‘Every gent. was acquainted with the usage of the house'
In its second day's work, the Continental Congress debated whether to adopt ‘rules of conduct to be observed in... determining questions' that came before the Congress. On 6 September 1774 James Duane (NY) moved that ‘a Committee should be appointed to consider Rules for the Conduct of the Congress and report them'.
John Rutledge the Elder (SC) opposed the motion: the ‘usage of the House of Commons woud be adopted in our Debates', he declared, ‘and that as every Gent. was acquainted with that usage, it woud be a Waste of Time to appoint a Committee on that Subject'.1John Adams noted the episode in his diary. ‘I then arose and asked Leave of the President to request of the Gentleman from New York, an ExplanaÂtion, and that he would point out some particular Regulations which he had in his Mind'. As to its ‘Method of voting', Duane asked, should Congress ballot ‘by Colonies, or by the Poll, or by Interests'?2 The same day (6 SepÂtember 1774) Congress adopted a short inventory of procedures; these duly appeared in its official journal of proceedings. The four rules provided:
1 Resolved, That in determining questions in the Congress, each Colony or Province shall have one Vote.
2 Resolved, That no person shall speak more than twice on the same point, without the leave of the Congress.
3 Resolved, That no question shall be determined the day on which it is agitated and debated, if any one of the Colonies desire the determinaÂtion to be postponed to another day.
4 Resolved, That the doors be kept shut during the time of business, and that the members consider themselves under the strongest obligations of honour, to keep the proceedings secret, until the majority shall direct them to be made public.3
Rules 2 through 4 supplied guidance suitable for any legislative or delibÂerative body in the eighteenth century. However, Rule 1 allocated to ‘each Colony or Province...
one Vote'. If ‘every Gent. was acquainted with [the] usage of the House of Commons', American delegates would have known that balloting in Westminster proceeded under the rule of member equalÂity. Members of the House of Commons enjoyed equal voice and vote with their colleagues. Tellers in Commons did not count Boroughs and CounÂties in divisions on questions. John Hatsell quoted the former Speaker of the House of Commons Arthur Onslow, his personal mentor, to this effect: ‘every Member is equally a Representative of the whole’. This was ‘the conÂstant notion and language of Parliament’.4After adopting the Declaration of Independence at the Pennsylvania State House, a date traditionally assigned to 4 July 1776, Congress appointed a committee to draft another set of procedural rules for its proceedings. Thomas Jefferson noted the following contributions he made following his appointment to the ‘Committee to Draw Up Rules of Procedure for ConÂgress’. These were sketchy stuff.
No person to walk while question putting.
Every person to sit while not speaking.
Orders of day at 12 o’clock.
Amendments first proposed to be first put.5
Congress adopted 12 procedures on 16 July 1776.6 Over the useful life of the Continental Congress (1774-89), that assembly adopted and discarded three sets of rules, each one incrementally more polished, elaborate and serÂviceable, before settling on a fourth and final set of procedural rules in 1781. These rules endured for the remaining life of the Continental Congress. The Journal of the Continental Congress records the final sitting of the body as taking place - in a tavern - on 2 March 1789.7