Mr. President, we need not look far, nor search deep, for the foundation
of this right in the Senate. It is close at hand, and clearly visible.
In the first place, it is the right of self-defence. In the second
place, it is a right founded on the duty of representative bodies, in a
free government, to defend the public liberty against encroachment. We
must presume that the Senate honestly entertained the opinion expressed
in the resolution of the 28th of March; and, entertaining that opinion,
its right to express it is but the necessary consequence of its right to
defend its own constitutional authority, as one branch of the
government. This is its clear right, and this, too, is its imperative
duty.
If one or both the other branches of the government happen to do that
which appears to us inconsistent with the constitutional rights of the
Senate, will any one say that the Senate is yet bound to be passive, and
to be silent? to do nothing, and to say nothing? Or, if one branch
appears to encroach on the rights of the other two, have these two no
power of remonstrance, complaint, or resistance? Sir, the question may
be put in a still more striking form. Has the Senate a right _to have an
opinion_ in a case of this kind? If it may have an opinion, how is that
opinion to be ascertained but by resolution and vote? The objection must
go the whole length; it must maintain that the Senate has not only no
right to express opinions, but no right to form opinions, on the conduct
of the executive government, though in matters intimately affecting the
powers and duties of the Senate itself.
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