Rutherford, Cabot, Ellsworth, Livermore, and Mitchell were appointed a committee to consider the petition.

These gentlemen, Gallatin wrote, were undoubtedly "the worst for him that could have been chosen, and did not seem to him to be favorably disposed." He himself considered the legal point involved as a nice and difficult one, and likely to be decided by a party vote.

The fourth article of the Constitution of the first Confederation of the United States reads as follows:-- "The better to secure and perpetuate mutual friendship and intercourse among the people of the different States in this Union, the free inhabitants of each of these States, paupers, vagabonds, and fugitives from justice excepted, shall be entitled to all privileges and immunities of free citizens in the several States." Article 1, section 3, of the new Constitution declares:-- "No person shall be a senator who shall not have attained to the age of thirty years, and been nine years a citizen of the United States, and who shall not, when elected, be an inhabitant of that State for which he shall be chosen." Mr.Gallatin landed in Massachusetts in July, 1780, while still a minor.
His residence, therefore, which had been uninterrupted, extended over thirteen years.

He took the oath of citizenship and allegiance to Virginia in October, 1785, since which, until his election in 1793, nine years, the period called for by the United States Constitution, had not elapsed.

On the one hand, his actual residence exceeded the required period of citizenship; on the other, his legal and technical residence as a citizen was insufficient.