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CONGRESS, UNITED STATES. 



to his seat or not. That is not the object. The 

 object is to gain party power, to acquire a power 

 in the body sufficient to achieve a two-thirds 

 vote of the Senate for the party objects of the 

 party that is now in the ascendency in the two 

 Houses of Congress ; and no man is so blind as 

 to wink his eyes against the truth of that prop- 

 osition. If this issue had been made before 

 a tribunal irrespective of party considerations 

 and the necessity, real or supposed, of a party 

 majority of two-thirds, we should never have 

 heard, in my judgment, of the right of Mr. 

 Stockton being seriously contested, or at least 

 such contest would only have been by a very 

 small minority of the body. 



" Mr. President, will not the same party ex- 

 cuses and the same need for party ascendency 

 and for party strength in this and in the other 

 House come about in the future ? In future 

 Senates, when the House may be divided, as it 

 may well be divided, equally in the case that I 

 put, what will be the effect of this precedent 

 and of party impulses generally ? It will be 

 for one of the parties to contest the seat of 

 a member of the other party in the House, 

 without any regard to the merits of the 

 case, but simply to grasp at and reach party 

 power. 



" Now, Mr. President, if Mr. Stockton is to 

 be deprived of his right to vote on the present 

 question, it must be by some rule or by some 

 law. Will the honorable Senator from Massa- 

 chusetts point out any rule or any law that con- 

 travenes, much less that overrules the positive 

 provision of the Constitution, that each Senator 

 shall be entitled to one vote ? That is the law 

 of the Constitution in the organization of the 

 Senate." 



In the progress of the debate, Mr. Stockton 

 rose to withdraw the vote given by him on the 

 previous day. He said : " Mr. President, I rise 

 to withdraw my vote, with the permission of 

 the Senate, and I am exceedingly anxious that 

 I shall make my position in doing so perfectly 

 clear. At the moment that I voted on the reso- 

 lution of the Judiciary Committee, no man had 

 questioned my right to vote in this body when 

 my name was called, from the moment I en- 

 tered the chamber, upon any subject whatever. 

 I had been, on the contrary, told by Republican 

 as well as Democratic Senators, by gentlemen 

 of different politics, that in their opinion I was 

 entitled to vote. None of them with whom I 

 spoke on the subject had examined that matter 

 particularly. The question of the validity of 

 that vote never crossed my mind. I believe to- 

 day, I believe this moment, that that vote was 

 a valid vote under the Constitution of the United 

 States." 



After an extended debate, Mr. Sumner with- 

 drew his motion for an amendment of the jour- 

 nal, and Mr. Poland, of Vermont, moved a re- 

 consideration of the vote of the previous day 

 on the resolution reported by the committee, 

 which was agreed- to. Various propositions 

 were now made to meet the difficulty before 



the Senate, among which Mr. Stunner, of Mas- 

 sachusetts, offered the following : 



Resolved, That the vote of Mr. Stockton be not 

 received in determining the question of his seat in 

 the Senate. 



A motion to refer this resolution to the Ju- 

 diciary Committee was lost, and the resolution 

 was then agreed to. 



The question on the original report of the 

 committee, which closed with the resolution, 



Resolved, That John P. Stockton was duly elected, 

 and is entitled to his seat as a Senator from the State 

 of New Jersey, for the term of six years from the 

 4th day of March, 18G5, 



was postponed until the next day. "When it 

 came up on March 27th, Mr. Clark, of New 

 Hampshire, moved to amend the resolution by 

 striking out all in it after the word " Stockton," 

 and inserting "is not entitled to a seat as Sen- 

 ator from that State for the term of six years 

 from the 4th day of March, 1865." 



Mr. Stockton, in opposition to the motion, 

 addressed the Senate in extended remarks, and 

 concluded as follows : " Mr. President, from the 

 foregoing examination, I think I have proved 

 the following propositions : 



"1. Senators of the United States are to be 

 'chosen' by the Legislatures of the several 

 States. 



u 2. The ' manner ' of the choice is to be pre- 

 scribed by the Legislature thereof. 



" 3. The Legislature of New Jersey, by stat- 

 ute, indicated the 'Senate and Assembly in 

 joint meeting assembled ' as the ' manner ' in 

 which the duty imposed upon them by the 

 Constitution of the United States should be 

 performed. 



" 4. The constitution of New Jersey recog- 

 nizes ' the Senate and Assembly in joint meet- 

 ing assembled ' as the Legislature of the State. 



" 5. ' The Senate and Assembly in joint 

 meeting assembled ' have full power to deter- 

 mine the ' the manner ' of the election of the 

 United States Senate, by the authority derived 

 from the Constitution of the United States ; the 

 constitution of the State ; by virtue of the 

 statute law of the State; by parliamentary 

 usage, and by universal custom. 



" 6. That if the joint meeting had not the 

 power to prescribe the manner of choice, yet 

 the ' manner ' being determined by the statute 

 of the State, 'the Senate and Assembly in joint 

 meeting assembled' were authorized to indi- 

 cate their choice by such rules as they might 

 adopt. 



"7. The election of Mr. Stockton under the 

 rules adopted by the joint meeting of 1865 wag 

 not a plurality election, but was the choice of 

 the majority, expressed by the method indi- 

 cated by them, so declared in the resolution 

 previous to the election, and subsequent to it 

 by the silence and acquiescence of all the mem- 

 bers. 



" 8. That the whole body confirmed the legal 

 election of Mr. Stockton, and authorized the 

 Governor, under the statute, to commission 



