Mr. SHELLABARGER. Without being precisely certain on a question so novel as this, I have a very distinct impression about it; and Idesire to make a sug cation to my friend that I may hear his repy to it. I do not know that there is anything new in the suggestion which I am about to make. I think that probably it has already been made. It must be conceded as perfectly obvious that the Constitution means to provide for the precise case which is contemplated by the resolution of the Gentfrom Pennsylvania, to wit, the convening of Congress at a time when there is no session of Congress, on account of an extraordinary emergency having arisen. That precise case is provided for by the constitution: and it is provided that the POTUS may convene the 2 Houses or either of them on account of that emergency. We cannot differ, then, about the proposition that the President has the power; and I do not understand that we do. This prop position is met, however, by the suggestion that the power is not exclusively in the President; that Congress may by an act of its own, either a concurrent or a JtResolution, delegate to some person or persons, other than the President, this power to determine the question of the existence of the exigency calling for the convening of Congress. Now, then, Mr. Speaker, my mind is troub led in taking that view by reason of the general construction arising out of the legal rule and principle that when a power is given in the constitution to a distinct officer, branch, or part of the Government, unless there are other terms in the instrument which control the matter, the power is exclusive. Take the clause in the Constitution coming below that in regard to the President commissioning the officers of the Government. Does anybody doubt but that is his exclusive power, and that Congress could not byJtResolution or otherwise confer e power on any other person to commission officers of the U.S.? Take this case: could we provide by law for a permanent repository of our power for the term ot our own lives, or, I should say, for the term of this Congress could we, I say, give anyone person the power to determine whether this Congress shou (1 come to ether and when it should come together before ecember next? There is no question about the power of congress to determine its own adjournment; but it seems to me that Congress must take it upon itself to determine whether it will again meet here before next December. If it adjourns, leaving no Congress in session, not having determined the question for itself, then I think that state of case has come where the Constitution provides a repository of the discretion, the exigency havin intervened. I come back to the general proposition that as a Generalrule, wherever a power is given by the constitution to any dept or officer of the Government, that power is exclusive unless you find something in other portions of the Constitution to control that rule making it exclusive.