Joint Session for Electoral College Certification: Why No Allowance for Objections?
This issue was first brought up to me by Mountain Publius Goat on my recent interview with Mark McGrew with further reporting from RovingPatrolBlog:
US Code Title 3,15
Counting electoral votes in congress
§ 15. Congress shall be in session on the sixth day of January succeeding every meeting of the electors. The Senate and House of Representatives shall meet in the Hall of the House of Representatives at the hour of 1 o’clock in the afternoon on that day, and the President of the Senate shall be their presiding officer. Two tellers shall be previously appointed on the part of the Senate and two on the part of the House of Representatives, to whom shall be handed, as they are opened by the President of the Senate, all the certificates and papers purporting to be certificates of the electoral votes, which certificates and papers shall be opened, presented, and acted upon in the alphabetical order of the States, beginning with the letter A; and said tellers, having then read the same in the presence and hearing of the two Houses, shall make a list of the votes as they shall appear from the said certificates; and the votes having been ascertained and counted according to the rules in this subchapter provided, the result of the same shall be delivered to the President of the Senate, who shall thereupon announce the state of the vote, which announcement shall be deemed a sufficient declaration of the persons, if any, elected President and Vice President of the United States, and, together with a list of the votes, be entered on the Journals of the two Houses. Upon such reading of any such certificate or paper, the President of the Senate shall call for objections, if any. Every objection shall be made in writing, and shall state clearly and concisely, and without argument, the ground thereof, and shall be signed by at least one Senator and one Member of the House of Representatives before the same shall be received. When all objections so made to any vote or paper from a State shall have been received and read, the Senate shall thereupon withdraw, and such objections shall be submitted to the Senate for its decision.
No call for objections were asked. Should this mean the voting in of Obama is illegal? The skipping over the asking if any objections has never happen before.
They know. They all know and they are trying their damnedest not to let it out. [emphasis from posting]
I similarly believe the questions at the end of the quotation are legitimate. I had originally counter-pointed Goat on whether or not any objections were taken prior to the Joint Session. However, perhaps the question should be raised at the Judiciary at this point, for it would appear that the Vice President broke the law (unless someone can show where it was legal to have made this change).
A couple of counter-points follow…
-Phil
“Richard Lawrence” made the following comment:
I would ask both Dr. Hegen <?sp? and Dr. Edwin Vieira …
BTW – Dr. Vieira wll be on PlainsRadio this Friday nite
Didn’t Mr. Cheney open the joint session of Congress by saying, “since there are no (or were no) written objections, we shall …”
As to whether it is appropriate for that particular joint Congressional meeting to ‘open’ like that or whether or not Robert’s Rules of Order were to be or should have been followed, I do not know.
And commenter “Arlen” (of InvestigatingObama fame) had this to say:
Frankly, I haven’t taken the time to look further into it, but one reader posted this comment over at Investigating Obama:
The best chance at invalidating Obama’s Election Day victory was last week, as the Electoral Vote was being counted during a joint session of Congress. Quoting from an entry on the yourfellowcitizen blog,
“Under federal law an objection to a state’s electoral votes may be made to the President of the Senate during Congress’s counting of electoral votes in January. The objection must be made in writing and signed by at least one Senator and one member of the House of Representatives. Both the Senate and the House of Representatives debate the objection separately. Debate is limited to two hours. After the debate, both the Senate and the House of Representatives rejoin and both must agree to reject the votes.”
We are beginning to get a better answer to all the above. Per “Justin Riggs,” prolific blogger at yourfellowcitizen.com, via another comment:
In both 2000 and 2004, objections were raised; not after, but during, the counting of the votes. In 2000, the Congressman had no Senator, and the objection was dismissed. In 2004, a Congressman and a Senator signed an objection, the joint session was dissolved, it was debated for two hours, and the Congress came to a conclusion. I’ve got transcripts of the three years available, if anyone wants them.
If discussed somewhere else please advise me.
It has been bothering me as to; where was, what did, why not during the count of the E.C. votes; Dr. Ron Paul.
Justin,
Fox News reported that this was the first time that there were no objections. Something is very fishy here. Please contact Dr. Edwin Vieira to help on this matter. Plains Radio can put you in touch with him.
I spoke with Dr. Edwin Vieira the other day and he too raised the issue of Cheney’s matter of proceeding, saying that Cheney should have verbally called for objections AFTER THE ANNOUCEMENT OF THE TALLY OF EACH STATE, and not to do so was most likely to conceal from public view that objections should be considered as a matter of form, even if there were, as it seems now, no objections to be made.
And yes the law requires that the objection be made in writing, hence if it is to be presented at time of the tally, common sense says that it would have to be written already and thus available before the Joint Session begins.
In reply to Justin Riggs comment – I read on one of the blogs that it is not that unusual to have an objection in Congress to the electoral college vote. I am sorry, but I cannot remember which blog now. Given the partisan nature of congress, this seems to me very likely to be true. I read there was an objection to the 2000 electoral vote count because of the controversey surrounding this election – Bush v. Gore. I would not be surprised if there was an objection filed in 2004 for the Bush/ Kerry election.
Again, with my love of documents, it would seem that if there were objections, they would be recorded somewhere, and if they’re recorded, perhaps the public would have access to them. I would also think that if there were no objections, that fact would be recorded for posterity as well.
The comment that bothers me is the one that says, “this has never happened before.” Is that true? Can someone substantiate it?
For me, to understand if the law was not followed requires understanding what “if any” means.
Does it mean that Senate Pres can know in advance that there are objections, and thus, the “call for objections” is optional?
I also wonder if the use of “if any” in the prior sentence conveys a different meaning for “if any” in the “call for objections” sentence.
The 1st “if any” conveyed a situation where there are not sufficient votes to select a P/VP. Is that also the condition for use of the 2nd “if any”? ie. a case where there were not sufficient electoral college votes to pick a P/VP?
My armchair conclusion is that he did not follow the law and he probably knew what he was doing.
Bush grants federal aid for Obama inauguration
President declares state of emergency so president-elect may use funds
Posted: January 13, 2009
6:28 pm Eastern
By Chelsea Schilling
© 2009 WorldNetDaily
President Bush declared a state of emergency in the District of Columbia today and ordered the use of federal funds for Barack Obama’s inauguration.
“An emergency exists in the District of Columbia,” White House press secretary Dana Perino said in a statement.
In the next week, as many as 2 million people are expected to travel to the area from all over the world to see Obama become the 44th president of the United States.
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=86091
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TAxpayers money for Hussein’s inaguguration and 2 million plus people to attend.
Does anyone seriously think that the MSM, politicians and judicial system are going to stop comarade Hussein Obama from taking power and beginning his Marxist dictatorship.?
http://legaltimes.typepad.com/blt/2009/01/just-in-obama-and-biden-will-visit-supreme-court-wednesday.html
This was a done deal before 1pm. I saw the opening of Congress on Tuesday. It took FOREVER! By 1:30 on the 8th everyone knew who POTUS was. Congress CANNOT move that fast.