The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1890-03-03
QUORUM OF The HOUSE.
Presence all That Is Required by the
Constitution.
Important: Decisions of the Courts
Bearing on the Subject.
specIous Objections Raised by the
Democrats Disposed OF.

sided, when filibustering has been forgotten
and men have returned to the notion tina
public Office implies public duties, the seen,
described but family in the Congressiona
Record Of January 30 will be read will
amazement, even by some Of those who par
ticipated as actors. The very fact that ,
| great constitutional question was met on (
great occasion by mere explosions Of turgi(
rhetoric and rank disorder will seem almos
incomprehensible on any basis, and quite Sc
on the part of men so eminent as to be choser
| among 10000 of their fellows for high politi
| cal office.
The House of Representatives is body Of
men $50 in number, representing vast ex
tent CT country, with interests and wants SC
varied that no catalogue could fully enumer.
ate them. II anyone supposes that each
| question receives the deliberate judgment OF
each and all the members, he is indulging in
dream of duty performed which has no cor.
responding reality. The great majority If the
bills which pass Congress pass on the author
ity Of committees. or of members whose rep
utation carries them through. of course
this is not true of public bills Of general con-
cern or Of national importance. Such bills
have full consideration, due debate and
proper attention. But bills Of local interest,
affecting distinct regions, and concerning
small numbers only, are daily passed with
many bills passed without the utterance of
an audible sound, because even the promoter,
amid the general certainty, would forget to
vote for his bill.
This was precisely what was contemplated
by the trainers of the constitution. If the
majority of the members were on the spot,
within sound Of the transaction, If they
heard the bill read at the desk and the voice
OF tie Speaker putting the question, there
could be no human probability that any
measure would pass detrimental to the Re-
public. In pursuance of this view every day
Tor hundred years the House has passed
bills. in the total innumerable, without even
count, by mere determination of volume of
voice. Even when more certain method Of
decision was demanded, and members stood
In their places and were counted, thousands of
bills have gone through on a vote eonfessedly
less than quorum. When the writer of this
article recently declared that he had heard
Mr. Carlisle announce such bills as duly
passed a hundred times. he was altogether
too guarded. He ought to have said thous-
and times.
1t is well to comprehend just what this
means Every such bill had to be signed by
Mr.. Carlisle personally for the very purpose
of certifying that it had passed properly and
COuStlIutlOndly. Every SUCH Ulll pdSS6u Dy
less than quorum present and voting, and
signed by Mr.. Carlisle, was, therefore, an
asseveratiOn on his part that quorum need
not vote. Ii it was not. how could he justify
his action? Ii it be needful to have quorum
in active participation by Evoting, how could
declared to the House and the world had not
the absolute requisite? The only reply to
this home question yet attempted is that in
asmuch as the journal does not record the
vote, nobody can question 1t, which is the
same as saying that the constitution can be
constitutionally violated every day in the
week. provided the House journal falsies by
omission.
In this connection. also. it must be noted
that many bills on which he himself declar
| ed in open House that less than a quorum
had voted have been signed by the late
| Speaker on the very day of passage, anC
therefore before the journal was even writ
ten, much less approved. How could thi:
have been done except In happy constitution
al reliance on the well-founded hope that the
| journal, when born, would not state the
| fact?
| The sober truth, however, is that all these
| proceedings are strictly constitutional, and
would be if the facts were journalized. The
| presumption always is that the body is legal.
| ly constituted; that a majority Is there-a
| quoIum-ready to do business. If anybody
| doubts 1t he can say so and have the legal in
| ference verified. This could be properly
well to remark that, after all that has been
| said of the dreadful tyranny of the ascer-
| tainment of a quorum by the Speaker, and
| after all the Mysteries of the newspaper head
| lines, it Is somewhat improving to remember
| that the ''actual count by the Speaker that a
| quorum" is or sis not present" was express.
| ly recognized for one particular exigency by
| clause of No. II of the old rules. While,
therefore, the friends of easy obstruction
who wish to lie in ambuscade, visible to the
A..N vctl~ IL Al,~l
admit that, outside the roll-call Of yeas and
nays, a quorum need not participate, yet
they claim that the precedents of hundred
years have been violated in recognizing the
fact that quorum of the House was actual
| ly present when the rOll-call owing to the
voluntary misconduct of members, did not
show majority actually voting
The phrase, "precedents of hundred
years." is simply rhetoric. Our fathers knew
nothing of this modern system Of metaphy-
sizes whereby man could be present and abb
sent at the same moment; could be visible to
demand the yeas and nays, and invisible
when they were called 1t did not occur to
their simple minds to gl0rify themselves for
being silent. while they felt it an insult to
have that silence pointed out. They thought
that opposition meant voting against bill.
Hence filibustering is Of modern origin. 1t
had its beginning as business in the House
Of Representatives at Washington: Thence
it spread all over the country, until from one
end Of the United States to the other mere in.
ertia had got to be a match for both ballots
and brains When filibustering began it took a
whole political party to block business. In
the last Congress it had ripened to such de-
gree of impossible perfection that one man
held the country at bay. The doctrine OF the
rights of the minority" seemed to have cul-
minated at that moment.
But the trying time for all ili-doing is the
summit Of prosperity. When Mr. Tweed
wanted to know what yoC were going to dc
about it," ne had challenged both the inge
| nuity and the courage Of mankind and from
and the result not doubtful. Had filibuster
| ing confined itself to the House of Represen
the thlVeS Bounds of nele reason s might % na1t
fourished long and had many de
| tenders. 1t was convenient method o
| demanding debate, of calling the attenti or
| of the country to violent political measures
| and deserved many of the concentrations Il
| then received. But when in 1882 1t com
| menced to be the common method of pre-
| venting decision of election cases. and fin
| ally in 1889 re established the Liberum Vet
member Secame the arbiter Of destiny, ev
cry man of sense recognized the fact tha
| practice was doomed.
| Moreover, filibustering went on growing
in the direction OF another disaster.
| reached the state legislatures, where tn
people could see it face to face. 1t cam
down to municipalities and school boards.
| invaded even the assemblies nf the church
| eS, and Rule XIV, among the Rules for j ud
icatories adopted by the Presbyterian Gen
eral Assembly of Pennsylvania bears witnes
alike to the evil and its suppression, whel
it declares that "silent members" must b
considered as acquiesciDg with the major
ty."
1t is no wonder that the scheme of opposl
tion by not voting spread so rapidly. 1t
| so much easier to sit still than to argue, s
much more restful to use the attraction Q
gravitaton than to exhaust nervous energy
that it was not in human nature to refrai
from the use of this power, whicn had tn
high sanction of Congress and "the prect
| dents of hundred years" But men neve
remain reasonably bad they almost alway
carry badness to excess, and therefore
correction. And thus this scheme of silenc
which worked so well in the distant atmo
phere of the National Capital, soon met Il
death when it got down to the regions
business. Washington is far away and onl
| little understood; but man whose contra
may be adjudged void and his business G.
reer ruined by this doctrine OF corpore
presence and parliamentary absence soon b
gins to understand one place where u
rights of minorities ought to leave on. Hen'
when municipal bodies began to lmita
their superiorS, and tried to break contrac
as we'll as QuOrums, the gladsome light
jurisprudence was soon shed upon them, an
the parliamentary fiction that man presel
could truthfully declare himself absent di
| appeared from every place except the Car
, toll at Washington.
In fact, there does not seem to be a sing
/ NJ