Year: 1872

MI. CampDell-but When IL
( Legislature has convened under tn
proclamation and is recognized b,


the Governor would not any actor
it may take be legal and binding
Mr.. Ray-They can not ratif.,
the action of an executive Office


which has not been performed il
accordance with the constitution.
Mr.. Campbell-That brings the
proposition down to the naked
question, where the discretion o1


deciding what is an extraordinary


occasion sufficient to justify a called


session is vested. I hold that it is


exclusively vested in the Governor.


Mr.. RAY say that the General


Assembly can not convene except at


the time prescribed by the consti-


tuition, or unless it is called together


by the Governor could not call an


extra session, and, any meeting


of the Legislature, except at the


regular time, would be illegal.


Mr.. McMillen-I understand the
Senator from -Ouachita (AIr. Ray


to concede the point that the Gov
ernor has right to call the General
Assembly together in extra session.


MIR. Ray-Yes, but not while the
General Assembly is in regular
session.


Mr.. McMillen-The General As
sembly was not in session. The
Governor had received no official
notification to that effect.


MIR. Blackman-The position I
take is this: The constitution pro-
vides that the General Assembly
may remain in session sixty days,
and that neither House shall adjourn
for longer time than three days
without the consent of the other.
1 maintain that we are in continual
session during the sixty days, and
that our adjournments from day to
day are merely recesses, unless both
houses decide to adjourn.


Mr.. Campbell-I can not see any
potency in that argument. I con-
tend that whatever might have been
the illegality or unconstitutionality
of the extra session, the fact that a
quorum of the House of Represen-
tatives, sitting in regular session,
afterward ratified and confirmed the
action of that extra session, makes
it legal and binding. Senators will
remember that while the English
Parliament was in session, in the
reign of Chales l., and a discussion
was in progress in relation to the
levying of tonnage and poundage,
the King sent in his writ prorogu-
ing or dissolving Parliament. The
question pending was whether the
resolution should pass, making an
inquiry into the disposition of the
money thus collected by the King,
and just as the Speaker of the House
of Commons, Sir John Finch, had
declared that he had received the
Kings command and was leaving
the chair, two members stepped up
and, laying violent hands upon him,
fOrcibly declared him in his seat
until the resolution passed. Al
though those two men were impris-
oned in the Tower for their revolu-
tionary conduct, yet no one ever
doubted the legality of the passage
of that resolution. Whatever the
House agrees to and afterward con-
firms is legal and binding no mat
ter whether the original action was
performed in a revolutionary man
ner.


MIR. Thompson---I will ask the
Senator whether he does not refer
to the rump parliament?


MIR. Campben-The Senator has
forgotten his history; this occurred
before the days of the rump parlia-
ment. Now, Mr.. President, to con-
clude; I charge that the most dan
gerous part of this conspiracy was
the completely of the Federal off,
cials here. I ask the Senators who
have had an opportunity of know
ing, whether the United States
government sanctions or in any
way countenances the action of
these officials here in Interfering