A caucus was immediately held by the opponents of Mr. Adams
among the representatives from the South and West, to take measures to
effect his expulsion. It was feared that the two thirds vote requisite
to expel a member could not be obtained. Three resolutions were
therefore prepared, the adoption of which it was deemed would in popular
effect be equivalent to an expulsion. Thomas F. Marshall, of Kentucky,
consented to present them the next day. The consideration of these
resolutions, which continued until the 5th of February, produced a
series of as violent and personal debates as perhaps the halls of
Congress ever witnessed. They were in these words:

"WHEREAS, The federal constitution is a permanent form of
government, and of perpetual obligation, until altered or modified
in the mode pointed out in that instrument; and the members of this
House, deriving their political character and powers from the same,
are sworn to support it; and the dissolution of the Union
necessarily implies the destruction of that instrument, the
overthrow of the American republic, and the extinction of our
national existence: a proposition, therefore, to the representatives
of the people, to dissolve the organic laws framed by their
constituents, and to support which they are commanded by those
constituents to be sworn before they can enter into the execution of
the political powers created by it and intrusted to them, is a high
breach of privilege, a contempt offered to this House, a direct
proposition to the legislature and each member of it to commit
perjury, and involving necessarily in its execution and its
consequences the destruction of our country, and the crime of high
treason.

"_Resolved, therefore_, That the Honorable John Quincy Adams,
member from Massachusetts, in presenting for the consideration of
the House of Representatives of the United States a petition praying
for the dissolution of the Union, has offered the deepest indignity
to the House of which he is a member, an insult to the people of the
United States, of which that House is the legislative organ; and
will, if this outrage be permitted to pass unrebuked and unpunished,
have disgraced his country, through their representatives, in the
eyes of the whole world.

"_Resolved, further_, That the aforesaid John Quincy Adams, for
this insult, the first of t