweetest joy to the parents, and he well knew a parent's feeling, was to see a well beloved son rise into public notice, distinguished by his virtues and talents. But how was it in Maryland?-Except you believe in a particular creed, your son, though ever so highly qualified for office, could not hold any without being an apostate from the religion of his fathers, and would not said parents in the bitterness of their hearts be almost ready to curse Maryland.

Instances have already occurred where a native born citizen of Maryland could not practice at the bar as an attorney, could not command a company of militia, though unanimously elected, because he could not subscribe what in his heart he did not believe.

An awful responsibility, he observed, rested on the members of this House, and he begged them to pause and reflect-it was in their power to put this question at rest forever-it was in their power to have their names recorded and handed down to posterity, as the friends of civil and religious liberty; and that they were among those who professed as well as practiced the great and good precept of "doing unto others what it was their wish others should do unto them.'

Mr. Tyson followed Mr. Kennedy on the same side. No person spoke in opposition. The following are the yeas and nays:

AFFIRMATIVE-Messrs. Semmes (Speaker), Kilgour, Milliard, Hawkins, Gough, Welch, Boon, Wickes, Maxcy, Estep, Beckett, Brooke, Dalrymple, Smith, Chapman, Rogerson, Edelen, Worthington, McCulloch, Spencer, Mills, Teackle, Eccleston, Beall, Duvall, Banette, Stevens, Sudler, Cockey, Barnes, Sappington, Fanguhar, Williams, Hall, Howard, Tyson, Kennedy, Lansdale, Lee, Hughes, Watson, Perry, Rud, Blair, Armstrong 45.

NEGATIVE-Messrs. Harris, Gantt, Lintchicum, Garner, Shaw, Turner, Goldsborough, Banning, E. Jones, B. I. Jones,

Ennalls, Broughan, Douglass, Thomas, Grubb, Gilpin, Harlan, Ridout, Speed, Ridgaway, Hopper, Hooper, Parker, Mitchell, J. Montgomery, Potter, Keene, Saulsbury, Hughlet, Merrick, Kershner, Jacques, Jr.-32.

THE END

INDEX