GAG RULE
A rule, regulation, or law that prohibits debate or discussion of a particular issue.
Between 1836 and 1844, the U.S. House of
Representatives adopted a series of resolutions
and rules that banned petitions calling for the
ABOLITION of SLAVERY. Known as gag rules,
these measures effectively tabled antislavery
petitions without submitting them to usual
House procedures. Public outcry over the gag
rules ultimately aided the antislavery cause, and
the fierce House debate concerning their future
anticipated later conflicts over slavery.
The submission of petitions to Congress has
been a feature of the U.S. political system ever
since its inception. The FIRST AMENDMENT to
the U.S. Constitution guarantees “the right of the
people . . . to petition the Government for a
redress of grievances.” First used in England,
petitions have been considered an important
means for the people to communicate grievances
to their representatives or other public officials.
When the first gag rule was instituted in
1836, House protocol required that the first
thirty days of each session of Congress be
devoted to the reading of petitions from con-
stituents. After those thirty days, petitions were
read in the House every other Monday. Each
petition was read aloud, printed, and assigned to
an appropriate committee, which could choose
to address or ignore it. This traditional proce-
dure had been interrupted in 1835, when the
House began to receive a large number of peti-
tions advocating the abolition of slavery. Many
of the petitions were organized by the American
Anti-Slavery Society, which had formed in 1833.
Southern representatives, many of whom
were slave owners and entertained no thoughts of
abolishing slavery, were outraged by the antislav-
ery petitions. In December 1835, southerners,
uniting with northern Democrats, won a vote to
table a petition that called for the abolition of
slavery in the District of Columbia. Breaking
established precedent, the pro-slavery faction also
won a vote to deny the petition its usual discus-
sion, printing, and referral to committee.
This procedure for the “gagging” of abolition
petitions was made into a formal resolution by
the House on May 26, 1836: “All petitions,
memorials, resolutions, propositions, or papers,
relating in any way, or to any extent whatsoever,
to the subject of slavery or the abolition of slav-
ery, shall, without being either printed or
referred, be laid on the table and . . . no further
action whatever shall be had thereon.” The reso-
lution incited strong opposition from many
northerners, who perceived it as a violation of
their time-honored CIVIL RIGHTS. JOHN
QUINCY ADAMS, a former president and now a
representative from Massachusetts, emerged as
the leader of an effort to revoke the new resolu-
tion. JOHN C. CALHOUN (D-S.C.), although a
member of the Senate rather than the House,
orchestrated the battle to preserve it.
The pro-slavery faction succeeded in renew-
ing the gag resolution, which expired at the end
of each session of Congress, in both sessions of
the Twenty-fifth Congress (1837–39). On Janu-
ary 28, 1840, it succeeded again when it won a
vote to turn the resolution into House Rule 21
(in later versions, Rules 23 and 25):
No petition, memorial, resolution, or other
paper praying the abolition of slavery in the
District of Columbia, or any State or Terri-
tory, or the slave trade between the States or
TERRITORIES OF THE UNITED STATES,in
which it now exists, shall be received by this
House, or entertained in any way whatever.
As a formal House rule rather than a resolu-
tion, the gag rule was now a permanent part
of House procedure and did not have to be
renewed by vote each session.
This new gag rule provoked even stronger
opposition.Whereas the previous gag resolution
tabled antislavery petitions after they were
received, the new gag rule did not allow peti-
tions to be received. It was also more extreme
than the Senate’s approach, which was to receive
such petitions but answer them in the negative.
As a result of these changes, northerners who
had previously supported the gag now joined
Adams in opposing it. Several years later, on
December 3, 1844, those opposed to the gag rule
finally succeeded in rescinding it.
The term gag rule has also been applied to
presidential regulations banning ABORTION
counseling by employees of family planning
clinics that received a particular type of federal
