appointed, at such place, in each State, as the legislature of such State shall direct.

Sec. 136. It shall be the duty of the executive of each State to cause three lists of the names of the electors of such State to be made and certified, and to be delivered to the electors on or before the day on which they are required, by the preceding section, to meet.

Sec. 137. The electors shall vote for President and Vice-President respectively, in the manner directed by the constitution.

Sec. 138. The electors shall make and sign three certificates of all the votes given by them, each of which certificates shall contain two distinct lists, one of the votes for President, and the other of the votes for Vice-President, and shall annex to each of the certificates one of the lists of the electors which shall have been furnished to them by direction of the executive of the State.

Sec. 139. The electors shall seal up the certificates so made by them, and certify upon each that the lists of all the votes of such State given for President, and of all the votes given for Vice-President, are contained therein.

Sec. 140. The electors shall dispose of the certificates thus made by them in the following manner:

One. They shall, by writing under their hands, or under the hands of a majority of them, appoint a person to take charge of and deliver to the President of the Senate, at the seat of Government, before the first Wednesday in January then next ensuing, one of the certificates.

Two. They shall forthwith forward by the post-office to the President of the Senate, at the seat of Government, one other of the certificates. Three. They shall forthwith cause the other of the certificates to be delivered to the judge of that district in which the electors shall assemble.

Sec. 141. Whenever a certificate of votes from any State has not been received at the seat of Government on the first Wednesday of January, indicated by the preceding section, the Secretary of State shall send a special messenger to the district judge in whose custody one certificate of the votes from that State has been lodged, and such judge shall forthwith transmit that list to the seat of Government.

Sec. 142. Congress shall be in session on the second Wednesday in February succeeding every meeting of the electors, and the certificates, or so many of them as have been received, shall then be opened, the votes counted, and the persons to fill the offices of President and VicePresident ascertained and declared, agreeably to the constitution.

Sec. 143. In case there shall be no President of the Senate at the seat of Government on the arrival of the persons intrusted with the certificates of the votes of the electors, then such persons shall deliver such certificates into the office of the Secretary of State, to be safely kept, and delivered over as soon as may be to the President of the Senate.

Sec. 144 Each of the persons appointed by the electors to deliver the certificates of votes to the President of the Senate shall be allowed,

on the delivery of the list entrusted to him, twenty five cents for every mile of the estimated distance, by the most usual road, from the place of meeting of the electors to the seat of government of the United States. Sec. 145. Every person who, having been appointed, pursuant to subdivision one of section one hundred and forty, or to section one hundred and forty-one, to deliver the certificates of the votes of the electors to the President of the Senate, and having accepted such appointment, shall neglect to perform the services required from him, shall forfeit the sum of one thousand dollars.

Sec. 146. In case of removal, death, resignation, or inability of both the President and Vice-President of the United States, the President of the Senate, or, if there is none, then the Speaker of the House of Representatives, for the time being, shall act as President until the disability is removed or a President elected.

Sec. 147. Whenever the offices of President and Vice-President both become vacant, the Secretary of State shall forthwith cause a notification thereof to be made to the executive of every State, and shall also cause the same to be published in at least one of the newspapers printed in each State.

Sec. 148. The notification shall specify that electors of a President and Vice-President of the United States shall be appointed or chosen in the several States as follows:

First. If there shall be the space of two months yet to ensue between the date of such notification and the first Wednesday in December then next ensuing, such notification shall specify that the electors shall be appointed or chosen within thirty-four days preceding such first Wednesday in December.

Second. If there shall not be the space of two months between the date of such notification and such first Wednesday in December, and if the term for which the President and Vice-President last in office were elected will not expire on the third day of March next ensuing, the notification shall specify that the electors shall be appointed or chosen within thirty-four days preceding the first Wednesday in December in the year next ensuing. But if there shall not be the space of two months between the date of such notification and the first Wednesday in December then next ensuing, and if the term for which the President and Vice-President last in office were elected will expire on the third day of March next ensuing, the notification shall not specify that electors are to be appointed or chosen.

Sec. 149. Electors appointed or chosen upon the notification prescribed by the preceding section, shall meet and give their votes upon the first Wednesday of December, specified in the notification.

Sec. 150. The provisions of this title, relating to the quadrennial election of President and Vice-President, shall apply with respect to any election to fill vacancies in the offices of President and Vice-President, held upon a notification given when both offices become vacant.

Sec. 151. The only evidence of a refusal to accept, or of a resignation

of the office of President or Vice President, shall be an instrument in writing, declaring the same, and subscribed by the person refusing to accept or resigning, as the case may be, and delivered into the office of the Secretary of State.

RESIDENCE.

House of Representatives, 42d Congress, 2d Ses

sion, Report No. 11.

JOHN CESSNA VS. BENJAMIN F. MEYERS.

FEBRUARY 7, 1872.-Laid on the table and ordered to be printed.

Mr. Hoar, from the committee on elections, made the following

REPORT:

THE COMMITTEE ON ELECTIONS, TO WHOM WAS REFERRED THE MEMORIAL OF JOHN CESSNA, CLAIMING TO BE ADMITTED TO THE SEAT FROM THE SIXTEENTH CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICT OF PENNSYLVANIA, RESPECTFULLY REPORT:

The case has required the consideration of many very interesting questions of law, and an examination, by itself, of the evidence in regard to the right to vote of each of several hundred persons. The committee have given it patient and thorough study.

The majority for the sitting member according to the returns, when correctly added, is fourteen. The contestant has shown that more than fourteen illegal votes were cast for his antagonist, and would have established his claim to the seat, were it not for illegal votes which were cast for the contestant himself, the evidence of which, so far as appears,

first came to his knowledge when introduced in the case. The questions of law which have arisen are, some of them, exceedingly doubtful, and there are statements of the law in the reports of previous cases which would be quite likely to induce an expectation on the part of the contestant of a different result in the whole matter. He seems, therefore, to have been well warranted in the belief that his duty to the people required him to claim the seat. The whole case has been conducted with entire propriety on both sides.

The majority for the sitting member, as found by the return judges, is fifteen. There is a mistake in the footing, and one should be deducted, leaving fourteen. The contestant claims that three hundred and twenty-eight illegal votes were cast for the sitting member; that two lawful votes which were cast for himself were not counted, and that eight legal votes which were offered for him were rejected. The sitting member, joining issue on these allegations, claims also that three hundred and forty-one votes were illegally thrown for contestant. Of these contestant admits that eighty-one have been proved to be illegal.

The provisions of the constitution of Pennsylvania, concerning the qualification of voters, are as follows:

"Article III, Section 1: In elections by the citizens every (white) freeman of the age of twenty-one years, having resided in this State one year, and in the election district where he offers to vote ten days immediately preceding such election, and within two years paid a State or county tax which shall have been assessed at least ten days before the election, shall enjoy the rights of an elector. But a citizen of the United States who had previously been a qualified voter of this State, and removed therefrom and returned, and who shall have resided in the election district and paid taxes as aforesaid, shall be entitled to vote af ter residing in the State six months: Provided, That (white) freemen citizens of the United States between the ages of twenty-one and twenty-two years, and having resided in the State one year and in the election district ten days as aforesaid, shall be entitled to vote, although they shall not have paid taxes."

The contestant claims, first, that he received a majority of the votes cast at the election by lawfully qualified voters; and, second, that the votes of certain other persons, lawfully qualified, who desired to vote for him, were exciuded, either from the box or the count, by the mistake or misconduct of the election officers. The result to which an examination of the first claim has brought us renders it needless to consider the second.

The questions which it is material to consider relate either to the qualification of voters under the clause in the constitution of Pennsyl vania just cited, or to the rules of evidence which should govern the House in election cases.

Under these constitutional provisions, the burden of proof, when either party insists that a vote should be deducted from those cast and returned for his competitor, is upon that party to show that the person

whose vote is in question voted; that the vote was for the competitor; that the voter lacked some one of the following qualifications, viz; citizenship of the United States; the age of twenty-one; residence in the election district for ten days just previous to the election; residence in the State one year just previous to the election, or for six months, if previously a qualified voter; payment, within two years, of a State or county tax, assessed at least ten days before the election, or, in lieu thereof, being between twenty-one and twenty-two years old.

It is claimed by the contestant that a considerable number of those who voted for his competitor lacked the qualification of residence in the election district. The largest number to whom this objection applies came into the election district for the purpose of working npon a railroad in process of construction therein, were employed in building said railroad, and were not proved to have formed any intention to reside in the district after its completion. The length of time which the completion of the road would be likely to occupy was not distinctly proved, but it was shown that persons who were in fact at work upon it continued in the district for a longer period than eighteen months. The committee have carefully considered the legal question which is thus raised.

The word "residence" used in the constitution of Pennsylvania in describing the qualification of voters is equivalent to "domicile," not in the sense in which a man may have a commercial domicile or residence in one country, while his domicile of origin and of allegiance is in another, but in the broadest sense of the term. As it is upon the meaning of this word that the case chiefly turns, it will be well to consider it a little more fully.

The word "domicile," or "residence," as used in law, is incapable of exact definition. Inquiries into it are very apt to be confused by taking the tests which have been found satisfactory in some cases and attempting to apply them as inflexible rules in all. Probably the definition which is most expressive to the American mind is that a man's domicile is "where he has his home." Two or three rules, however, are well established. A man must have a domicile somewhere; a domicile once gained remains until a new one is acquired; no man can have two dom. iciles at the same time. With these exceptions, it will, we believe, be found that nearly every rule laid down on the subject in the books, even if generally useful, fails to be of universal application, and would be opposed to the common sense of mankind if extended to some states of fact that may arise. For instance, Vattel defines domicile to be “a fixed residence in any place with an intention of always staying there." On this Judge Story (Conflict of Laws, Sec. 43,) well remarks: "This is not an accurate statement. It would be more correct to say that that place is properly the domicile of a person in which his habitation is fixed, without any present intention of removing therefrom." But certainly Judge Story's definition is not much better. A man's domicile remains after he forms the intention of removing therefrom, and sometimes even after he removes, until he gets another. A man may acquire a domicile,