The House first voted to lay the petition on the table. {255} The Speaker, Mr. James K. Polk, then put Mr. Slade's motion to print. Whereupon Mr. Slade attempted to debate the whole question of slavery in the District under the motion. The Speaker ruled that the contents of the petition could not be debated under the motion to print. Mr. Vanderpoel, of New York, then moved to lay Mr. Slade's motion on the table, and the House voted to do so by a large majority. [Sidenote: Mr. Hammond's motion involving the denial of the right of petition.] Two days later the play was on again. Mr. Jackson, of Massachusetts, presented a petition from sundry citizens of Massachusetts, containing the usual prayer, and moved its reference to a select committee. Whereupon Mr. Hammond, South Carolina, moved that the petition should not be received. This was the ultra-Southern position in regard to the anti-slavery petitions, and Mr. Hammond's enunciation of it in the House antedates Mr. Calhoun's in the Senate by more than a fortnight. The Constitution guarantees the right of the people to assemble peaceably and petition the Government for redress of grievances. The right to petition certainly includes the right to have the petitions heard by the body petitioned. If the body refuses to receive the petition, it prevents its being heard, and by preventing its being heard it makes the right itself a mockery. On the other hand, the Constitution vests in each House of Congress the power to make its own rules of procedure. This power must, of course, be so used as not to violate any other clause of the Constitution. Under this power, however, each House may and should protect itself against all obstacles thrown by outsiders in the way of the discharge of its duties in legislating for the country. If any number of people undertake, by an abuse of the right of petition, to obstruct the legitimate work of the Congress for the whole people, each House {256} certainly has the right to meet this attempt in any way which will not deny the right of petition, the right of any one or any number of the people to be heard in asking for a redress of grievances. [Sidenote: The new method for dealing with petitions in the House of Representatives.]