[Constitution, Jefferson's Manual, and the Rules of the House of Representatives, 109th Congress]
[109th Congress]
[House Document 108-241]
[Jeffersons Manual of ParliamentaryPractice]
[Pages 194-198]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]


 

                     sec. xviii--orders of the house


[[Page 195]]



Sec. 380. Keeping of the doors of the House.

  Of  right, the 
door of the House ought not to be shut, but to be kept by porters, or 
Sergeants-at-Arms, assigned for that purpose. Mod ten. Parl., 23.





Sec. 381. Right of the Member to demand execution of the 
subsisting order.

  The  only case where a Member has a right to insist on 
anything, is where he calls for the execution of a subsisting order of 
the House. Here there having been already a resolution, any person has a 
right to insist that the Speaker, or any other whose duty it is, shall 
carry it into execution; and no debate or delay can be had on it.



<> Thus 
any Member has a right to have the House or gallery cleared of 
strangers, an order existing for that purpose; or to have the House told 
when there is not a quorum present. 2 Hats., 87, 129. How far an order 
of the House is binding, see Hakew., 392.

  As a request for unanimous consent to consider a bill is in effect a 
request to suspend the order of business temporarily, a Member has the 
right at any time to demand the ``regular order'' (IV, 3058). Where the 
regular order is demanded pending a request for unanimous consent, 
further reservation of the right to object thereto is precluded (Speaker 
Foley, Nov. 14, 1991, p. 32128). Occasionally a Member may incorrectly 
demand the ``regular order'' to assert that remarks are not confined to 
the question under debate. On such an occasion the Chair may treat the 
demand as a point of order requiring a ruling by the Chair (May 1, 1996, 
pp. 9888, 9889).


  Absent an existing order for that purpose, a Member may not demand 
that the galleries be cleared, as this power resides in the House (II, 
1353), which has by rule extended the power to the Speaker (clause 2 of 
rule I) and the Chairman of the Committee of the Whole (clause 1 of rule 
XVIII), but not to the individual Member.


[[Page 196]]

tant or interesting matter, they ought not to be proceeded on till an 
hour at which the House is usually full [which in Senate is at noon].



Sec. 383. Parliamentary law as to proceeding with orders 
of the day.

  But  where an order is made that any particular matter be taken 
up on a particular day, there a question is to be put, when it is called 
for, whether the House will now proceed to that matter? Where orders of 
the day are on impor



  The rule of the House providing for raising the question of 
consideration (clause 3 of rule XVI) has, in connection with the 
practice as to special orders of business, superseded this provision of 
the parliamentary law. The House always proceeds with business at its 
hour of meeting, unless prevented by a point that no quorum is present 
(IV, 2732).




Sec. 384. Orders of the day now obsolete.

  Orders  of the day 
may be discharged at any time, and a new one made for a different day, 3 
Grey, 48, 313.



  The House found the use of ``Orders of the day'' as a method of 
disposing business impracticable as long ago as 1818, and not long after 
abandoned their use (IV, 3057), although an interesting reference to 
them survives in clause 1 of rule XIV. The House proceeds under rule XIV 
unless that order is displaced by the use of special orders of business 
or the intervention of privileged business.




Sec. 385. Business at the end of a session.

  When  a session 
is drawing to a close and the important bills are all brought in, the 
House, in order to prevent interruption by further unimportant bills, 
sometimes comes to a resolution that no new bill be brought in, except 
it be sent from the other House. 3 Grey, 156.



  This provision is obsolete so far as the practice of the House is 
concerned, as business goes on uninterruptedly until the Congress 
expires (clause 6 of rule XI).




Sec. 386. Effect of end of the session on existing orders, 
especially as to imprisonment.

  All  orders of the House determine with the 
session; and one taken under such an order may, after the session is 
ended, be discharged on a habeas corpus. Raym., 120; Jacob's L. D. by 
Ruffhead; Parliament, 1 Lev., 165, Pitchara's case.



[[Page 197]]

like that providing for the hour of daily meeting of the House, expires 
with a session (I, 104-109). The House uses few standing orders. 
However, in the first session of the 104th Congress, the House continued 
a standing order regarding special-order and morning-hour speeches for 
the remainder of the entire Congress (May 12, 1995, p. 12765). In 1866 
the House discussed its power to imprison for a period longer than the 
duration of the existing session (II, 1629), and in 1870, for assaulting 
a Member returning to the House from absence on leave. Patrick Woods was 
committed for a term extending beyond the adjournment of the session, 
but not beyond the term of the existing House (II, 1628).

  The House, by clause 6 of rule XI and the practice thereunder, has 
modified the rule of Parliament as to business pending at the end of a 
session which is not at the same time the end of a Congress. A standing 
order,




Sec. 387. Jefferson's views as to the constitutional 
power to make rules.

  Where  the Constitution authorizes each House to 
determine the rules of its proceedings it must mean in those cases 
(legislative, executive, or judiciary) submitted to them by the 
Constitution, or in something relating to these, and necessary toward 
their execution. But orders and resolutions are sometimes entered in the 
journals having no relation to these, such as acceptances of invitations 
to attend orations, to take part in procession, etc. These must be 
understood to be merely conventional among those who are willing to 
participate in the ceremony, and are therefore, perhaps, improperly 
placed among the records of the House.



[[Page 198]]

amined and decisively determined in reference to the law of 1851, which 
directs the method of procedure for the House in its constitutional 
function of judging the elections of its Members; and it has been 
determined that this law is not of absolute binding force on the House, 
but rather a wholesome rule not to be departed from except for cause (I, 
597, 713, 726, 833; II, 1122). In modern practice, existing statutory 
procedures, including provisions of concurrent resolutions, are 
readopted as Rules of the House at the beginning of each Congress (see, 
e.g., H. Res. 6, Jan. 4, 1995, p. 462). This practice was codified in 
clause 1 of rule XXVIII when the House recodified its rules in the 106th 
Congress (H. Res. 5, Jan. 6, 1999, p. 75, see Sec. 1013, infra). Where 
the House amended a standing rule of general applicability during a 
session and the amended rule did not require prospective application, 
the rule was interpreted to apply retroactively (Sept. 28, 1993, p. 
22719).


Sec. 388. The House's construction of its power to adopt 
rules.

  The  House has frequently examined its constitutional power to make 
rules, and this power also has been discussed by the Supreme Court (V, 
6755). It has been settled that Congress may not by law interfere with 
the constitutional right of a future House to make its own rules (I, 82; 
V, 6765, 6766), or to determine for itself the order of proceedings in 
effecting its organization (I, 242-245; V, 6765, 6766). It also has been 
determined, after long discussion and trial by practice, that one House 
may not continue its rules in force to and over its successor (I, 187, 
210; V, 6002, 6743-6747; Jan. 22, 1971, p. 132). Congress may bind 
itself in matters of procedure (II, 1341; V, 6767, 6768), but its 
ability to so bind a succeeding Congress has been called into doubt (V, 
6766). In one case the Chair denied the authority of such a law that 
conflicted with a rule of the House (IV, 3579). The theories involved in 
this question have been most carefully ex





  As to the participation on occasions of ceremony, the House has 
entered its orders on its journal; but it rarely attends outside the 
Capitol building as a body, usually preferring that its Members go 
individually (V, 7061-7064) or that it be represented by a committee (V, 
7053-7056). It has discussed, but not settled, its power to compel a 
Member to accompany it without the Hall on an occasion of combined 
business and ceremony (II, 1139). But the House remains in session for 
the inauguration of the President on the portico of the Capitol (Jan. 
20, 1969, pp. 1288-92) and the mace is carried to the ceremony.