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CONGRESS, UNITED STATES (ELECTORAL COMMISSION). 



ment is that, whether there be a law now ex- 

 isting or not, it is competent to Congress to 

 pass such a law ; and if a law to provide for a 

 writ of quo icarranto would be constitutional, 

 then it is constitutional to impose a like duty 

 on any other tribunal to investigate the title. 

 That is to say, if you could devolve that duty 

 npon any tribunal by means of a writ of quo 

 warranto, you can devolve it by other means. 

 If the Governor's certificate would not be con- 

 clusive there, it is not conclusive here. The 

 right to inquire into the fact exists somewhere ; 

 and if nowhere else, it must be here. 



" Thus thinking that Congress could devolve 

 upon some tribunal the authority to inquire 

 into the title of the President, and that such au- 

 thority would necessarily give to the tribunal 

 investigating the right to go into the truth, not- 

 withstanding any certificate to the falsehood, 

 I argue that here before this Electoral Com- 

 mission, invested with all the functions of the 

 two Houses, you can inquire into the truth, no 

 matter what may have been certified to the 

 contrary. 



'Furthermore, I submit to the commission 

 that there is another rule of law which neces- 

 sarily leads us to answer affirmatively the ques- 

 tion whether the truth can be given in evidence 

 notwithstanding the certificate: and that is, 

 that fraud vitiates all transactions, and can al- 

 ways be inquired into in every case except pos- 

 sibly two. I will not argue now that the judg- 

 ment of a court of record of competent juris- 

 diction can be impeached collaterally for fraud 

 in the judge. Opinions differ. If it cannot be 

 impeached, it must be because such an impeach- 

 ment would lead to an inquiry that would be 

 against public policy. It would be a scandal 

 to inquire into the bribery or corruption of a 

 judge while the judge is sitting to administer 

 justice ; and therefore, from motives of public 

 policy, it may be the rule that, until the judge 

 ia impeached and removed, you cannot inquire 

 into the corruption of his acts. And it may 

 also be true that you cannot inquire into the 

 validity of an act of a Legislature upon the 

 ground of fraud or bribery. But, with those 

 two exceptions, I venture to claim that there 

 is no act and no document anywhere that you 

 cannot impeach for fraud. Now, this canvass- 

 ing board and this Governor were not invested 

 with any such sanctity as are judges of courts 

 of record. They were not dispensing justice 

 between litigating parties, and it would not be 

 against public policy to inquire into the corrup- 

 tion or invalidity of their acts. Not a single 

 consideration that I have ever heard of, or 

 which I can imagine, would lead us to the con- 

 clusion that you cannot inquire into the truth 

 of their certificates ; and I put it to the com- 

 mission that they corruptly acted if they were 

 bribed or led_astray by hunger for office or the 

 thirst for powerorthe thirst for gold. You can 

 impeach their acts. "Who is it whose acts we 

 are now seeking to impeach ? It is the then 

 Governor of Florida, Stearns Stearns, the man 



who sent the telegram asking on what grounds 

 the votes of counties could be thrown out, and 

 who received, for answer, 'fraud, intimidation,' 

 or something else Stearns, the man who con- 

 trolled the canvassing board sitting to certify 

 whether he and they were to continue in office." 



The President : " One of the objectors to the 

 second certificate will now be heard, on the 

 eame rules and conditions prescribed in respect 

 to the objectors to the first." 



Mr. Representative Kasson : " What is the 

 case before the commission? First, a certifi- 

 cate, as required by the Constitution and laws 

 of the United States and in conformity with 

 the statutes of the State of Florida, certifying 

 the electoral votes of one of these States which 

 my honorable friend who last spoke before the 

 recess (Mr. Tucker) was pleased to call ' sove- 

 reign States ' of this Union. That certificate 

 is the one which was first opened and read in 

 the joint session. There is a second so-called 

 certificate opened in the joint meeting of the 

 two Houses of Congress in which the persons 

 signing the same preface their own certificate 

 by one signed by an officer not recognized by 

 the laws of the United States nor by the stat- 

 utes of Florida as a certifying officer, being the 

 Attorney-General of the State of Florida. He 

 certifies that there is no provision of the law 

 of Florida ' whereby the result of said return 

 can be certified to the Executive of said State ; ' 

 admitting by that certificate, if it has any force 

 at all, that his action is without the law and 

 without any sanction of the statutes of the 

 State. Next, the self-styled electors certify to 

 their own election and their own qualifica- 

 tions, and that they themselves notified the 

 Governor of their own election. That is Cer- 

 tificate No. 2 a certificate of unauthorized 

 persons and uncertified persons in the view of 

 the laws, State and national, and that was pre- 

 sented and opened, in pursuance of the recent 

 act of Congress, for what it is worth. 



" There is a third certificate still more ex- 

 traordinary still more wanting in all the legal 

 elements of electoral verification, and which 

 asks for itself consideration. It is a certificate 

 which is thoroughly ex post facto, certified by 

 an* officer not in existence until the functions 

 of the office had been exhausted ; a certificate 

 which recites or refers to posterior proceed- 

 ings in a subordinate court and in a superior 

 State court, the latter expressly excluding the 

 electoral question ; a certificate which is ac- 

 companied by that sort of a return which a 

 canvassing board might under some circum- 

 stances report to the State officers, but which 

 has never been sent to the Congress of the 

 United States or to the President of the Senate 

 for their consideration in the one hundred 

 years in which we have been a Republic. 

 Every date of the judicial orders and of the 

 laws authorizing the executive acts certified, 

 the official existence of the very officers who 

 certify them, the proceedings in the court as 

 recited in them, are all subsequent to that time 



