Mr. Smilie said he was a friend to freedom of debate, but that there was a difference between this, and that abuse of it when you cannot get a decision without an exertion of physical strength. This has been our case several times. The rule now proposed to be altered is the old rule, and is only restored. We very well know, that a debate has been often prolonged merely to prevent a decision. We have been kept till ten and twelve o'clock at night, and sometimes till daylight. It is an inconvenience which he at his time of life had seriously felt. There can be no evil from the rule as now established. The responsibility of the majority is such to the people, that, if they should abuse it, as the minority have their privilege, the people will correct it, when the minority shall fairly state it to them. He said the majority were also responsible to the people to transact the public business.
Mr. Stanford, in reply to Mr. Smilie, said he did not think it proper to give this dispensing power to the majority, if they by the constitution did not possess it, as he contended they did not. He said we have heard of a sedition law, and the reign of terror. The bill, when first introduced for that law, went to prevent freedom of speech. This rule, in his opinion, much more deserved the character of a "Gag-law," than the Sedition law did.
Mr. Wright mentioned the great abuses of this privilege of the minority the last winter. He said, if we don't establish a written, decent rule, we must have a common law rule, such as they have in the British House of Commons, to shuffle and put down, when the abuse of this privilege becomes enormous.
Mr. Quincy.—Mr. Speaker, I do not regard this question in the light in which some of its advocates, as well as its opponents, have considered it; as a mere contest for power between the majority and the minority. It is of a higher character. It affects the essential principles of civil liberty, and saps its hopes at its very foundation. I rejoice that the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Nelson) has limited his proposition, so as to preclude any mistake concerning the object of it. We are not now advocating an unrestrained privilege of debate. The inquiry is, shall a main question ever be taken in this deliberative body, until every member, who has not already spoken, shall have had an opportunity, if he wishes to avail himself of it, to speak at least once upon the question? The ground taken by those who oppose the proposition, is that of necessity and convenience. These are the very points, which, in a free country, ought most vigilantly to be guarded. For it is here that the spirit of despotism always lies in ambush. Under the cover of necessity, or convenience, it steals upon the liberties of a people, and never fails, sooner or later, to make them its prey.
It is not to be denied, that the subject is in some respects difficult to manage, with any hope of convincing. There is a state of feeling, both within this House and out of it, very unpropitious to an impartial debate. In this House it is argued as a question concerning who shall have the power, a majority, or a minority. And as it is agreed, on all hands, that, in the exercise of the power, abuse may happen, the present majority, like all other majorities, have a prevailing inclination to reserve, in their own hands, the exclusive privilege of abuse. And without doors, the subject is of less difficulty. For, of late years, the popular ear has been so vexed with speech upon speech, wind upon wind, the public patience has been so exhausted, in hunting up the solitary grain of sense, hidden in the bushels of chaff, that it is ready to submit to any limitation of a privilege, which subjects it to so irksome a labor. The people are almost ready to exclaim, "do what you will with the liberty of speech, provided you will save us from that fresh of words, with which we are periodically inundated."
Now, this is the very state of the public mind in which the corruption of essential principles commences. Through apparent necessity, or temporary convenience, or disgust at abuse, the popular sentiment is made to acquiesce in the introduction of doctrines vitally inconsistent with the perpetuity of liberty.
I ask the House to consider what is that principle of civil liberty, which is amalgamated and identified with the very existence of a legislative body. In what does it consist? And what is its character? It consists in the right of deliberation. And its character is, that it belongs not to the body, but the individual members constituting the body. The body has the power to control and to regulate its exercise. But it has not the power to take away that right altogether, by the operation of any general principle. An individual member may render himself unworthy of the privilege. He may be set down; he may be denied the right, because he has abused it. But whenever a legislative body assumes to itself the power of stopping, at its will, all debate, at any stage of deliberation, it assumes a power wholly inconsistent with the essential right of deliberation, and totally destructive of that principle of civil liberty which exists, and is identified with the exercise of that right.
The right of every individual member is, in fact, the right of his constituents. He is but their Representative. It is in their majesty, that he appears. It is their right that he reflects. The right of being heard by their Representative is the inherent and absolute right of the people. Now, it is in the essential character of such a right, that it exists, independent, and in despite of any man, or body of men, whatsoever. It is absurd to say, that any right is independent, which depends upon the will of another. It is absurd to say, that any right is absolute, which is wholly relative to the inclination of another; which lasts only as long as he chooses, and terminates at his nod. Now, whether this power be exercised by one, or many, it matters not. The principle of civil liberty is gone, when the inherent and absolute nature of the right is gone.
Apply this reasoning to the case before us. It is impossible to conceal the fact, that as our rules and orders stand, independent of the proposition now offered as an amendment, it is in the power of a majority to preclude all debate, upon any question, and force every member of the House to vote, upon any proposition, without giving him the opportunity of explaining his own reasons, or stating the interests of his constituents. This is undeniable. Is it not, then, plain and conclusive, that, as our rules and orders now stand, according to recent construction, every member of this House holds his right of speaking, not on the principle of his constituents, whose Representative he is, but upon the will of the majority of this House? For that which another may at any time take away from me, I hold not by my own right, but at his will. Can any thing be more obviously at variance with the spirit of the constitution and the first principles of civil liberty?
Let not any man say this power will not be abused. In the nature of things it must be abused. This is the favorite argument of every despotism, and, of course, will not fail to be urged when it is about to plant itself in the very temple of liberty.