Bismarck daily tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, Dakota [N.D.]) 1881-1916, 1900-01-24
Majority and Minority Commit
tee Reports Are Laid Before
the Senate.
Majority Report Holds Senate
Not Responsible for Legisla-
tive Negligence.
Every Contingency but This One
Provided Against in the
Constitution.

WASHINGTON, Jan. 24.-The reports
of the committee on privileges and cleo
tions in the case Of M. S. Quay, who
claims a. seat in the United States SEN
ate on the strength Of an appointment
from the governor Of Pennsylvania, have
been presented in the senate. The ma
jority report opposing the seating Of
MIR. Quay was signed by Senators Caf-
ferry, Pettus, Turley, Harris and Bur
rows, the last named the only Repubi-
can signing it. The minority report
bears the signatures of Senators Hoar,
Chandler, Pritchard and McComas, all
Republicans, and advocates giving the
seat to Mr.. Quay.
The majority report reviews the cir
cumstances under which Mr.. Quay's ap-
pointment was made, including the
failure of the Pennsylvania legislature
to elect a senator. It then says:
Only Until the Next Meeting.
After vacancy in the Office of United
States senator occurs or comes to pass,
if the next legislature does not fill it, it
continues to exist. It is the same va
cancy, not a new one. Now the state
executive is given power to make tempo
rary appointments in case of vacancy,
not as long as it continues or exists, but
only until the next meeting Of the legis-
lature, which is then required to fill the
vacancy. This clearly means that the
paramount intention to have the legisla-
ture choose the senators is to prevail,
and whenever the legislature has had
the opportunity to fill the vacancy either
before or after it occurs, the execu-
tive has no power to appoint,
And when we take the phrase,
eff vacancies happen by resignation or
otherwise, during the recess of the 1egis-
lature Of any state,'' if we concede that
the general word ''otherwise'' is not
qualified nor limited by the specific word
resignation and that it includes va
cancies which are caused by effiux of
time and which can be foreseen, as well
as vacancies which are caused by cas-
ualty or the happening of an expected
event and which cannot be foreseen,
still it must be construed and defined
with reference to the balance of the
phrase SO as to give effect to all it's parts;
and it thus results that the vacancy, no
matter how it is produced, must happen,
take place or begin during recess Of
the legislature, and this in itself would
be decisive against Mr.. Quay's claim. :"
No Intention to Provide For This.
"Every contingency is thus provided
for, except the sole contingency that the
legislature will fail to perform it's sworn
duty. Against contingency of this
kind the trainers of the Constitution did
not intend to provide
After discussing at length the circum-
stances under which the Constitution
was framed, the majority announces it's
conclusion as follows:
ssWe think that the trainers of the
Constitution never contemplated nor in-
tended to provide for case where
state by its own deliberate act should
deprive its legislature of the power
to fill an entire term at its
beginning. Ill our opinion they never
intended to give the governor of state
the power to fill the entire terms by
original appointment, unless possibly in
a case where the legislature had chosen
and the person elected had refused to
act or died before qualification. In
other works we conclude that the power
Of appointment was not to be exercised
unless the vacancy occurred in recess
of the legislature and was occasioned by
some casualty like death OF resignation" !"
The report then quotes numerous
precedents, beginning with that of Ken
sey Johns of Delaware, in 1894, and
closing with the case Of Henry W. Cor
bett of Oregon in 1898.
The minority report takes the opposite
view. Quoting Section 8, Article Of
the Constitution, the minority say that
the failure Of the governor to call the
legislature to elect senator does not act
to deprive the governor Of the power of
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