was raised as to the validity of the election.
The Senate of the United States expressly de-
cided that, in choosing a United States sena-
tor, the Legislature of the State did not act
under the Constitution of the State, but un-
der the Constitution of the United States ;
that it stood absolved from all its obligations
to the State Constitution, and exercised the
power directly conferred upon it, by the Con-
stitution of the United States, which ex-
empted it from every obligation to obey any
provision of the State Constitution in respect
to that subject. Now, if the Legislature is
bound to obey such a provision as this, then
everybody is bound by it. Congress is bound
by our laws, if they are legal; if they are not
legal, then they are not bound.
Mr. CLARKE. I remember the case alluded
to; but I understood the Senate to decide it
upon the ground that it was a question which
went home to the consciences of the members
of the Legislature.
Mr. STIRLING. How can it go to their con-
sciences, when they are exercising a power
derived from the Constitution of the United
States, and which the Constitution of the State
had no right to take from them?
Mr. CLARKE. The Constitution of the
United States only says that the Legislature
of the State shall elect United States senators.
But the quo mode, and those from whom they
shall elect, I regard are matters to be regu-
lated by the State Constitution.
Mr. CHAMBERS. I am sorry to see my friend
from Prince George's (Mr. Clarke) so enam-
ored of oaths, which I rather think are the
nuisance of the country at this time, as to
desire to enact in our Constitution that a man
shall take an oath which he admits we have
no power to prescribe. It is bad enough to
make us take oaths which he admits they
have the power to put to us.
Mr. CLARKE. I think we have the right to
prescribe the oath.
Mr. CHAMBERS. I referred, in the last Con-
vention, to the very case to which the gen-
tleman from Baltimore city (Mr. Stirling) has
alluded. And I also referred to another case
in the city of Baltimore, where a person
elected to Congress did not reside in that por-
tion of the State from which the Legislature
of the State said he should come. But he
was admitted to his seat, because Congress
decided the the Legislature had no right to
limit the portion of the State from which the
candidate should be taken.
Mr. PETER. The idea seems to be to avoid
having a Congressman, or an office-bolder
under the General Government, filling a seat
in either House of the Legislature of the State
of Maryland. To meet that view, I propose,
after the proposition now under considera-
tion shall have been disposed of, to offer this
amendment:
Strike out the words—"his acceptance |
there of shall vacate his seat"—and insert the
following:
"And shall not decline or refuse such of-
fice within ten days after his election or ap-
pointment, then his seat as a senator or dele-
gate shall be vacated."
I think that will meet the views en-
tertained by all parties, so us to exclude any
office-holder under the General Government
from holding a seat in the Legislature of the
State of Maryland.
Mr. BRISCOE. Notwithstanding what hag
been said by my friend from Kent (Mr. Cham-
bers) in regard to the strict constitutional
view of this question, the people of Mary-
land, I think, have been heretofore acting in
the same position of disregarding their obli-
gations to respect the Constitution of the
United States, as we would be if we should in-
corporate in our Constitution the amendment
proposed by the gentleman from Prince
George's (Mr. Clarke.) When we undertake to
confine the election of senators by territorial
limits, one to the eastern shore and one to
the western shore, we undertake, so far as
it is competent for the Legislature of Mary-
land to do so, to prescribe the qualifications
of senators of the United States. We have
done it, at all events, and looking to that,
and believing that the adoption of the propo-
sition of the gentleman from Prince George's
(Mr. Clarke) would have the effect of accom-
plishing a great good, preventing one of those
evils that have come under my own observa-
tion, I am willing to risk this question of the
doubtful exercise of a power, by voting for it.
I know that there was a divided vote in the
Senate of the United States upon the ques-
tion of the admission of a senator from Indi-
ana, in the case to which the gentleman from
Baltimore city (Mr. Stirling) alludes. But
my construction of that power of the Con-
gress of the United States to judge of the
qualifications of its own members, goes to
this extent. Section five of the Constitution
of the United States says :
"Each house shall be the judge of the elec-
tions, returns and qualifications of its own
members."
That is a very broad proposition Now,
my construction of this article is, that when
the framers of this Constitution put that pro-
vision there, they had antecedently stated in
the third section what were the qualifications
of senators of the United States. That sec-
tion reads:
" No person shall be a senator who shall not
have attained to the age of thirty years, and
been nine years a citizen of the United States,
and who shall not, when elected, be an in-
habitant of that State for which he shall be
chosen."
Now, according to my view, the power
here given to the Senate of the United States
to judge of the qualifications of its members
is limited by this antecedent third section, |
