Thus, Mr. President, the unbroken line of precedent, the history of the usage of this government from 1789 at the first election of President and Vice-President until 1873, when the last count of electoral votes was made for the same offices, exhibits this fact, that the control of the count of the electoral votes, the ascertainment and declaration of the persons who were elected President and Vice-President, has been under the co-ordinate power of the two houses of Congress, and under no other power at any time or in any instance.  The claim is now gravely made for the first time, in 1877, that in the event of disagreement of the two houses the power to count the electoral votes and decide upon their validity under the Constitution and law is vested in a single individual, an appointee of one of the houses of Congress, the presiding officer of the Senate.  In the event of a disagreement between the two houses, we are now told, he is to assume the power, in his sole discretion, to count the vote, to ascertain and declare what persons have been elected; and this, too, in the face of an act of Congress, passed in 1792, unrepealed, always recognized, followed in every election from the time it was passed until the present day.  Section 5 of the act of 1792 declares:—­

That Congress shall be in session on the second Wednesday in February 1793, and on the second Wednesday in February succeeding every meeting of the electors; and the said certificates, or so many of them as shall have been received, shall then be opened, the votes counted, and the persons who shall fill the offices of President and Vice-President ascertained and declared agreeably to the Constitution.

Let it be noted that the words “President of the Senate” nowhere occur in the section.

But we are now told that though “Congress shall be in session,” that though these two great bodies duly organized, each with its presiding officer, accompanied by all its other officers, shall meet to perform the duty of ascertaining and declaring the true result of the action of the electoral colleges and what persons are entitled to these high executive offices, in case they shall not agree in their decisions there shall be interposed the power of the presiding officer of one of the houses to control the judgment of either and become the arbiter between them.  Why, Mr. President, how such a claim can be supposed to rest upon authority is more than I can imagine.  It is against all history.  It is against the meaning of laws.  It is not consistent with the language of the Constitution.  It is in the clearest violation of the whole scheme of this popular government of ours, that one man should assume a power in regard to which the convention hung for months undecided, and carefully and grudgingly bestowing that power even when they finally disposed of it.  Why, sir, a short review of history will clearly show how it was that the presiding officer of the Senate became even the custodian of the certificates of the electors.