Report of the Judiciary Committee.
June 14—Mr. Hartridge, from the Committee on the Judiciary, made the following report:
The Committee on the Judiciary, to whom were referred the bill (H. R. No. 4315) and the resolutions of the Legislature of the State of Maryland directing judicial proceedings to give effect to the electoral vote of that State in the last election of President and Vice-President of the United States, report back said bill and resolutions with a recommendation that the bill do not pass.
Your committee are of the opinion that Congress has no power, under the Constitution, to confer upon the Supreme Court of the United States the original jurisdiction sought for it by this bill. The only clause of the Constitution which could be plausibly invoked to enable Congress to provide the legal machinery for the litigation proposed, is that which gives the Supreme Court original jurisdiction in “cases” or “controversies” between a State and the citizens of another State. The committee are of the opinion that this expression “cases” and “controversies” was not intended by the framers of the Constitution to embrace an original proceeding by a State in the Supreme Court of the United States to oust any incumbent from a political office filled by the declaration and decision of the two Houses of Congress clothed with the constitutional power to count the electoral votes and decide as a final tribunal upon the election for President and Vice-President. The Forty-fourth Congress selected a commission to count the votes for President and Vice-President, reserving to itself the right to ratify or reject such count, in the way prescribed in the act creating such commission. By the joint action of the two Houses it ratified the count made by the commission, and thus made it the expression of its own judgment.
All the Departments of the Federal Government, all the State governments in their relations to Federal authority, foreign nations, the people of the United States, all the material interests and industries of the country, have acquiesced in, and acted in accordance with, the pronounced finding of that Congress. In the opinion of this committee, the present Congress has no power to undo the work of its predecessor in counting the electoral vote, or to confer upon any judicial tribunal the right to pass upon and perhaps set aside the action of that predecessor in reference to a purely political question, the decision of which is confided by the Constitution in Congress.
But apart from these fundamental objections to the bill under consideration, there are features and provisions in it which are entirely impracticable. Your committee can find no warrant of authority to summon the chief justices of the supreme courts of the several States to sit at Washington as a jury to try any case, however grave and weighty may be its nature. The right to summon must carry with it the power to enforce obedience to the mandate, and the Committee can see no means by which the judicial officers of a State can be compelled to assume the functions of jurors in the Supreme Court of the United States.
There are other objections to the practical working of the bill under consideration, to which we do not think it necessary to refer.
It may be true that the State of Maryland has been, in the late election for President and Vice-President deprived of her just and full weight in deciding who were legally chosen, by reason of frauds perpetrated by returning boards in some of the States. It may also be true that these fraudulent acts were countenanced or encouraged or participated in by some who now enjoy high offices as the fruit of such frauds. It is due to the present generation of the people of this country and their posterity, and to the principles on which our Government is founded, that all evidence tending to establish the fact of such fraudulent practices should be calmly, carefully, and rigorously examined.
But your committee are of the opinion that the consequence of such examination, if it discloses guilt upon the part of any in high official position, should not be an effort to set aside the judgment of a former Congress as to the election of a President and Vice-President, but should be confined to the punishment, by legal and constitutional means, of the offenders, and to the preservation and perpetuation of the evidences of their guilt, so that the American people may be protected from a recurrence of the crime.
Your committee, therefore, recommend the adoption of the accompanying resolution:
Resolved, That the two Houses of the Forty-fourth Congress having counted the votes cast for President and Vice-President of the United States, and having declared Rutherford B. Hayes to be elected President, and William A. Wheeler to be elected Vice-President, there is no power in any subsequent Congress to reverse that declaration, nor can any such power be exercised by the courts of the United States, or any other tribunal that Congress can create under the Constitution.
We agree to the foregoing report so far as it states the reasons for the resolution adopted by the committee, but dissent from the concluding portion, as not having reference to such reasons, as not pertinent to the inquiry before us, and as giving an implied sanction to the propriety of the pending investigation ordered by a majority vote of the House of Representatives, to which we were and are opposed.
Wm. P. Frye.
O. D. Conger.
E. G. Lapham.
Leave was given to Mr. Knott to present his individual views, also to Mr. Butler (the full committee consisting of Messrs. Knott, Lynde, Harris, of Virginia, Hartridge, Stenger, McMahon, Culberson, Frye, Butler, Conger, Lapham.)
The question being on the resolution reported by the committee, it was agreed to—yeas 235, nays 14, not voting 42.