INTERSTATE AND FOREIGN COMMERCE, COMMITTEE ON. (See Committees.) INVALID PENSIONS, COMMITTEE ON. (See Committees.) IRRIGATION OF ARID LANDS, COMMITTEE ON. (See Committees.) JEFFERSON'S MANUAL. The rules of parliamentary practice comprised in Jefferson's Manual shall govern the House in all cases to which they are applicable, and in which they are not inconsistent with the Standing Rules and Orders of the House and Joint Rules of the Senate and House of Representatives.-Rule XLIV. (Jefferson's Manual,—ante, pp. 101 to 192.) JOINT COMMISSIONS. (See Commissions.) JOINT COMMITTEES. There are four committees of the two Houses, established by law or rule, which are styled joint committees. They each consist of two practically separate and distinct committees which act independently of each other in respect to the legis lative business of their respective Houses. They have, however, joint supervision and control of certain public works and institutions, such as the Library of Congress, Public Printing, etc. The joint committees are: The Committee on Printing, established by law.-R. S., sec. 3656; The Committee on the Library.-Rule XI, clause 48; and The Committee on Enrolled Bills.-Rule XI, clause 50. The Committee on Disposition of Useless Papers in Executive Departments.-Stats. at L., vol. 25, p. 672. The Committee on Enrolled Bills was established as a joint committee by the joint rules formerly in force. The members of this joint committee on the part of each House, according to the practice, examine and correct enrolled bills originating, respectively, in their own House. All reports from this committee are made exclusively to the House of Representatives, where the enrolled bill is signed first by the Speaker and thence transmitted by the Clerk to the Senate for the signature of the Vice-President. The Committee on the Disposition of Useless Papers is provided for by the act of February 16, 1889 (Stat. at L., vol. 25, p. 672), and was first appointed in the Fifty-third Congress. (See Journal 1, 53, p. 76.) JOINT RESOLUTIONS. The resolving clause of a joint resolution is, "Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled" (R. S., sec. 8), and, in all respects, joint resolutions are governed by the same rules as bills, the word "bill,” where it occurs in the rules, being held to apply equally to a "joint resolution."-Congressional Globe, 3, 27, p. 384. Joint resolutions, like bills, are numbered serially in the order of their introduction, and are abbreviated thus: (H. Res.-), indicating House joint resolution, (S. R. -) Senate joint resolution. Joint resolutions can not be amended so as to convert them into bills or simple resolutions, nor can bills or simple resolutions be so amended as to convert them into joint resolutions. Joint resolutions of State or Territorial legislatures, being in fact mere memorials, may be presented (as petitions are delivered to the Clerk) by delivery thereof to the Speaker, with the subject-matter, reference, and member's name indorsed thereon. (See Rule XXII, clause 3.) By the Constitution of the United States and the rules of the two Houses, no absolute distinction is made between bills and joint resolutions, either in regard to the mode of proceeding with them before they become laws, or their force and effect afterwards. For more than fifty years, however, a very marked distinction seems to have been recognized in the legislation of Congress, and the form of joint resolution was resorted to chiefly, and almost entirely, for such purposes as the following, viz: "Proposing an amendment to the Constitution;" "to express the sense of Congress;" "to construe provisions in former laws;" "to admit new States;" "to direct or regulate the printing of documents;" and, until the second session of the Twentyseventh Congress, no instance is to be found of an appropriation elsewhere than in a bill. During the first fifty years of the Government the whole number of joint resolutions passed scarcely amounted to two hundred, while since that period the number has been quadrupled, and at the Forty-first Congress alone amounted to more than five hundred. The increase within the latter period in the number of joint resolutions containing appropriations has been in a still greater proportion. The early and long-continued practice of Congress indicates that the framers of the Constitution who sat in the First and succeeding Congresses, and those who followed them for many years, construed the constitutional provision that "no money shall be withdrawn from the Treasury but in consequence of appropriations made by law" as requiring the highest character of law-namely, bills, not joint resolutions. (See Resolutions.) JOINT RULES. JOURNAL. Each House shall keep a Journal of its proceedings, and from time to time publish the same, excepting such parts as may, in their judgment, require secrecy; and the yeas and nays of the members of either House on any question shall, at the desire of one-fifth of the members present, be entered on the Journal.— Const., 1, 5; 3, 5. The Constitution of the United States requires that "objections" returned to the House by the President with a bill shall be entered" at large on their Journal;" and in all cases the votes of both Houses on the passage of a bill so returned shall be determined by yeas and nays, and the names of the persons voting for and against the bill shall be entered on the Journal of each house, respectively.-Const., 1, 7, 2, 6. The official record of the proceedings of the House is its Journal.-Journal, 2, 48, p. 554. The House may judge of what are and what are not "proceedings."―Journal, 1, 29, p. 1047. It is not usual to note in the Journal a personal explanation by a member when no action or proceeding of the House or question of order is based thereon.-Journal, 2, 53, p. 435. It is not in order to place on the Journal indirectly what the House has refused to place there directly.-Journal, 3, 37, pp. 122, 123. All proceedings of the House subsequent to the erroneous announcement of a vote which would have been irregular if such vote had been correctly announced, are to be treated as a nullity, and are not to be entered on the Journal.-Journals, 1, 29, p. 1032; 1, 31, p. 1436. A demand to enter a protest upon the Journal does not present a question of privilege.-Journal, 2, 33, p. 451. A motion being made to amend the Journal while it is passing under judgment of the House for approval, should said motion to amend be laid on the table, the Journal does not accompany it.-Journal 1, 26, p. 28. When a member's vote is incorrectly recorded, it is his right on the next day, while the Journal is before the House for its approval, to have the Journal corrected accordingly.-Journal 2, 30, p. 211. But it is not in order to change a correct record of a vote given under a misapprehension.-Journal, 1, 31, p. 1266. The fact that a bill is read at length in the House pursuant to the rules does not authorize its publication in full either in the Journal or Congressional Record.-Journal, 2, 48, p. 354. Pending a call of the house and in the absence of a quorum it is not in order to entertain a motion to omit or expunge certain proceedings from the Journal.-Journal, 2, 52, p. 107. Where by an error of the Clerk in reporting the vote by yeas and nays the Speaker announces a result different from that shown by the roll, the status of the question must be determined from the vote as actually recorded.-Congressional Record, 1, 49, p. 7546. If, however, by reason of such error the Speaker announces that the House decides to adjourn, and the House does in fact accordingly disperse and adjourn, although the vote as actually recorded shows a refusal to adjourn, the session of the House when it next meets will be considered not a continuation of the preceding session but as of a new legislative day.-Congressional Record, 2, 49, p. 314. The Journal of the proceedings of the last day of a previous session, which has adjourned without day, is not read for approval by the House on the first day of a second or subsequent session. Journal, 2, 44, pp. 18-22. Neither is the Journal of the last day of the last session of a Congress approved, for the reason that legislative business usually continues up to the very moment of adjournment by limitation. A motion for a recess being in the nature of business, was held not in order until after the Journal is read; (Congressional Record, 2, 50, p, 677) but it has since been held that a motion for a recess might be entertained before the reading of the Journal.-Journal, 2, 52, p. 98. It is in order before, as well as after, the reading of the Journal to call up for consideration a report from the Committee on Rules touching the rules or order of business of the House.Journal, 1, 52, p. 91. When a bill, resolution, or memorial is introduced "by request" these words shall be entered upon the Journal.-Rule XXII, clause 4. The Speaker shall examine and approve the Journal before it is read.-Rule I, clause 1. And every day, after taking the chair, "on the appearance of a quorum, shall cause the Journal of the proceedings of the last day's sitting to be read."Rule I. When the point is made before the reading of the Journal that no quorum is present, the practice is for the Speaker to cause the roll to be called in order to ascertain the fact. The approval of the Journal is the transaction of business, a proceeding which affects the regularity and validity of the proceedings of the previous day. If the point is made before the Journal is read that no quorum is present it is the duty of the Chair to cause the roll to be called to ascertain the fact. The rule provides that the Speaker before causing the Journal to be read shall have previously examined and approved |