ASSENT.
The house which has received a bill and passed it, may present it for
the King’s assent, and ought to do it, though they have not by message
notified to the other their passage of it. Yet the notifying by message
is a form which ought to be observed between the two houses, from
motives of respect and good understanding. 2 _Hats._, 142. Were the bill
to be withheld from being presented to the King, it would be an
infringement of the rules of Parliament. _Ib._
[When a bill has passed both houses of Congress, the house last acting
on it notifies its passage to the other, and delivers the bill to the
Joint Committee of Enrollment, who see that it is truly enrolled in
parchment.] When the bill is enrolled, it is not to be written in
paragraphs, but solidly, and all of a piece, that the blanks between the
paragraphs may not give room for forgery. _Grey_, 143. [It is then put
into the hands of the clerk of the House of Representatives to have it
signed by the Speaker. The clerk then brings it by way of message to the
Senate to be signed by their President. The Secretary of the Senate
returns it to the Committee of Enrollment, who present it to the
President of the United States. If he approve, he signs, and deposits it
among the rolls in the office of the Secretary of State, and notifies by
message the house in which it originated that he has approved and signed
it; of which that house informs the other by message. If the President
disapproves, he is to return it, with his objections, to that house in
which it shall have originated; who are to enter the objections at large
on their journal, and proceed to reconsider it. If, after such
reconsideration, two-thirds of that house shall agree to pass the bill,
it shall be sent, together with the President’s objections, to the other
house, by which it shall likewise be reconsidered; and if approved by
two-thirds of that house, it shall become a law. If any bill shall not
be returned by the President within ten days (Sundays excepted) after it
shall have been presented to him, the same shall be a law, in like
manner as if he had signed it, unless the Congress, by its adjournment,
prevent its return; in which case it shall not be a law. _Const. U. S._,
I, 7.]
[Every order, resolution, or vote, to which the concurrence of the
Senate and House of Representatives may be necessary, (except on a
question of adjournment), shall be presented to the President of the
United States, and before the same shall take effect, shall be approved
by him; or being disapproved by him, shall be repassed by two-thirds of
the Senate and House of Representatives, according to the rules and
limitations prescribed in the case of a bill. _Const. U. S._, I, 7.]