WASHINGTON — Senate Democrats threatened this week to refuse to seat any new senator chosen by Gov. Rod Blagojevich, but it is not clear the senators have the legal authority to reject a fully qualified appointee.
In 1969, the Supreme Court ruled the House of Representatives could not refuse to seat Rep. Adam Clayton Powell, a New York Democrat who was accused of putting his wife on the payroll and misusing travel funds. Despite those charges, he was re-elected by his constituents in Harlem.
“The Constitution does not vest in the Congress a discretionary power to deny membership by majority vote,” wrote Chief Justice Earl Warren. Congress may “judge only the qualifications set forth in the Constitution,” he said.
The qualifications are minimal. A senator must be at least 30 years old, a U.S. citizen and “an inhabitant” of the state.
