CONSTITUTIONAL RESPONSIBILITY OF SENATORS FOR

THEIR VOTES IN CASES OF IMPEACHMENT.

RESOLUTIONS IN THE SENATE, JUNE 3, 1868.

JUNE 3d, Mr. Sumner submitted the following Resolutions, which were read and ordered to be printed.

W

HEREAS a pretension has been put forth to the effect that the vote of a Senator on an impeachment is so far different in character from his vote on any other question that the people have no right to criticize or consider it; and whereas such pretension, if not discountenanced, is calculated to impair that freedom of judgment which belongs to the people on all that is done by their representatives: Therefore, in order to remove all doubts on this question, and to declare the constitutional right of the people in cases of impeachment,

1. Resolved, That, even assuming that the Senate is a Court in the exercise of judicial power, Senators cannot claim that their votes are exempt from the judgment of the people; that the Supreme Court, when it has undertaken to act on questions essentially political in character, has not escaped this judgment; that the decisions of this high tribunal in support of Slavery have been openly condemned; that the memorable utterance known as the Dred Scott decision was indignantly denounced

and repudiated, while the Chief Justice who pronounced it became a mark for censure and rebuke; and that plainly the votes of Senators on an impeachment cannot enjoy an immunity from popular judgment which has been denied to the Supreme Court, with Taney as Chief Justice.

2. Resolved, That the Senate is not at any time a Court invested with judicial power, but that it is always a Senate with specific functions declared by the Constitution; that, according to express words, "the judicial power of the United States shall be vested in one Supreme Court, and in such inferior courts as the Congress may from time to time ordain and establish," while it is further provided that "the Senate shall have the sole power to try all impeachments," thus positively making a distinction between the judicial power and the power to try impeachments; that the Senate, on an impeachment, does not exercise any portion of the judicial power, but another and different power, exclusively delegated to the Senate, having for its sole object removal from office and disqualification therefor; that, by the terms of the Constitution, there may be, after conviction on impeachment, a further trial and punishment "according to law," thus making a discrimination between a proceeding by impeachment and a proceeding "according to law"; that the proceeding by impeachment is not "according to law," and is not attended by legal punishment, but is of an opposite character, and from beginning to end political, being instituted by a political body on account of political offences, being conducted before another political body having political power only, and ending in a judgment which is political only; and therefore the vote of a Senator on impeachment,

though different in form, is not different in responsibility, from his vote on any other political question; nor can any Senator, on such an occasion, claim immunity from that just accountability which the representative at all times owes to his constituents.

3. Resolved, That Senators in all that they do are under the constant obligation of an oath, binding them to the strictest rectitude; that on an impeachment they take a further oath, according to the requirement of the Constitution, which says, Senators, when sitting to try impeachment, shall be on oath or affirmation"; that this simple requirement was never intended to change the character of the Senate as a political body, and cannot have any such operation; and therefore Senators, whether before or after the supplementary oath, are equally responsible to the people for their votes, it being the constitutional right of the people at all times to sit in judgment on their representatives.

VALIDITY AND NECESSITY OF FUNDAMENTAL

CONDITIONS ON STATES.

SPEECH IN THE Senate, June 10, 1868.

THE Senate having under consideration the bill to admit the States of North Carolina, South Carolina, Louisiana, Georgia, and Alabama to representation in Congress, Mr. Sumner said:

MR PRESUDENT' a I shall speak

R. PRESIDENT,- What I have to say to-day will be confined to a single topic.

of the validity and necessity of fundamental conditions on the admission of States into the body of the Nation, — passing in review objections founded on the asserted equality of States, and also on a misinterpretation of the power to determine the "qualifications" of electors, and that other power to make "regulations" for the election of certain officers. Here I shall encounter the familiar pretensions of another time, no longer put forth by defiant Slave-Masters, but retailed by conscientious Senators, who think they are supporting the Constitution, when they are only echoing the voice of Slavery.

Fundamental conditions on the admission of States are older than our Constitution; for they appear in the Ordinance for the vast Territory of the Northwest, adopted anterior to the Constitution itself. In that Ordinance there are various conditions, of perpetual obligation, as articles of compact. Among these is the

famous prohibition of Slavery. In the early days of our Nation nobody thought of questioning the validity of these conditions. Scattered efforts were made to carry Slavery into some portions of this region, and unquestionably there were sporadic cases, as in Massachusetts itself; but the Ordinance stood firm and unimpeached.

One assurance of its authority will be found in the historic fact, that in 1820, on the admission of Missouri as a State of the Union, there was a further provision that in all territory of the United States north of 36° 30′ north latitude, "Slavery and involuntary servitude, otherwise than in the punishment of crimes, whereof the parties shall have been duly convicted, shall be and is hereby FOREVER prohibited." 1 This was the famous Missouri Compromise. Missouri was admitted as a State without any restriction of Slavery, but all the outlying territory west and north was subjected to this condition forever. It will be observed that the condition was in no respect temporary, but that it was "forever," - thus outlasting any territorial government, and constituting a fundamental law, irrepealable through all time. Surely this condition, perpetual in form, would not have been introduced, had it been supposed to be inoperative, had it been regarded as a sham, and not a reality. This statute, therefore, testifies to the judgment of Congress at that time.

It was only at a later day, and at the demand of Slavery, that the validity of the great Ordinance of Freedom was called in question. Mr. Webster, in his memorable debate with Mr. Hayne in 1830, vindicated this measure in language worthy of the cause and of

1 Act of March 6, 1820: Statutes at Large, Vol. III. p. 548.