590 CONGRESSIONAL PROCEEDINGS. 



require mention. But if the Secretary has not himself, under his own mere motion, 

 a right to remove, it would be impossible to imagine reasons why the power of orig- 

 inal appointment was not given to the Board. 



In other words, the reasons which excluded the Board from appointing are iden- 

 tically the reasons which preserve to the Secretary the power of removing. It may, 

 perhaps, render it more perspicuous to add that these reasons are the official respon- 

 sibilities and practical personal intercourse of the Secretary with his assistants. 



Besides, it is very evident that the interests of the Institution might 

 often be in peril if the power of removal were denied to the Secretary. 



The Board of Regents are not in session during a great part of the 

 year. Many of them reside at great distances from Washington; and 

 could not be assembled without much inconvenience to themselves and 

 heavy expense to the Institution. During this period it might be of 

 the utmost importance to remove an unfaithful assistant. He might 

 cease to do that for which alone he was appointed, to assist the Secre- 

 retary in the affairs of the Institution. He might refuse to deliver 

 up to the Secretary the property of the Institution which the law puts 

 in his charge. He might threaten and intend to destroy it, might 

 treat the Secretary with personal indignity, and insult and defame the 

 Regents, and spread insubordination throughout the Institution. For 

 such conduct there would be no prompt and adequate remedy unless 

 the Secretary possessed the power of removal. One case of this kind 

 has already occurred. A person in the employment of the Institution 

 has refused to deliver up certain papers, the property of the Institu- 

 tion, and threatened to destroy them. He has also written a letter, 

 which was published over his own signature in a New York paper, 

 vilifying the Secretary and several of the Regents, by name, in the 

 most abusive language. For this and other causes during the last 

 recess of Congress he was removed by the Secretary, and, as the com- 

 mittee can not doubt, most justly removed. This very individual was 

 the principal witness against the Secretary on the examination before 

 your committee. 



We think that the resolution of the Regents, above quoted, while 

 maintaining the superior authority of the Board, properly asserted 

 the power of the Secretary. 



Your committee regret very much to say that the Secretary was 

 also justified in the removal of Mr. Jewett. His removal was not 

 arbitrary, unjust, and oppressive. Mr. Jewett is a man of talent and 

 scholastic attainments, but it is evident, from his own testimony, that 

 he considered himself as holding an antagonistic position to the Secre- 

 tary, as "having charge of the library, and being considered by the 

 public as the representative of that interest in 'the Institution." He 

 construed the law in oneway; the Secretary construed it differently. 

 He thought and said that it would be treachery in him to cooperate 

 with the Secretary, according to the latter's construction of the law. 

 He told the Secretary, in effect, that if he attempted to annul the 



