New York State Executive Department Records of the Proposed Constitutional Convention

Alphabetical.

The New York State Constitution provides that every twenty years the voters of the State shall decide if there shall be a convention to revise and amend the Constitution. In August 1956, the Temporary State Commission on the Constitutional Convention was created to study and report on proposals for changes in and simplification of the State Constitution and to collect information and data useful to the delegates and people before and during the convention to be held in 1959. In the 1957 election, the voters of New York State defeated the proposal to hold a Constitutional Convention.

The records in this series were compiled by Secretary to the Governor, Jonathan Bingham, and Executive Assistant to the Counsel, Milton D. Stewart, who worked in the administration of Governor W. Averell Harriman. The series documents the work of the Governor's staff to assess and gain support for the proposed Constitutional Convention. It contains reports, studies, hearing notes, and meeting minutes of the Temporary State Commission on the Constitutional Convention as well as fact sheets, newspaper clippings, copies of Democratic and Republican policy statements, bibliographies, pamphlets and brochures, correspondence, memoranda, copies of radio broadcast scripts, proposed legislation and printed materials. Also included are press releases of the New York State Committee for a Constitutional Convention.

There are no restrictions regarding access to or use of the material.