GAFFNEY, S. C., city and county-seat of Cherokee County, 110 miles northwest of Co lumbus, on the Southern Railway. Its indus tries comprise cotton and cotton-seed-oil mills, fertilizer works, lime, fibre works, tin and monazite mines, etc. It has extensive cotton growing interests; has a woman's college, a Carnegie library, several schools and churches, and owns and operates the electric-lighting plant and the water supply system. Pop. 4,800.
a series of rules adopted 1836-44 by the House of Representatives, to prevent the reception of anti-slavery petitions and check the possibility of debate on the sub ject. No other measure created more virulent debate. The Constitution forbids Congress to pass any law °abridging the right of the people to petition the government for a redress of grievances?' and impliedly to refuse to receive petitions, as an unheard petition is a nullity. From 1831 on, the abolition societies rained pe titions on Congress, urging the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia, over which it had complete legislative power. They were referred to the Committee on the District, which at first reported adversely, then ceased to report at all, despite complaints. The 24th Congress, 1835-36, laid them on the table instead; but in both Houses there soon arose an outcry to bar them from congressional cognizance alto gether. In the Senate, Calhoun on 7 Jan. 1836 moved not to receive two such petitions, on the ground that the South must in the end be worn out and degraded by having constantly to justify its institutions before a body which had no jurisdiction over them anywhere; but after two months' debate, it was voted to receive them and they were immediately rejected, which re mained the rule thereafter. In the House, on 8 February, Henry L. Pinckney of South Carolina moved that all the petitions be referred to a select committee, tinder instructions to report that Congress could not constitutionally inter fere with slavery in the States, and ought not to do so in the District; on 18 May the com mittee so reported, with another resolution that all petitions relating to slavery be laid on the table without action or reference. Under the previous question both resolutions were passed 25-26 May; the last 117 to 68, John Quincy Adams refusing to vote and denouncing them as a violation of the Constitution, the rules of the House and the rights of his constituents.
Thereafter Mr. Adams, as the champion of the right of petition, became involved for years in an endless struggle against the °gag? On 18 Jan. 1837 this struggle was renewed. The furi
ous scenes in which Mr. Adams was pitted against nearly all the rest of the House are among the most picturesque in American his tory. • On 21 Dec. 1837, John M. Patton of Vir ginia moved and secured the passage (122 to 74) of a resolution to lay on the table without debate, reference or action, all papers concern ing slavery in any State, °District or Territory)) of the United States. Adams again denounced it and refused to vote. On 11 Dec. 1838 the Atherton Gag° was moved by Charles J. Ather ton of New Hampshire, and passed 126 to 73; it was the same in essence as the others. On 21 Jan. 1840 the House adopted as its 21st Rule that no paper praying the abolition of slav ery or the slave trade should in future be re ceived by the House or entertained in any manner. But this only passed by 114 to 108: the refusal of the right of petition was incensing the North, and forcing even Democratic repre sentatives to protest. Thereafter at every ses sion, in adopting the rules, Mr. Adams moved to strike out the 21st. The violence of the assaults on him increased, but the majorities against him decreased. At the special session of 1841 his motion was carried on a motion to adopt the rules only for 10 days, but recon sidered and defeated. Finally, on 3 Dec. 1844 a motion to lay his motion on the table was lost by 104 to 81, and the 21st Rule was abolished by 108 to 80. Nothing of the kind was again attempted. Since 12 Dec. 1853 petitions are no longer presented in the House, but handed to the clerk. Consult Adams,
GAGARIN, Alexander Ivano vich, Russian soldier: d. 1857. He distinguished himself in the campaigns in the Caucasus es pecially in the Dargo expedition, and in 1847 became military governor of Kutais; in 1853 he took command of the troops on the Turkish frontier, becoming afterward commander of the 18th Infantry division. He was seriously wounded at Kars and in 1857 returned to his duties at Kutais as governor-general. He was charged with the subjugation of Suanethea and ordered to bring the prince of that province to Tiflis. The latter, Constantin Dadeschlcalian, surprised Gagarin in his castle and inflicted on him wounds from which he died a few days afterward.