246 



CONGRESS. (SUSPENSIONS FKOM OFFICE.) 



for, as I say, these remarks that I am now 

 making are quite aside from any questions we 

 have at present before us the Attorney-Gen- 

 eral of the United States, in his response to 

 this resolution of the Senate, makes no hint 

 that any part of the papers there, whether 

 called for or not called for, were private and 

 unofficial and personal or even confidential. 

 Public papers, official papers, were called for. 

 Public papers, official papers, are spoken of 

 and only spoken of in his response. He says 

 that these papers called for by the Senate re- 

 late exclusively to the suspension of Duskin. 

 How relate ? Do they relate to the motives of 

 the President of the United States in suspend- 

 ing Duskin, do you suppose? Do you suppose 

 the President or any of his friends had filed in 

 the Department of Justice a statement of his 

 motives in proceeding in the case of Duskin to 

 perform a high, official, and important act? 

 By no means. That would be absurd and ri- 

 diculous. 



" These papers, therefore, on the statement 

 of the Attorney- General, that relate exclusive- 

 ly to the suspension of Duskin, must state 

 facts, or what are alleged to be facts, regard- 

 ing the conduct of that officer either in his ca- 

 reer in doing the business that the laws of the 

 United States impute to him, or in his career 

 as a citizen and man, rendering him fit to be 

 continued in his place or rendering him de- 

 serving of being put under civil arrest until 

 his case can be considered in the way that the 

 law has provided. That is what they must be, 

 as we all know. Now, then, if the Senate is 

 called upon, as it is, to assist in displacing this 

 man permanently from his office, the very 

 papers that exist there on the admission of the 

 Attorney-General are papers which relate to 

 the conduct and management of that office 

 while he had possession of it. And yet the 

 minority of the committee tell us that inas- 

 much as these papers, if they were produced, 

 would not only give us the facts upon which 

 we ought to act for the proposed removal of 

 this man, but would enable us to understand 

 the reason that the President had for exercis- 

 ing that high official act, therefore the Senate 

 of the United States being called upon to pro- 

 nounce judgment on the official conduct of 

 this man, and the President of the United 

 States having been previously called upon 

 within his jurisdiction to pronounce a judg- 

 ment upon a similar question about the same 

 man, the Senate can not have the papers, be- 

 cause if they aid in the exercise of their juris- 

 diction it would disclose the ground upon 

 which the President acted in the exercise of 

 his ! If that is not a proposition which would 

 stagger the credulity and amaze the under- 

 standing of any intelligent man in a govern- 

 ment of laws or in a government of reason, I 

 am quite unable to comprehend what would 

 be." 



Mr. Pugh, of Alabama, argued that the de- 

 mand for papers made upon the Attorney-Gen- 



eral was a demand for private papers. He said : 

 "Are the papers called for from the Attor- 

 ney-General such as the Senate has the right 

 to have in the discharge of any of its duties ? 

 The President states that the papers are pri- 

 vate, unofficial, and relate to nothing over 

 which the Senate has jurisdiction. The ma- 

 jority of the Judiciary Committee and its dis- 

 tinguished chairman the Senator from Ver- 

 mont say that this information, although un- 

 official and private, does enable the Senate to 

 discharge a duty that it has, a power that it 

 claims, of revising the official act of the Presi- 

 dent in suspending George M. Duskin as dis- 

 trict attorney. 



" That is the undisputed basis of the claim 

 to these private unofficial papers and docu- 

 ments. It is a claim of the power of the Sen- 

 ate to exercise the same control and revision 

 over the act of suspension or removal which is 

 claimed and exercised and given to the Senate 

 expressly by the Constitution of advising and 

 consenting to appointments. There is no mis- 

 take about that being the claim asserted by 

 the majority of the Judiciary Committee, and 

 there is no mistake that the resolution report- 

 ed condemns the official act of the Attorney- 

 General for the reason that he has withheld, 

 on the order of the President, information 

 that he states was composed of private docu- 

 ments and papers that he said were unofficial 

 and private, and withheld from the Senate on 

 the President's positive order because they are 

 private, because they are unofficial, and relate 

 to no duty that the Constitution or law im- 

 poses upon the Senate to discharge. 



"Is there anything in the history of the 

 Government to support this claim ? The dis- 

 tinguished Senator from Vermont has present- 

 ed a large array of what he calls precedents. 

 I undertake to say, and I challenge denial 

 upon the fullest test, that there is no case in 

 the history of the Government for eighty years 

 where any such documents as those called for 

 in the resolution were ever transmitted to the 

 Senate in executive or public session on the 

 order of the Senate upon an Attorney-General 

 or President." 



Mr. Morgan, of Alabama, said : " Let us give 

 to the Senate and the President the sort of 

 safeguard and restraint also that the courts 

 employ in the protection of grand juries and 

 traverse juries ; and let us protect the Presi- 

 dent, his advisers and informants, against 

 the forced revelation of the facts upon which 

 he removes a man from office, as we protect 

 witnesses and grand jurors from the dan- 

 gers to them and to the public welfare which 

 would arise from the disclosure of their 

 votes in charging powerful men or powerful 

 bands of conspirators with great crimes. The 

 wise decree of public policy is that no man 

 has the right to require of a public officer in- 

 formation of a fact the publication of which 

 will injure the State, unless the fact is essen- 

 tial to the performance of some duty to the 



