undertaking to pass upon the question whether the present capitol ever was fit for the purposes for which it has been used, your committee are certain that it is now utterly inadequate to those purposes. Practically there are no committee rooms either for the House of Representatives or for the Senate. And there is less need to enlarge upon this want as it must have forced itself upon the attention of every member of this body. In the hurry and necessary press of business incident to biennial sessions of forty days, incessant industry and attention to committee duties becomes needful to mature bills for legislative action, and all facilities practicable should be accorded to those upon whom these duties are incumbent. The most vital interests of the State are involved in this subject of adequate rooms and accommodations for those who are looked to for the soundness of its measures and the wisdom of its laws. And while it is as it has been during past and the present session, that the House of Representatives and the Senate are compelled to waste day after day of precious time, pending the action of the committees, it requires no argument to enforce considerations of public necessity in aid of an obvious and necessary measure.

Other considerations present themselves to your committee. Some of these, and the most prominent of them, have been presented in the inaugural message of the executive. During the first four years after the removal of the State capitol from Detroit to Lansing, all the State departments and offices were kept in the capitol. After a few years, want of room impelled and made necessary the building now used by the State officers, but the building was so badly and imperfectly erected that, in the language of the Governor's message, "It is in danger of falling." It has been found necessary to secure this building from impending danger by the introduction of heavy iron rods ongitudinally, secured by nuts and screws, and even now

this building, which is of brick, shakes and trembles in every gale of wind.

Aside altogether from insecurity and want of permanence of this structuae, and indeed, if it had been ever so well built it contains not more than half the room required by the purposes to which it is devoted, the requirements of which are continually growing with the growth of the State. And already the force of clerks required by the Auditor General at certain seasons of the year, are compelled to perform their duties in a space so cramped as to interfere with their efficiency, and to cause them to hinder and embarrass each other.

The records of the department of State, of the State Land Office, and of the Auditor General's office' are of vital importance, as well to the public at large as to thousands of citizens individually, and a just prudence requires that these records should be preserved.

The vouchers, forming a large and voluminous class of documents, which have been accumulating from the foundation of the government of Michigan, and which are matters of daily reference, should be systematically arranged, and securely kept for that purpose. But such a disposiof them is entirely out of the question, with present accommodations. And until other accommodations are provided by the Legislature, they must remain as now, a confused mass of matter, poked in large boxes and stowed away in holes and corners, liable to destruction by fire, wet, mould and vermin. And if not destroyed, wholly unattainable, when wanted in an emergency of haste.

The Supreme Court is required to hold two sessions annually at the seat of government, and one of these sessions is at the time when the several Halls of the House and Senate are in use. Although a room has been lately fitted up for the temporary use of that body, yet already has the State Treasurer been compelled, by want of space in the State building, to resort to this room, and to appro

priate it to the Bank department of his office. The State Library is a collection of books of large extent, and of great and rapidly increasing value. A large portion of this Library is at present hidden away in boxes and drawers, practically useless for reading, or for reference, and in danger of injury from moth and milldew, to which danger is to be added that of destruction by fire, to which the entire Library is liable, from the insecurity, from the character and condition of the structure in which it is kept. This danger was made apparent only a few days previous to the present session, when, by the merest accident, the whole structure was saved from being enveloped in flames. In view of the considerations above named, your committee would respectfully recommend an appropriation of fifty thousand dollars, to be placed at the disposal and under the control of a State Building Board, hereafter to be constituted, for the purpose of collecting necessary materials, of procuring needful plans and specifications, and of taking other needful measures for the construction of a State Capitol. No opinion of plans is reported, as it is submitted that the adoption or rejection of plans will necessarily have to be submitted to a Board of Building Commissioners.

All of which is respectfully submitted.

J. W. PHELPS, Chairman.

[ No. 21. ]

COMMUNICATION from the Attorney General.

Lansing, February 1, 1858. To the Speaker of the House of Representatives:

SIR-I have had the honor to receive a copy of the res olution of the House of this date asking my opinion whether the recommendations contained in the Governor's special message of the 27th ultimo, respecting the Sault St. Marie canal, are in conflict with section 7, of article 14 of the Constitution.

Section 9 of that article, declares that "the State shall not be a party to or interested in any work of internal improvement, except in the expenditure of grants to the State of land or other property.

The contract for building the St. Mary's canal, entered into by the State through its Commissioners with sundry contractors in the year 1853, in pursuance of two acts (No. 38 and No. 61) of the session of that year, was performed and the work accepted by the Governor in the summer of 1855. No one, I believe, has questioned the power of the

Legislature to become a party to a contract for constructing the canal by means of the 750,000 acres of land granted to the State for that purpose by Congress in August, 1852. The work was done and accepted by the State, and the entire quantity of the lands granted therefor, patented to the assignees of the contractors in pursuance of the statutes; and the question now arises whether the State, under its Constitution, has the power to preserve this important work from decay and ruin. Before this question shall be answered in the negative, we have a right to demand the most explicit and unequivocal, showing that such was the intention of the framers of the instrument, and that such is the unavoidable construction to be given to the language.

The canal lies within the jurisdictional limits of our State, subject to our sovereignty and laws. The use of the tract of land of four hundred feet in width, through which it passes, is by the act of Congress granted to the State for the construction and convenience of the canal and the appurtenances thereto forever, for the purposes of the canal, and for no other purposes. The same act requires the Legislature of the State to keep an account of the sales of the 750,000 acres, and of all expenditures in the construction, repairs and operating of said canal, and of the earniegs thereof, and provides that whenever the State shall be fully reimbursed for all advances made for the construction, repairs and operating of said canal, with legal interest, on all advances until the reimbursement of the same, or upon payment by the United States of any balance of such advances over such receipts, from such lands and canal, with such interest, the State shall be allowed to tax for the use of the canal only such tolls as shall be necessary to pay all necessary expenses for the care, charge and repairs of the same. It is evident that the act of Congress contemplates that the State may be under the necessity of making repairs upon the canal, in