Abridgment of the Debates of Congress, from 1789 to 1856, Vol. 2 (of 16)

by United States. Congress

Thursday, March 20.

The Senate resumed the consideration of the report of the Committee of Privileges, on the measures proper to be adopted in relation to a publication of the 19th of February last, in the newspaper called the Aurora; and it was agreed to fill the blanks in the second resolution reported, with the words "Monday 24th, twelve o'clock," and, at the close of the resolution, with the words "twenty-second;" and,

On motion, to adopt this part of the report, as follows:

Resolved, That William Duane, now residing in the city of Philadelphia, the editor of the said newspaper called the General Advertiser, or Aurora, be, and he is hereby, ordered to attend at the bar of this House, on Monday, the 24th day of March inst., at 12 o'clock, at which time he will have an opportunity to make any proper defence for his conduct, in publishing the aforesaid false, defamatory, scandalous, and malicious assertions, and pretended information; and the Senate will then proceed to take further order on the subject; and a copy of this and the foregoing resolution, under the authentication of the Secretary of the Senate of the United States, and attested as a true copy by James Mathers, Sergeant-at-Arms for the said Senate, and left by the said Sergeant-at-Arms with the said William Duane, or at the office of the Aurora, on or before the twenty-second day of March instant, shall be deemed sufficient notice for the said Duane to attend in obedience to this resolution:

It passed in the affirmative—yeas 18, nays 10, as follows:

Yeas.—Messrs. Bingham, Chipman, Dayton, Dexter, Foster, Goodhue, Greene, Gunn, Hillhouse, Laurance, Livermore, Lloyd, Paine, Read, Ross, Schureman, Tracy, and Wells.

Nays.—Messrs. Anderson, Baldwin, Bloodworth, Cocke, Franklin, Langdon, Marshall, Mason, Nicholas, and Pinckney.

So the report of the committee was adopted, as follows:

Whereas, on the 19th day of February, now last past, the Senate of the United States, being in session, in the city of Philadelphia, the following publication was made in the newspaper, printed in the said city of Philadelphia, called the General Advertiser, or Aurora, viz:

"In our paper of the 27th ult. we noticed the introduction of a measure into the Senate of the United States, by Mr. Ross, calculated to influence and affect the approaching Presidential election, and to frustrate, in a particular manner, the wishes and interests of the people of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.

"We this day lay before the public a copy of that bill as it has passed the Senate.

"Some curious facts are connected with this measure, and the people of the Union at large are intermediately, and the people of this State immediately interested to consider the movements, the mode of operation, and the effects.

"We noticed a few days ago the caucuses (or secret consultations) held in the Senate Chamber. An attempt was made in an evening paper to give a counteraction (for these people are admirable at the system of intrigue) to the development of the Aurora, and to call those meetings jacobinical; we must cordially assent to the jacobinism of those meetings—they were in the perfect spirit of a jacobinical conclave.

"The plain facts we stated are, however, unquestionable; but we have additional information to give on the subject of those meetings. We stated, that intrigues for the Presidential election were among the objects; we now state it as a fact that cannot be disputed upon fair ground, that the bill we this day present was discussed at the caucus on Wednesday evening last.

"It is worthy of remark how this bill grew into existence.

"The opponents of independence and republican Government, who supported Mr. Ross in the contest against Governor McKean, are well known by the indecency, the slander, and the falsehood of the measures they pursued—and it is well known that they are all devoted to the Federal party, which we dissected on Monday. Mr. Ross proposed this bill in the Federal Senate, (how consistently with the decency of his friends will be seen;) a committee of five was appointed to prepare a bill on the subject: on this committee, Mr. Pinckney, of South Carolina, was appointed. On Thursday morning last (the caucus held the preceding evening) Mr. Ross informed Mr. Pinckney that the committee had drawn up a bill on the subject, when in fact Mr. Pinckney had never been consulted on the subject, though a member of the committee! The bill was introduced and passed as below.

"On this occasion it may not be impertinent to introduce an anecdote which will illustrate the nature of caucuses, and show that our popular Government may, in the hands of a faction, be as completely abused as the French Constitution has been, by the self-created Consuls:

"In the summer session of 1798, when Federal thunder and violence were belched from the pestiferous lungs of more than one despotic minion, a caucus was held at the house of Mr. Bingham, in this city. It was composed of members of the Senate, and there were present seventeen members. The Senate consisting of thirty-two members, this number was of course a majority, and the session was a full one.

"Prior to deliberation on the measures of war, navy, army, democratic proscription, &c., it was proposed, and agreed to, that all the members present should solemnly pledge themselves to act firmly upon the measures to be agreed upon by the majority of the persons present at the caucus.

"The measures were perfectly in the high tone of that extraordinary session. But upon a division of the caucus it was found that they were divided, nine against eight. This majority, however, held the minority to their engagement, and the whole seventeen voted in Senate upon all the measures discussed at the caucus.

"Thus it is seen that a secret self-appointed meeting of seventeen persons dictated laws to the United States, and not only that nine of that seventeen had the full command and power over the consciences and votes of the other eight, but that nine possessed, by the turpitude of the eight, actually all the power which the constitution declares shall be vested in the majority only. In other words, a minority of nine members of the Senate ruled the other twenty-three members.

"It is easily conceivable, as in the recent changes in France, that this spirit of caucusing may be conducted in progression down to two or three persons; thus three leading characters may agree to act upon measures approved by any two of them; these three may add two others, and they would be a majority of five: and those adding four others would be a majority of nine; and this nine possess all the power of a majority of twenty-three!

"Yet such is the way we are treated by those who call themselves Federalists.

"The following bill is an offspring of this spirit of faction secretly working; and it will be found to be in perfect accord with the outrageous proceedings of the same party in our State Legislature, who are bent on depriving this State of its share in an election that may involve the fate of the country and posterity."

Resolved, That the said publication contains assertions and pretended information, respecting the Senate, and the Committee of the Senate and their proceedings, which are false, defamatory, scandalous, and malicious, tending to defame the Senate of the United States, and to bring them into contempt and disrepute, and to excite against them the hatred of the good people of the United States: and that the said publication is a high breach of the privileges of this House.

Resolved, That William Duane, now residing in the city of Philadelphia, the editor of the said newspaper called the General Advertiser, or Aurora, be, and he is hereby, ordered to attend at the bar of this House on Monday, the 24th day of March, inst., at 12 o'clock, at which time he will have opportunity to make any proper defence for his conduct, in publishing the aforesaid false, defamatory, scandalous, and malicious, assertions and pretended information; and the Senate will then proceed to take further order on the subject: and a copy of this and the foregoing resolution, under the authentication of the Secretary of the Senate of the United States, and attested as a true copy by James Mathers, Sergeant-at-Arms for the said Senate, and left by the said Sergeant-at-Arms with the said William Duane, or at the office of the Aurora, on or before the twenty-second day of March, instant, shall be deemed sufficient notice for the said Duane to attend in obedience to this resolution.