since its foundation.

The President of the Senate is commanded by the Constitution to open
the votes in the presence of the two houses. He does not summon
them to witness his act, but they summon him by appointing a day and
hour when he is to produce and open in their presence all the
certificates he may have received, and only then and in their
presence can he undertake to open them at all. If he was merely to
summon them as witnesses of his act it would have been so stated.
But when did the President of the Senate ever undertake to call the
two houses together to witness the opening and counting of the
votes? No, sir; he is called at their will and pleasure to bring
with him the certificates which he has received, and open them
before them and under their inspection, and not his own. When the
certificates have been opened, when the votes have been counted, can
the President of the Senate declare the result? No, sir, he has
never declared a result except as the mouthpiece and the organ of
the two houses authorizing and directing him what to declare, and
what he did declare was what they had ascertained and in which
ascertainment he had never interfered by word or act.

Suppose there shall be an interruption in the count, as has occurred
in our history, can the President of the Senate do it? Did he ever
do it? Is such an instance to be found? Every interruption in the
count comes from some Member of the House or of the Senate, and upon
that the pleasure of the two houses is considered, the question put
to them to withdraw if they desire, and the count is arrested until
they shall order it to recommence. The proceeding in the count, the
commencement of the count is not in any degree under his control.
It is and ever was in the two houses, and in them alone. They are
not powerless spectators; they do not sit "state statues only," but
they are met as a legislature in organized bodies to insure a
correct result of the popular election, to see to it that "the votes
shall then be counted" agreeably to the Constitution.

In 1792 when some of the men who sat in the convention that framed
the Constitution enacted into law the powers given in relation to
the count of the electoral votes, they said, as I have read, that
the certificates then received shall be opened and the votes
counted, "and the persons to fill the offices of President and
Vice-President ascertained agreeably to the Constitution," and that
directi