Recently Representative Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) was censured by the House entirely on party lines over his pushing of the Trump/Russia collusion narrative. Critics of the House majority either seem to think that the Trump/Russia collusion was true or that Schiff was being censured as petty retaliation for action against Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.) and Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.). I’ve got news for those folks for the latter. People have been censured for smaller things than this. One of them was Rep. William Bynum (D-Ind.).

The Reed Congress

The results of the 1888 election gave Republicans unified government for the first time since the Grant Administration, and Speaker Thomas Brackett Reed (R-Me.) aimed to make the most of it. He dramatically increased the power of the speaker and did so primarily by eliminating the disappearing quorum, in which members who were physically present would literally not answer their names as a way of denying the House the ability to conduct business. This would result in a ridiculous number of roll calls in which names were called out. Thus, with a small majority, Reed needed all the Republicans he could get, and this was proving a difficult task. Thus, one day he just counted people as present whether they answered their names or not. This resulted in a cacophony of protest from Democrats, Democrats trying to hide behind desks, and one kicking a door down to escape. Reed’s power consolidation led to his critics calling him “Czar Reed”. One representative was particularly heated in his condemnation of Reed’s rule. Minority Whip William D. Bynum (D-Ind.) angrily weighed in against “the arbitrary, the outrageous, the damnable rulings of the Chair” (Tuchman). However, although Bynum’s anger at the Speaker is cited as the cause of his censure, on further investigation I discovered this isn’t actually true. The issue actually related to a prominent Pittsburg resident.

Bynum spoke on the House floor against James Campbell, who had been accused of forgery, calling him a “liar and a perjurer” (The Sunday Herald). Republican Thomas Bayne read into the Congressional Record Campbell’s letter defending himself and called for Bynum’s remarks to be removed. Bynum, in response, called Bayne “the sewer through which this attack of Campbell made its way into the record” and upon objection changed it to “conduit pipe” and went on to say regarding Bayne that “I want to say now that I accept and am willing to believe that I have as great confidence in the character of Mr. Campbell as I have in the character of the gentleman who makes this attack upon me” (The Sunday Herald).

For this insult to another member, the Republican majority voted to censure Bynum for “unparliamentary language” on May 17, 1890, on a party line vote. The Democrats would win the House in 1890, but Bynum would lose reelection in the Republican sweep of 1894. Ironically, he would himself dissent from the Democratic Party come 1896 when they nominated William Jennings Bryan, instead running the party organization of the “National Democratic Party”, which supported the Gold Standard. President McKinley would in 1900 appoint him to the commission codifying U.S. criminal laws, where he would serve until 1906.

References

To Adopt the Last Part of the Resolution Regarding the Censure of William D. Bynum. (P. 4864). Govtrack.

Retrieved from

https://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes/51-1/h174

Tuchman, B. (1962). Czar Of the House. American Heritage, 14(1).

Retrieved from

https://www.americanheritage.com/czar-house

Uproar in the House. (1890, May 18). The Sunday Herald.

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