Slavery was such a contentious issue in the 1830s that Congress simply didn’t talk about it. The “gag rule” passed in the House of Representatives in 1836. It automatically tabled (dismissed) all petitions regarding slavery.
Under the gag rule, anti-slavery petitions were not read on the floor of the House, referred to a committee, nor printed. No member needed to make a motion for the rule to take effect. The rule was renewed in each Congress between 1837 and 1839. In 1840 the House passed an even stricter rule, which refused to accept all anti-slavery petitions.
The House rescinded it in 1844 when Representative John Quincy Adams successfully argued that—whatever one’s view on slavery—stifling the First Amendment right to petition was unconstitutional.
