“ We are of opinion that the power of inquiry-with process to enforce it-is an essential and appropriate auxiliary to the legislative function. It was so regarded and employed in American Legislatures before the Constitution was framed and ratified. Both houses of Congress took this view of it early in their history-the House of Representatives with the approving votes of Mr. Madison and other members whose service in the convention which framed the Constitution gives special significance to their action-and both houses have employed the power accordingly up to the present time. ”

“ To await the slow process of indictment and prosecution for a misdemeanor, might prove quite ineffectual, and necessary legislation might be obstructed, and perhaps defeated, if the legislative body had no other and more summary means of enforcing its right to obtain the required information. That the power may be abused, is no ground for denying its existence. It is a limited power, and should be kept within its proper bounds ”

“ The first of the principal questions, the one which the witness particularly presses on our attention, is, as before shown, whether the Senate-or the House of Representatives, both being on the same plane in this regard-has power, through its own process, to compel a private individual to appear before it or one of its committees and give testimony needed to enable it efficiently to exercise a legislative function belonging to it under the Constitution. ”

“ While the power to exact information in aid of the legislative function was not involved in those cases, the rule of interpretation applied there is applicable here. A legislative body cannot legislate wisely or effectively in the absence of information respecting the conditions which the legislation is intended to affect or change; and where the legislative body does not itself possess the requisite information-which not infrequently is true-recourse must be had to others who do possess it. ”

“ The argument advanced to the contrary was that as the Constitution expressly grants to each house power to punish or expel its own members and says nothing about punishing others, the implication or inference, if any, is that power to punish one who is not a member is neither given nor intended. ”

“ There are some things that the Senate may do. How? According to a mode of its own. Are we to ask the other branch of the Legislature to concede by law to us the power of making such an inquiry as we are now making? Has not each branch the right to make what inquiries and investigation it thinks proper to make for its own action? ”

“ The Constitution provides for a Congress, consisting of a Senate and House of Representatives, and invests it with 'all legislative powers' granted to the United States, and with power 'to make all laws which shall be necessary and proper' for carrying into execution these powers and 'all other powers' vested by the Constitution in the United States or in any department or officer thereof. ”

“ To enforce its laws upon any subject, without the sanction of punishments, is obviously impossible. Yet there is an express grant of power to punish in one class of cases, and one only, and all the punishing power exercised by Congress, in any cases, except those which relate the piracy and offenses against the laws of nations, is derived from implication. ”

“ The right view in our opinion is that it takes nothing from the lawful object avowed in the same resolution and rightly inferable from the earlier one. It is not as if an inadmissible or unlawful object were affirmatively and definitely avowed.
We conclude that the investigation was ordered for a legitimate object; that the witness wrongfully refused to appear and testify before the committee and was lawfully attached; that the Senate is entitled to have him give testimony pertinent to the inquiry, either at its bar or before the committee ”

“ Well, sir, proposing to legislate, we want information. We have it not ourselves. It is not to be presumed that we know everything; and if any body does presume it, it is a very great mistake, as we know by experience. We want information on certain subjects. ”

“ If the Senate has the right to investigate the department, is the Senate to hesitate, is the Senate to refuse to do its duty merely because the public character or the public reputation of some one who is investigated may be thereby smirched, to use the term that has been used so often in the debate? ”

“ The court sustained the constitutional validity of the act of 1857, and, after referring to the constitutional provision empowering either house to punish its members for disorderly behavior and by a vote of two-thirds to expel a member, held that the inquiry related to the integrity and fidelity of Senators in the discharge of their duties, and therefore to a matter 'within the range of the constitutional powers of the Senate' and in respect to which it could compel witnesses to appear and testify. ”

“ The Department of Justice is one of the great executive departments established by congressional enactment, and has charge, among other things, of the initiation and prosecution of all suits, civil and criminal, which may be brought in the right and name of the United States to compel obedience or punish disobedience to its laws, to recover property obtained from it by unlawful or fraudulent means, or to safeguard its rights in other respects, and also of the assertion and protection of its interests, when it or its officers are sued by others. ”

“ One is that we are not now concerned with the direction in the first subpoena that the witness produce various records, books, and papers of the Midland National Bank. That direction was not repeated in the second subpoena, and is not sought to be enforced by the attachment. This was recognized by the court below (299 F. 623) , and is conceded by counsel for the appellant. The other is that we are not now concerned with the right of the Senate to propound or the duty of the witness to answer specific questions, for as yet no questions have been propounded to him. ”

“ The witness challenges the authority of the deputy to execute the warrant on two grounds-that there was no provision of law for a deputy, and that, even if there were such a provision, a deputy could not execute the warrant because it was addressed simply to the sergeant at arms. We are of opinion that neither ground is tenable. ”

“ The trustee in the bankruptcy proceeding had effected a settlement of the bankrupts' interest in the pool, and of course his action was subject to examination and approval or disapproval by the bankruptcy court. ”

“ Keeler, 99 N. Y. 463, 482, 483, 2 N. E. 615, 624 (52 Am. Rep. 49) , where the validity of a statute of New York recognizing and giving effect to this power was drawn in question, the Court of Appeals approvingly quoted what it had said in Wilckens v. Willet, and added:
'It is difficult to conceive any constitutional objection which can be raised to the provisions authorizing legislative committees to take testimony and to summon witnesses. ”

“ The said defendants were duly served with process in said action and duly served with copies of said temporary restraining order on said 11th day of April, 1924, and said injunction has not been modified by said court and no further order has been made in said case by said court, and said injunction is in full force and effect.'↑ Story Const. § 545 et seq.; 1 Kent's Com. p. ”