d. Case of an Elder who had ceased to act

Soon after the organization of the house a question arose involving the right of Dr. Freeman Edson, a ruling elder from the Presbytery of Rochester, to a seat in the Assembly. The case was brought up by an overture from the first Presbyterian Church in Wheatland, N. Y. This communication stated that that church had adopted the plan of annual election of elders; that Dr. Edson’s term of service having expired, he was not re-elected (being “unacceptable to the church;”) and that the Presbytery of Rochester though apprized of these facts, appointed him a commissioner to the General Assembly. The points disputed were: Is Dr. Edson a ruling member of the Church? and, if this be admitted, had he a right under these circumstances, to a seat in the house? The committee to which the case was referred, reported in the negative on both these points, asserting that the election of an elder for a limited time was invalid; and that Dr. Edson having ceased to act as an elder, because unacceptable to the Church, was not eligible as a commissioner. This report after debate was re-committed to the same committee, Drs. Ely and Junkin being added to their number. The second report of the committee admitted the validity of Dr. Edson’s election and ordination as an elder, but denied his right to a seat, because he was not an acting elder in the congregation to which he belonged. Dr. Ely, as the minority of the committee, presented a counter report.

The house seems very soon to have arrived at unanimity on the first point, viz.: that Dr. Edson having been elected and ordained as a ruling elder, he was to be recognized as such, and that neither the irregularity of his election, nor the fact of his having ceased to exercise his office in a particular church could invalidate his ordination. On the second point, viz.: the right of a man who is not an acting elder in some congregation to a seat in the Assembly, the debate was more protracted. It was argued in defence of this right, 1. That ceasing to act as an elder in any particular congregation could not deprive a man of the other functions of his office. What is an elder under our constitution, but a man entitled to rule, when requested, as a member of a session, or when appointed, as a member of presbytery, synod or General Assembly? His not having been invited to rule in a session cannot invalidate his right to rule, when properly called upon, in other judicatories. The right to rule is incident to his eldership and must continue as long as the office continues. 2. That this principle was sanctioned by precedent; elders who had ceased to act as such having often been admitted to a seat in the Assembly. 3. That it would have all the injustice of an ex post facto law now to deprive a presbytery of one of its representatives on this ground. 4. That this rule, if applicable to elders, must be applied also to ministers, and lead to the exclusion from the house of all ministers who were not pastors.

On the other side it was argued, 1. That elders are representatives of the people, and that sending up elders who are not rulers in some congregation, is divesting the lay delegation of its character as a representation of the people. 2. That the perpetuity of the office of an elder only means that a man once ordained as an elder may be recalled to the eldership in the same or another congregation without being reordained. 3. That the cases of ministers and elders are not parallel, inasmuch as the former, although they cannot become pastors without the consent of the people, may yet, according to our system, be ordained and made members of a presbytery, without any previous election to a particular charge. After several protracted sessions, the debate was finally terminated by Dr. Miller proposing the following substitute for the committee’s report, which substitute was adopted by a nearly unanimous vote:

The committee to whom was referred overture No. 1, a communication from the session of Wheatland congregation, in reference to the appointment of Freeman Edson as a commissioner to this Assembly, beg leave to present the following report, viz., Agreeably to the constitution of our Church the office of ruling elder is perpetual, (see Form of Gov. ch. 13. 6.) and cannot be laid aside by the will of the individual called to that office, nor can any congregation form rules which would make it lawful for any one to lay it aside. Your committee are of opinion that the mode of electing elders in the congregation of Wheatland for a term of years, was irregular, and ought in future to be abandoned; but cannot invalidate the ordination of persons thus elected and ordained to the office of ruling elder.

And whereas it appears that Mr. Freeman Edson was once elected to the office of ruling elder in the church of Wheatland, and was regularly set apart to that office; whereas there seems to be some material diversity of views between the Presbytery of Rochester and the Church session to which Mr. Edson once belonged, as to the manner in which, and the principle on which he ceased to be an acting elder in the said church, into which the Assembly have no opportunity at present of regularly examining, and whereas the presbytery, with a distinct knowledge, as is alleged, of all the circumstances attending the case, gave Mr. Edson a regular commission as a ruling elder to this General Assembly; therefore Resolved, That he retain his seat as a member of the Assembly.

e. Commissioners Excluded Pending Investigation

[Form of Government, chap. xii., sec. vii.—Digest of 1873, pp. 332, 525.]

Chap. 12, 7, of the Form of Government reads: “The General Assembly shall meet at least once a year. On the day appointed for the purpose, the moderator of the last Assembly, if present, shall open the meeting with a sermon, and preside until a new moderator be chosen. No commissioner shall have a right to deliberate or vote in the Assembly until his name shall have been enrolled by the clerk, and his commission examined and filed among the papers of the Assembly.” In order then to a proper organization, it is necessary that the moderator of the last Assembly, if present, should preside, until a new moderator is appointed; and secondly, that the commissions of the delegates should be examined and their names enrolled by the clerk. The constitution formerly directed that the commissions should “be publicly read;” but in 1827 the presbyteries sanctioned the striking out of those words, and the insertion of the word “examined” in their place. It was then adopted as a standing rule that the moderator should, immediately after the house was constituted with prayer, appoint a committee of commissions, to whom the commissions were to be delivered; and the Assembly was then to have a recess to allow the committee time to perform this duty and to make out the roll. See p. 40 of the Min. for 1826. In the year 1829, however, it was resolved that the permanent and stated clerks be a standing committee of commissions, to whom the commissions were to be delivered for examination before the opening of the Assembly. See Min. for 1829, p. 384. These clerks are therefore entrusted by the constitution, by the standing rules, and the uniform practice of the house, with the formation of the roll. They are to report the names of those whose commissions are unobjectionable, who “immediately take their seats as members;” and they must further report on those commissions which are “materially incorrect” or “otherwise objectionable.” See Min. for 1826, p. 39. The house is then to determine, whether the persons bearing such commissions are entitled to their seats or not. It was therefore in obedience to the constitution that Dr. Elliott, the moderator of the Assembly of 1837, took the chair, and presided until a new moderator was chosen. He decided with obvious propriety that the first business was the report of the standing committee of commissions on the roll. This decision was submitted to. The regular course of proceeding was continued by the call, on the part of the moderator, for any other commissions which might be in the house. These were to be handed to the committee, examined, and if found regular, the delegates presenting them were to be enrolled, and take their seats. When this was done, and not before, those commissions which were incorrect, or on any ground objectionable, were to be taken into consideration, and the house were to decide whether those who bore them were entitled to a seat or not. This is not only the uniform and constitutional mode of proceeding, but it is obviously proper and necessary. Until the roll is so far completed as to include the names of all the delegates present whose commissions are unquestioned, there is no house legally constituted; those who have a right to deliberate and vote are not legally ascertained. Until this process therefore was gone through with, the claims of those whose commissions had been rejected by the clerks could not be legally considered or decided upon. It was right then, when the moderator called for commissions, for Dr. Mason to rise and present those which he actually offered; and it was right in Mr. Squire to present his own. It was however obviously correct, on the part of the moderator, to say to these gentlemen, that as the clerks have rejected these commissions, the question whether they are to be received or not cannot be submitted to the house, until the house be ascertained; until it is known who are entitled to deliberate and vote upon the question.

However improper the conduct of the clerks may have been, the house was not responsible for it until they sanctioned it. The Assembly had no official information of the ground of the rejection. They might have disapproved of it, and admitted the commissioners to their seats. The decision of the clerks is not the decision of the house; it merely suspends the right of the member until the house has decided on his claim.

It may be said that this view of the case gives the clerks a very dangerous power. It is a sufficient answer to this objection, that it is a power given by the constitution; and that it is one which they have always been permitted to exercise. Every year there are commissioners whose names the clerks refuse to enroll; and their decision is considered final until the house has considered and determined on the subject. Besides, this power is guarded from abuse, as far as the case admits of it. From the decision of the clerk, refusing to enroll a member, an appeal lies to the Assembly; and if the Assembly refuse to receive him, there is, in most cases, no redress. If the ground of this refusal be the irregularity of the commission, the presbytery suffers from the negligence of its officers. If the ground is the want of proper authority in the body giving the commission, there is a further appeal to the churches; or it may be, to the civil courts.

It is further objected that the right “of a commissioner to deliberate and vote was perfect the moment he presented his commision to the clerk for the purpose of having his name enrolled;” and the decision of the supreme court in the case of Marbury vs. Madison is appealed to in support of this position.

We deny, however, the position itself. It matters not how the general principle on which it is founded may be decided; our constitution declares that the presentation of the commission is not enough. Before a delegate can deliberate and vote, his name must be enrolled by the clerk; until this is done, the right, however perfect it may be, is not legally ascertained or established.

f. Reduction of Representation

[Form of Gov., chap. xii., sec. ii.—Comp. Digest of 1873, pp. 211, 212.]

The propriety of altering the ratio of representation, so as to reduce the number of delegates forming the General Assembly, has been agitated for some time, and during the last year it has been freely discussed in our periodicals. The subject was brought before the Assembly by memorials from the Presbyteries of Greenbrier and Western District, asking the Assembly to overture to the presbyteries the expediency of reducing the ratio of representation; and also from the Presbytery of Zanesville, proposing to adopt the plan of synodical instead of presbyterial delegations. The Committee of Bills and Overtures returned these memorials to the house, recommending the following resolution, which was adopted, viz:

“Resolved, That it is not expedient to refer to the presbyteries any measure, having for its object the alteration of the existing ratio of representation.”

From the small degree of interest excited by this subject in the Assembly, and from the strength of the vote on its rejection, we are led to infer that only a few individuals in our Church sympathize with the agitation kept up in the papers during the last year. There appear to be three principal reasons for desiring the proposed change.

1. It is urged that our General Assembly, as now constituted, is too large for the transaction of business in a way at once deliberate and expeditious. In an Assembly composed of so many individuals trained to public speaking, there will always be a large number anxious to deliver their views on every leading question. If all who wish to speak are fully heard, it consumes an inordinate amount of time; and if the liberty of speech, is restricted, it leads to confusion and dissatisfaction. And besides, the time of the house is often taken up by speeches on unimportant questions, while the real business is left to be hurried through, in the closing hours of the session, with a precipitancy which forbids deliberation, and endangers the wisdom of the decisions.

These are doubtless real evils; but it is urged in reply, that the proposed measure would have no tendency to obviate or abate them. All the experience of deliberative bodies goes to show that no reduction in the number of members would have the effect of diminishing the amount of speaking, unless it were carried to a point that would entirely defeat the whole principle of representation in the Assembly. Upon every question about which there is a diversity of views at all, there will be found in every such body, however small it might be made, persons representing every shade of opinion, and therefore anxious to express their opinions. Debates are terminated, not by the exhaustion of speakers, but the exhaustion of opinions and arguments on the one side, and the exhaustion of patience on the other. Now experience proves that this exhaustion takes place sooner in a very large body, than in a moderately small one. The speaking in the former case, being mostly confined to a few of the ablest members of the body, is soon done up, and the majority refuses to hear any more. Hence there is less speaking in the British House of Commons, made up of more than six hundred members, upon great public questions, than there would be in the House of Representatives of any State in this Union, composed of one-sixth of the number.

The evils arising from the undue consumption of time by speeches seem to be inherent and incurable; at least they are incurable by any reduction of representation compatible with the character of the Assembly.

2. A second and more plausible argument for the proposed measure, is drawn from the expense of assembling so large a body from every part of the United States.

And it happens, further, from the necessities of the case, that this tax falls heaviest upon the remote and less wealthy parts of the Church.

That this is felt to be a severe grievance is manifest, from the warmth of the debate which sprang up incidentally, about the distribution of the monies collected and reported for the Commissioner’s Fund. It appears that some of the richer presbyteries first pay the expenses of their delegates, and merely transfer any balance that may remain to the general fund. The effect of this, of course, is to diminish the dividend available for the other members. Cases of difficulty and hardship, and even injustice are liable to arise out of this arrangement. But the obvious answer to all this, as an argument for reducing the delegation is, that in the first place, these evils may easily be cured by more ample and equal provision on the part of the Church at large, to meet the expenses of those whom she delegates to transact her business; and in the second place, that they would not be met by a reduction of the delegation. The most natural result of this measure would be, a corresponding reduction in the amount of the contributions to the fund. If any one will cast his eye over the statistical table, he will see at once, that the contributions to this fund are graduated not at all by the means of the churches, but simply by their estimate of its necessities. The present inadequacy of this fund ought to be held up before the churches until it is seen and felt; and no one can doubt that there is abundant means to supply the deficiency. The way to remedy the evil, is not by discussions and resolutions in the Assembly, but by spreading information, and calling to it the attention of the churches.

If the question be whether the necessary expenses of the present delegation to the Assembly are wisely laid out, or in other words, whether it is worth to the Church what it costs, we take for granted, no one would hesitate to give an affirmative answer. For in the first place it is clear that the contributions for this purpose, do not, in the least, diminish those made for benevolent purposes, or other ecclesiastical objects. This has been settled long ago in the experience of the Church. And in the second place, the obvious advantages arising from the association of the members of the Assembly, and the impressions received from the various exercises and doings of the body, immeasurably outweigh the comparatively trifling expense of its annual assemblage.

3. The third argument for the reduction of the Assembly is that it vacates unnecessarily for several weeks, so many pulpits. To this it may be answered, 1. That most of the pulpits are not necessarily, or in fact, vacant at least for the whole time. In almost every place some supplies can be procured in the absence of the pastor, either by licentiates, or unemployed or transient ministers. 2. It is often a great relief to the minister to escape for a little while from the steady pressure of pastoral care and labor, to recruit his health, unbend his mind, and refresh his spirits by pleasant intercourse with his brethren. And, of course, the people also get the full benefit of this invigorating process, on the part of their pastor. 3. Even if there were no incidental considerations of this sort, the temporary vacancy of a few churches would be nothing, in comparison with the advantages arising from the greater wisdom and weight of the Assembly as now constituted. Any material reduction in its numbers, (and to be effective it must be material,) would not only endanger the principle of adequate representation, but essentially diminish that moral power, both conservative and efficient, which is now one of its principal functions.

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