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The Senate Reacts To Franklin Pierce's Veto

Creator:		n/a
Date:		May 4, 1854
Publication:		The Congressional Globe
Source:		Library of Congress

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58		These are considerations which I think are entitled to great weight now, before we proceed to fix a day when it is probable that we shall not attain the object intended in the mean time. If the intention is to ascertain whether the principles announced in the message are meant to be applied to the homestead bill, by a response from the President to our action on that bill, I am willing to postpone the consideration of this subject until that time shall arrive.

59		Mr. CLAYTON. Mr. President, I am under a strong impression that the ancient practice of the Senate was, when a veto message came in upon a bill originating here, to proceed at once to the consideration of the subject, and to continue that consideration from day to day until the question should be settled. I do not mean to say by this that no sort of business whatever possibly could intervene. Something indispensably necessary might be occasionally taken up. But the impression which I have is, that the course which I have stated, has been the usual habit of the Senate. Certainly, if it has been, it must have originated from the impression derived from the words of the Constitution, that you shall enter the message on the Senate's Journal, and then proceed to the consideration of it as a matter entitled, in consequence of its importance, to priority over other measures. I know very well the language of the Constitution will admit of a different construction, but still, I think that a plain man, reading the Constitution as it stands, would be inclined to the impression that it is the duty of the House to which a Veto message may be transmitted, after entering it on its Journal, to proceed at once to its consideration, and certainly to do so within a reasonable time. I think this has been the uniform practice. Now, sir, in the case referred to by the honorable Senator from North Carolina, I take it for granted, from what he read from the Journal, that there was a debate on that veto message, as there has been on all veto messages that I ever heard of here, and of course it was postponed from day to day.

60		Mr. BADGER. The Senator will allow me to say that there never was one word of debate upon it, until the day when it was disposed of. It was taken up, and postponed from day to day without debate.

61		Mr. CLAYTON. Has the honorable Senator looked at the record of debate? Mr. BADGER. I have looked at the record of the debates. The first day was fixed, and then it was postponed until the next day, and so on, but there was no discussion until the Thursday after the Monday on which the veto came in.

62		Mr. CLAYTON. Well, sir, I do not know anything in regard to that particular precedent to which the Senator has referred; but I have learned from another gentleman, that complaint was made at the time, in the other house, that the Constitution was disregarded in this very particular, in the Senate not proceeding to the consideration of the message immediately. However, sir, be this as it may, would it not be more respectful to the President, and is it not due to ourselves that we should go on within this measure, until we know the sense of Congress in regard to it? I do not mean to press the measure in hot haste, so as to prevent the Senate giving it a full and thorough consideration. It is entitled to that; but I think it is fairly entitled to precedence over other subjects: and whenever its consideration is called for by any member of the Senate, it ought, in pursuance of the spirit of the Constitution, to be taken up and considered.

63		I do not suffer myself, in giving the opinion which I do in regard to this measure, to be influenced at all by other matters. I have nothing now to do with the homestead bill, or the Pacific railroad bill, or anything else, If this subject is to be taken up, I shall desire on some suitable occasion, when no other gentleman wishes the floor, to give my views briefly in relation to this veto message, but I am quite ready to go on with the consideration of it now, and it is my impression that it is our duty to do so. I am ready to vote upon it today.

64		Mr. CLAY. So am I.

65		Mr. DODGE, of Iowa. I concur entirely, Mr. President, with the view taken by the Senator from Delaware in reference to this question. I think the Senate owes it to itself, and to the dignity of the occasion, to pursue the course which he has indicated. I am decidedly averse to the proposition of my friend from Illinois, to postpone action on this question until another legislative measure to which he has alluded shall be passed upon by this body. Sir, no Senator, no created man, is more devotedly or ardently the friend of that measure to which he has alluded -- the homestead bill -- then I am. I am its friend, whether the President be so or not. I never connect one measure with another; nor do I wait for, or look to, Executive vetoes. I vote as becomes my position and my constituents, and the duty that I owe to them.

66		I believe, then, that it is our duty now to proceed to the consideration of the President's message, and to reply, by affirmative or negative action, to the positions which he has taken in that message. For one, sir, I return him my thanks for the veto which he has sent here. I believe it is right in every word, phrase, and sentence. I furthermore believe that if he had not vetoed this bill, he would have been false to that party whose representative he was in the last presidential election-false to the resolutions of that convention which nominated him, and which unanimously resolved and re-resolved that the Democratic party was opposed to a distribution of the proceeds of the sides of the public lands.