The Arkansas banner., 1844-04-03
REMARKS OF MIR. NORRIS.
OF NEW HAMPSHIRE.


 Hampshire, Georgia, Mississippi, and Missouri,
 to hold seats in the House of Representatives
 The SPEAKER stated the order of the day to be the report of the Committee on Flee tions, on which the gentleman from New Hampshire had the floor.
 Mir. NORRIS rose, and after a few introduc tory remarks, said, notwithstanding the man. ner and feelings which had characterized the debate on this subject from the very first moment of the session; notwithstanding the high-toned charges which had been preferred against the representatives of four sovereign States on this floor, of which New Hampshire (the State he had the honor in part to repre- senD was one,-he hoped that the House would be able to approach this subject as great constitional and legal question, and calm ly and dispassionately to meet it, on legal and constitutional grounds-that, for one, 1t was his ardent desire so far to divest himself of all personal feeling in the matter as to be able so to meet and discuss it. Il had been said here, by gentlemen on the other side of this hail, that there was an ulti- mate tribunal beyond the bar of this House, which was to pass final judgment on this question; that the people of this nation would pass judgment of confirmation or reversal upon our decision. He .(Mr. N. said he was reloiced that it was SO; for were 1t not for this controlling power of the people, he would place but very little value upon their constitutional rights and freedom.
 He said the positions which he should as sume would be legal ones; such as necessa- rily sprang out of the peculiar organization ei government, or such as were based upon the plain and indubitable principle of the common law He now invited gentlemen to discuss those positions with him, both before this House and the country.
 It had been said by the gentleman from New Y ork, Mr. W. HUNT, on yesterday, that the difficulty in this case arose from a misunderstanding as to the powers of the gen. eral and State governments; but he (Mr. NJ dissentedfrom that position. Thelegislatures of New Hampshire, Georgia, Mississippi, and Missouri, had no right, as such, 10 repre- sentation in this House. The contest was not between the State and general govern ments, but between the sorereign people of four States of this Union and the Congress ol the United States. The people of those States demanded their constitutional right of repre- sentation on this floor, to which certain mem- bers ill this House were opposed. And why : Was it because the representatives from those States had not been fairly elected by majo- rity of the qualified electors in their respec- tive States Was 1t because they had not been elected in conformity with the only reg ulations in their respective States by which il was possible for the people to have made the election? No. But it was because they had not been elected by single districts, in con- formity with rule prescribed by an act of the last Congress, which mode of election it was impossible for the people of those States to have pursued. Neither the State legisla- lures nor Congress had established such dis trcts within the borders of their respective States. In proof of this, Mir N. said, he would refer the House to a portion of the celebrated protest of the federal party, which declares that
 s'By the act of Congress of June, lS42, for the apportionment of representatives among the several States according to the sixth cen sus,' it was enacted that, in every case where a State Is entitled to more than one represen- tative, the number to which each shall be en- titled under the apportionment shall be elected by districts composed of contiguous territory equal in number of representatives to whlcl said State may be entitled, no one distric electing more than one representative.'
 1sThe several States above named have re- fused or failed to provide by law for the cleo ton by districts of representatives from thost States respectively to the 18th Congress, eacl of them being entitled to more than one rep resentative, and the people of those State have failed, therefore, to elect representative by districts, as the law of Congress required
 "These facts are notorious, indisputable and undisputed; they are known to all, and admitted by all Failing to elect by districts. they have failed to elect at all, for all legal and constitutional purposes. They could not elect, because there were no districts in those States from which to elect. Election by gen eral ticket Is no election. No existing an( valid law authorized any such election to bt held; and no election, therefore, has beer held in those States at which representatives for the 18th Congress could be chosen"
 Here, said Mir. N, was the rule, as pre- scribed in the second section of the appop tionment act of the last Congress; and here the exposition of that rule, as given by the federal party on this floor, with it's conse- quences upon the right to representation o the people of these States.
 This was no contest, then, between the State and general governments, but struggle of the people of four of the sovereign States of this confederacy, for their consttutiona rights of representation on this lloor-lor the right to participate in making those laws by which they were to be governed, against tho disfranchising operation of this law of Con gress. Whether, then, the second section o apportionment act under debate, was or was not mandatory upon the State legislatures whether it placed the State legislatures under constitutional obligations to enact laws tc carry it out, he would not stop single mo ment to discuss. It was enough for him tc know that its godfathers, it's advocates upor this floor, con.ended 1t was so far nsandator, upon the sopereign people offour of the States as, by its own mere operation, to disfranchis' them-to thrust them without the pale of thu Union against their most solemn protestations