Abridgment of the Debates of Congress, from 1789 to 1856, Vol. 4 (of 16)United States. Congress
History
Abridgment of the Debates of Congress, from 1789 to 1856, Vol. 4 (of 16)
United States. Congress
Law -- United States; United States -- Politics and government
The Constitution of the United States says that Congress shall "have
power to dispose of and make all needful rules and regulations
respecting the territory or other property belonging to the United
States." Can an agreement arising from the exercise of this power,
supersede the right of exercising the power expressly delegated by the
constitution itself? Certainly not.
On the ground of policy I presume that there is no gentleman who will
contend that the power of which I wish to deprive the Governors, ought
to be retained. The gentleman from Georgia himself says, that if he
were about to frame an original ordinance, he would not think of such
a power. As the opinion of Judge Tucker has been referred to on one
subject, I will refer to it on the subject of prerogative. Let it be
recollected, that the power to prorogue and dissolve is one of the
highest prerogatives of the King of England: that it crept into the
governments of his colonies, and thence into this ordinance, previous
to the adoption of the constitution. It now remains for the United
States to say, whether they will copy after Great Britain, and because
it is a high prerogative, give the Governors of the Territories of
the United States the same powers as she gives to her Territorial
Governors. I trust it will be expunged.
"The title 'prerogative,' it is presumed, was annihilated in
America with the Kingly Government." "This definition (of
prerogative) is enough to make a citizen of the United States
shudder at the recollection that he was born under a government
in which such doctrines were received as catholic," &c.
This is the opinion of Judge Tucker. Is not this sufficient to induce
us to take away from Governors this prerogative? Is not this feature
modelled after the feature in the Government of England? Certainly;
and that it is transferred from her Colonial Government, I can show by
the present ordinance for the government of Canada, [to which Mr. P.
referred.] It is the same principle, and we have copied it.
I will not object to retain this power, if any gentleman can show any
advantage to be gained by it. I will suppose an extreme case; that any
of the Territories designed to commit treason, and the Legislature were
to pass an act giving it their sanction; (and they have shown less
treasonable disposition than some of the elder States, if we may judge
from occurrences of a few years past)--could not the Governor put his
negative on this law? There could be no such law without his consent.
It is therefore entirely unnecessary, in any possible case, to give the
Governor the arbitrary power of dissolving the Legislature.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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