USA > Colorado > History of the State of Colorado, Volume II > Part 29
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As to the election of Mr. Belford to the Forty-Fourth Congress, there was no dispute. Taking his credentials from the Executive he went down to Washington at the beginning of the December session and claimed his seat. Unfortunately for him, the country happened to go Democratic that year. At that time, as will be remembered, all the polit- ical elements were in an unprecedented state of feverish excitement over the greatest presidential contest that has ever occurred in this country, and both parties were figuring for every inch of vantage ground that could be gained prior to the canvass of the electoral vote by Congress in joint convention. Hence, when the question of seating Mr. Belford came up, it seemed probable that the Democratic majority in the House would deny the legality of the admission of Colorado under the Presi- dent's proclamation, notwithstanding the fact that our Senators elect had been accepted and seated without question.
At a caucus of the Republicans on the 4th of December, it was decided to cast the vote of that party for James A. Garfield for Speaker, and to insist upon the recognition of Colorado as a State. The case was given into the hands of General Banks as manager. When the roll was called, and Colorado reached, Banks rose to a "question of privilege" and presented Belford's credentials as a representative elect
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from the State of Colorado. The clerk who presided, gave precedence to a motion by Mr. Holman to proceed to the election of a speaker; a member of the majority proposed that the matter of Belford's right to a seat, be referred to the Judiciary Committee when appointed, to decide whether or not Colorado had been legally admitted as a State, and it was so referred. This was undoubtedly a grievous wrong which should never have been permitted to stain the congressional records, nevertheless it was committed, but not without vehement protest.
The matter was retained in committee until December 12th, when, by a vote of seven to three, the committee resolved to admit Mr. Bel- ford as the member elect from Colorado, but the report was not sub- mitted to the House until after the holidays. On the 3d of January a majority and a minority report were brought in. The latter, presented by Mr. Hurd, maintained that the admission of Colorado as a State was a legislative act, and Congress could not delegate to any other depart- ment authority to make the declaration that a State had been admitted to the Union. It treated the President's proclamation as of no value whatever, because the law under which he issued it was inoperative. The minority held that no State could be admitted,-despite the fact that Michigan, Missouri, Iowa, Nevada and others had been received under precisely similar conditions as governed in the Colorado case,-until its constitution had been presented to and approved by Congress, and it was asserted that this view had the support of some of the ablest lawyers on the committee. The report concluded as follows :
"This minority believing that Colorado has not yet been admitted as a State, and desiring to expedite the people of that Territory in their efforts to obtain such admission, recommend the adoption of an act as follows :
"Be it enacted, etc., That the constitution and government which the people of Colorado have formed for themselves, be, and the same is hereby accepted, ratified and confirmed, and that the State of Colorado shall be, and is hereby declared to be, one of the United States of America, and is hereby admitted into the Union upon an equal footing with the original States, in all respects whatsoever."
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The intent of this proposed action was manifest,-to secure delay until after the counting of the electoral vote, since, if the admission were to be acknowledged and perfected, the electoral vote of the new State would have to be counted, thereby carrying the majority to Mr. Hayes and against Mr. Tilden, as in the final count the majority was reduced to one.
Proctor Knott of Kentucky presented the majority report, with a resolution declaring Colorado to be a State, and that its duly elected representative, James B. Belford, should be admitted to a seat. After considering the provisions of the act which authorized the people to form a State government, the committee entered upon an elaborate review of the objections presented by the minority. They declared that the provisions of the Enabling act which empowered the President to declare the State admitted to the Union upon certain things having been made known to him, was in no sense a delegation to him of the will of Congress that Colorado should be admitted upon the happening of a certain series of events. That will Congress expressed for itself in the act. Nor was it a delegation of any authority to him to judge of the expediency or inexpediency of the act taking effect upon the per- formance of certain conditions. That judgment Congress formed and expressed for itself when it presented the conditions. It simply em- powered him to declare the legal result of a complete performance of all the conditions presented in the act, on the part of the people of Col- orado, namely: The completion of the compact between the United States and the people of Colorado that the latter should constitute a State in the Union.
" Believing that they have discharged these obligations, and that every condition upon which Colorado was to be admitted into the Union has been complied with, the committee recommend the adoption of a resolution that Colorado is a State in the Union, and that James B. Belford, representative elect from that State, be sworn and admitted to his seat as such."
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CHAPTER XVI.
BELFORD SWORN AND SEATED-THE STRUGGLE FOR THE FORTV-FIFTH CONGRESS - REVIEW OF THE GREAT CONTEST IN THE HOUSE-A LONG AND REMARKABLE DISCUSSION-PATTERSON SEATED-EVENTS SUCCEEDING THE RATIFICATION OF THE CONSTITUTION-MEETING OF THE FIRST STATE LEGISLATURE-FINANCIAL CONDITION OF THE NEW STATE-ELECTION OF U. S. SENATORS-SHORT BIOG- RAPHIES OF CHAFFEE AND TELLER-ELECTION OF PRESIDENTIAL ELECTORS- FIRST FEDERAL APPOINTEES-HALLETT, DECKER AND CAMPBELL.
After a lengthy debate both reports were recommitted to the Judi- ciary Committee. Finally, on the last day of January, 1877, after two months of anxious expectancy, the majority report was taken up, adopted, and Belford sworn and seated, to serve until March 3d, or a little more than thirty days. It was not done, however, until after the passage of the Compromise Electoral Commission bill. In the interim it had been widely reported and believed that Mr. Patterson had opposed both the admission of the State and the seating of Judge Bel- ford, but I can discover no justification for such rumors. On the contrary, Mr. Patterson informs me that he at no time, neither in Col- orado nor in Washington, threw the slightest doubt or obstacle in his way, but at the very beginning of the session in December urged Belford's right to the unexpired term with the Democrats in the House. Mr. Lapham of New York, a Republican, in a speech delivered in the Forty-Fifth Congress, stated very emphatically that Patterson persist- ently urged and insisted that the State had been duly admitted, that Belford was lawfully elected, and it was a grievous wrong not to admit him.
Reverting for a moment to the October campaign, it was then also widely reported that an agreement had been entered into between
Very truly yours. mes B Belford
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Patterson and Belford, whereby it was arranged that the successful candidate in October should have no competitor for the Forty-Fifth Congress,-in brief, that the first election should decide for both. The basis for the belief, and the only one, was an interview between Mr. Chaffee and Mr. Patterson, at the Teller House in Central City. I was made acquainted with the substance of the conversation there had, by Mr. Chaffee himself, immediately after it occurred. I did not then understand that Patterson had actually agreed to abide by the result in October, but that there had been some talk about it. Patterson was thoroughly imbued with the conviction that he would be elected in October. When before the Committee on Elections in Washington, Belford, in answer to the question whether he had entered into an agree- ment with Mr. Patterson, whereby the October election was to be considered as decisive for both Congresses, replied, "No, I never did." Rumors of such an understanding ran all through the campaign of 1876, and the succeeding one of 1878, and Patterson was severely censured by Republicans for alleged violation of the compact. In August, 1878, Mr. Chaffee, writing from Saratoga, New York, on the subject, stated that he had never said that the conversation between him- self and Mr. Patterson " was an agreement, or in the nature of an agree- ment." He then recites the substance of the conversation heretofore referred to, and from diverse reports of which the public came to believe there had been an arrangement of some kind in the nature of a compact, in which it appears that Patterson expressed the greatest confidence in his election in October, and that Mr. Chaffee declared he would be beaten. There was some talk about betting. Then Mr. Patterson said (we quote from Mr. Chaffee), “ If I am beaten in October, I will not run in No- vember, but will quit politics, and thereafter confine myself to the practice of law."
But whether this may be termed an agreement or not, or whether it was observed or otherwise, has very little to do with the main question. The fact remains that both parties prepared for an election in November, and it was not until the 14th of October that the Republican chiefs,
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having, as they believed, rightly construed the law to mean that the October election for both terms was legal, and that all future elections until 1880 must be held in the same month, that the proclamation was withdrawn, and with it Mr. Belford's candidacy.
Both candidates went to Washington claiming a seat in the Forty- Fifth Congress, Belford bearing a certificate from the Governor, Patterson without further claim than an abstract of the votes taken in November, and a considerable mass of testimony which he had taken in Denver and at other points in the State. For the remainder of the case we have resorted to and sedulously examined the Congressional Record, from which the facts subjoined have been collated.
The first session of the Forty-Fifth Congress assembled October 15th, 1877. The clerk of the House presided and called the roll. On reaching Colorado, he made a statement of the reasons which impelled him not to place the name of either claimant from Colorado upon the roll. He had received a credential signed by the Governor of the State, with the seal attached, declaring the election of James B. Belford on the 3d day of October, 1876. The law of Congress required him to place upon the roll the names of those representatives, and those only, whose credentials showed that they were elected in accordance with the laws of their States respectively, or the laws of the United States. He did not think there was any law in existence, either in the State of Colorado, or any law of the United States, which authorized the election of a representative to the Forty-Fifth Congress for Colorado on the 3d of October, 1876. This being the case, and the certificate which Mr. Belford brought showing on its face that he was elected at a time unauthorized by either the laws of the United States or of his State, he (the clerk) could see no way in which he could place Mr. Belford's name on the roll.
In addition, Mr. Patterson had sent in a written protest, claiming that he was the representative elect from Colorado, with a certified copy of an abstract of the votes cast in each county in November, but it was made clear that these votes were never canvassed by any board of can-
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vassers, and that no certificate was ever issued to any one declaring the result of said election. Therefore, he could not place Patterson's name on the roll. The upshot of the business was, that the clerk submitted the entire case to the judgment of the House, when it should be organized.
This brought Mr. Hale of Maine, who had become Mr. Belford's champion, to his feet with a resolution to have the name of Belford placed on the roll as the duly elected representative from Colorado. It was promptly ruled out of order, because Mr. Wood of New York had moved the previous question on a motion to proceed to the election of a speaker. A short time afterward Mr. Samuel J. Randall was elected. In drawing for seats, one was assigned to Colorado to be occupied by the representative who should be declared entitled to it.
The case then went over until the 16th, when Mr. Hale called up his resolution and addressed the House at length on the subject of Bel- ford's prima facie right to the seat. In regard to the claim that the law of Congress fixed a certain day in November for the election of repre- sentatives to Congress, he argued that Ohio, Maine, and other States had chosen members to this Congress in October, but forgot to mention that these States were expressly excepted by the amendatory act of 1875. He claimed that the Enabling act of March 3d, 1875, provided for the full and complete organization of the new State, and for its proper representation in Congress; that it clothed the Constitutional Convention with power to fix the times for the early elections, and it had provided for them in these terms: "The general election shall be held on the first Tuesday of October, in the years of our Lord 1876, 1877, 1878 and annually thereafter, on such days as may be prescribed by law." There was no time for an election for member of Congress to be provided by any other body, since no legislature had then been elected to take this subject in hand and fix a day. He then entered upon a general resume of the election and the circumstances attending the result. It may be interpolated here, that none of Mr. Hale's speeches contributed to aid Mr. Belford's cause, for they were severely partisan, hot tempered and ill considered.
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Mr. Harris of Virginia offered a resolution to consign "all the papers in the case, to the Committee on Elections when it should be appointed, with instructions to report either as to the prima facie right or final right, of said claimants, as the committee shall deem proper, and that neither claimant be sworn in until said committee reports."
Mr. Patterson's protest and memorial were then read, the latter in the form of a printed brief, reciting all the principal incidents relating to the election which have already been epitomized; Belford also furnished a brief. A part, and rather an important part too, of the testimony taken by Patterson in his contest, was a statement by Governor Routt, who testified that "in his judgment Belford had not been legally elected as a representative to the Forty-Fifth Congress."
Few examples of contested elections have ever received from Con- gress, no matter which party was in the ascendancy, the care, attention and candid discussion that were given to the one under consideration. For days together the entire time of the House was given up to debating the legal points involved. In reading the record I was amazed at the earnestness and time expended upon them. Even a rapid digest of the different arguments would fill many chapters of this volume. Entertaining the partisan view of the matter which all the members of the party, to which I was then, and am still attached, held, until I had made an exhaustive examination of the complete record for the purpose of attaining historical truth, I was disposed to share the common opinion of Republicans that Mr. Patterson had acted in bad faith toward his adversary, and had been seated in the Forty-Fifth Con- gress solely because of his connection with the majority in that body and regardless of the legal rights. Hence, I am impelled to give the subject much more extended attention than the casual reader, who neither took part in, nor cares for the facts in this famous contest, may deem appropriate or necessary.
After the debate had proceeded to sufficient length to evoke the salient points of the vexatious problem, Mr. Conger of Michigan made this observation: "Mr. Speaker, whoever writes the history of the
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struggle of Colorado for admission as one of the States of the Union, will give a history of more varied and changeable views of the same party to suit different occasions than, I think, were ever presented in any other subject upon which the historian has ever expended labor." The record shows it. It is so interwoven with doubts and conflicting opinions, and it is so extremely difficult to analyze and unravel the com- plications of the various questions almost inextricably thrown about it, as to open the widest latitude for the expression of views, without equal opportunity for discovering which was rightly entitled to the verdict.
Stripped of technicalities, personalities and partisan bias, the whole question hinged upon whether Congress endowed the Constitutional Convention with authority to fix the date of any but the first election for representative, in other words, for any but the unexpired term of the Forty-Fourth Congress. The law of 1872, Section 25 of the Re- vised Statutes, provided that in order to secure uniformity of dates for the election of representatives, the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November should be the day. On the 3d of March this act was so amended as to except the States whose constitutions required amending in order to bring them into conformity with the law, as Maine, Ohio, Indiana and others whose elections occurred in October. It was claimed by Mr. Chaffee, and by many able lawyers whom he consulted, that the Enabling act made an exception of Colorado also, because it was passed subsequent to the act of 1872 and the amendatory act, therefore re- pealed or suspended said acts for the time being. But an examination of the House Journal shows that while both the Enabling act and the amendment of March 3d, 1875, were passed at about the same time in the closing hours of the Forty-Third Congress, the passage of the amendment and its approval succeeded and did not antedate the adoption and approval of the Enabling act, hence the latter could not have repealed nor suspended the operation of the amendment in favor of Colorado, and this, I think, was where the original mistake occurred with Mr. Chaffee and his advisers in October, 1876.
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In all the vast amount of matter contained in these debates, extending through weeks of time, there is no manifestation except per- haps in the remarks of Mr. Hale, of any other desire than to reach the exact lawful status. It was conceded on all sides to be one of the most perplexing cases ever brought into the House. The speakers of both parties directed their efforts to its elucidation as a matter of deeper import than mere partisan considerations. No man can read these discussions without being impressed with their sincerity, nor without discovering the complexity of the legal questions. While there were many precedents of one kind and another, not one of them seemed to fit this particular phase.
At the outset the Democrats were by no means anxious to seat Mr. Patterson. They had a good working majority without him. Their feeling toward him at the beginning was hostile. They remembered him with sentiments amounting to hatred, for had he not persuaded several Democrats to vote for the Enabling act, upon the pledge that Colorado would come in as a Democratic State, and cast her electoral vote for Samuel J. Tilden, and had he not only disappointed them in this, but caused the defeat of their greatest leader since Andrew Jack- son's time ?
Returning to the original proposition, perhaps the clearest and best review of the case was given by Gen. Buckner of Kentucky, who said that the only question before the House was whether or not the certifi- cate of the Governor of Colorado, showing upon its face that the election was held on a day unauthorized by law, entitled the holder of such a credential to a prima facie right to a seat. He held that the Governor might have avoided all this difficulty by merely stating that Mr. Belford had been duly elected according to the laws of Colorado, for, " I under- take to say, and no one will doubt that if such had been the form of the certificate, Mr. Belford would, unquestionably, have had the prima facie right to a seat here. But the governor does not give such a certificate. He undertakes not merely to give his conclusions of law upon the facts, but he states a fact, which, according to my construction of the law,
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proves that the election was invalid ; that there was no authority of law for holding the election on the day upon which he says Belford was elected. This brings us to the only question really before the House ; and this question is not to be decided upon what the Constitutional Convention did upon its view of the law, but it is for each member of the House upon an examination of the authority under which the Con- vention acted, to determine the question for himself. The rights of Mr. Patterson to a seat here are not involved in this discussion. The question whether the Governor or the State authorities issued the proclamation required by law, is not before the House. Nor is there before the House the question whether Mr. Patterson or Mr. Belford received the largest vote at the election in October or November, or what proportion of votes they received, or whether any particular county did or did not vote at the November election." The whole question he declared to be one of law, and the only law under which the people of Colorado had a right to act after the first election, was the law of Con- gress of 1872, and the amendatory act of 1875, providing a day for the election of all representatives to Congress in November.
Mr. Southard said, speaking of the claim that the Enabling act repealed the statute of 1875 or 1872, so far as Colorado was concerned, the act of 1875 exempting certain States whose constitutions had to be amended, was passed subsequent to the Colorado Enabling act, and therefore must be taken as the latest expression of the legislative will. But putting this fact aside as of no material value to the issue, he assumed that Section 25 of the Revised Statutes had no relation to the case of Colorado or to any other new State in the act of forming a con- stitution. That section had only to do with States then actually existing, certainly not with Colorado, which was then a Territory. The bill for an Enabling act was not introduced until a year afterward, hence it could not by any stretch of imagination be assumed to come within the clause of 1875 excepting any State "that has not yet changed its day of election and whose constitution must be amended to effect a change in
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the day of election of State officers," etc. So the amendment had no relation to the question of the election in Colorado.
Several members admitted that if the certificate issued to Belford by the Governor had simply recited that at an election duly and regu- larly held under the laws of Colorado he had been elected, it would have constituted a prima facie case. But it was the legality of the day which had been named therein that was in dispute, and which made it necessary to investigate and see whether or not that was the legal day. Grave doubts arose in all minds on this point, hence the importance of deliberate examination.
Now much of the talk about what the certificate should or might have expressed, was absurd. A certificate which simply stated that at an election regularly held Mr. Belford or Mr. Patterson was duly elected, without giving any date at all, would be an anomaly in public docu- ments of that nature. The Executive might just as well have omitted the seal or his signature. While I have no authority at hand to sub- stantiate the assertion, there is no doubt whatever in my mind that no document claiming to be a certificate of election in which the date of the election was left out, was ever presented to Congress and accepted as a valid instrument.
However, the papers went to the Committee on Elections, before whom Patterson and Belford appeared by invitation, and made ex- haustive argument, each in his own behalf. In the course of pro- ceedings before the committee the following stipulation in writing was presented :
It is hereby mutually agreed and stipulated between Thomas M. Patterson on the one part, and James B. Belford on the other, that if laws were in force, and by virtue of which an election might have been legally held in the State of Colorado, upon the 7th day of November A. D. 1876, for representative to the Forty-Fifth Congress from said State, the following number of votes were legally cast by qualified electors at an election held in said State upon the said 7th day of November, A. D. 1876, for said representative to the Forty-Fifth Congress, and which votes were divided among the persons respectively voted for upon said day for said office, as follows:
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