Mr. Ross differed. In the former instances, the President made the original communications to the Senate before he had answered them; now he has answered and only communicates an account of the transaction.
Mr. Burr was against striking out. The National Convention, he observed, might, when they received the answer to their first communication, have said, as is now said on the floor of the Senate, that the correspondence there ended, and that it was not necessary to make us a reply; but they acted differently, and he hoped the Senate would acknowledge the receipt of their pledge of friendship. Indeed he said, he could not see that any great harm would arise in the two branches of the Legislature interchanging even once a year a letter of friendship and good will with the Republic. It was objected that the present resolution was no answer to the letter. A few lines would make it so, and they might easily be added. The omission did not prove, as had been asserted by one member, that it was impossible to answer it. That it was not impossible was testified by the proceedings of the other branch. He did not intend to slight the dignity of the Senate, however, he said, by quoting the proceedings of the other House as a binding rule of proceeding for this; but their proceedings certainly proved the possibility of making an answer; and besides, there was full as much propriety in looking for precedents in their conduct, as in the proceedings of a British Parliament. Each, however, in their place might deserve weight, though not implicit reliance.
He advocated the rights of the Senate to answer for themselves, and the propriety of acknowledging the receipt of the Colors, which were not sent to the Executive exclusively.
He concluded by citing the Senate's own precedents in analogous cases, and he hoped that it would not be insisted that the practice of two or three successive years deserved to be laid to the charge of inadvertency.
After a few words more from Messrs. Strong, Burr, Read, and Butler, the yeas and nays were called upon striking out, which were taken and stood—yeas 16, nays 8, as follows:
Yeas.—Messrs. Bingham, Bradford, Cabot, Ellsworth, Foster, Gunn, Latimer, Livermore, Marshall, Paine, Read, Ross, Rutherford, Strong, Trumbull, and Walton.
Nays.—Messrs. Bloodworth, Brown, Burr, Butler, Langdon, Martin, Robinson, and Tazewell.
Whereupon it was
Resolved, unanimously, that the President be informed the Senate have received, with the purest pleasure, the evidences of the continued friendship of the French Republic, which accompanied his Message of the 4th inst.
That the Senate unite with him in all the feelings expressed to the Minister of France on the presentation of the Colors of his nation, and devoutly wish that this symbol of the triumphs and enfranchisement of that great people, given as a pledge of faithful friendship, and placed among the evidences and memorials of the freedom and independence of the United States, may contribute to cherish and perpetuate the sincere affection by which the two Republics are so happily united.