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CHAPTER XXII.

Remonstrates against a Decision of Congress........ Leaves Congress and prefers a Complaint to the General Court of Massachusetts........Resolve of the General Court........Remonstrance........ The Decision of Congress considered.........Pay of a Member of Congress..........State of the Currency..........Letter from John Adams........Mode of Living at Congress.........American Mail captured..........Mr. Lovell's Letter to Mr. Gerry published by the Enemy........Correspondence with General Washington.

CIRCUMSTANCES now occurred, which terminated for a time Mr. Gerry's services in the congress of the United States, and induced him to appear in person with an appeal from their proceedings, to his immediate constituents.

These circumstances, so singular in themselves, and so inconsistent with the present better established notions of parliamentary practice, we proceed to relate.

On February 19, 1780, congress had under consideration the report of a committee for estimating the supplies to be furnished by the several states for the current year, and the prices at which the several articles should be credited to the states which procured them.

This subject was fruitful in vexation as often as it occurred. Its adjustment determined the contingent required of a state. It was in the nature

of a levy or tax. It was to be assessed if justice was consulted on principles of equality, and that equality was to be deduced not merely from the wealth and population of the several states, but also by a reference to their former contributions, so that anterior inequalities of apportionment might be promptly adjusted. With no statistical tables every thing depended on the opinions of members, formed loosely indeed, with insufficient materials, but influenced, whether they believed it or not, by a common wish of each to shift the unwelcome burthen from himself to his neighbour.

Massachusetts had by some means become jealous of an attempt on the part of the other members of the confederacy to load her with an unreasonable weight, and had frequently complained of being treated like a willing horse whom its drivers were compelling to a fatal exertion. On this occasion the delegates from Massachusetts determined to oppose the assessment; and when the clause relative to the prices to be allowed was under consideration, Mr. Gerry moved a recommitment for the purpose of conforming the prices. to those agreed upon by a convention of states from New-Hampshire to Pennsylvania inclusive, held at New-Haven in January 1778.

This motion was objected to as being out of order; an appeal was made to the house who sustained the objection, and the ayes and noes being

required by Mr. Gerry, the house refused to record

them.

This refusal gave great offence to Mr. Gerry, not, as he said, as an individual or in his private capacity, but in his public character as a delegate from a sovereign state, and as affecting in his person the rights of that state.

Unable to obtain a record of votes on the question proposed by him, Mr. Gerry the next day addressed a note to the president, in which he very formally set forth his rights, and insisted "that the sense of the house be now taken by yeas and nays, whether the motion he made yesterday was in order."

Congress, on the receiving of this letter, "Voted, that any member thinking his privilege infringed by any thing said or done in the house, ought of right to be heard in his place."*

On the discussion of this resolve, it was moved to amend it by adding, "and not otherwise;" but the amendment on a division of the house was rejected.

This rejection left it obvious, that a hearing of the aggrieved member in his place was not the only mode permitted; and the resolve was, therefore, no answer to the demand made by Mr. Gerry in his letter of 21st February.

Having waited a month without hearing that

* Journals of Congress, February 22, 1780.

any attention was paid to his demand, he again addressed congress by letter, dated 30th April. In this letter he maintains, that his motion was strictly in order; that on the question, whether it was or was not in order, he had a right to the record of the ayes and noes; that to deprive a mem→→ ber of that privilege was a violation not of his own rights but those of the state he represented; and that it would be his duty to secede from congress, and to complain of this violation to his constituents, unless it was immediately redressed. And he protests against any delay, which by protracting the remedy until the plan, out of which the controversy grew, should be carried by its advocates. "That," said he, "would be a denial of justice by a delay of it, and would seem as if the majority of the house might at any time take off the opposition of a member, by depriving him of his privilege and obliging him to submit to a grievance, or to withdraw from the house during pleasure."

No further measures being taken by congress on this application, Mr. Gerry left Philadelphia and laid his complaint before the general assembly of Massachusetts.

The house, on a report of their committee, immediately voted not only to sustain Mr. Gerry's complaint, but to connect with it another of their own on the unequal assessment, the discussion of which had been the original cause of difficulty.

The council were slower in their movements, and probably thinking that the expression of opinion by the popular branch had answered all the purposes, which could be proposed by the measure, suffered the resolve of the house to lie upon their table.

This did not satisfy Mr. Gerry. In the November following, being re-elected a member of congress, he declined accepting the station, and gave as a reason for his refusal that the rights and prerogative of the state had been invaded in his person, and that no redress had been granted on his own application, and no demand for redress been made by his constituents. This intimation again brought the matter before the legislature, and procured the passing of the following resolve:

"Whereas it has been represented to this court in several letters from Elbridge Gerry, Esq. and the papers accompanying the same, that by a determination of the honourable congress he was denied a privilege, to which he was entitled as a member of that honourable body according to their own rules and orders. And whereas a complaint of so grievous a nature, when founded on such evidence of the facts as is contained in the letters and papers referred to, demands the serious attention of his constituents, and calls for enquiry to be made touching the subject matter of his complaint. Therefore

"Resolved, that this court approve of the high sense which Mr. Gerry entertained of his right of privilege as a member of congress, and that the delegates in congress from this commonwealth be, and they hereby are directed to make necessary enquiries relative to the breach of privilege complained of, and such representations to congress in reference thereto, as the importance of the subject requires."

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