Corwin Amendment - Ratifications

Ratifications

Pursuant to Article V of the Constitution, consideration of the Corwin Amendment then shifted to the state legislatures. On May 13, 1861, the Ohio General Assembly became the first to ratify the amendment. Next was the Maryland General Assembly on January 10, 1862. Later that year, Illinois lawmakers—sitting as a state constitutional convention at the time—also endorsed the amendment. That action is of questionable validity, because the Congress submitted the amendment to the state legislatures for ratification rather than to state ratifying conventions.

On March 31, 1864, the Ohio General Assembly rescinded its ratification of the Corwin Amendment, noting that the Civil War had rendered it irrelevant and calling it "an impediment to the free action of congress in the present exigencies of the country as well as a misrepresentation of the public sentiment of the people of Ohio, and contrary to the spirit of the age."

The Corwin Amendment is still pending before the state legislatures for ratification. It would need 35-37 ratifications to become part of the Constitution, depending on the validity of Ohio's rescission and of Illinois's questionable ratification. In 1963, more than a century after the Corwin Amendment was submitted to the state legislatures by the Congress, a joint resolution to ratify it was introduced in the Texas House of Representatives by Dallas Republican Henry Stollenwerck. It was referred to the House's Committee on Constitutional Amendments on March 7, 1963, and received no further consideration.