532 CONGRESSIONAL PROCEEDINGS. 



this question if it were not that I think the Senate has a duty to dis- 

 charge to itself and to its dignity. I need not say that I entertain as 

 profound a respect and admiration for the distinguished gentleman 

 who sent this communication here as any other person in the House or 

 in the country. I take the occasion thus early to say that I have 

 formed no opinion upon the merits of the question which has been 

 raised by that communication, I deem it my duty, as far as possible, 

 to hold my mind free and open for the purpose of forming an opinion 

 hereafter. 



Sir, I can not consent for one member of this body to send this 

 communication to the Committee on the Judiciary or to a select com- 

 mittee, because, although I believe it to have been intended with the 

 best motives and to have been entirely unexceptionable in the view of 

 the writer, yet I think it is derogatory from the dignity of the Senate. 

 What is it, sir? It is a resignation of an officer. Every citizen of 

 the United States has a right to hold an office if he can get it, and 

 certainly every citizen of the United States holding an office has a 

 right to resign it, and it is not necessary for him, in order to be 

 relieved from the burden of the office, to assign any reason or excuse 

 whatever. Whatever may be said by way of apology, or excuse, or 

 reason, or jiistification does not alter the character of the act itself. 

 It is an absolute resignation. It is complete. It is final. The Senate 

 has nothing to do but to file it. It is done. The Senate can not com- 

 pel the individual to retain his office. They can not ask him to take 

 it back again, however high he may be. They can reappoint him, but 

 they must receive his resignation as a complete act. 



According to my hiunble judgment, what this retiring Regent 

 ought to have done was to send a letter to the President of the Senate, 

 saying, in so many words, " Sir, I resign the office of Regent of the 

 Smithsonian Institution." It is true that a Regent, like every other 

 public officer, has a right to inform the public and to inform Congress, 

 if he pleases to do so, of the grounds why he declines a further con- 

 tinuance in the discharge of a public trust, but that should be, not by 

 a letter explaining his reasons for his resignation ; but it should be done 

 through the public press or otherwise, so as not to make the table of 

 the Senate bear the burden of all personal, and political, and other 

 explanations of persons retiring from public office. 



It is manifest that the honorable and distinguished gentleman has 

 not considered the legal nature and the official character of the act he 

 was performing. I say, then, this resignation was complete and abso- 

 lute when the words "I resign this office" were written; but that is not 

 the whole of the communication. We are, besides, favored with an 

 explanation of the reasons why he resigns. This is either for the 

 information of the public (and if so, it ought not to have been made 

 to the Senate of the United States), or else it is for the purpose of 



