majority of the votes of the whole House was found in favor of the Reverend James

Laurie.

Ordered, That the Clerk of this House do acquaint the Senate there with.

Mr. John Randolph, from the committee to whom was referred, on the sixth instant, the report of a Select Committee appointed on the thirteenth of March last, "to prepare and report articles of impeachment against Samuel Chase, one of the Associate Justices of the Supreme Court of the United States," made a report thereon; which was read, and ordered to be referred to a Committee of the Whole House on Monday

next.

On motion,

Resolved, That a committee be appointed to revise the rules and articles for the government of the Army of the United States; and that they report by bill, or otherwise. Ordered, That Mr. Varnum, Mr. Matthew Clay, Mr. Tallmage, Mr. Patterson, and Mr. Butler, be appointed a committee, pursuant to the said resolution.

A petition of James M'Pherson was presented to the House and read, praying that the title to a certain tract or parcel of land containing three miles square, which has been granted to the petitioner by the Ottawa tribe of Indians, may be confirmed to him in fee simple, for the reasons therein specified.

Also, a petition of Mary Gresham, widow of Joseph Gresham, formerly a soldier in the Virginia line of the Continental army, praying that she may receive such allowance of pay or other emoluments, as hath been heretofore granted to the widows of soldiers who died in the actual service of the United States, during the Revolutionary war with Great Britain.

Ordered, That the said petitions, together with the memorial of Return Jonathan Meigs, junior, which was read and ordered to lie on the table, on the twenty-third of March last, be referred to the Committee of Claims.

Ordered, That Mr. Van Rensselaer have leave to be absent from the service of this House, for fifteen days.

The several orders of the day were farther postponed until Monday next.
And then the House adjourned until Monday morning eleven o'clock.

MONDAY, DECEMBER 3, 1804.

Ordered, That the committee to whom were referred, on the twenty-ninth and thirtieth ultimo, a representation of sundry citizens of the State of Massachusetts, and a memorial of Perez Morton and Gideon Granger, in behalf of the holders of the title of the Georgia Mississippi Company to lands lying within the territory ceded by the State of Georgia to the United States, be discharged from the consideration thereof; and that the said representation and memorial be referred to the Committee of Clairns.

The Speaker laid before the House a letter addressed to him from Thomas M. Thompson, Secretary of the State of Pennsylvania, enclosing the original return of the election of John Hoge, to serve in this House as a Representative for the said State, in the place of William Hoge, who hath resigned his seat; which were ordered to be referred to the Committee of Elections.

A memorial,in the French language, with a translation thereof, from sundry planters, merchants, and other inhabitants of the Territory of Louisiana, whose names are there. unto subscribed, was presented to the House and read, praying, for the reasons therein specified, that so much of an act passed at the last session of Congress, providing for the temporary Government of Louisiana, as divides the same into two Territories, and prohibits the importation of slaves therein, may be repealed; also, that prompt and efficacious measures be taken to incorporate the inhabitants of the said Territory of Louisiana into the Union, and to admit them to all the rights, privileges, and inmunities, of the citizens of the United States.

Ordered, That the said memorial be referred to the committee, to whom was referred, on the twelfth ultimo, so much of the message from the President of the United States as relates to "an amelioration of the form of Government of the Territory of Louisiana;" that they do examine the matter thereof, and report the same, with their opinion thereupon, to the House.

An engrossed bill repealing so much of the act, entitled "An act for laying and collecting duties on imports and tonnage within the territory ceded to the United States by the treaty of the thirtieth of April, one thousand eight hundred and three, between the United States and the French Republic, and for other purposes," as prohibits drawbacks of duties upon goods in certain cases, was read the third time.

Resolved, That the said bill do pass, and that the title be, "An act concerning drawbacks on goods, wares, and merchandise, exported from the district of Orleans."

Ordered, That the Clerk of this House do carry the said bill to the Senate, and desire their concurrence.

A petition of Walter Channing, surviving partner of the house of Gibbs and Channing, of Newport, in the State of Rhode Island, merchant, was presented to the House and read, praying a remission of the duty on a certain quantity of saltpetre imported by the said house, in the ship Mount Hope, from the Isle of France, some time in the month of May, one thousand eight hundred and three, and that the amount of duties already paid by the petitioner on account of the said saltpetre, may be refunded to him.

Ordered, That the said petition be referred to the Committee of Commerce and Manufactures.

A representation and memorial of John B. Walbach, a Lieutenant in the Army of the United States, and Aid-de-Camp to Brigadier General James Wilkinson, was presented to the House and read, praying compensation for extra services rendered by him, in the capacity of Aid-de-Camp, aforesaid, in attending the said General Wilkinson, at several places therein named, whilst a Commissioner on behalf of the United States to negotiate treaties with certain Indian tribes; also, for the value of a riding horse, which was lost some time in the month of June, one thousand eight hundred and one, in consequence of the severity of the duty assigned to the memorialist.

Ordered, That the said representation and memorial be referred to the Secretary of War, with instruction to examine the same, and report his opinion thereon to the House. A message fron the Senate, by Mr. Otis, their Secretary :

Mr. Speaker: The Senate have passed the bill, entitled "An act making an appropriation to supply a deficiency in an appropriation for the support of Government, during the present year, and making a partial appropriation for the same object during the year one thousand eight hundred and five." And then he withdrew.

Ordered, That the committee appointed, the twelfth ultimo, on so much of the message from the President of the United States as relates "to the inconvenience arising from the distance to which, under existing laws, prizes captured from the corsairs of Barbary must be brought for adjudication," have leave to report thereon, by bill, or bills, or otherwise.

Mr. Rodney, from the committee last mentioned, presented, according to order, a bill establishing a Court for the adjudication of prizes in certain cases; which was received, and read the first time.

On motion,

The said bill was read the second time, and ordered to be committed to a Committee of the Whole House to-morrow.

The House, according to the order of the day, resolved itself into a Committee of the Whole House on the report of the committee of the thirtieth ultimo, to whom was referred the report of a select committee appointed on the thirteenth of March last, "to prepare and report articles of impeachment againt Samuel Chase, one of the Associate Justices of the Supreme Court of the United States ;" and, after some time spent therein, Mr. Speaker resumed the chair, and Mr. Varnum reported that the committee had, according to order, had the said report under consideration, and directed him to report their agreement to the articles of impeachment contained therein, with two amendments; which he delivered in at the Clerk's table.

The House proceeded to consider the said report: When,

An adjournment being called for,

The several orders of the day were farther postponed until to-morrow.
And the House adjourned until to-morrow morning eleven o'clock.

TUESDAY, DECEMBER 4, 1804.

Two other members, to wit: Abram Trigg, from Virginia, and Matthew Lyon, from Kentucky, appeared, and took their seats in the House.

Another new member, to wit: Alexander Wilson, returned to serve in this House as a Representative for the State of Virginia, in the place of Andrew Moore, appointed a Senator of the United States, appeared, produced his credentials, and took his seat in the House; the oath to support the Constitution of the United States being first administered to him by Mr. Speaker, according to law.

A petition of Sally Rust, of the town of Kent, in the State of Connecticut, the only child and legal representative of James Liblee, deceased, was presented to the House and read, praying that she may be allowed the bounty of land, and other emoluments,

due for the services of the deceased, as a soldier in General Poor's brigade of the Continental army, during the Revolutionary war with Great Britain.

Ordered, That the said petition, together with the memorial of Peter Landais, of the State of New York, presented the twenty-sixth of October, one thousand eight hundred and three, be referred to the Committee of Claims.

A memorial and petition of the Directors and Agents of the Ohio Company, whose names are thereunto subscribed, was presented to the House and read, praying that the memorialists may be permitted to take twenty lots of land, of one mile square each, from the lands reserved by the said Company in the State of Ohio, for the support of schools and religious purposes, to supply the like quantity of land thus appropriated; also, that the memorialists, in behalf of the Company, may be entitled to the privilege of purchasing the whole of the lots of land reserved within the purchase heretofore made by the said company in the State of Ohio, at some stipulated price, or be allowed the right of pre-emption on such terms as may be fixed for the sale of other unculti. vated lands within the said State.

Ordered, That the said memorial and petition be referred to Mr. Tallmage, Mr. Nicholson, Mr. Hasbrouck, Mr. Morrow, and Mr. Thompson; that they do examine the matter thereof, and report the same, with their opinion thereupon, to the House.

Mr. Crowninshield, from the Committee of Commerce and Manufactures, to whom were referred, on the twentieth and twenty-first ultimo, the petition of Thomas Parke, and others, Directors of the Library Company of Philadelphia, and the memorial and petition of the Board of Trustees of the College of New Jersey, signed by Joseph Bloomfield, their President, made a report thereon; which was read, and considered: Whereupon,

Resolved, That the petitioners and memorialists, respectively, have leave to withdraw their said petition and memorial.

Mr. Clark, from the committee appointed, on the twenty-third ultimo, "to inquire into the expediency of extending the time for claimants to lands under the State of Georgia, lying South of the State of Tennessee, to register the evidences of their title with the Secretary of State," made a report thereon; which was read, and ordered to be referred to a Committee of the Whole House on Thursday next.

Mr. Matthew Clay, from the committee to whom was recommitted, on the twentysecond ultimo, the bill giving power to the stockholders of the Marine Insurance Company of Alexandria to insure against fire, reported an amendatory bill; which was received, and read the first time.

On motion,

The said bill was read the second time, and ordered to be committed to a Committee of the Whole House to-morrow.

The House resumed the consideration of the report of the committee, made the thirtieth ultimo, to whom was referred the report of a select committee, appointed on the thirteenth of March last, "to prepare and report articles of impeachment against Samuel Chase, one of the Associate Justices of the Supreme Court of the United States;" and the amendments yesterday reported thereto from the Committee of the Whole House, being twice read, were, on the question severally put thereupon, disagreed to by the House.

The articles of impeachment contained in the said report, as originally proposed by the select committee, being read at the Clerk's table, in the words following, to wit: Articles exhibited by the House of Representatives of the United States, in the name of themselves and of all the People of the United States, against Samuel Chase, one of the Associate Justices of the Supreme Court of the United States, in maintenance and support of their impeachment against him, for high crimes and misdemeanors. ARTICLE I. That, unmindful of the solemn duties of his office, and contrary to the sacred obligation by which he stood bound to discharge them "faithfully and impartially, and without respect to persons," the said Samuel Chase, on the trial of John Fries, charged with treason before the Circuit Court of the United States, held for the district of Pennsylvania, in the city of Philadelphia, during the months of April and May, one thousand eight hundred, whereat the said Samuel Chase presided, did, in his judicial capacity, conduct himself. in a manner highly arbitrary, oppressive, and unjust, viz.

1. In delivering an opinion, in writing, on the question of law, on the construction of which the defence of the accused materially depended, tending to prejudice the minds of the jury against the case of the said John Fries, the prisoner, before counsel had been heard in his defence.

2. In restricting the counsel for the said Fries from recurring to such English authori

ties as they believed apposite, or from citing certain statutes of the United States, which they deemed illustrative of the positions upon which they intended to rest the defence of their client.

3. In debarring the prisoner from his constitutional privilege of addressing the jury (through his counsel) on the law, as well as on the fact, which was to determine his guilt or innocence, and at the same time endeavoring to wrest from the jury their indisputable right to hear argument and determine upon the question of law, as well as the question of fact, involved in the verdict which they were required to give :

In consequence of which irregular conduct of the said Samuel Chase, as dangerous to our liberties as it is novel to our laws and usages, the said John Fries was deprived of the right secured to him by the eighth article amendatory of the Constitution, and was condemned to death, without having been heard by counsel in his defence, to the disgrace of the character of the American bench, in manifest violation of law and justice, and in open contempt of the rights of juries, on which ultimately rest the liberty and safety of the, American People.

ARTICLE II. That, prompted by a similar spirit of persecution and injustice, at a Circuit Court of the United States, held at Richmond, in the month of May, one thousand eight hundred, for the district of Virginia, whereat the said Samuel Chase presided, and before which a certain James Thompson Callendar was arraigned for a libel on John Adams, then President of the United States, the said Samuel Chase, with intent to op press and procure the conviction of the said Callendar, did overrule the objection of John Basset, one of the jury, who wished to be excused from serving on the said trial, because he had made up his mind as to the publication from which the words, charged to be libellous in the indictment, were extracted; and the said Basset was accordingly sworn, and did serve on the said jury, by whose verdict the prisoner was subsequently convicted.

ARTICLE III. That, with intent to oppress and procure the conviction of the prisoner, the evidence of John Taylor, a material witness on behalf of the aforesaid Ċallendar, was not permitted by the said Samuel Chase to be given in, on pretence that the said witness could not prove the truth of the whole of one of the charges contained in the indictment, although the said charge embraced more than one fact.

ARTICLE IV. That the conduct of the said Samuel Chase was marked, during the whole course of the said trial, by manifest injustice, partiality and intemperance, viz. 1. In compelling the prisoner's counsel to reduce to writing, and submit to the inspection of the Court, for their admission or rejection, all questions which the said counsel meant to propound to the above named John Taylor, the witness.

2. In refusing to postpone the trial, although an affidavit was regularly filed, stating the absence of material witnesses on behalf of the accused; and although it was manifest that, with the utmost diligence, the attendance of such witnesses could not have been procured at that term.

3. In the use of unusual, rude, and contemptuous expressions towards the prisoner's counsel; and in falsely insinuating that they wished to excite the public fears and indignation, and to produce that insubordination to law, to which the conduct of the Judge did, at the same time, manifestly tend.

4. In repeated and vexatious interruptions of the said counsel, on the part of the said Judge, which at length induced them to abandon their cause and their client, who was thereupon convicted and condemned to fine and imprisonment.

5. In an indecent solicitude manifested by the said Samuel Chase for the conviction of the accused, unbecoming even a public prosecutor, but highly disgraceful to the character of a Judge as it was subversive of justice.

ARTICLE V. And whereas it is provided by the act of Congress, passed on the twenty-fourth day of September, one thousand seven hundred and eighty-nine, entitled "An act to establish the judicial courts of the United States," that for any crime or offence against the United States, the offender may be arrested, imprisoned, or bailed, agreeably to the usual mode of process in the State where such offender may be found: and whereas it is provided by the laws of Virginia, that, upon presentment by any Grand Jury of an offence not capital, the Court shall order the Clerk to issue a summons against the person or persons offending, to appear and answer s ich presentment at the next Court; yet the said Samuel Chase did, at the Court aforesaid, award a capias against the body of the said James Thompson Callendar, indicted for an offence not capital, whereupon the said Callendar was arrested and committed to close custody, contrary to law in that case made and provided.

ARTICLE VI. And whereas it is provided, by the thirty-fourth section of the aforesaid act, entitled “An act to establish the judicial courts of the United States," that the

laws of the several States, except where the Constitution, Treaties, or Statutes, of the United States shall otherwise require, or provide, shall be regarded as the rules of decision in trials at common law, in the courts of the United States, in cases where they apply; and whereas, by the laws of Virginia, it is provided, that, in cases not capital, the offender shall not be held to answer any presentment of a Grand Jury until the court next succeeding that during which such presentment shall have been made, yet the said Samuel Chase, with intent to oppress and procure the conviction of the said James Thompson Callendar, did, at the court aforesaid, rule and adjudge the said Callendar to trial, during the term at which he, the said Callendar, was presented and indicted, contrary to law in that case made and provided.

ARTICLE VII. That, at a Circuit Court of the United States, for the District of Delaware, held at New Castle, in the month of June, one thousand eight hundred, whereat the said Samuel Chase presided, the said Samuel Chase, disregarding the duties of his office, did descend from the dignity of a judge and stoop to the level of an informer, by refusing to discharge the Grand Jury, although entreated by several of the said jury so to do; and, after the said Grand Jury had regularly declared, through their foreman, that they had found no bills of indictment, nor had any presentments to make, by observing to the said Grand Jury, that he, the said Samuel Chase, understood, "that a highly seditious temper had manifested itself in the State of Delaware, among a certain class of People, particularly in New Castle county, and more especially in the town of Wilmington, where lived a most seditious printer, unrestrained by any principle of virtue, and regardless of social order; that the name of this printer was-" but, checking himself, as if sensible of the indecorum which he was committing, added-" that it might be assuming too much to mention the name of this person, but it becomes your duty, gentlemen, to inquire diligently into this matter," or words to that effect: and that, with intention to procure the prosecution of the printer in question, the said Samuel Chase did, moreover, unauthoritatively enjoin on the District Attorney of the United States the necessity of procuring a file of the papers to which he alluded, (and which were understood to be those published under the title of "Mirror of the Times and General Advertiser,") and, by a strict examination of them, to find some passage which might furnish the ground work of a prosecution against the printer of the said paper: thereby degrading his high judicial functions, and tending to impair the public confidence in, and respect for, the tribunals of justice, so essential to the general welfare. ARTICLE VIII. And whereas mutual respect and confidence between the Government of the United States and those of the individual States, and between the People and those Governments, respectively, are highly conducive to that public harmony without which there can be no public happiness, yet the said Samuel Chase, disregarding the duties and dignity of his judicial character, did, at the Circuit Court, for the District of Maryland, held at Baltimore, in the month of May, one thousand eight hundred and three, pervert his official right and duty to address the Grand Jury then and there assembled, on the matters coming within the province of the said jury, for the purpose of delivering to the said Grand Jury an intemperate and inflammatory political harangue, with intent to excite the fears and resentment of the said Grand Jury, and of the good People of Maryland against their State Government and Constitution, a conduct highly censurable in any, but peculiarly indecent and unbecoming in a Judge of the Supreme Court of the United States: and, moreover, that the said Samuel Chase, then and there, under pretence of exercising his judicial right to address the said Grand Jury, as aforesaid, did, in a manner highly unwarrantable, endeavor to excite the odium of the said Grand Jury, and of the good People of Maryland, against the Government of the United States, by delivering opinions, which, even if the judicial authority were competent to their expression, on a suitable occasion and in a proper manner, were, at that time, and as delivered by him, highly indecent, extra-judicial, and tending to prostitute the high judicial character with which he was invested, to the low purpose of an electioneering partizan.

And the House of Representatives, by protestation, saving to themselves the liberty of exhibiting, at any time hereafter, any further articles, or other accusation, or impeachment, against the said Samuel Chase, and also of replying to his answers which he shall make unto the said articles, or any of them, and of offering proof to all and every the aforesaid articles, and to all and every other articles, impeachment, or accusation, which shall be exhibited by them, as the case shall require, do demand that the said Samuel Chase may be put to answer the said crimes and misdemeanors, and that such proceedings, examinations, trials, and judgments, may be thereupon had and given, as are agreeable to law and justice.

VOL. V.-5