Turning Points
in Wisconsin History
The rejected constitution of 1846
Rejected Constitution of the State of Wisconsin, 1846.
After months of debate, the 1846 constitutional convention produced this document. It was controversial from the start and provoked widespread debate and condemnation, chiefly for provisions that would have given women the right to own property, immigrants the right to vote, and for another that would have prohibited privately owned banks. After it was rejected by voters (all of them white males, by definition, and including a strong pro-banking constituency in the lakeshore counties of eastern Wisconsin), a second constitutional convention was called in 1847. This produced a new, less controversial, draft that was finally ratified by voters and led to Wisconsin's admittance as a state in 1848; it is linked elsewhere on the Turning Points site. We present here the manuscript of the first, rejected state constitution of 1846. Click "Page & Text" to see a typed version of any page.
| Related Topics: |
Territory to Statehood The State Constitutions of 1846 and 1848 |
| Creator: | Wisconsin. Constitutional Convention (1846) |
| Pub Data: | Original manuscript in the Wisconsin Historical Society Archives (Series 182) |
| Citation: | Wisconsin. Constitutional Convention (1846). Rejected Constitution of the State of Wisconsin, 1846. Original manuscript in the Wisconsin Historical Society Archives (Series 182). Online facsimile at: http://wisconsinhistory.org/turningpoints/search.asp?id=54; Visited on: 4/19/2024 |
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