confirms
the impression that by a single, happy stroke the young Illinoisan had
achieved enviable distinction; but whether he had qualities which
would secure an enduring reputation, was still open to question.

In the long run, the confidence of party associates is the surest
passport to real influence in the House. It might easily happen,
indeed, that Douglas, with all his rough eloquence, would remain an
impotent legislator. The history of Congress is strewn with oratorical
derelicts, who have often edified their auditors, but quite as often
blocked the course of legislation. No one knew better than Douglas,
that only as he served his party, could he hope to see his wishes
crystallize into laws, and his ambitions assume the guise of reality.
His opportunity to render effective service came also in this first
session.

Four States had neglected to comply with the recent act of Congress
reapportioning representation, having elected their twenty-one members
by general ticket. The language of the statute was explicit: "In every
case where a State is entitled to more than one Representative, the
number to which each State shall be entitled under this apportionment
shall be elected by districts composed of contiguous territory equal in
number to the number of Representatives, to which said State may be
entitled, no one district electing more than one Representative."[170]
Now all but two of these twenty-one Representatives were Democrats.
Would a Democratic majority punish this flagrant transgression of
Federal law by unseating the offenders?

In self-respect the Democratic members of the House could not do less
than appoint a committee to investigate whether the representatives in
question had been elected "in conformity to the Constitution and the
law."[171] Thereupon it devolved upon the six Democratic members of
this committee of nine to construct a theory, by which they might seat
their party associates under cover of legality. Not that they held
_any_ such explicit mandate from the party, nor that they deliberately
went to work to pervert the law; they were simply under psychological
pressure from which only men of the severest impartiality could free
themselves. The work of drafting the majority report (it was a
foregone conclusion that the committee would divide), fell to Douglas.
It pronounced the law of 1842 "not a _law_ made in pursuance of the
Constitution of the United States, and valid, operative, and bin