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feelings, and injurious to their interests, they -ask no favor
(on that account. They will at all times and at any ex-
pense yield submission to the constituted authorities, and
obey their call; but theydo expect to be protetecd fromn
persecution and shielded from oppression.
  The petitioners request if a postponement can be had
on no other terms, that you would recommend the appoint-
ment of a committee to visit the Shakers at Enfield, and
there go into an examination and hearing of these com-
plaints. What can be the object of this proposal' It is
simply delay. No good could be effected by the measure
proposed. A committee might view their well cultivated
firms and their neat and peaceful habitations, without see-
ing in either any evidence to support these complaints, or
prove the guilt of the respondents. If the charges are to
be proved at all, they must be proved, as has been stated
to you by living and intelligent witnesses, and these wit-
ivesses may as well be examined here before a committee
of the Legislature, and in the presence of the members, as
in any other place.
  The Shakers are desirous that the hearing may proceed.
Although not so well prepared as they wish, to repel the
accusations of their enemies, they have no doubt of being
able to satisfy you that these accusations are unfqunded,
and that there is nothing in their peculiar opinions, doc-
trines or practices which can justify or induce the Legis-
lature to become the keepers of their consciences or the
SRecial guaardians of their property.
   Mr. Willis gave to the committee a brief history of the
oriain and progress of .the petitions and of the reasons
which had prevented the petitioners attending at this time
to prove their complaints. He said that although there
bad for many years been causes of complaint against the
Shakers, they would not probably at this time have been
laid before the Legislature, had not new cases recently
occurred to excite the public mind and deepen the feeling
upon this subject. The petitioners were inot such men as
would lend their names to any applicant or any petition
without cause or consideration. They expressed the senti-
iilent of the public, and were entitled, as he believed, to a
fair hearing. On the petition which was presented last
June no order of notice had issued, and at the comnmence-
ment of tlhis session it was altogether uncertain whvat direc-
6on would be given to that and the other petitions. After