shall be necessary to a choice. And if the House of Repre sentatives shall not choose a President whenever the right of choice shall devolve upon them, before the fourth day of March next following, then the Vice-President shall act as President, as in the case of the death or other constitutional disability of the President.

"The person having the greatest number of votes as VicePresident shall be the Vice-President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of electors appointed; and if no person have a majority, then, from the two highest numbers on the list, the Senate shall choose the Vice-President; a quorum for the purpose shall consist of two thirds of the whole number of Senators, and a majority of the whole number shall be necessary to a choice.

"The Congress may determine the time of choosing the electors, and the day on which they shall give their votes, which day shall be the same throughout the United States."

§ 199. How these electors may be appointed, whether directly by the people, or by the state legislatures, or otherwise, the Constitution does not assume to determine. It leaves the settlement of that matter entirely to the several states. There need be no uniformity in their practice; in fact, until recently there never has been. Formerly the method of choosing by the state legislatures was common. At the present day the choice is made by the body of voters in all the states.

§ 200. What was the idea contained in these constitutional provisions? Was it that the people were to be directly instrumental in the selection of their chief executive officers? Plainly not. The scheme is complicated, and seems to have been contrived expressly to prevent what is often called the tyranny of majorities. Even now, when the college of electors is chosen by the body of voters, it is possible that a person shall receive the ballots of a large majority of the presidential electors, while a majority of the actual voters have preferred another candidate. In fact, the people of the United States, as one collective aggregate, are not appealed to in the selection of the President, but that people as segregated into their

local commonwealths. The idea of original state equality and sovereignty has here left its impress upon the organic law. When, therefore, we hear, at the present day, a complaint that a person may be the President of the minority, it should be remembered that this fact is the result of a concession to the demands of state independence, which were insisted upon with so much pertinacity when the Constitution was framed and adopted. In those clauses which provide for an election. by the House of Representatives, this idea of state sovereignty is absolutely controlling; the old feature of state equality in the legislature is expressly preserved.

§201. But aside from the influence which the theory of state independence and sovereignty exerted upon these provisions of the organic law, the whole scheme assumes that the people were not to interfere directly in the selection of their chief executive officers. "By the theory of the Constitution, the evident intention of its framers, and the early practice, it was not designed that the President and Vice-President of the United States should be directly or indirectly voted for by the people in such a manner that a citizen, casting his ballot, should be understood as designating any particular person for either of these offices. Their choice was to be removed from the excitement and distractions of popular elections, and was to be intrusted to the cool and deliberate judgment of a few special electors appointed for that purpose by the several states in such manner as their laws should prescribe. These special electors were assumed to enter upon the discharge of their functions, untramelled by any pledges, and left only to the guidance of their own personal convictions of what were the best interests of the country.

§ 202. "But the rapid spread of the idea of popular sovereignty has swept away these checks planned by the founders of the government, so that while the letter of the Constitution is strictly obeyed, its intention is directly violated in the election of the chief magistrate. This has been accomplished by the abandonment of the choice of the electors to the people of the several states, and by the closely drawn lines of party discipline; so that sets of electors, unequivocally pledged to a

particular candidate, and directly voted for by the people, have become, in fact, the mere passive instruments of the majority of voters in each state, in carrying out their will as expressed at the ballot-box. The electoral college is thus reduced to a mere machine, a mere conduit through which may flow the stream of popular suffrage. We do now, in fact, vote for the President and Vice-President as really as though their names were inscribed upon the papers we deposit. We have thus, in this respect, virtually made to ourselves a new constitution, which exactly resembles the original in form, but is vastly different in substance. This complete change in the manner of electing the President is a remarkable instance of the way in which written laws and constitutions, however carefully guarded, may be made to yield to a change in the popular feelings and wishes; so that, while not a clause is repealed or modified, the effect of the whole is entirely transformed. On the letter of the Constitution there has grown up an unwritten law, not, indeed, enacted by courts, but devised and voluntarily obeyed by those who manage the machinery of popular elections.1

§ 203. I would not return to the ancient theory. I am persuaded that our fathers had not faith enough in the intelligence of the people. I believe that the whole body of voters is less liable to err in the choice of those rulers whose functions are political, than any small and select number of men specially appointed, however pure and patriotic they may be. I believe that our general elections fairly express the popular will, and that the decision is, on the whole, in accordance with the best interests of the nation. We might well, therefore, abandon the idle and useless form of interposing the machinery of an electoral college between the people and their choice, and allow the votes to be cast directly for the persons designated to the offices of President and Vice-President. I have called this form idle and useless; it certainly is so, unless it be purposely retained as a check upon the power of a majority. If it be thought best that a majority of voters in the United States should not necessarily determine the selection of President,

1 See Pomeroy's Introduction to Municipal Law, § 731.

then this expedient of an electoral college is well contrived to thwart the wishes of such majority. But all this is entirely opposed to the tendencies of the age, and to the principles upon which the state governments are organized and administered. There are theorists who have suggested plans by which minorities may be the more efficiently represented; but no one has, as yet, contended that, in a republican form of government, the minority should possibly control.

§ 204. The Senate. - Article I. Section III. provides that "the Senate of the United States shall be composed of two Senators from each state, chosen by the legislature thereof, for six and each Senator shall have one vote." years;

Provision is made for classifying those who are first chosen, so that the terms of office of one third shall expire every second year. "If vacancies happen by resignation or otherwise, during the recess of the legislature of any state, the executive thereof may make temporary appointments, until the next meeting of the legislature, which shall then fill such vacancies."

The same Article, Section IV., declares that, "the times, places, and manner of holding elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each state by the legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time, by law, make or alter such regulations, except as to the places of choosing Senators."

The body which appoints the Senators is fixed beyond the reach of Congress or state legislation, -the legislatures of the respective states. The places of choosing are also fixed, — the place where each legislature, by the local law, is to hold its sessions. The times and manner of holding elections are left to the states, unless Congress should, by a general law, prescribe some common rule. Congress has not availed itself of this power so plainly conferred upon it by the Constitution, and there is some diversity in the manner of choosing Senators among the different states. In some the two houses meet in joint session, and a majority of the whole united body is sufficient; in others the houses vote separately, and do not meet in joint session until a majority of each has made its selection,

and then if the choice of both branches has fallen upon the same person the election is complete, if not, a resort is had to a joint ballot.

The Constitution

$ 205. The House of Representatives. determines the method of electing members to the lower House in the following manner: - Article I. Section II. § 1, "The House of Representatives shall be composed of members chosen every second year by the people of the several states, and the electors in each state shall have the qualifications requisite for electors of the most numerous branch of the state legislature."

The first paragraph of Section IV. of the same Article, cited in § 204, applies to the election of Representatives as well as of Senators.

In this connection may be read Section IV. of Article IV. as follows: "The United States shall guarantee to every state in this Union a republican form of government."

§ 206. As to the times, places, and manner of holding elections of Representatives, the Congress has complete control, so far as positive provisions of the Constitution do not interfere; in the event that Congress does not exercise its authority, the states have a like complete control. Thus Congress may prescribe the day and month for holding the election, and make them the same throughout the country, with the limitation that the election must be once in two years. Congress may also prescribe whether the choice shall be by single districts, or by a general vote in each state; and may, no doubt, divide the states into congressional districts. The national legislature has not, however, exercised the full power conferred upon it, and most of the regulations governing the choice of Representatives have been left to the separate states. Over the qualifications of the electors, Congress has no control further than may be included in the clause by which the United States is to guarantee a republican form of government to each

state.

§ 207. Here we perceive that the general government has no voice in deciding who shall be privileged to vote for Representatives in Congress. The whole subject is controlled by