Mr. HOVE. Mr. President. I do not propose to discuss the question before the Senate at any length. There is but little object in discussion. If the Senfrom NewJersey sought any personal or any partisan triumph in this controversy, he has secured that. Vthat ever may be the decision of the Senate, it can not reflect upon his personal or his partisan character or claims. He has already a decision in his favor pronounced by n committee of this body composed of a large majority of his political opponents, and einbracin some of the best. it not the very best, legzi talent in the Senate. If, therefore, the Senate decides not to admit his claims to a seat here, there can be no party advantage derived to the party in the majority. The only way possible for the majority here to gain any advantage by a de cision of thisquestion, is by vindicating exactly the law of teland, on decreeing what is positively and abstractly and legally rightto be done. I think myself, at all times, and under all considerations, the importance of deciding one of thesequestions correctly, transe ends very much the importance of having any particular member in or out of this body. Therefore, so farus I have examined the question at all, I have examined it with express reference to seeing what is the law of the case; and ifI were not very certain that my own conclusions were correct, I should feel bound to follow the lead of the committee which has investigated and reported upon the case. But it does seem to me that there are twoquestions which if put to this Senate one after 1. ie other, or if put to any lawyer in the Senate one after the other, there would be no diver sity of opinion upon either of them among the members oftie Senate. If I asked the Senate whether the vote which was given in that joint convention for the present Senfrom NewJersey would have elected him under the laws of that State in case there had been no rule of the jointconvention pronounced, 1 think every member of the Senate would say “No; certainly not.” If that convention had never declared by rule that a plurality of the votes given should constitute an election, and yet the convention had given precisely the vote they did ire on this trial, orty votes to the Senfrom NewJersey and 41 votes against the Senfrom NewJersey distributed among others, I do not think there is a single Senator on this floor butwould have said at once, “ Of course he cannot have been elected by any such vote as that." Why? simply because 40 votes cannot overcome 40 one; a minority cannot control a majority in the absence of a rule. If I put the other question to the Senate, whether ajoint convention of the 2 Houses of the Legislature, can by rule, repeal or modify or change a law of the State, I think every Senator would say at once, “Certainly not; by rule the 2 Houses injoint convention cannot make a law, cannot repeal a law, cannot modify a law, cannot change a law.” That would be the judgment of every Senator here upon that single question. If these 2 questions put separately would be answered in that way, in the negative, how happens it that both of these answers are over ruled and disregarded when we come to consider the elfect of them together? The only clause of the Constitution which bears upon the view of this question which I take is the clause which declares that “the times, places, and manner of holding elections for Sens&Reps shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature there of.” There is the delegation to the Legislature of the power, in the absence of any congressional legislation or direction, to rescribe the times, places, and manner of holing elections for Senators. It is under the authority derived from that clause of the Constitution that the Legislutnre of NewJersey, the very body referred to in the clause, did by law, the only way that a Legislature can do anything. provide that Senators from that State might be chosen by the 2 Houses in joint meeting. There was the exercise of the authority here delegated to the Legislature. By that delegation the 2 Houses were clothed with the authority to make the election. If this was the 1st election they had ever been called upon to make; if this was the 1st time those 2 Houses were ever asse inbledin joint meeting, and they had enacted no rule on the subject, as I said before, I cannot conceive that there is a single member on this floor who would hesitate for a moment to say that if they had one on under those circumstances and bal lote, and but 40 votes had been given for the Senfrom NewJersey and 41 hadbeen ven against him, he could not be elected. As Fsaid before, no one will assert that those 2 Houses in joint meeting could make a law or could repeal or modify a law, and yet there are those who or no here that because the joint convention did agree by a majority before they balloted that a pluralit might elect, therefore the Senator was electc, although he did not get a majority of the votes. But why so? The law was, before the rule was enacted, that a majority must be necessary to his election. After the rule was enacted it is contended the law became that a pluralit might elect. If that is the force of the rule, oes not the rule change and modif the law of NewJersey, the enactment of that Legislature? There are those who say that the act of the Legislature of NewJersey which directed that Senators should be appointed by the 2 Houses in joint convention, did, in terms, require that a majority of the votes of the 2 cases should be necessary to an election, but yet that when the 2 Houses met together and agreed that a lu rality might elect, then when an individua received that plurality it was in etIecta majority: that the 2 Houses had agreed that it should stand for a majority. Mr. President, we cannot regard it as a majority because here is the record storing us right in the face which shows that 81 votes were given upon that question and only 40 of them were given for the sitting member, and it is impossi lo for us to say by any rule of law or mathematics that 40 is a majority of 81.