Mr. COWAN. If the majority did it, why not. It is certainly the act of the majority, and I know no reason why it would not be a valid act, because they were free to choose their own mode, and we have no right to challenge the one they adopted. I know that jurors are not allowed to bind themselves to render a verdict determined by referring it to a hazard, but I know of no authority competent to say to a Legislature that they shall not decide 1) lot. such a way might be reprehensible an improper, and I do not advocate it, but I do not now that we could correct by discarding it, and I think it would be good if ratified by certifying it as the act of the body. In the present case the majority agreed that the choice of the most of the body should be the choice of the whole, and I have no doubt in the world but that this is a proper and legitimate mode of expressing the will of a majority. The Constitution of the U.S. provides that the Legislatures of the several States shall elect Senators, and it is said that because the election is committed to the Legislatures it isa legislative act, only to be legally performed by the Legislatures in the some way as they make laws; that is, that every act of theirs must be by a majority of each House composing the body acting concurrently, and not jointly. This is absurd. A legislative act is the act of making alaw; that is the meaning of the word. To elect a Senator is not to make a law, but to choose an officer; and if the election of a Senator was given by the Constitution to a corporation of bricklayers, and they performed it, no body would say the act was building a wall or layingbricks. Anybodywould say thisisabsurcl. The word “Legislature, ” designated in the Constitution as the State organ for the election of Senators, is a mere word of description, and does not indicate that the duty imposed is legislative in its character. It does not perform that duty as a Legislature, but as a jnint meetin; not as 2 bodies acting concurrently, utas one bod actiu jointly. Now, it is said such a ho y not being able to make a law cannot make a rule; but that does not follow, for a law and a rule are differ ent. We cannot make laws here in the senate, but we can make rules; and so of the Legislature in joint meeting. It could not legislate or make laws, but it could make rules for its own government. Who could gainsay their right? The rule was good and valid, but it was like all rules, within the control of the body making them, and it might have been rese inded by the majority making it if they did not like its operation. I think the whole proceedings were under the control of the joint meeting until they were consummated; the might have reconsidered the vote electing Mr. Stockton if they had chosen to do so, notwithstanding the rule, because even if that was a breach of good faith, yet it was all in their own hands, and nobody could prevent them.