Passing from the Speaker to the Clerk, we find still another illustration, showing that the word _preside_, under which the Chief Justice derives all his powers, has received an authoritative interpretation in the rules of the House of Representatives, and the commentaries thereon. I cite from Barclay’s Digest. “Under the authority contained in the Manual, and the usage of the House, the Clerk _presided_ over its deliberations while there was no Speaker, but simply put questions, and, where specially authorized, preserved order, not, however, undertaking to decide questions of order.”[147] In another place, after stating that in several Congresses there was a failure to elect a Speaker for several days, that in the twenty-sixth Congress there was a failure for eleven days, that in the thirty-first Congress there was a failure for nearly a month, that in the thirty-fourth and thirty-sixth Congresses respectively there was a failure for not less than two months, the author says:-- “During the three last-named periods, while the House was without a Speaker, the Clerk _presided_ over its deliberations; not, however, exercising the functions of Speaker to the extent of deciding questions of order, but, as in the case of other questions, putting them to the House for its decision.”[148] This limited power of the Clerk is described in a marginal note of the author,--“Clerk _presides_.” The author then proceeds:-- “To relieve future Houses of some of the difficulties which grew out of the very limited power of the Clerk as _a presiding officer_, the House of the thirty-sixth Congress adopted the present 146th and 147th rules, which provide, that, ‘pending the election of a Speaker, the Clerk shall preserve order and decorum, and shall decide all questions of order that may arise, subject to appeal to the House.’”[149] From this impartial statement we have a practical definition of the word _preside_. It is difficult to see how it can have a different signification in the National Constitution. The word is the same in the two cases, and it must have substantially the same meaning, whether it concern a Clerk or a Chief Justice. Nobody ever supposed that a _presiding_ Clerk could rule or vote. Can a _presiding_ Chief Justice?