1814. CORRESPONDENCE, Constituents and representatives.—
By the Constitution
of Virginia, established from its earliest
settlement, the people thereof have professed
the right of being governed by laws to which
they have consented by representatives chosen
by themselves immediately. In order to give
to the will of the people the influence it ought
to have, and the information which may enable
them to exercise it usefully, it was a part
of the common law, adopted as the law of
this land, that their representatives, in the
discharge of their functions, should be free
from the cognizance or coercion of the coordinate
branches, Judiciary and Executive;
and that their communications with their
constituents should of right, as of duty also,
be free, full, and unawed by any. So necessary
has this intercourse been deemed in the
country from which they derive principally
their descent and laws, that the correspondence
between the representative and constituent
is privileged there to pass free of expense
through the channel of the public post, and
that the proceedings of the legislature have
been known to be arrested and suspended at
times until the Representatives could go home
to their several counties and confer with their
constituents.—
Jury Petition. Washington ed. ix, 448.
Ford ed., vii, 158.
(1797)
