Great Commission

“ Thus the nation, fighting on every point with the army, either in the line or as auxiliaries, will prove that a great people cannot unwillingly be brought under the yoke that they have once shaken off.
“Gentlemen, I will only remind the government that eight years ago, in the session of 1820, the ministers then acknowledged that they had been in possession, for eight months, of the project of a law drawn up by a special commission, and you all know how it has hitherto resulted. ”

“ Many of the States have revised their public acts with great and manifest benefit, and I recommend that provision be made by law for the appointment of a commission to revise the public statutes of the United States, arranging them in order, supplying deficiencies, correcting incongruities, simplifying their language, and reporting them to Congress for its action. ”

“ We do not wish to take sides at all nor to influence it in any way. We want to accomplish the purpose of the Commission. Those interests overlap to some extent because whenever we ask a Commission question, it has collateral bearings on a great many things, but to the extent that we can, we have conferred, as I say, with the defense counsel and the representatives of the district attorney’s office in arriving at the questions which have been asked, and I think we will cover before this examination is concluded the important areas. ”

“ Mr. Hubert. You disliked McWillie?
Mr. Paul. No: but I didn’t care too much for his personality.
Mr. Hubert. Did you ever express yourself in that way to Ruby?
Mr. Paul. Yes; I did.
Mr. Hubert. What was his answer?
Mr. Paul. Well, he told me—that he thinks he is a great guy—Jack says. Well, actually, I for one never meet too many friends with Jack, and Jack made everybody a friend and I haven’t got too many friends. I just work to make a living. I’m not interested in a whole lot of other things.
Mr. Hubert. In other words, what you are saying is that Jack was a man who made a lot of friends? ”

“ VI. “At the End of every Session of Parliament, all the Public Acts are ingrossed into one great Roll by Bowyer, as Clerk of the Parliament; and the same Roll, being by him subscribed, he delivereth into the Chapel of the Rolls; which is thereupon there received, and placed among the Records of the Chancery, being the highest Record of the Kingdom, without any other Warrant than his Hand: Which Acts or Statutes so by him transcribed, do bind his Majesty’s Subjects of all Degrees for ever. ”

“ Although no General Collection of the Statutes of England, or of Great Britain, has been hitherto published by Authority of the Crown or of the Parliament, it appears that Measures were carefully taken in former Times for collecting and authenticating the Legislative Acts, both of the Scottish and Irish Parliaments. ”

“ Whereas the Knights, Citizens, and Burgesses, and Commissioners of Shires and Boroughs in Our Parliament of Great Britain assembled, having taken into their Consideration the State of the Public Records of this Kingdom, and the necessity of providing for the better arrangement, preservation, and more convenient use of the same, have heretofore humbly laid before Us a Report of their Proceedings thereon, and also humbly represented unto Us that the Public Records of the Kingdom are in many Offices unarranged, undescribed, unascertained ”

“ He executed his commission with great promptitude and dispatch, only calling at one public-house for half a minute, and even that might be said to be in his way, for he went in at one door and came out at the other; ”

“ After The Union of Great Britain and Ireland, a Select Committee of the House of Commons was appointed in the first Session of the United Parliament, to consider of the most effectual Means of Promulgating the Statutes of the United Kingdom ”

“ These our great natural rights we keep to ourselves; we will not have them tampered with; respecting them we give to you no commission whatsoever. ”

“ We being willing for certain reasons to be certified about the Tenour of a certain Act made and ordained in our Parliament at Westminster in the Fortieth Year of our Reign intituled “An Act for the Union of Great Britain and Ireland,” Command You, that the Tenor of the aforesaid Act with all things relating thereunto under Your Seal distinctly and openly without Delay You send to Us in our Chancery and this Writ. ”

“ Pulton’s Plan
The earliest Instance of the Exertions of any Individual, without the Sanction of Parliamentary Authority, towards making a Collection of Statutes from authentic Sources, appears to have been afforded by Pulton.—He was a learned Barrister, of great Age and Experience, and was employed for several Years in the Consideration of the Statute Law. He published two useful Books upon that Subject: first, an Abridgement of the Penal Statutes;Catalogue A. No. 38, 44, 45. and afterwards a Calendar or Abstract of all the Statutes in use, chronologically arranged ”

“ The Text of this Charter, which is a Charter of Inspeximus, reciting and confirming Carta de Foresta, 9 Hen. III. is printed from an Entry on the Charter Roll of 28 Edw. I. No. 25, on that Roll.
Like Charters of Inspeximus of this Date, under the Great Seal, are preserved in the Archives of Durham Cathedral and Oriel College, Oxford; these agree very exactly with the Text as now printed from the Charter Roll; except that they begin with the Name and Title of the King at length, and vary a little in spelling the Names of some of the Witnesses. ”

“ The several departments being perfectly co-ordinate by the terms of their common commission, none of them, it is evident, can pretend to an exclusive or superior right of settling the boundaries between their respective powers; and how are the encroachments of the stronger to be prevented, or the wrongs of the weaker to be redressed, without an appeal to the people themselves, who, as the grantors of the commissions, can alone declare its true meaning, and enforce its observance? ”

“ The necessity of a living, central, permanent authority had been rendered obvious by the disastrous working of the old system, arising partly from the absence of such control—an authority accumulating experience in itself, independent of local control, uninterested in favour of local abuse, and responsible to the Government. A Board of three Commissioners was therefore appointed under the Act, themselves appointing assistant Commissioners, capable of receiving the powers of the Commission by delegation. ”

“ Having now finished the work assigned to me, I retire from the great theatre of Action; and bidding an Affectionate farewell to this August body under whose orders I have so long acted, I here offer my Commission, and take my leave of all the employments of public life. ”

“ On account of the integration of large numbers into industrial centers, it has been proposed that a commission be created, composed of members from both races, to formulate a better policy for mutual understanding and confidence. ”

“ It is well that governments should be thus sanctified to the ears and eyes of the governed; for, if there be a commission more certainly given straight from the hand of God than another it is that of a ruler of men. ”

“ We deeply regret that the language of the law under which we are acting does not confer upon us the necessary power to negotiate with you upon the important questions affecting the welfare of our people; but trust that the wisdom of our legislators will direct the return to you of a commission sufficiently empowered to finally settle the destiny of a defenseless people, relying alone upon the justness of their cause, the honor of your Government, and the integrity of yourselves. ”

“ Every Movement on the Side of the Commissioners & the Assembly must be important. I trust no Concessions will be made on your part which shall have the remotest tendency to fix a precedent; for if it is once establishd, a thousand Commissions of the like arbitrary kind may be introducd to the utter ruin of your free Constitution. The promoters of ministerial measures in this Town are pleasd to hear from one of the Commissioners that they are treated with great respect: Even common Civility will be thus colourd to serve the great purpose. ”

“ Moreover, we wish to make it clear that we are not necessarily standing for a division of power. There may be separately constituted departments of government, one primarily for administration, the other primarily for legislation, yet a concentration of authority in one of them, as in the case under the cabinet system of Europe. The gentlemen of the opposition are advocating not only a concentration of power, but a fusion of functions as well. Their commission is at once the executive cabinet and the legislative body. ”

“ The commission consisted of seven as good men as were to be found in the country, representing the bench, the church, the army, the professions, the employers, and the employed. They acted as a unit, and the report which they unanimously signed is a masterpiece of sound common-sense and of sound doctrine on the very questions with which our people should most deeply concern themselves. ”

“ Any government fit for a high state of civilization would have as one of its fundamental elements a small body, not exceeding in number the members of a cabinet, who should act as a Commission of Legislation, having for its appointed office to make the laws. ”

“ So too the officers of the state derive their commission from the people, albeit the king, in conformity with law, decides the detail of their appoint ment, together with the other necessary arrangements of the executive government. Once establish the principle, and the consequences are easy to draw. ”

“ One may well hesitate wholly to condemn this government by commission, because it is the first emphatic recognition in American political and economic organization of a manifest public responsibility. In the past the public interests involved in the growth of an extensive and highly organized industrial system have been neither recognized nor promoted. ”

“ The Commission, considered as a free, spontaneous offering of a loyal people to the cause of our common country, is a wonderful enterprise. The Commission, standing ready to supply any deficiency, to remedy any defect, and to meet any unforeseen emergency, has done a good work that cannot be forgotten. ”

“ When a minister considers that some institution in his branch of the service requires to be reformed, he begins by submitting to the Emperor a formal report on the matter. If the Emperor agrees with his minister as to the necessity for reform, he orders a Commission to be appointed for the purpose of considering the subject and preparing a definite legislative project. The Commission meets and sets to work in what seems a very thorough way. ”

“ For a while I was relieved from writing about politics, and assigned to the World’s Fair, and there were so many distinguished men from all over the nation associated in that enterprise that it was very much like politics in its superficial aspects. There was, for instance, the World’s Columbian Commission, a body created under the authority of Congress, composed of two commissioners from each state, appointed by its governor, and that body exactly the size of the senate was like it in personnel and character. ”

“ From when it may happen that officers of the Crown may be multiplied to such a degree as to become dangerous to the liberty of the people, by virtue of a commission which does not appear to this House to derive any such advantages to trade as many have been led to expect. ”

“ A commission for the administration of executive business, like the Civil Service Commission, is a very different thing from a committee endowed with discretion to pass upon the interests of free and equal citizens, not being itself either executive, legislative, or judicial. Such a body will inevitably become the engine of either one interest or another against the rest, or sink into nonentity. Such a commission lacks all the guarantees of justice and of correct civil action which we have established around our legislative, judicial, and executive institutions. ”

“ They created an admirable system, a system founded on the most sensible rules of business administration, and likely to work badly only where the Commission might encounter the opposition of hostile appointing officers. ”

“ For nothing, my lords, is now considered but senatorial interest, nor is any subordination desired but in the supreme council of the empire. For the establishment of this new regulation, the honours of every profession are prostituted, and every commission is become merely nominal. To gratify the leaders of the ministerial party, the most despicable triflers are exalted to an authority, and those whose want of understanding excludes them from any other employment, are selected for military commissions. ”

“ No member of the Commission shall be responsible, except to the Government appointing him, for any action or omission in the performance of his duties. No one of the Allied or Associated Governments assumes any responsibility in respect of any other Government. ”

“ Authorize your commissioner to pledge the faith of this State, that their ultimatum shall not only be laid before the people of the keystone State, assembled likewise in their sovereign capacity, but that she will recommend it to her sister States of the North, for like action on their part, and so let the people, and not the politicians, decide whether this Union is to be broken up. ”

“ The commissioners under the 7th article of the treaty of Ghent have so nearly completed their arduous labors that, by the report recently received from the agent on the part of the United States, there is reason to expect that the commission will be closed at their next session, appointed for May 22 of the ensuing year. ”

“ The United States Government have proposed two modes in which such a commission might be constituted: First, that it might consist of commissioners named in equal numbers by each of the two Governments, with an umpire to be selected by some friendly European power; secondly, that it might be entirely composed of scientific Europeans, to be selected by a friendly sovereign, and might be accompanied in its operations by agents of the two different parties, in order that such agents might give to the commissioners assistance and information. ”