Dekanawidah be included) were assigned to the Caniengas, a like number
to the Oneidas, fourteen to the lordly Onondagas, ten to the Cayugas,
and eight to the Senecas. Except in the way of compliment, the number
assigned to each nation was really of little consequence; inasmuch as,
by the rule of the league, unanimity was exacted in all their
decisions. This unanimity, however, did not require the suffrage of
every member of the council. The representatives of each nation first
deliberated apart upon the question proposed. In this separate council
the majority decided; and the leading chief then expressed in the great
council the voice of his nation. Thus the veto of Atotarho ceased at
once to be peculiar to him, and became a right exercised by each of the
allied nations. This requirement of unanimity, embarrassing as it might
seem, did not prove to be so in practice. Whenever a question arose on
which opinions were divided, its decision was either postponed, or some
compromise was reached which left all parties contented.

The first members of the council were appointed by the convention--under
what precise rule is unknown; but their successors came in by a method
in which the hereditary and the elective systems were singularly
combined, and in which female suffrage had an important place. When a
chief died or (as sometimes happened) was deposed for incapacity or
misconduct, some member of the same family succeeded him. Rank followed
the female line; and this successor might be any descendant of the late
chief's mother or grandmother--his brother, his cousin or his
nephew--but never his son. Among many persons who might thus be
eligible, the selection was made in the first instance by a family
council. In this council the "chief matron" of the family, a noble dame
whose position and right were well defined, had the deciding voice. This
remarkable fact is affirmed by the Jesuit mission-ary Lafitau, and the
usage remains in full vigor among the Canadian Iroquois to this