CARPENTER, MATTHEW H. 



CHEMISTRY. 



91 



motives or of the effects of their acts on civili- 

 zation. 



CARPENTER, MATTHEW H., born in More- 

 town, Vermont, in 1824; died in Washington, 

 February 24, 1881. In 1843 he entered the 

 Military Academy at West Point, where he re- 

 mained two years. He then went to Boston 

 and studied law with Rufus Choate, and was 

 admitted to the bar. In 1848 he removed to 

 Wisconsin, and entered the practice of his pro- 

 fession, in which he soon became eminent for 

 his legal ability and brilliant talent, which won 

 him high reputation in the Supreme Court of 

 the Unitad States even before his entrance into 

 public life. Not until after the war did Mr. 

 Carpenter take an active part in politics. Be- 

 fore and during the war he was a Democrat ; 

 but, when the leading men took sides on that 

 issue, he became a Union man. When, at the 

 close of the contest, he espoused Republican- 

 ism, his generally recognized ability command- 

 ed for him the active support of that party in 

 Wisconsin, and in 1869 he was elected to the 

 United States Senate in place of Senator Doo- 

 little. 



Mr. Carpenter served in the Senate from 

 May 4, 1869, until March 3, 1875, and occa- 

 sionally showed great power as a lawyer and 

 debater, but lacked those qualities necessary to 

 make a public man understand public senti- 

 ment. He belonged to that class of brilliant 

 politicians who so strongly influenced the pro- 

 ceedings of Congress from 1869 to 1875, and 

 of which General Butler was a representative 

 man. About this time Mr. Carpenter was the 

 victim of malicious slanders, but he was able to 

 prove to general satisfaction that they were 

 groundless. In 1874 Wisconsin Republicans, 

 like the party elsewhere, were suffering from 

 thj injudicious action of Congress upon the 

 salary bill and like matters, and the feeling 

 against the railroad corporations was also a 

 distrasting element. The party had, however, 

 a majority in the Legislature, but a considera- 

 ble portion of it was made up of Independents. 

 Mr. Carpenter received the caucus nomination 

 for Senator, but the independent minority 

 refusad to vote for him. After a protracted 

 struggle, the Democrats joined the independent 

 Republicans and elected Mr. Cameron. Mr. 

 Carpenter accepted his defeat, vouched for the 

 Republicanism of his successor, and retired to 

 his extensive law practice, taking little interest 

 in political affairs. During the contest over 

 the presidential succession of 1876-'77, Mr. 

 Carpenter appeared before the Electoral Com- 

 mission as one of the Tilden counsel, and made 

 an argument in his behalf. The Legislature of 

 Wisconsin, which met in January, 1879, was 

 called upon to choose a successor to Senator 

 Howe. The contest between Messrs. Howe, 

 Keyes, and others. was a bitter one, and finally 

 Mr. Carpenter was presented as a compromise 

 candidate. He had been approved on financial 

 questions, and his superior talents rose para- 

 mount over all the opposition formerly urged. 



His election gave general satisfaction to the 

 Republicans. He took his seat March 4, 1879. 

 Among several speeches which he addressed to 

 the Senate, all remarkable for their ability, that 

 against the Fitz John Porter bill is regarded as 

 his finest effort. His course in politics during 

 his last term in office was much more inde- 

 pendent than previously, and as a lawyer he 

 had few equals in Washington, where most of 

 his later years were spent. 



CENSUS OF THE UNITED STATES. 

 (See UNITED STATES CENSUS.) 



CHEMISTRY. The president of the Chem- 

 ical Section of the British Association, Professor 

 A.W.Williamson, made the growth of the atomic 

 theory during the last fifty years the subject of 

 his opening address at the last year's meeting, 

 maintaining that its general validity had been 

 confirmed by the tests of experimental applica- 

 tion to which it had been rigorously subjected. 

 The binary or dualistic theory of combination, 

 and the doctrine of multiple proportions which 

 were formerly connected with it, and which 

 seemed to be satisfactorily applicable to the 

 simpler compounds and the salts, broke down 

 when chemists came to deal with double com- 

 pounds which were not saline in character, and 

 with the carbon compounds; and it became 

 necessary to find other methods of accounting 

 for the phenomena of chemical combinations. 

 As the investigations were continued with ref- 

 erence to this object, the idea of substitution 

 came to be more and more used in the place of 

 that of mere additive combination. Element- 

 ary chemical reactions which, according to the 

 binary theory, were supposed to consist of 

 dualistic processes, involving sometimes the 

 assumption offerees (like predisposing affinity) 

 of a purely metaphysical character, were ex- 

 plained as consisting of atomic displacements, 

 or interchanges of a kind well known to be of 

 common occurrence. Many products of the 

 combination of known molecules have been 

 found to be formed by processes of double de- 

 composition, so that each molecule of such 

 products is built np partly of atoms derived 

 from one of the materials, partly of atoms 

 from the other. In the organic compounds, 

 many of the molecules having a very complex 

 structure have been found to undergo in their 

 reactions very simple changes, of the same 

 kind as those which mineral compounds under- 

 go. Families of organic compounds have been 

 discovered whose members are connected by 

 close analogy of constitution and properties, 

 each of them forming a series, each term of 

 which is a compound whose molecule contains 

 one atom of carbon and two atoms of hydrogen 

 more than the previous one. Our knowledge 

 of molecules has undergone a most remarkable 

 and important extension by the discovery that 

 various elements in what we are accustomed 

 to consider the free state, really consist of 

 molecules containing like atoms combined with 

 one another. Those marvelous varieties of 

 matter called isomeric compounds have found 



