State Senate

“ The Senate, sir, is so constituted that they are not only to compose one branch of the legislature, but, by the second section of the second article, they are to compose a privy council for the President. Hence it will be necessary that they should be, in a great measure, a permanent body, constantly residing at the seat of government. Seventy years are esteemed for the life of a man ”

“ The design of the House of Representatives is to represent the people of the United States, and to protect their liberties. The design of the Senate is to give stability and energy to the government. A single democratic assembly would be subject to changes and inconstancy incompatible with a regular administration. But the gentlemen carry their amendment further than the power of recall; they say that a rotation in office ought to be established; that the senators may return to the private walks of life, in order to recover their sense of dependence. ”

“ When the Senate act as legislators, they are controllable at all times by the representatives; and in their executive capacity, in making treaties and conducting the national negotiations, the consent of two thirds is necessary, who must be united to a man, (which is hardly possible,) or the new men biennially sent to the Senate, if the states choose it, can control them; and at all times there will also be one third of the Senate, who, at the expiration of two years, must obtain a reelection, or return to the mass of the people. ”

“ The Senate is fitted to do deliberately and well the revising which is its properest function, because its position as a representative of state sovereignty is one of eminent dignity, securing for it ready and sincere respect, and because popular demands, ere they reach it with definite and authoritative suggestion, are diluted by passage through the feelings and conclusions of the state legislatures, which are the Senate’s only immediate constituents. The Senate commonly feels with the House, but it does not, so to say, feel so fast. ”

“ It has been argued that, if the power of removal vests in the President alone, it annuls or renders nugatory the clause in the Constitution which directs the concurrence of the Senate in the case of appointment: it behooves us not to adopt principles subversive of those established by the Constitution. It has been frequently asserted, on former occasions, that the Senate is a permanent body, and was so constructed in order to give durability to public measures. If they are not absolutely permanent, they are formed on a renovating principle which gives them a salutary stability. ”

“ I never despaired of the Senate; never thought there was any danger of its functions not being appreciated by the people, if it were only true to itself; and what we have to do now, as I think we are emerging from our state of transition, is to prove to the people that we possess powers equally important and exercise them in a manner equally beneficial to the country in our own departments to those that are possessed and exercised by other branches of the Legislature in theirs. ”

“ When the people behold in the Senate the countenance of an aristocracy, and in the President the form at least of a little monarch, will not their alarms be sufficiently raised, without taking from their immediate representatives a right which has been so long appropriated to them? The executive will have more influence over the Senate than over the House of Representatives. ”

“ Because, in one or two instances, the Senate possess more power than the House of Representatives, are these gentlemen supported in their remarks, when they tell you they wished and expected more powers to be given to the present Congress—a body certainly much more exceptionable than any instituted under this system? ”

“ And, let me ask, gentlemen, is there equal security in this case as in the other? Shall we trust the Senate, responsible to individual legislatures, rather than the person who is responsible to the whole community? It is true, the Senate do not hold their offices for life, like aristocracies recorded in the historic page; yet the fact is, they will not possess that responsibility for the exercise of executive powers which would render it safe for us to vest such powers in them. ”

“ Your Senate is appointed directly by the State Legislatures. Your President and House of Representatives, indirectly, by the same authority. Suppose they should neglect or refuse to make these appointments, can you compel them to do it? No, sir. Can you punish them for not doing it? Not in the least. They may appoint or not, as they think proper; and if they should neglect or refuse to do it, your boasted complete Government would die a natural death, by its own imbecility. It is not fair, then, to say that a power is constitutional, because the Government would be incomplete without it. ”

“ King; and no inference can be drawn from what he says, that there is any right or power in a State Legislature to demand obedience or resignation from a Senator, to their instructions. He considers their instructions to be, what in truth and practice they have always been, nothing more than advice or information coming from a high source and entitled to great respect. He says, “the Senate is to be composed of men appointed by the State Legislatures. They will certainly choose those who are most distinguished for their general knowledge. ”

“ He wished the Senate to be a pretty numerous body. If two members only should be allowed to each state, and a majority be made a quorum, the power would be lodged in fourteen members, which was too small a number for such a trust. ”

“ We think the amendments will place the Senate in a proper medium between a fluctuating and a perpetual body. As the clause now stands, there is no doubt that senators will hold their office perpetually; and in this situation they must of necessity lose their dependence, and attachments to the people. It is certainly inconsistent with the established principles of republicanism that the Senate should be a fixed and unchangeable body of men. There should be, then, some constitutional provision against this evil. A rotation I consider as the best possible mode of effecting a remedy. ”

“ The Senate is not a body of varied and fluctuating origins into which new elements can be quietly inserted. An English writer cannot estimate how dear the sacred brace of Senators for each State may or may not be to the American heart. But the possibility of Congress delegating the power to appoint additional Senators to certain non-political bodies, or to juries of a specific constitution, is at least thinkable as the beginning of a movement that would come at last into parallelism with that in the British Empire. ”

“ If you begin with the subordinate officers, they are dependent on their superior, he on the next superior, and he, on whom?—on the Senate, a permanent body, by its peculiar mode of election, in reality existing forever—a body possessing that proportion of aristocratic power which the Constitution no doubt thought wise to be established in the system, but which some have strongly excepted against. ”

“ Their weight is far inferior to that of the Commons. Here is a strong instance of the accumulation of powers of the different branches of government without producing any inconvenience. That Senate, sir, is a separate branch of the legislature, is the great constitutional council of the crown, and decides on lives and fortunes in impeachments, besides being the ultimate tribunal for trying controversies respecting private rights. ”

“ The Senate shall be composed of one member from each congressional district, but there shall never be less than five nor more than fifty in any State Senate.
2. Senators shall be elected for a term of ten years subject to recall at the end of each two years, by petition signed by a majority of the electorate of their district.
3. (a) No legislation shall originate in the Senate. Its function is to advise as to measures sent there by the House, to make suggestions and such amendments as might seem pertinent, and return the measure to the House, for its final action. ”

“ The power of the Senate would be more likely to be abused were it vested in a council of thirteen, of which there would be one from each state. One man could be more easily influenced than two. We have therefore a double security. I am firmly of opinion that, if you take all the powers of the President and Senate together, the vast influence of the representatives of the people will preponderate against them in every case where the public good is really concerned. ”

“ The ease with which they would, upon all occasions, have secured a majority in the legislature, might, in times less virtuous than the present, have operated as temptations to designing and ambitious men to sacrifice the public good to private views. This cannot be the case at present; the different mode of representation for the Senate will, as has already been observed, most effectually prevent it. The purpose of establishing different houses of legislation was to introduce the influence of different interests and principles ”

“ The next Legislature may choose to drive out the new favorite and reinstate the old one; and thus this Senate, instead of being an anchor to the State, a stable and permanent body to save us from sudden gales and storms, will in practice, be floating on the surface, fixed to nothing, and driven to and fro by every change of the wind. ”

“ The general government has not the same authority with regard to the members of the Senate. It would have been improper to have intrusted them with it; for such a power would, in some measure, have authorized them to fix the times and places when and where the state legislatures should convene, and would tend to destroy that necessary check which the general and state governments will have on each other. ”

“ The executive department should ever be independent, and sufficiently energetic to defeat the attempts of either branch of the legislature to usurp its prerogative. But the proposed control of the Senate is setting that body above the President: it tends to establish an aristocracy. ”

“ Bribery and cabal can be more easily practised in the choice of the Senate, which is to be made by the legislatures, composed of a few men, than of the House of Representatives, who will be chosen by the people. ”

“ They suppose seven years a sufficient period to give the Senate an adequate firmness, from not duly considering the amazing violence and turbulence of the democratic spirit. When a great object of government is pursued, which seizes the popular passions, they spread like wild-fire and become irresistible. He appealed to the gentlemen from the New England States, whether experience had not there verified the remark. As to the executive, it seemed to be admitted that no good one could be established on republican principles. ”

“ Notwithstanding the symptoms of injustice which had marked many of our public councils, they had not proceeded so far as not to leave hopes that there would be a sufficient sense of justice and virtue for the purpose of government. He admitted the evils arising from a frequency of elections, and would agree to give the senate a duration of four or five years. A longer term would defeat itself. It never would be adopted by the people. ”

“ The Senate might of their own body elect a president who would have no dangerous influence. He is to succeed the President, in case of removal, disability, &c., and is to have the casting vote in the Senate. ”

“ Adams expressly recognized, however, the absence of the authority of a constituent body to recall or to instruct a United States Senator: “The Senate of the United States is a branch of the legislature; and each Senator is a representative, not of a single State, but of the whole Union. ”

“ Is it possible, in the nature of things, that two Senators can be as well acquainted with the feelings and interest of the people of Virginia, as ten men selected from among them, and taken from the several parts of the State? Will the people be satisfied to have that body able to continue a revenue system which their immediate representatives think oppressive, or perhaps unnecessary? Certainly they would not; whatever the wisdom and virtue of the Senate may be, he was convinced they were not competent to those peculiar objects for which a just representation was absolutely necessary. ”

“ On this plan, we should have in the Senate a permanent will, a weighty interest, which would answer essential purposes. But is this a republican government, it will be asked. Yes, if all the magistrates are appointed and vacancies are filled by the people, or a process of election originating with the people. He was sensible that an executive, constituted as he proposed, would have in fact but little of the power and independence that might be necessary. ”

“ That the elections of representatives and senators are not frequent enough to insure responsibility to their constituents.
Second. That one representative for thirty thousand persons is too few.
Third. The Senate have a share in the appointment of certain officers, and are to be the judges on the impeachment of such officers. This is blending the executive with the legislative and judicial department, and is likely to screen the offenders impeached, because of the concurrence of a majority of the Senate in their appointment. ”