194 



CONGKESS, UNITED STATES. 



that it is one part of the purpose of this bill to 

 undo something which the President has done. 

 Now, that is an incorrect idea to be entertained 

 respecting the propositions embraced in this 

 bill. It is precisely the idea that the opponents 

 "of the bill are most anxious to have the country 

 take up and adopt. 



" I hope that my friend from Massachusetts 

 will not insist upon loading an important bill 

 of this description, which is to settle a high 

 principle, with a mere matter of detail, which 

 needs investigation, which is certainly open to 

 the implication and the imputation that it is de- 

 signed to be made the cover for repairing some 

 wrong which the President of the United States 

 has done. It has no lit place as an amendment 

 to this bill. It might just as well be applied 

 to any other bill; and any other proposition 

 respecting the administration of affairs might 

 just as well be loaded on this bill. It is a sub- 

 ject separate and distinct, one that belongs to 

 itself, that ought to be considered by itself, be- 

 cause all that this bill undertakes to do is to 

 regulate the tenure of office, and not to name 

 the classes of persons who shall be treated as 

 principal officers in the Government, so to 

 speak, and be nominated and appointed by and 

 with the advice and consent of the Senate, as 

 distinguished from those inferior offices sug- 

 gested in the Constitution, the appointment of 

 which may be vested in the President, or the 

 heads of departments, or the courts of law." 



Mr. Sumner, of Massachusetts, said : " If I 

 understood the Senator aright, he said that this 

 amendment if ingrafted on his bill might en- 

 danger it. I think he is mistaken in that. I 

 think so far from endangering it, it would give 

 it strength. 



"It would give it both strength and merit. 

 Why would it give it both strength and merit? 

 Because it is a proposition which grows out of 

 the exigency of the hour. His bill on a larger 

 scale is just such a proposition ; it grows out of 

 the exigency of the hour ; and that is the 

 strength and the merit of his original bill. "We 

 shall pass that, if we do pass it and I hope we 

 shall in order to meet a crisis. We all feel 

 its necessity. But the proposition which I 

 now move grows equally out of the exigencies 

 of the hour. If it is ingrafted on the bill, it 

 will be, like the original measure, to meet the 

 demands of the moment. It will be because 

 without it we shall leave something undone 

 which we ought to do. 



" Now, I ask Senators about me, is there any 

 one who doubts that under the circumstances 

 such a provision as this ought to pass ? Is 

 there any one who doubts, after what we have 

 seen on a large scale, that the President, for the 

 time being at least, ought to be deprived of the 

 extraordinary function which he has exercised ? 

 He has announced openly in a speech that he 

 meant to 'kick out of office 'present incum- 

 bents, and it was in that proceeding, ' kicking 

 out of office,' that on his return to Washington 

 afterward he undertook to remove incumbents 



wherever he could. Now, sir, it seems to me 

 that we owe our protection to these incumbents 

 so far as possible. It belongs to the duty of 

 the hour. If the Senator from Vermont will 

 tell me any other way in which this proposi- 

 tion can be promoted successfully I shall gladly 

 follow him ; but until then I think that I ought 

 to insist that it shall share the fortunes of the 

 bill . which he is now conducting, ' enjoy its 

 triumph, and partake its gale.' If his bill suc- 

 ceeds, then let this measure, which is as good 

 as the bill, succeed also." 



Mr. Fessenden, of Maine, said : " When the 

 honorable Senator from Massachusetts first 

 suggested this proposition, I had very great 

 doubts about it. My doubts have continued, 

 and they are as strong now as they were in the 

 beginning. I cannot tell exactly how far the 

 proposition may extend ; but experience has 

 satisfied me that all legislation of this kind 

 which is directed to the overthrow of a prac- 

 tice upon which the Government has pro- 

 ceeded for years, in fact since its foundation, 

 under laws passed by Congress regulating the 

 different departments and the connections of 

 the different departments, and particularly 

 such legislation adopted on the spur of the 

 moment, without having an examination by a 

 committee to see what its operation will be, is 

 very dangerous in itself, and for that reason I 

 was opposed to acting upon the proposition 

 when he first submitted it until it should have 

 had a thorough examination. 



" There are thousands of officers in this 

 country who from the foundation of the Gov- 

 ernment and under the operation of existing 

 laws have been appointed by the heads of de- 

 partments without being confirmed by the Sen- 

 ate, and they have been increasing ; and it is 

 so from the necessity of the case, and no par- 

 ticular evil has been found to follow from it. 

 These persons are employe's, if you please to 

 call them so, in the different departments of the 

 Government that have been specified by my 

 honorable friend from New Hampshire. Take 

 the city of New York; there are connected 

 with the New York custom-house a very large 

 number of inspectors, a very large number of 

 weighers and gangers, and other officers, ap- 

 pointed by the Secretary of the Treasury gen- 

 erally on the nomination of the collector him- 

 self who is at the head of the office. The law 

 so provides, and has provided for it from the 

 beginning of our custom-house system. It re- 

 sults from the necessity of the case. The head 

 of the office is the best judge as to who are the 

 men who may properly be employed to dis- 

 charge these various duties, and consequently 

 the nomination has been left to him, and the 

 appointment is made by the head of the de- 

 partment here confirming that nomination, he 

 being responsible for the execution of the laws 

 in his department, for the collection of duties, 

 and for the proper conduct of the department 

 itself. 



" Sir, contemplate what a state of things 



