Page:History of Washington, Idaho, and Montana.djvu/336

304 excitement of a change of government forms, for congress, on the 22d of February, 1889 (very appropriately), passed an enabling act, proposing the terms on which the state of Washington might be admitted to the union. It commanded the governor to issue a proclamation on the 15th of April for an election of seventy-five delegates to a constitutional convention, the election to be held on the first Tuesday after the second Monday in May of that year. The delegates were directed to meet at the capital on the 4th of July for organization, and to declare, on behalf of the people, their adoption of the constitution of the United States, whereupon they should be authorized to form a constitution for the proposed state. The constitution should be republican in form, make no distinction in civil or political rights on account of race or color, except as to Indians not taxed, and not be repugnant to the constitution of the United States and the principles of the Declaration of Independence. It should provide, by ordinances irrevocable without the consent of the United States and the people of said states, that perfect toleration of religious sentiment shall be secured, and no inhabitant of the state ever molested on account of his mode of worship; that the people of the state should forever disclaim all right to the unappropriated public lands lying within the boundaries thereof, or to the Indian reservations, which should remain under the absolute jurisdiction and control of congress; that the lands of non-resident citizens of the United States should never be taxed at a higher rate than the lands belonging to residents; that no taxes should be imposed by the state on lands or property therein belonging to, or which might be thereafter purchased or reserved by, the United States; but nothing in the ordinances should preclude taxing the lands owned or held by Indians who had severed their tribal relations and obtained a title thereto by patent or grant, except those lands which congress might have exempted from taxation, which