    [Constitution, Jefferson's Manual, and the Rules of the House of Representatives, 109th Congress]
    [109th Congress]
    [House Document 108-241]
    [The United States Constitution]
    [Pages 83-87]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

                                   ARTICLE VI.

    Sec. 194. Validity of debts and engagements.

      \1\ All  Debts
    contracted and Engagements entered into, before the Adoption of this
    Constitution, shall be as valid against the United States under this
    Constitution, as under the Confederation.

    Sec. 195. Constitution, laws, and treaties the
    supreme law of the land.

      \2\ This  Constitution, and the Laws of the United
    States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made,
    or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall
    be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be
    bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the
    Contrary notwithstanding.

    [[Page 84]]

    shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution; but
    no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any
    Office or public Trust under the United States.

    Sec. 196. Oaths of public officers; and prohibition of
    religious tests.

      \3\ The  Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and
    the Members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and
    judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States,

    Sec. 197. Form of oath.

      The  form of the oath is prescribed
    by statute (5 U.S.C. 3331; I, 128): ``I, AB, do solemnly swear (or
    affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United
    States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true
    faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely,
    without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion, and that I will
    well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am
    about to enter. So help me God.''

    Sec. 198. Administration of oath at organization.

      The  Act of
    June 1, 1789 (2 U.S.C. 25), provides that on the organization of the
    House and previous to entering on any other business the oath shall be
    administered by any Member (generally the Member with longest continuous
    service) (I, 131; VI, 6) to the Speaker and by the Speaker to the other
    Members and Clerk (I, 130). The Act has at times been considered in the
    House as directory merely (I, 118, 242, 243, 245; VI, 6); but at other
    times has been observed carefully (I, 118, 140). The Act was cited by
    the Clerk in recognizing for nominations for Speaker as being of higher
    constitutional privilege than a resolution to postpone the election of a
    Speaker and instead provide for the election of a Speaker pro tempore
    pending the disposition of certain ethics charges against the nominee of
    the majority party (Jan. 7, 1997, p. 115).

      Previously it was the custom to administer the oath by State
    delegations, but beginning with the 71st Congress Members-elect have
    been sworn in en masse (VI, 8). The Clerk supplies printed copies of the
    oath to Members and Delegates who have taken the oath in accordance with
    law, which shall be subscribed by the Members and Delegates and
    delivered to the Clerk to be recorded in the Journal and Congressional
    Record as conclusive proof of the fact that the signer duly took the
    oath in accordance with law (2 U.S.C. 25). See Deschler, ch. 2. The
    Speaker has requested that guests in the gallery rise with the Members
    during the administration of the oath of office to a Member-elect (Nov.
    12, 1991, p. 31255).

    [[Page 85]]

    (I, 396; VI, 11). There has been discussion as to the competency of a
    Speaker pro tempore to administer the oath (I, 170), and in the absence
    of the Speaker a Member-elect waited until the Speaker should be present
    (I, 179), but in 1920 a Speaker pro tempore whose designation by the
    Speaker had been approved by the House, administered the oath to a
    Member (VI, 20). The House may authorize the Speaker to administer the
    oath to a Member away from the House (I, 169), or may, in such a case,
    authorize another than the Speaker to administer the oath (I, 170; VI,
    14). For forms used in this procedure see (VI, 14).

    Sec. 199. Functions of the Speaker in administering the
    oath.

      The  Speaker possesses no arbitrary power in the administration of
    the oath (I, 134), and when objection is made the question must be
    decided by the House and not by the Chair (I, 519, 520). An objection
    prevents the Speaker from administering the oath of his own authority,
    even though the credentials be regular in form (I, 135-138). The Speaker
    has frequently declined to administer the oath in cases wherein the
    House has, by its action, indicated that he should not do so (I, 139,
    140). And in case of doubt he has waited the instruction of the House

    Sec. 200. Administration of the oath as related
    to the quorum.

      Members-elect  have been sworn at the beginning of a second session
    before the ascertainment of a quorum (I, 176-178), but when the Clerk
    called the second session of the 87th Congress to order, Members-elect
    were not sworn before ascertainment of a quorum and election of Speaker
    McCormack to succeed Speaker Rayburn, who had died during the sine die
    adjournment (Jan. 10, 1962, p. 5). Members-elect have also been sworn
    where a roll call or other ascertainment has shown the absence of a
    quorum (I, 178, 181, 182; VI, 21) but in one instance, however, the
    Speaker declined to administer the oath under such circumstances (II,
    875).

    Sec. 201. Privilege of administration of the
    oath.

      A  proposition to administer the oath to a Member is a matter of
    high privilege (VI, 14). It has been administered during a call of the
    roll and during an electronic vote on a motion to agree to rules at the
    time of organization (I, 173; VI, 22; Jan. 5, 2005, p. ----) and during
    an electronic vote taken during House deliberations interlocutory to an
    ongoing joint session to count the electoral votes (Jan. 6, 2005, p. --
    --). It also has been administered before the reading of the Journal (I,
    172), in the absence of a quorum (VI, 22), on Calendar Wednesday (VI,
    22), before a pending motion to amend the Journal (I, 171), and after
    the previous question has been ordered on a bill reported back to the
    House from the Committee of the Whole (Oct. 3, 1969, p. 28487). A
    division being demanded on a resolution for seating several claimants,
    the oath may be administered to each as soon as his case is decided (I,
    623). Where a Member-elect whose right to a seat has been determined by
    the House presents himself to take the oath, his right to be sworn is
    complete and cannot be deferred even by a motion to adjourn (I, 622),
    but the Speaker has entertained the motion to adjourn after adoption of
    a seating resolution but before the Member-elect was present in the
    Chamber to take the oath (May 1, 1985, p. 10019).

    [[Page 86]]

    where an objection was sustained neither by affidavit nor on the
    responsibility of the Member objecting, the House declined to entertain
    it (I, 455).

    Sec. 202. Challenge of the right to take the oath.

      The  right
    of a Member-elect to take the oath is sometimes challenged and the
    Speaker requests the Member-elect to stand aside temporarily (VI, 9-11,
    174; VIII, 3386). This usually occurs at the time of organization of the
    House. The challenge proceeds from some Member, but the fact that he has
    not yet taken the oath himself does not debar him from making the
    challenge (I, 141). The Member challenging does so on his responsibility
    as a Member or on the strength of documents (I, 448) or on both (I, 443,
    474). And

    Sec. 203. Consideration of an objection to the taking of
    the oath.

      It  has been held, although not uniformly, that in cases where
    the right of a Member-elect to take the oath is challenged, the Speaker
    may direct the Member to stand aside temporarily (I, 143-146, 474; VI,
    9, 174; VIII, 3386). The Member so challenged is not thereby deprived of
    any right (I, 155). Similarly, the seating of a Member-elect does not
    prejudice a pending contest, brought under the Federal Contested
    Elections Act (2 U.S.C. 381-396), over final right to the seat (Jan. 7,
    1997, p. 120). When several are challenged and stand aside the question
    is first taken on the Member-elect first required to stand aside (I,
    147, 148). In 1861 it was held that the House might direct contested
    names to be passed over until the other Members-elect had been sworn in
    (I, 154). Motions and debate are in order on the questions involved in a
    challenge, and in a few cases other business has intervened by unanimous
    consent (I, 149, 150). By unanimous consent the consideration of a
    challenge is sometimes deferred until after the completion of the
    organization (I, 474), and by unanimous consent also the House has
    sometimes proceeded to legislative business pending consideration of the
    right of a Member to be sworn (I, 151-152).

    [[Page 87]]

    Sec. 204. Relation of credentials to the right to
    take the oath.

      Although  the House has emphasized the impropriety of swearing-in
    a Member without credentials (I, 162-168), yet it has been done in cases
    wherein the credentials are delayed or lost and there is no doubt of the
    election (I, 85, 176-178; VI, 12, 13), or where the governor of a State
    has declined to give credentials to a person whose election was
    undoubted and uncontested (I, 553). A certificate of election in due
    form having been filed, the Clerk placed the name of the Member-elect on
    the roll, although he was subsequently advised that a State Supreme
    Court had issued a writ restraining the Secretary of State from issuing
    such certificate (Jan. 3, 1949, p. 8). Where the prima facie right is
    contested the Speaker declines to administer the oath (I, 550), but the
    House admits on his prima facie showing and without regard to final
    right a Member-elect from a recognized constituency whose credentials
    are in due form and whose qualifications are unquestioned (I, 528-534).
    If the status of the constituency is in doubt, the House usually defers
    the oath (I, 361, 386, 448, 461). In the 99th Congress, the House
    declined to give prima facie effect to a certificate of election, the
    results of the election being in doubt, and referred the issue of
    initial as well as final right to the Committee on House Administration
    (H. Res. 1, Jan. 3, 1985, pp. 380-87). After a recount of the votes was
    conducted by that committee, the House on its recommendation declared
    the candidate without the certificate entitled to the seat (H. Res. 146,
    May 1, 1985, p. 9998). The House also may defer the oath when a question
    of qualifications arises (I, 474), but it may investigate qualifications
    after the oath is taken (I, 156-159, 420, 462, 481), and after
    investigation unseat the Member by majority vote (I, 428).

    Sec. 205. Sanity, loyalty, and incapacity as related
    to the oath.

      Questions  of sanity (I, 441) and loyalty (I, 448) seem to pertain
    to competency to take the oath as distinct from a question of
    qualifications, although there has been not a little debate on this
    subject (I, 479). In one case a Member-elect who had not taken the oath
    was excluded from the House because of disloyalty, where the resolution
    of exclusion and the committee report thereon concluded that he was
    ineligible to take a seat as a Representative under the express
    provisions of section 3 of the 14th amendment (VI, 56-59). This action
    by the House was cited in the Supreme Court decision of Powell v.
    McCormack (395 U.S. 486, 545 fn. 83) which denied the power of the House
    to exclude Members-elect by a majority vote for other than failure to
    meet the express qualifications stated in the Constitution. In Bond v.
    Floyd, 385 U.S. 116 (1966), the Supreme Court held that the exclusion by
    a State legislature of a member-elect of that body was unconstitutional,
    where the legislature had asserted the power to judge the sincerity with
    which the Member-elect could take the oath to support the Constitution
    of the United States. In the 97th Congress, the House declared vacant by
    majority vote the seat of a Member-elect unable to take the oath because
    of illness, where the medical prognosis showed no likelihood of
    improvement to permit the Member-elect to take the oath or assume the
    duties of a Representative (H. Res. 80, Feb. 24, 1981, pp. 2916-18).

    Sec. 206. Decisions of the Court.

      Decisions  of the Supreme
    Court of the United States: McCulloch v. Maryland, 17 U.S. (4 Wheat.)
    316 (1819); Ex parte Garland, 71 U.S. (4 Wall.) 333 (1867); Davis v.
    Beason, 133 U.S. 333 (1890); Mormon Church  v. United States, 136 U.S. 1
    (1890).