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Debate on the Civil Service Bill.

December 27, 1882.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. If there is no further routine morning business the Chair, in pursuance of the agreement made on Saturday last, lays before the Senate the unfinished business; which is the bill (S.133) to regulate and improve the civil service of the United States. The bill is before the Senate as in Committee of the Whole, and the pending question is on the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut [Mr. HAWLEY].

Mr. ALLISON. Let it be reported.

The ACTING SECRETARY. It is proposed to add the following as new sections to the bill:

SEC. 8. That no Senator or Representative or Territorial Delegate of the Congress, or Senator, Representative, or Delegate elect, or any officer or employé of either of said, Houses, and no executive, judicial, military, or naval officer of the United States, and no clerk or employé of any Department, branch, or bureau of the executive, judicial, or military or naval service of the United States, shall, directly or indirectly, solicit or receive, or be in any manner concerned in soliciting or receiving, any assessment, subscription, or contribution for any political purpose whatever, from any officer, clerk, or employé of the United States, or any Department, branch or bureau thereof, or from any person receiving any salary or compensation from moneys derived from the Treasury of the United States.

SEC. 9. That no person shall, in any room or building occupied in the discharge of official duties by any Officer or employé of the United States mentioned in this act, or in any navy-yard, fort, or arsenal, solicit, in any manner whatever, or receive any contribution of money or any other thing of value for any political purpose whatever.

SEC. 10. No officer or employé of the United States mentioned in this act shall discharge, or promote, or degrade, or in any manner change the official rank or compensation of any other officer or employé, or promise or threaten so to do, for giving or withholding or neglecting to make any contribution of money or other valuable thing for any political purpose.

SEC. 11. That any person who shall be guilty of violating any provision of the three foregoing sections shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, and shall, on conviction thereof, be punished by a fine not exceeding $5,000, or by imprisonment for a term not exceeding three years, or by such fine and imprisonment both, in the discretion of the court.

Mr. BECK. What amendment is that?

The PRESIDENT pro temper. It is the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut [Mr. HAWLEY], which was the pending question on the adjournment of the Senate on Saturday. The amendment to this amendment, offered by the Senator from Oregon [Mr. SLATER], as modified by the Senator from Missouri [Mr. VEST], was rejected, which left the pending question on this amendment.

Mr. BECK. I desire to say a word on that subject now.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. If the Senator will suspend for a moment, the Chair will state that it was the unanimous agreement on Saturday night, on the adjournment, that debate should be limited to ten minutes, and that but one speech on a subject should be allowed to each Senator. The Chair now reminds the Senator from Kentucky of it inasmuch as the Chair will endeavor to enforce the rule.

Mr. BECK. Mr. President, on Saturday night the question was presented very fairly by the amendment of the Senator from Missouri, whether we in good faith intended to prevent contributions for political purposes by Government employés and whether we intended to protect them against being required to pay such assessments. I had till then supposed from all that had taken place heretofore, from the message of the President, from the debate had and the action taken upon the resolution which I had the honor to introduce, and upon the bill which I sent to the Committee on the Judiciary, that there was to be no sort of objection to extending the law of 1876 so as to embrace all that class of cases, by preventing anybody under any pretense from levying political assessments upon the employés of the Government, and by prohibiting them from contributing for political purposes. If there was anything I thought to be generally acquiesced in that was.

Now, what are we met with? A simple repetition in plausible form of existing conditions with no existing evil remedied. A proposition to prevent the employés of the Government from being required to pay assessments to anybody or from contributing money for political purposes was voted down by the unanimous vote of the Republican party of the Senate on Saturday night against the unanimous vote of Senators on this side. The act of 1876 had received the sanction of the Supreme Court of the United States; it has been read so often that I do not care to read it again. It had failed to reach the evils it sought to remedy; therefore the President of the United States sent a message to Congress, when we met a few weeks ago, in which he said:

In July last I authorized a public announcement that employés of the Government should regard themselves as at liberty to exercise their pleasure in making or refusing to make political contributions, and that their action in that regard would in no manner affect their official status.

In this announcement I acted upon the view which I had always maintained and still maintain, that a public officer should be as absolutely free as any other citizen to give or to withhold a contribution for the aid of the political party of his choice. It has however, been urged, and doubtless not without foundation in fact, that by solicitation of official superiors and by other modes such contributions have at times been obtained from persons whose only motive for giving has been the fear of what might befall them if they refused. It goes without saying that such contributions are not voluntary, and in my judgment their collection should be prohibited by law.

Not their collection by other officials; that had been tried and proved to be a failure; but their collection under any pretense whatever should be prohibited by law, because they were not in fact voluntary. "A bill which will effectually suppress them will receive my cordial approval," said the President.

After reading that message I believed there was an opportunity to stop this great and growing evil, and I introduced a resolution which looked to obtaining the proof of the fact that great evils did exist and presented a bill which was word for word the bill which after careful consideration was presented by the Senate committee at the last Congress preventing these employés from contributing money for party purposes under coercion express or implied or under pretense of assessment or anything else. When that resolution was introduced and when the questions it proposed to examine were being argued, the two leading members of the Republican side of the Chamber, who had been members of the executive committee, seemed to acquiesce in all I had proposed in the bill. The language of the Senator from Maine [Mr. HALE], as found in the RECORD of December 9, page 5, was as follows:

Is it not easy enough upon what is known, upon what is believed, upon the basis of the President's message and the accepted sentiment of the country for any committee of the Senate to report a statute that would increase the power and force and embracing strength of the act of 1876 without setting a political investigation afoot?

He was followed by the Senator from Iowa [Mr. ALLISON], another distinguished member of that executive committee, who used these words on the same day:

Now, I say to the Senator from Kentucky and the Senator from Delaware that I stand ready to vote for the severest possible law upon this subject. I am willing that this provision of the law of 1876 may be extended wherever you wish it to go, and I agree that public sentiment has crystallized against the system of contributions from office-holders.

It is a pretense that we are to wait for these investigations in order to pass the necessary statute. Call up your civil-service bill now on your table; embody in it whatever you desire to embody in it in reference to the protection of officials, and I shall give it my hearty support and vote, as I doubt not the other Senators on this side of the Chamber will.

Believing that that was the case, I referred the whole subject to the Judiciary Committee. I was fortified in doing so by the statement made by the chairman of that committee, the Senator from Vermont [Mr. EDMUNDS], who said:

The Curtis conviction, in my opinion — and it seems the Supreme Court has so decided or everybody supposes it will so decide — was under a perfectly constitutional law prohibiting all these assessments under whatever contrivance, whether called contributions or what not. I have no doubt of it myself, and I think everybody believes that the Supreme Court if it has not already decided it will so decide it.

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Again, the Senator from Vermont [Mr. EDMUNDS] said:

So, then, in all sincerity, and believing just as strongly as my friend from Kentucky does that it is wrong in every point of view for officials of any kind to call upon other officials who are in some measure, great or small, dependent upon them, for contributions in any way, I thought it was wise for the very objects my friend has in view, to send this matter to a committee to put it into a shape where we could conduct an investigation in a way that the law would permit.

When the proportion wan made by the Senator from Missouri [Mr. VEST] the other night condensing the bills I had introduced and referred, which only extended the provisions of the law of 1876 to the point where not only no official could collect from another, but where nobody else could collect from a Government employé, which I was induced to believe by the language of the Senator from Maine and the Senator from Iowa and the Senator from Vermont would be readily accepted, every man of the Republican party who voted voted against it; and now they present to us a plausible amendment professing that they are not going to allow any employé to collect from any other employé or any official to reach him, but they leave the door wide open, and they know it, for any committee they may select, who are not employés of the Government, to use all the force, all the intimidation, and all the persuasion they may see fit. Their non-official committee may publish a list of those who give and those who do not give; of course they know that the employé feels that that means just as much his dismissal as if he had refused to contribute to the official himself. The Republican Senators are making a profession that they intend to do something which they do not really intend to do; and when the debate was up the other night — in ten minutes I have no time to discuss anything — the Senator from Connecticut [Mr. HAWLEY], whom I see by the public papers has been appointed the caucus chairman to manage this bill and take it out of the hands of the Senator from Ohio [Mr. PENDLETON] —

Mr. HAWLEY. I hope the Senator will allow me to correct that. There, is not a shadow of truth in that report.

Mr. BECK. I have seen the report in the New York and other papers.

Mr. HAWLEY. I do not care where the Senator saw it; I am higher authority than the papers.

Mr. BECK. All right; this is what the Senator, the distinguished champion of the bill —

Mr. HAWLEY. I am chairman of the committee, and obliged to defend the bill.

Mr. BECK. I accept the statement that he is not the caucus chairman, but he is certainly extremely anxious to defeat the only amendment worth anything. The Senator from Connecticut the other night, when we were endeavoring in good faith to prevent what the President said he desired, to prohibit contributions by these people because they were not free to give or refuse as they pleased, gave notice of what would be the effect of refusing.

I dread —

He said —

occupying time any longer, I would speak if I thought there were three men in the Senate of the United States who could vote for that monstrous and utterly indefensible proposition, a trespass upon the natural rights of mankind. Any person who would not resist with all his power the attempt to carry into effect the amendment of the Senator from Missouri would be unworthy the name of an American citizen.

Again —

To any man who ever read five pages of Blackstone, even of the introduction, as a matter of public policy the Government has a right to protect its servants against each other, to forbid wrong-doing on either side; that it may clearly do; but when you get outside of the employment, I do what I please with my money, and when two of us are outside of the Government employ A may ask B and B ask A freely to contribute, and B may give to A and A to B.

Hear him again:

I repeat that when the Government has paid me my money for my services I defy that Government to say how I shall spend that money within the ordinary limitations of the criminal law; and no man will pretend, I take it, that it is dishonorable to subscribe for political purposes, that it is of itself corrupt, or that political agitation and political labor are not absolutely indispensable to the existence of a government. I as a citizen of this Government, employed by it, do not lose my liberties and my rights by the employment I would not be made a dog as that proposed law would make me; I would resist it; I would contribute the first moment I could get out and get to the subscription-book or contribution-box, and tell the officer of the Government who came to me to punish me for it that I was ready for his jail or anybody's gibbet if necessary to defend the independence of mankind by resisting it.

Of course, if he had an executive committee organized and run by his retainers or his clerks to go to the Departments and demand money not in his name but as outsiders, and men were published as having refused, he would put them to the gibbet as far as political employment was concerned, at least all applied to would so understand it, and he has arranged by his amendment to resume the power to bring about that condition of things.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore rapped with his gavel.

Mr. BECK. Is my time out?

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. So the Secretary tells me.

Mr. BECK. I wish to be heard on this subject on another amendment.

Mr. EDMUNDS. I hope the Senator from Kentucky will be allowed, by unanimous consent, to proceed. This is an important matter.

Mr. SHERMAN. That will break down the rule.

Mr. EDMUNDS. I do not care if it does. Let him have fair play.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question is on the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut [Mr. HAWLEY].

Mr. HAWLEY. I ought to correct a misapprehension of the Senator from Kentucky [Mr. BECK], for it is clearly a misapprehension. The statute of 1876, to which he refers, is not repealed by the amendment I have proposed; and let me say, to begin with, the amendment I offered here was first offered by me as a bill on the 9th of December, referred to the Committee on Civil Service, and there it was amended chiefly by adding two sections to it, and I was instructed to offer it as an amendment to this bill. It provides that no Senator or Representative, and goes on with terms that are meant to include every officer and employé of the Government who can be thought of, shall solicit or receive, directly or indirectly, or be in any manner concerned in soliciting or receiving, any assessment, contribution, or subscription for political purposes.

The amendment rejected, which the Senator from Kentucky seems to lament the rejection of, was one for prohibiting a Government employé of any class from giving for political purposes to any person whatever. That was the thing I condemned, as I thought it a trespass on the rights of American citizens, and so I think it is. If it had been simply confined to forbidding a Government employé from giving to any other Government employé or officer, then it would come within the rightful reach of the Government. But that point is covered by the statute of 1876, which we do not repeal, that forbids the giving to any other officer or employé; and this statute covers the remaining gap. It forbids any of the officers of the Government, of any rank or degree, from directly or indirectly soliciting or receiving from each other any such contribution.

Now, the statute of 1876 not repealed and [unknown] together, cover the whole field, and the committee instructed me to put with that and offer as a part of my amendment that which appears in the amendment as the second and third sections, clauses forbidding any person in the world to have anything to do with collecting or receiving any moneys for political purposes in any public building or navy-yard, or fort, or arsenal, or office of the United States. Then it goes on to prohibit the promotion or degradation or discharge of any employé for not giving any money in any way, or withholding it. There was a clause in forbidding a removal by reason of the vote he might give, but that was taken out because it directly interfered with what all parties acknowledge to be proper and right that the Executive should have in the leading offices of the Government men of his own political faith. Under that clause as I had it originally a President could not choose a Cabinet of his own faith, nor appoint a foreign minister, nor bureau officers of the Treasury or customs service in accordance with his views of affairs. That it was necessary to strike out. It forbids the promotion or degradation or removal or prejudice of any employé for giving or not giving or withholding or neglecting to give any money, forbids its collection within all Government buildings by any outsider, and forbids all employés of all possible grades from collecting or receiving from each other. I think it covers as nearly as possible the whole ground. This amendment was substantially reported by the Judiciary Committee the other day. Except that by striking out the clause referring to the vote of an employé, the amendments of the Judiciary Committee I think are dispensed with. I think the whole ground is covered by the statute of 1876 and this proportion.

Mr. BECK. Can I move to amend by striking out the last section of the amendment?

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. Yes, sir.

Mr. BECK. I submit that motion, and ask to be heard on it.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Kentucky moves to amend the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut by striking out the last section.

Mr. BECK. The Senator from Connecticut very properly says that his amendment does not seek to repeal the law of 1876. I admit that. The law of 1876 was the law when the President, at the opening of this session, sent his message to the Congress of the United States, in which he struck at the root of the whole evil when he said:

It goes without saying that such contributions are not voluntary, and in my judgment their collection should be prohibited by law. A bill which will effectually suppress them will receive my cordial approval.

Did not the President know that the law of 1876 was in force when he sent that message to us on the 4th of December? Did not he know that Curtis had been tried and fined for a violation of that law? Did he not know that that law had proved utterly inefficient to cure the evils that existed in the public service? Did he not know that employés were intimidated, and that their contributions were in fact coerced though it was pretended that they were voluntary? Did he not know it so well that he called upon Congress to amend and extend the law of 1876 and to stop the contributions and thus reach the root of the evil? And now gentlemen assume a merit or a virtue by saying we do not propose to repeal that law. Of course not. You have found out ways of getting around it, and without violating it making it null and void; but you do not propose to strengthen it as the President recommends; you do not propose to do anything except name a few more officials and employés that are to be embraced in or affected by that law, each as Senators, Representatives, and Delegates. But the gravamen, the vice, is untouched,

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which is the contribution, which might be involuntary, though it did not appear so been use of the fact that the employé knew that he did not stand in the same relation as other men when he was called upon to give or to refuse. That is what the President called upon us to remedy; that is what my bill proposes to do, and that is what the amendment of the Senator from Missouri [Mr. VEST] proposed to do.

We are met with a refusal by Republican Senators to comply with the request of the President, who has stated how plain and gross the evil is and how the law needs amendment, by a proposition to name some Senators and others who were not named in that law, and then be told by Senators that they do not propose to repeal it and claim credit for that. But that is not the question. If that bill had been sufficient or if the one now proposed were sufficient there would be no need for the message of the President; there would be no need of complaint from any quarter.

As to the remark of the Senator from Connecticut that he thinks no free man with a decent regard for liberty would vote for it, I tell him and I tell the country that the President has said it ought to be done. This side of the House, as intelligent as he dare assume the other side to be, unanimously voted for it. The Supreme Court, in an opinion which was read the other night, in all its arguments shows that it is a necessary and proper thing to do. When gentlemen talk about private liberty being encroached on because they can not pay out the money received out of the taxes of all the people to run a partisan canvass let them read the opinion of the Supreme Court and they will find a dozen cases where the personal liberty of the citizen, when he accepts office, if you call it so, is abridged. The Secretary of the Treasury can not buy ships or trade in merchandise; a member of Congress can not practice before the Court of Claims, and dozens of cases are given in the decision of the court which I will hand to the reporter rather than read, showing that all these things are prohibited. The court says:

The act now in question is one regulating in some particulars the conduct of certain officers and employés of the United States. It rests on the same principle as that originally passed in 1789 at the first session of the First Congress, which makes it unlawful for certain officers of the Treasury Department to engage in the business of trade and commerce, or to own a sea-vessel, or to purchase public lands or other public property, or to be concerned in the purchase or disposal of the public securities of a State or of the United States (Rev. Stat., sec. 243); and that passed in 1791, which makes it an offense for a clerk in the same Department to carry on trade or business in the funds or debts of the States or of the United States, or in any kind of public property (id., sec. 244); and that passed in 1812, which makes it unlawful for a judge appointed under the authority of the United States to exercise the profession of counsel or attorney, or to be engaged in the practice of the law (id., sec. 713); and that passed in 1853, which prohibits every officer of the United States or person holding any place of trust or profit, or discharging any official function under or in connection with any Executive Department of the Government of the United States, or under the Senate and House of Representatives, from acting as an agent or attorney for the prosecution of any claim against the United States (id., sec. 5498); and that passed in 1863, prohibiting members of Congress from practicing in the Court of Claims (id., sec. 1058); and that passed in 1867, punishing, by dismissal from service, an officer or employé of the Government who requires or requests any working-man in a navy-yard to contribute or pay any money for political purposes (id., sec. 1546); and that passed in 1868, prohibiting members of Congress from being interested in contracts with the United States (id., sec. 3739); and another, passed in 1870, which provides that no officer, clerk, or employé in the Government of the United States shall solicit contributions from other officers, clerks, or employés for a gift to those in a superior official position, and that no officials or clerical superiors shall receive any gift or present as a contribution to them from persons in Government employ receiving a less salary than themselves, and that no officer or clerk shall make a donation as a gift or present to any official superior (id., sec. 1784). Many others of a kindred character might be referred to, but these are enough to show what has been the practice in the legislative department of the Government from its organization, and so far as we know, this is the first time the constitutionality of such legislation has ever been presented for judicial determination.

The evident purpose of Congress in all this class of enactments has been to promote efficiency and integrity in the discharge of official duties, and to maintain proper discipline in the public service. Clearly such a purpose is within the just scope of legislative power, and it is not easy to see why the act now under consideration does not come fairly within the legitimate means to such an end.

A feeling of independence under the law conduces to faithful public service, and nothing tends more to take away this feeling than a dread of dismissal. If contributions from those in public employment may be solicited by others in official authority, it is easy to see that what begins as a request may end as a demand, and that a failure to meet the demand may be treated by those having the power of removal as a breach of some supposed duty growing out of the political relations of the parties. Contributions secured under such circumstances will quite as likely be made to avoid the consequences of the personal displeasure of a superior as to promote the political views of the contributor — to avoid a discharge from service more than to exercise a political privilege.

If there were no other reasons for legislation of this character than such as relate to the protection of those in the public service against unjust exactions, its constitutionality would, in our opinion, be clear; but there are others, to our minds, equally good. If persons in public employ may be called on by those in authority to contribute from their personal income to the expenses of political campaigns, and a refusal may lead to putting good men out of the service, liberal payments may be made, the ground for keeping poor ones in. So, too, if a part of the compensation received for public services must be contributed for political purposes, it is easy to see that an increase of compensation may be required to provide the means to make the contribution, and that in this way the Government itself may be made to furnish indirectly the money to defray the expenses of keeping the political party in power that happens to have for the time being the control of the public patronage.

These extracts from the opinion of the court ought to relieve gentlemen of their scruples. They at least show how hollow all such pretenses are.

I hold in my hands a copy of a trial by court-martial where a distinguished officer, James H. Taylor, I believe a grandson of the late President, a Kentucky gentleman, was court-martialed because he asked one of his friends to write to his two Senators, General WILLIAMS and myself, to beg the Department not to send him from Newport Barracks where he had been ordered away back to Omaha because the removal would be at great expense and put a young man over his head because he lived in Cincinnati and was a pet of some of the officers hero. He was court-martialed and, I think, unjustly reprimanded. This was his letter:

NEWPORT BARRACKS, JULY 31.

GENERAL: I received duly your telegram notifying me of the issuance orders carrying me at the end of the coming month to Omaha. If the consequence of the change was to carry me into the field or into active operations I would say nothing and quietly go with cheerfulness; but as I have been unable to find in my own mind any reason for my displacement, at great expense and inconvenience to my family, other than the gratification of a junior whose only service in the Department has been in the city of Washington, I have done what under ordinary circumstances I shrink from. The interest and well-being of my family, as well as a sense of great injustice done to myself, have induced me to ask political assistance from the Senators of my State, Kentucky, in the revocation of the order. I tell you this frankly, simply for the purpose of assuring you that nothing in the premises has or will be done by me which I have any desire to hide.

Very respectfully, your obedient servant,
J. H. TAYLOR.
Assistant Adjutant-General.

General Drum, Adjutant-General

Because he dared to ask a friend to write to two Senators and tell them the hardship of the case he was court-martialed. I hold in my hand the proceedings of the court-martial, which I do not care to read. They would show how the liberty of officials is interfered with more offensively than by prohibiting them from becoming political partisans even voluntarily.

It was suggested to me by the Senator from Arkansas [Mr. GARLAND] that there are plenty of other cases. I hope he will give them. He mentioned several of them to me. An officer can not take his wife on board a ship. There are a thousand things officials can not do. All we propose to say is in accordance with the recommendation of the President of the United States, that men who are employed in the public service and drawing their money out of the taxes of this people shall not, directly or indirectly, be approached by any political party and be made to believe, its they now believe, that their places are no longer safe unless they give a part of their earnings to advance the interests of one political party. If we refuse to do that there is no genuine civil-service reform in any proposition Senators are making and parading before the country as evidence of their virtue, their conversion, or their patriotism — call it what you like.

These poor subordinate clerks in the Departments have never been important political factors, notwithstanding all the fuss made about them. The men in the great custom-houses at New York and elsewhere, the men in the Internal-Revenue Department, the men all over the country in the post-offices are the principal political emissaries; and they are not affected by the civil-service reform contained in this bill; and when the Senator from North Carolina [Mr. VANCE] moved to include them his motion was voted down by the Republican party, and these political emissaries will pay and work as they do now.

These subordinate clerks here are struggling now merely to make a living; half of them can not vote; three-fourths of them do not vote. They amount to nothing in general politics. The proposition to divide the clerical force here among the States is a mere farce. It is worse; it is an injury rather than a benefit to the people of the States. I wish to God no man or woman from Kentucky would ever come here and ask for a mere clerkship in any Department. A man sacrifices his independence the moment he comes here, and the longer he stays the poorer he gets, until he becomes absolutely dependent. During the first eight years of my service in the House no man or woman from my district ever asked me for an office in Washington, and I was proud of the fact. I do not want to turn out these people. I do not care if the District of Columbia has more than its proportion. They are living here. I do not want good people to come from my State, nor from the distant States, where they can have respectability at home. I would rather a son of mine should crack rock on the roadside than to come here and hold a little subordinate clerkship, and cringe and fawn on politicians to keep him there, and sink down lower in his own estimation and the estimation of the country, year by year, by hanging around those Departments. I care nothing about these places.

As the Senator from Missouri [Mr. COCKRELL] — I thank him for his speech — stated, Mr. George William Curtis went before this committee and showed them where the evil was. Mr. Curtis said:

My official relation to this subject for a time under General Grant's administration brought me into confidence with a great many official gentlemen in various parts of the country and in various branches of the service. On one occasion there was a very heavy assessment made in the New York custom-house. A body of gentlemen connected with the service there made representations to me of their absolute inability, with Justice to their families, to pay this assessment in addition to others that had been levied at about the same time during the same year. I replied, of course, that officially I had nothing to do with the matter, but that knowing the collector I would wait upon him and see what could be done. I went to the collector, whom I know personally very well; I stated the case of these gentlemen, and he heard me with politeness, with impatient politeness, and when I had ended he brought his first down on his table with great emphasis, and said: "Well, Mr. Curtis, for every one of the gentlemen in this office who are unwilling to pay this assessment I know of at least fifty, whose names are duly registered, who would very willingly take the place with all the incumbrances."

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We desire to remove these incumbrances, and to let the men who do the work have the places without the incumbrances. I repeat, if this amendment offered by the Senator from Connecticut passes, all that will happen will be that the Senator from Connecticut and the Senator from Iowa and the Senator from Maine and others will no longer be members of the executive committee, but their confidential friends or their private secretaries may be, and these private secretaries and confidential friends will go to these employés, just as other employés do it now, and give them to understand, "Your names will be published." If they inquire, "Did Senator — threaten about it?" the reply will be, "No; he only requested me to let him know what you did." That is all that is necessary to intimidate every one of them, and plenty of excuses can be found for turning them out other than the true one. The Senator from New York [Mr. MILLER], in the speech he made the other day, said:

I should not be standing here advocating this bill if I did not believe there were great wrongs perpetrated in the civil service of this Government, and I have already just stated, not more than five minutes ago, that I believed that if this bill could be put in operation within a few years' time it would reduce the cost of the civil service of this Government not less than 25 per cent.

That 25 per cent would be reduced, and he admits it can be. We all know it can. Every one of them would be a non-subscribing employé, whom the private secretaries or friends of distinguished gentlemen, called if you please an executive committee, applied to and did not get money from —

[Here the hammer fell.]

Mr. HAWLEY. A few words briefly in answer. I think the Senator from Kentucky has already been challenged emphatically to prove the removal of a single employé of this Government by reason of his not giving a political subscription. The gauge of the gentleman who made that challenge has not been taken. It extended to any person, down to a messenger, a doorkeeper, a scavenger, who has been turned out for any such reason. If any such case can be shown I trust a punishment as severe as the law may allow, as well as the contempt of the entire American nation, may be visited upon the officer making such a removal.

Now, the point between us, which the gentleman does not state as clearly as I should like to hear him, is just this: He and his friends desire to forbid a Government officer of any class from giving to anybody anywhere, and that is the proposition which I denounced with a good deal of warmth the other night, for I do not believe it is within the lawful reach of the Government. I think it would be bad policy, I think it would be a mark of degradation inflicted upon the public officers, to pass any such law. But the offense at which we are aiming is an oppressive exaction, and that is what we have sought, to the best of our ability, aided by the best advice in the Senate, to reach in the amendment that I have proposed.

Mr. BECK. I doubt it.

Mr. HAWLEY. What takes the gentleman doubt?

Mr. BECK. What I said did not intend to say aloud. You have been very skillful in your pretenses, but you have carefully avoided the real point.

Mr. HAWLEY. The word "pretenses" is one the gentleman would not like to have applied to himself. That is not a pleasant word.

Mr. BECK. I did not say it aloud.

Mr. HAWLEY. I assure the gentleman that we have taken the advice of a man who is a much abler lawyer than either he or I, if he will allow me to say that much. There are such men certainly. We have taken the advice of a very able lawyer. Our object was to prevent any and every man who got any money from the United States for his work collecting or assessing anything of any value whatever from any other man in the United States who got a cent from the United States for his work. That of itself will remove a vast deal of the evil. But we went further and said that no human being could, inside of Uncle Sam's buildings or grounds, solicit in any way anybody for a single cent. Then we said that no officer should promote or remove or degrade a man because he did or did not give, and he is liable to a heavy fine and heavy imprisonment if he does anything of that sort.

Now, some want us to go a step further and say that outside if after the clerk is employed and has left the Government office and received his salary he chooses to spend $5 in the circulation of Andrew Jackson's anti-nullification proclamation as a political document, he shall be liable to three years' imprisonment. That is utterly ridiculous and I shall not vote for anything of the sort.

I neglected to remind the Senate of another precaution we have proposed against illegal assessments, &c,, another defense of the employé, and that is contained in the general provisions of this bill, under which the politician who may demand the discharge of an employé does it without the possibility of securing his own man in the place of that employé, because the vacancy is to be filled by a competitive examination, and nine-tenths of the motive for asking the removal of subordinates is removed by these provisions.

Now, under the general bill for the reform of the civil service as proposed, and with the amendment offered by the committee and now pending, I do not see how a man with any manhood in the service of the United States can ask for any further protection. With the strong arm of the Government, under a penalty of $5,000 fine and imprisonment not exceeding three years, or by both fine and imprisonment in the discretion of the court, I say he is protected by these provisions which prevent anybody in the world from oppressively exacting a cent from him.

I trust there may be no further amendment.

Mr. VEST. Mr. President, the declared object of the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut is to do away with the great evil of coercive or involuntary political assessment upon employés of the Government. That it is a great evil is conceded by all parties, by every Senator who has discussed the question. Now, unless there be some paramount reason, unless there be some constitutional objection, unless there be some principle violative of individual or public right which militates against the broadest, most effectual, and comprehensive provision to meet this monstrous evil, then the position which the Senator from Connecticut has assumed is not tenable. I undertake to declare, and I do not believe a single Senator on this floor doubts the assertion, that any provision which we make which does not absolutely prohibit the employé of the Government from paying to any one for political purposes is absolutely void. Our knowledge of human nature, our knowledge of the rancor and zeal of political conflicts, our experience in the past, all teach us that this is so.

Sir, will you tell me that there is a politician, no matter of what party, maddened with the desire to obtain possession of the Government or to retain it, who in the heated excitement of a great political contest will stop to obey the law when money is to be obtained?

The Senator from Connecticut tells us that all persons are prohibited from going into public offices to solicit money. Aye, sir, and we have such a law in regard to the navy-yards of the United States, and in 1880 what was the result? We prohibited the collection of assessments and the levying of them inside of the navy-yards of the United States; and the result was that a man was put by the Republican party at the gate of each navy-yard, and the employés were notified that they could pay outside of the soil over which the jurisdiction of the United States extended.

It is a mere fraud in fact, whether so intended or not, to say that this provision that only employés and officers of the Government are prohibited from collecting assessments amounts to anything at all. As the Senator from Kentucky says, Mr. Smith or Mr. Jones, the pliant and supple tools of the party in power, not holding office, can assume the place of assessors and collectors, and they will go to these employés and collect from them as much as they can.

What is the meaning of those words contained in the notice issued in the last campaign by the Republican campaign committee of which my friend from Iowa [Mr. ALLISON] was so prominent a member, that they are authorized to state that no objection will be made in any official quarter to the collection of these assessments? What was the understanding of the employés? It was that the President and heads of Departments favored this collection, not in so many words; and if this amendment passes in the shape offered by the Senator from Connecticut what will be the result? Indirectly, but just as effectually, the material needed for political purposes will be raised and expended.

Now, sir, one word more and I am done. In my opinion it is a farce, "leather and prunella," and amounts to nothing. Is there a constitutional objection to what I have proposed? The Senator from Connecticut was pleased to say that he was stricken with horror, amazed beyond expression that any Senator should offer such an amendment as that which as a substitute was offered by myself, that it invaded the rights of American citizens. Will that Senator, or any other Senator who voted with him, point out to me, if the amendment I offered is violative of the rights of American citizens, that clause of the Constitution under which he can forbid an American citizen who holds an office in this Government from soliciting subscriptions for political purposes? Where does the Constitution give him that right? Assuming him to be correct in the position he takes here to-day, if you have the right as you claim it now to prohibit solicitation, you have the right to prohibit payment; and until you answer that question the attack made by the Senator from Connecticut is "sound and fury," with all respect to him, proving nothing except his zeal for a mistaken cause and a false position.

Mr. President, this amendment, the Senator from Connecticut says, is drawn by an astute and able lawyer. I have no doubt of it I think I know, without enjoying the Senator's confidence, the lawyer who drew it, and I think it shows the marks of a most astute and able lawyer. Under the guise, under the plausible pretext of doing away with corruption of political sentiment, it leaves open the door through which a river of corruption can run over the country. It was drawn by an able lawyer; it shows his ability. I have no question as to his ability and as to the purpose for which it was drawn. I notify the Senator, though, that after this amendment has been voted on, whether it be adopted or rejected, I shall offer at the proper time as an additional section of the bill the amendment which I offered on Saturday night but which was voted down. ["Now!" "Now!"] Well, Mr. President, I will offer it now.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. It is not in order now. The Senator from Kentucky has offered an amendment to the amendment.

Mr. BECK. I withdraw it.

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The PRESIDENT pro tempore. Now the Senator from Missouri can offer his amendment.

Mr. VEST. I offer this amendment —

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. If it is the same amendment which was voted down before it can not be offered now in Committee of the Whole. It can be reoffered in the Senate.

Mr. BUTLER. I wish the Secretary would read that amendment. I wish to know what it is.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The amendment of the Senator from Connecticut [Mr. HAWLEY]?

Mr. BUTLER. The amendment of the Senator from Missouri [Mr. VEST].

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. That was voted down on Saturday and it is not now before the Senate as in Committee of the Whole. It can be reoffered in the Senate.

Mr. HARRISON. Mr. President —

Mr. PENDLETON. If the Senator will allow me an instant I wish to correct a mistaken statement into which the Chair has inadvertently fallen. The Senator now offers his amendment as an amendment to the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut. It was offered as a substitute before.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. That was precisely what was done on Saturday and it was voted down.

Mr. PENDLETON. As a substitute. It is now offered as an amendment.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. It is the same thing.

Mr. PENDLETON. No, sir; it is now an additional section.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. It in the same thing that was voted down in Committee of the Whole.

Mr. HOAR. But in the one case it was offered as an entirety by a substitution; that is, to substitute B for A; the Senate voted that down; and now the offer is to add B to A, making the clause A plus B. That is a different thing. Saying that you will not have it inside of the other is not saying that you will not have it in addition to the other.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Chair will receive it, then, as an additional section to the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut. The amendment of the Senator from Missouri will be read.

The ACTING SECRETARY. It is proposed to add to the amendment the following:

That the solicitation of money, property, or other thing of value by any executive officer, clerk, or employé of the United States, or the giving by any such officer, clerk, or employé of any such money, property, or other thing of value, for political purposes, or to advance the political interests of any person or party, is hereby prohibited. And any person offending against any of the provisions of this section shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, and upon conviction thereof shall be lined in a sum not exceeding $500; and such offending party shall, in addition to the fine imposed, be discharged from his office.

Mr. HARRISON. Mr. President, I do not think I shall be able to make much contribution to this debate, but I do desire to say just a word or two on the particular point now under consideration by the Senate.

I believe this legislation which we are attempting now would be classed by the profession as remedial legislation. It is legislation addressed to an evil, intended to remove it. I think always, whether in construing or enacting such legislation, we are helped if we can clearly understand the evil against which it in directed, and I think if we can bring the Senate now in this discussion to a recognition of that evil and to a definition of it we shall understand ourselves better as to these amendments.

That evil, if I understand it, is not the collection of money for political uses. I do not understand that any Senator here controverts the fact that there are legitimate and proper uses to which money may be put in political campaigns. The evil, then, against which we direct our legislation is not the collection of money for political uses; neither is it the corrupt or unlawful use of money in elections. What is it then? It is simply this, sir, as I understand it: it is to remove from all those in the official service of the United States any other influence or control in their giving than that which may operate upon a private individual. That is what I understand to be the aim; that every clerk in a Department and every officer of the Government shall be entirely emancipated from every influence except those influences which may operate upon the unofficial citizen in determining the question whether he will give or not give. The intention is by this bill to remove not only coercive, influences but the semblance of them; not only to withhold legal power to exact but to withhold the use of official place which may be treated as an exaction.

Therefore we say there shall be no request for contributions coming from any official source; the request when made shall not be backed by any official position, influence, or power. When we have accomplished that and have emancipated these men from whom contributions are asked, I insist that we have met the evil complained of, and have gone as far as we rightfully can go.

The Senator from Missouri asks what constitutional provision is infringed upon or violated by a provision prohibiting an officer or clerk in one of these Departments from giving to legitimate political purposes. I do not need to point him to a constitutional provision. That instrument is a collection of comprehensive declarations relating to the Government; but I do insist that it is a common principle applicable as well to the service of the United States and its employés as to the service of corporations and individuals and their employés that when a man has once earned the salary stipulated by law or fixed by contract, has earned it by the stipulated hours of work, it is his, absolutely his; and the principle sought to be introduced here is that the Government may follow that money into his control and dictate the use of it to him. I say that may not be done. The Government of the United States can not prohibit any man from using money that is his for any legitimate purpose. We may prohibit the use of it for illegal purposes, for purposes of fraud or corruption in elections, but I deny that the Government may control the use of the money that it has paid to the man for services

Where would this principle stop, Mr. President? If, in the opinion of the Senate, contributions to ecclesiastical uses were deemed to be improper, cannot we follow the money into an employé's possession and put a limitation on his power? There is a very wide and a very secure, distinction between prohibiting solicitation by an officer and prohibiting the giving voluntarily to an individual.

Mr. VEST. Will the Senator permit me to ask him a question?

Mr. HARRISON. Certainly.

Mr. VEST. Where does he find, under his argument, then, the power or the principle that authorizes the prohibiting of the payment by one office-holder to another?

Mr. HARRISON. Precisely here: we are there legislating directly in the interest of the emancipation of the man. When he gives to another officer there is room there for the introduction of the principle of official control, and in the other case there is none whatever. We may say that an officer of the United States shall not be the collector or the recipient of such contributions, but it is quite another thing to say that a man who has earned the salary stipulated by law to him and has it in his pocket can not use it for any legitimate purpose he may please.

Mr. JONES, of Florida. Mr. President, so far as the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut goes, I approve of it heartily, but, as I had occasion to say the other night in debate, it is very far short, in my judgment, of what it ought to be to meet the necessities of this question. I agree in a great deal that has been said by the Senator who has just taken his seat; and in the very clear and concise argument which he has made he has shown to the Senate one thing — that if there is jurisdiction to legislate at all over this subject it is for the purpose of protecting the person who holds office against the solicitations of money for political purposes from any source whatever. He has shown that clearly, that if we have jurisdiction to legislate it is for the purpose of protecting the humble individual who may be in a position of dependence upon this Government and receives his support from it for his daily labor against solicitations of money that he has honestly earned being allowed upon him for the purposes of any political organization.

Now, let us test this amendment by that argument, and let us see how far short it falls. I say nothing just now about the essence of the amendment of the Senator from Missouri which relates to voluntary contributions, but I will say, testing it in the light of the Senator's argument, why should we confine the authority of law to a Senator, to a representative of a Territory, or a Representative in Congress in the other end of the Capitol? If this thing is to turn upon the protection to be afforded to the humble employé, why do you not direct the prohibition of the law against everybody that may seek to obtain money from him for that purpose?

Mr. HARRISON. Will the Senator allow me to answer that question now?

Mr. JONES, of Florida. Certainly.

Mr. HARRISON. In the one case the legislation is in the interest of the emancipation of the office-holder, and in the other case it is a restraint upon his freedom as a citizen and his ownership of that which is his.

Mr. JONES, of Florida. The Senator's fine mind may be able to draw a distinction between a Senator in his individual character and his official character; but I can not see it. I say that you have no right to legislate on this subject against a Senator of the United States any more than you have against any man who is not connected with this high body, and that it is not the official character of the Senator or the official character of the Representative or the Delegate of a Territory that gives you authority to act, but it is the portion of the person from whom the money is to be exacted. If you have authority to protect him against the solicitations of Members, and Senators, and Delegates, you have authority to protect him against the solicitations when made from any quarter, it matters not where.

Mr. HARRISON. The Senator uses the word "protect." Does he think that describes the act of prohibiting a man from doing of his own will what he wants to do?

Mr. JONES, of Florida. No, Mr. President, I do not; but you will see from thy nature of this first section that two things are contemplated; first it is directed against officials occupying high public places under the Government and is for the protection of those in official station in humble capacity. Now, I say if you are going to give the humble office-holder protection, make it an offense for any man, whether he

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be a Senator or Representative, to solicit from a person drawing compensation from the Government of the United States any contribution of money for a political purpose. Can the jurisdiction be doubted? If so, then you make it turn upon the official character of the Senator, and you can not maintain it.

Then when you come to the section which I discussed the other night, which makes it an offense for any person to do within a public building what it is unlawful for a Senator or a Representative to do outside of a public building, the absurdity of the provision is made plain. As I said, there in no authority to legislate against a person in a public building any more than there is outside of it; but if your purpose is to protect the individual who is in the employ of the Government against contributions for political purposes, then so frame your amendment that it shall be unlawful for any person, whether in office or out of it, to solicit such contribution for such ends.

Mr. LOGAN. Mr. President, I desire to call the attention of the Senator from Florida and the Senator from Missouri to this proposition, that there is no power to legislate in reference to public buildings that does not exist in reference to legislation outside of public buildings. I understand this legislation to mean this and nothing more, that the Government of the United States having jurisdiction over public buildings and public grounds where the jurisdiction is ceded to it, as it always is in every ease where it has a public building, it has a right not only to protect the public building, but to say whether persons shall go inside of it or not. That power exists. This legislation is for the purpose of preventing Senators and Representatives and other officers of the Government from going in for the purpose of annoying the clerks and other persons and asking them for contributions. That is all there is of that. The Government has a perfect right to do it; but the Government has no right to say out on the street that you shall not ask a person for a penny or ten dollars as a beggar or anything else. There is that distinction, and it seems to me to be perfectly clear.

Then one other word in reference to this amendment. Gentlemen do not seem to make the distinction that strikes me, and that was certainly very clearly set forth by the Senator from Indiana, between prohibiting officers and employés of the Government from soliciting contributions and persons of their own will giving contributions. It seems to me that there is a very clear distinction between the two. The principle of restraining persons from forcing contributions and restraining persons from voluntarily giving contributions is very different. Suppose Congress passes a law and makes it punishable by a fine of $5,000 and imprisonment in a penitentiary for three years for any man to assault a stage on the highway and demanding money of the passengers. Why does Congress do that? Congress does it for what? The crime is in the party who demands, because he has the force to do it and the ability at the time to take the money of the innocent individual which does not belong to him. That is the reason for that. Suppose Congress should make another section to a bill of that kind saying that the person who demanded the money should be punished by confinement in the penitentiary, and after that that the individual who had the money should be protected in retaining his money provided he invests it in calicoes, would you not say that Congress was thereby restricting the rights of the citizen? Would you say that Congress would have any right to do that? Would you say that Congress would have a right to determine as to what this man should invest his money in after he had been protected from the highwayman? I presume no one would say that.

The same principle applies to this. You prevent an officer from making a demand for money which he has no right to do, but through his influence and power over the individual of whom he makes the demand the fear is that he can coerce money from an individual. You prevent that person from using this coercive power, existing in him on account of his position, to obtain money that he has no right to for political purposes. That is your, law. Now, when you prohibit a man from obtaining money in this way by exercising the power that applies to the individual that he may coerce or dismiss him from his place if ho does not pay, then can you say to the person, "If we prevent this man from taking your money you shall invest your money in a certain way?" That is the principle exactly; the same principle that I mentioned. Will you punish a man for robbing a stage, taking money that does not belong to him, and yet turn around and direct the man who owns the money what he shall invest it in? I do not think you have any right to do any such thing.

Let us go a little further with this. You have a right certainly to say to officers of the Government that they shall not coerce other officers of the Government; and that is all there is in this. The States have the right to fix the qualifications of voters, and I will ask the Senator from Florida this question. In his State, under its constitution, the Legislature has power to fix the qualifications of voters, so that they do not violate the provisions of the Constitution of the United States. That every one admits. Now, suppose you attack to this bill the qualification that if any man shall contribute and be convicted of it he shall be deprived of the right of the elective franchise thereafter; would you say you had a right to do that?

Mr. JONES, of Florida, Do you want me to answer that?

Mr. LOGAN. I merely ask you whether you think you would have the right to do it.

The PRESI DENT pro tempore. The senator from Illinois will recollect that interruptions will be taken out of his time.

Mr. LOGAN. I do recollect it.

Mr. JONES, of Florida. I only want to reply to the question as it is put to me. It is not fair for a Senator to put a question and then not have an answer. I do not believe this government has any authority over the subject of suffrage, and therefore I should not think such a provision would be admissible.

Mr. LOGAN. Very well; I think not either; but you say that no officer shall demand money of a man who is employed by the Government in Washington who is a citizen of your State. That is all right; but you propose also to say to him by your provision that when he goes to Florida for the purpose of voting at an election, if any citizen not an officer shall ask him to contribute one dollar for a band of music or for a hall for a person to make a political speech in, he is subject to a fine of $500 and imprisonment in the penitentiary for three years. That is your proposition. Do you believe that that is not an infringement upon the rights of the citizen, depriving him of the exercise of a right that he has — that is, to use his own money in his own way so that he does not violate the law?

Mr. JONES, of Florida. Let me suggest to the Senator whether it is not just as reasonable for me to do it as an individual as to do it as a Senator?

Mr. LOGAN. The difference is this: that the Senator being supposed to have influence with the clerk in the Department, in exercising that influence and in making the demand the clerk would give the money without wanting to give it, perhaps; and hence it would be taking money from him against his will. That is the theory of this proposition. The other is not taking it against his will, but allowing him to do as he pleases in reference to that matter without any officer interfering with him. I say it is an abridgment of the liberties of the citizen in the exercise of the rights that he has under our form of Government. I do not believe you have the power to deprive him of the exercise of that right any more than you have power to say that a clerk in a Department shall not contribute to the Episcopal Church, or the Methodist, or the Catholic, or any other church. If you may tell him where he shall put his money, you may tell him what church he shall contribute to just as well. You have the same right to restrict him in his contributions for purposes of that kind as you have for any other lawful purposes.

[Here the hammer fell.]

Mr. LAPHAM. Mr. President, the precise question presented now, if I understand it, is as to the power of this body as a legislative body to restrict the citizen in the use he may make of his own property or earnings. A person has labored in the service of the Government and received the compensation which the law provides as his salary; and it has become his private property. Now have we, as a legislature, any power over it except within the bounds provided in the Constitution?

The Constitution provides in the fifth article of amendments to that instrument that no person shall "be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law." What is depriving a man of his property? If we deprive a private citizen of the right to use his property for all legitimate purposes, we take from him the value of his property as much as though we deprived him of it altogether. If we may restrict the citizen in the use which he is to make of his property for the purpose of promoting the interests of the party to which he belongs, we may upon the same principle provide that he shall not contribute to the use of the religious organization with which he is connected. We may say to him, "The use of tobacco is an evil; you shall not expend your money in the purchase of cigars or tobacco." We may say, "The use of intoxicating beverages is an evil, and you shall not expend your money in the purchase of those articles." We may say to him, "You shall not expend it in the purchase of tea and coffee, for the use of those is, in the judgment of the Senate, an evil;" and in that way deprive him of many or all the legitimate uses of his property, and this would take from him his property to all intents and purposes within the meaning of the Constitution. If we may prohibit the use in one direction, we may command the use in another and provide that after defraying the legitimate expenses of his family the citizen shall devote the balance of his income to religious or charitable purposes or to the support of the Government.

This is the question, as I understand it, and it is amazing to me that Senators should hesitate upon the proposition whether we can invade private rights and take from the citizen the privilege to use his property as he pleases for all legitimate and lawful purposes.

Mr. SHERMAN. Mr. President, when this proposition was presented on Saturday night last I felt a good deal as the Senator from Connecticut [Mr. HAWLEY] did, a kind of surprise amounting almost to indignation; but now, since the speeches made by the Senator from Indiana [Mr. HARRISON] and the Senator from New York [Mr. LAPHAM], I am inclined to rest the debate; still, as I have looked into the question, I will say a few words in regard to it.

What is the proposition? It is proposed to prohibit the giving by any clerk or employé of the Government of any property, money, or thing of value for political purposes or to advance the political interests of any person or party. That is prohibited and made a misdemeanor, an offense punishable by a fine of $500. It is not the solicitation of money from any clerk; but if any clerk after he has earned his money

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should give one dollar toward printing the tickets of the party to which he belongs, one dollar to aid in the election of any constable in his town or county, any subordinate officers however humble, he would be subject to the penalty of $500. It seems to me if we had not run mad on this subject this proposition would at once excite the cry of "halt!"

But the gentleman who offers this proposition carefully excludes himself. Why should not a Senator be prohibited also from giving any money to aid in his own election or in the election of anybody else? Senators and Members are carefully excluded from this amendment. It only applies to the poor employés, to the clerks and subordinate officers.

Mr. President, it is a monstrous proposition; and what was said by the Senator from Connecticut, although in the heat of indignation, was not too strong. The attempt by Congress to control the action and power of these subordinate officers over the money that they have earned honestly and fairly would be a crime in itself, an outrage and a wrong. Who are these persons that we are dealing with in number? Every person in the navy-yard, every employé of the Government, from post-masters down, every clerk, every one of the 100,000 people employed, most of them performing some little duty for the Government of the United States, who gives a dollar or fifty cents toward paying for the expenses of a barbecue or for the erection of a stand, or contributes a load of lumber or any article of property for the purpose of contributing to a political object or for any man or any party whatever, is liable to severe punishment. The proposition on its face is monstrous.

Suppose we should undertake instead of saying "party" to say "church?" I have been raised in the Episcopal Church, and some of my friends in the Methodist and Baptist Churches. Suppose it should be thought proper to prohibit one form of religious worship; you might have the same power to pass it in regard to the church or some form of church government, or against drinking whisky or drinking beer, or for anything else? What connection has the giving of this money with your political affairs? None whatever.

But you say there is no constitutional prohibition. No, I do not think there is, because the framers of the Constitution never contemplated the possibility of Congress attempting to control officers in this way. No member of that grave convention which framed the Constitution could have dreamed that in one hundred years alter they had framed that Constitution Congress would be engaged in providing a law that a man who had honestly earned his money in the Government employment should not do with it as he pleased. But does that make it any the less improper for Congress to do it? Congress may do a thousand, things that are wrong. Congress has the power to declare war. It may abuse its power by declaring an unjust war, and slaughtering thousands of people in an unjust war. So with many other things; it may abuse all its powers; there are none of the powers of the Government but may be readily abused.

The question is not can Congress do this or that, but ought Congress to do such a thing as this? I do not know that it even rises to the dignity of a constitutional argument. The Senator from Missouri seems to treat it as if it was a constitutional question. He asks if you can prevent an officer from soliciting from another officer and thus coercing him to give money for political purposes, why can you not prevent him from giving it for any purpose? I ask him this question, following his line of logic: If you can prevent your officers from giving money for a political purpose, why can you not prevent them from giving money for church purposes and for school purposes and holiday purposes, for Christmas festivals, or anything else that Congress may choose to think on the whole is bad? You can not fix the line of demarkation. In my judgment, we have already run wild on this question. Congress up to this hour of this Government have been negligent and careless about civil-service reform, and now they are run mad upon it. For years Congress, when it was controlled by Democrats as well as when controlled by Republicans, refused even to appropriate money to carry into effect the law on the statute-book which authorized and required the Departments to prescribe civil-service rules and reform. In the last term of General Grant's administration, when lie was heartily in favor of civil-service reform, Congress refused to appropriate the money to enable him to employ clerks for doing the thing the law prescribed; and in President Hayes's time, when he was heartily in favor of civil-service reform, Congress, when the House of Representatives was Democratic, again refused to appropriate money to carry into effect the civil-service law. Why, sir, this is a new-born zeal on the part of Congress.

The objections I have to this bill are not to the things that are proposed in it, but that it halts and is lame when it reaches members of Congress. Where is the provision in this bill which prevents members of Congress from interfering unconstitutionally and unlawfully with the exercise of executive power? Such a provision when offered was voted down by a majority of four or five. We should prevent members of Congress from soliciting that which by law and the Constitution is invested in the executive department; that is, the giving out of offices.

Sir, we are growing wild. If we pass some simple law — and I think this measure probably goes as far as we ought to go — some proposition like that offered by the Senator from Connecticut, which goes, it seems to me, as far as we ought to go, and a little further I think than we ought to go, prohibiting anything like coercion, duress, influence, and power by a higher officer over a lower one — if we do that we do a great thing. But we do more than that by this bill. By cutting off the temptation of removal we also protect the officers in the enjoyment of their offices. The great motive power, the great influence brought to bring about the removal of public officers in the Departments through the political influence of members of Congress, is the thing that ought to be cut off. If the inducement for that conduct on the part of members is cut off as a matter of course it removes a great body of the evil.

Sir, we have already debated this bill for two weeks or more. We are likely to debate it during the Christmas holidays. We have lost the benefit of these Christmas holidays, by the pendency of this bill. In my judgment this bill ought not to have occupied a single day of the session. There is nothing in it of a striking character, except it is these amendments which are proposed, not to defeat the bill, but having a tendency to defeat the bill. I supposed when we adjourned Saturday night that it was understood the debate on this matter was ended. I supposed this amendment had been voted down, and there was the end of it; but if the amendments are all to be renewed and repeated under a ten minutes' debate I see no hope for getting through this week or perhaps next week. I hope we may have a vote on all these propositions and dispose of this bill. [Here the hammer fell.]

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question is on the amendment of the Senator from Missouri [Mr. VEST) to the amendment of the Senator, from Connecticut [Mr. HAWLEY].

Mr. GEORGE. Mr. President, I wish to say a word after the remarks which have been made by other Senators to-day.

I regard this proposition as one of the most material connected with civil-service reform. I am satisfied that no enactment which we can pass will have the effect to prohibit political assessments, unless contributions, call them "voluntary" if you will, by any of the Federal employés and officials are prohibited. I am satisfied from the previous practice and history of the Government, from the incidents mentioned by Senators in debate, that there is no way to prevent political assessments except to prevent political contributions.

There is a great deal of force in the suggestion made by the Senator from Ohio [Mr. SHERMAN] that Congress ought not to interfere with the disposition of his salary made by any official or employé of the Government; that he ought to be left free to do with his earnings as he sees proper. I acknowledge the force of that, but his objection applies as strongly to several other acts passed by Congress upon the subject of the employment of their money by the officers of the Government as it does to this. Is it not true that an officer of this Government ought to be allowed to do as he pleases with his money in investing it in trade, as a merchant, or in a vessel or in the public securities or in public lands? It is his money; he has earned it by honest and faithful work, says the Senator from Ohio, and we ought not to interfere with his disposition of it. Yet, sir, from the very foundation of the Government we find a law on the statute-book which prohibits certain officers of this Government from investing their money in trade and in vessels and in speculations in the public, securities and in public, lands. Why was this? These laws were passed not, as argued by some Senators on the other side, in the exercise of a power in Congress to protect these officials; it was because the Government saw that, while the act itself of engaging in merchandise, of running a vessel, of buying public lands was innocent, yet these employments afforded the opportunity of doing that which was wrong. The Government saw that if its officials were allowed to engage in these businesses it would be impossible to keep them in that line of duty which would be, right and honest; so, acting upon the same principle (because without this total prohibition you can not suppress this evil of political assessments) I and the Senators on this side of the Chamber ask that there be a total prohibition. Will any Senator say, in view of the experience of the past, that any law can be made efficient which allows voluntary contributions? Will any Senator say that we have the power to devise a system by which political assessments will be prohibited, and at the same time voluntary contributions be allowed? It is because of this impossibility that I think we ought to adopt the amendment offered by the Senator from Missouri.

Mr. President, the evil against which we are legislating is not only the evil mentioned by the Senator from Indiana [Mr. HARRISON]; it is not only that clerks in the Departments and employés in the navy-yards have been forced to contribute to political funds by fear of what might happen to them in case they refused; but the evil goes far beyond that. It was alluded to the other day in very graphic terms by the Senator from Maine [Mr. HALE], not now in his seat. It was the habit into which politicians had fallen in those evil days of using money in elections; the habit of inquiring, when a nomination is to be made for this office or that office, "How much money will the nominee and his friends contribute to the election?" That is the great evil against which legislation ought to be enacted. It is to allow, and to provide for, the determination of elections by the people fairly, uninfluenced and uncontrolled by the use of money. Senators say there are legitimate purposes for which money may be used in elections; that certain things have to be done which are right and proper. That may be; but can not those purposes be carried out, can not those ends be attained without contributions from officers of the Government; and can not the money be raised by patriotic private citizens of the country without resorting to contributions made by those who are in official position? The

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party not in power are compelled to rely on contributions by private citizens, and it is only right and fair that the other party shall be confined to the same methods.

Then, sir, I have another reason and a very strong reason against political contributions. These, clerks belong to the party in power; the party in power fixes the amount of their salaries, and if this party expects to levy contributions or expects to receive voluntary contributions from these officials, will there be any hesitancy in making the salary large enough to respond to t he demand? The result is that the office-holders contribute to the political fund, and their friends, being the majority in Congress, increase their salaries in order that they may meet the demand without inconvenience. That is one great reason why we should prohibit them entirely.

I have one other reason, sir, founded in the fact that of late years the very fundamental principle on which our institutions rest has been entirely ignored and reversed by the action of the party in power; that is, instead of this Government, its measures, and its policies being influenced and controlled by the will of the people —

[Here, the hammer fell.]

Mr. MAXEY. Mr. President, on the 5th of December a resolution on the subject of political assessments was offered by the Senator from Kentucky [Mr. BECK]; on the 15th of December it was submitted to the Committee on the Judiciary; and on the 23d of that month a bill was reported by that committee in lieu of the resolution offered. The amendment proposed by the Senator from Connecticut to the pending bill takes in, I believe all of the Judiciary Committee's bill down to the fourth section of that bill, takes it in, I believe, verbatim, as far as I can judge from a hasty examination of the two; but that section, for some reason, is left out of the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut, and that, section, to my mind, is one of the most important in that bill presented by the Judiciary Committee. That section reads:

SEC. 4. That no officer, clerk, or other person in the service of the United States shall give or hand over to any other officer, clerk, or person in the service of the United States, or to any Senator or member of the House of Representatives or Territorial Delegate, any money or other valuable thing on account of or to be applied to the promotion of any political object whatever.

I would very greatly prefer, and think it would be better and more dignified, to take up the bill of the Judiciary Committee on this great question and let it be brought in and the reasons of that committee presented to the Senate, for its consideration and discussion take place and amendments be made to that bill on its own merits, rather than have it tacked on by way of amendment to this pending bill, where it can not receive that degree of attention that so great a subject ought to receive. But if the body of the Judiciary Committee bill is to be incorporated in this, then it seems to me you ought to take this fourth section, which certainly is as important as any other part of that bill. While I recognize the maxim of the law that that which is done by another is done by one's self, qui facit per alium facit per se, still I would suggest an amendment to that fourth section, after the word "Delegate," in line 5, to insert "or other person acting for such Senator, Member, or Delegate," and if it be in order I will move that section 4, amended as I have suggested, as an amendment to the pending amendment. Is that in order now?

The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. CAMERON, of Wisconsin, in the chair). Not now, because there is an amendment to an amendment already pending.

Mr. MAXEY. Then I give notice that at the proper time I shall offer that as an amendment. Still, I repeat what I said before, that I do it simply, if this is to be adopted as a part of this bill, but preferring very much that the whole Judiciary Committee bill should come up and stand on its own merits.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on the amendment of the Senator from Missouri. [Mr. VEST] to the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut [Mr. HAWLEY].

Mr. EDMUNDS. I should like to have the yeas and nays on that, if I do not take up any of my ten minutes in asking for them.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The yeas and nays are called for.

The yeas and nays were ordered.

Mr. WILLIAMS. I simply wish to say that without some amendment embracing the principle contained in the proposition of the Senator from Missouri our whole labor and work will have been lost upon this bill, for it will not be worth a thing without something of that sort in it. Why, sir, we have heard no complaint through the country that the clerks in the offices of the Government in Washington were not efficient, that they were not intelligent, that they were not capable of discharging their duties. Then why limit this bill merely to a competitive examination to test their capacity to discharge the duties imposed on them? The country does not know anything against their efficiency; the country has not complained of it; but the great thing the country has complained of is, that the power and patronage of the Executive of the nation have grown into monstrous proportions; that it has organized an immense army of more than 100,000 office-holders; that it has posted them in all the strongholds of power; that it has put them in citadels of strength in every village and town in the country and has used them to furnish the grease, or the soap you may call it, by which the machine is lubricated and run. It is these assessments of which the people have complained. I should like to know, if the office-holders are to be protected from the importunities and assessments of each other, why not protect them against the importunities of outsiders as well? May not an outsider of prominence and power, acting in conformity with the wishes of the chief office-holders of his party, "bulldoze" these clerks and employés as well as anybody else?

Sir, it is not alone the protection of the office-holder to which the country demands our attention. It is to protect the country itself against corrupt combinations, against the corrupt use of money, against the improper collection of money from the office-holders to be used at elections.

There is a wide difference between using money at the elections and using money to build churches, or to invest in ships, or in anything else, as some gentlemen have suggested. This very bill declares that the collecting and giving of money for political purposes is a misdemeanor. The bill itself and all the amendments make it unlawful. If it is unlawful to collect, is it not unlawful to give? Why is it unlawful? Because the general policy of the law is against the use of money at elections, and there is a privity between the Government and its own office-holders, which gives the Government a power over them which it has not over other people. I can not see any sanctity in a Government office to protect people therein from the intrusion of outsiders. It is as much a crime, it is as much an offense against the law, to solicit money upon the streets from an office-holder as it is to solicit it in a public building; it is as much against the policy of the law to give money to an outsider to be used at elections, and unless some principle of this sort goes into the bill I shall vote against it.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on the amendment of the Senator from Missouri [Mr. VEST] to the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut [Mr. HAWLEY], on which the yeas and nays have been ordered.

The Principal Legislative Clerk proceeded to call the roll.

Mr. BECK (when his name was called). I am paired upon all questions connected with this bill with the Senator from Maine [Mr. HALE]. I should vote "yea" if I were not so paired. I shall not announce my pair at each vote, because the Senator from Maine is absent from the city.

Mr. JACKSON (when the name of Mr. HARRIS was called). My colleague [Mr. HARRIS] is necessarily absent, and is paired on this bill and the amendments connected with it with the Senator from Kansas [Mr. INGALLS]. I make this announcement for the day.

Mr. MAXEY (when his name was called). I am paired with the Senator from Massachusetts [Mr. DAWES]. If he were present, I should vote on this amendment "yea."

Mr. WALKER (when his name was called). I am paired with the Senator from Iowa [Mr. McDILL]. If he were here, I should vote "yea."

Mr. WILLIAMS (when his name was called). On all party questions I am paired with the Senator from Nebraska [Mr. SAUNDERS]. As this question seems to have assumed that character this morning I shall not vote. If the Senator from Nebraska were here, I should vote "yea."

The roll-call was concluded.

Mr. CAMERON, of Pennsylvania. On this question I am paired with the Senator from South Carolina [Mr. BUTLER]. If he were here, I should vote "nay."

Mr. ROLLINS. The Senator from Nevada [Mr. FAIR] is paired with the Senator from Virginia [Mr. MAHONE] upon this question. The Senator from Virginia would vote "nay."

Mr. BLAIR. On this question I am paired with the Senator from Georgia, [Mr. BARROW].

Mr. CAMERON, of Pennsylvania. I understand that the Senator from South Carolina [Mr. BUTLER] would vote against the amendment if he were present. In that case I shall vote. I vote "nay."

The result was announced — yeas 18, nays 27; as follows:

YEAS — 18.
Brown,
Call,
Cockrell,
Coke,
Davis of W. Va.,
Garland,
George,
Gorman,
Groome,
Jackson,
Jonas,
McPherson,
Morgan,
Pendleton,
Slater,
Vance,
Vest,
Voorhees.

NAYS — 27.
Aldrich,
Allison,
Anthony,
Cameron of Pa.,
Cameron of Wis.,
Chilcott,
Conger,
Davis of Ill.,
Edmunds,
Frye,
Harrison,
Hawley,
Hill,
Hoar,
Jones of Nevada,
Kellogg,
Lapham,
Logan,
Miller of Cal.,
Miller of N.Y.,
Platt,
Plumb,
Rollins,
Sewell,
Sherman,
Van Wyck,
Windom.

ABSENT — 31.
Barrow,
Bayard,
Beck,
Blair,
Butler,
Camden,
Dawes,
Fair,
Farley,
Ferry,
Grover,
Hale,
Hampton,
Harris,
Ingalls,
Johnston,
Jones of Florida,
Lamar,
McDill,
McMillan,
Mahone,
Maxey,
Mitchell,
Morrill,
Pugh,
Ransom,
Saulsbury,
Saunders,
Sawyer,
Walker,
Williams.

So the amendment to the amendment was rejected.

Mr. GEORGE. At the end of the first section of the proposed amendment I move to add:

And no such officer or employé, except heads of Departments and such as are elected by the people or the Legislatures of the States, shall contribute either directly or indirectly anything of value for partisan purpose.

643

Mr. HAWLEY. I was about to raise the point of order that that is the same amendment already voted on. I do not know, however, but that there may be a shade of difference, but it is the principle precisely which has been twice voted down.

Mr. GEORGE. My amendment excepts heads of Departments und such officers as are elected by the people or the Legislatures of the States.

Mr. HAWLEY. Let us vote it down.

Mr. HOAR. Does the Senator from Mississippi mean to enact by law that no Government officer shall present one of his speeches to anybody else if he should think it of very great value?

Mr. GEORGE. I mean to prevent as far as I can the interference of Federal officials with elections.

While I am up I will take occasion to finish the sentence which I was attempting to finish when the hammer fell when I was up before. I meant then to say that the interference of Federal officials in elections has reversed the fundamental principle upon which our free institutions are based; that according to that principle the will and opinion of the people ought to control and direct and give color to the administration of the Government; but that by the recent practice of the Republican party, by the interference of Federal officials, by levying contributions, by the raising of money from officers and from those who are not officers, they undertake and have in a measure succeeded in controlling the vote, the will, and the opinion of the people. I desire, sir, to reverse that. I aim, sir, to have this Government, in all its measures, in all its politics, subservient to its masters, the people, and not a machine to control and even thwart that will. The nearer it reflects that will the more it will advance their interests and promote their welfare.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the amendment of the Senator from Mississippi [Mr. GEORGE] to the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut [Mr. HAWLEY].

Mr. ALLISON. I ask for the yeas and nays on the amendment to the amendment.

The yeas and nays were ordered, and the Principal Legislative Clerk proceeded to call the roll.

Mr. GARLAND (when his name was called). I am paired on this question with the Senator from Illinois [Mr. DAVIS], who is temporarily absent from the Chamber. If he were here, I should vote "yea."

Mr. MAXEY (when his name was called). I am paired with the Senator from Massachusetts [Mr. DAWES].

Mr. WALKER (when his name was called). I am paired with the Senator from Iowa [Mr. McDILL]; otherwise I should vote "yea."

The roll-call was concluded.

Mr. BLAIR. I am paired with the Senator from Georgia [Mr. BARROW]. If he were present, I should vote "nay."

Mr. DAVIS, of West Virginia. I am requested to announce the pair of my colleague [Mr. CAMDEN] with the Senator from Wisconsin [Mr. SAWYER]. I make that announcement for the day.

The result was announced — yeas 12, nays 28; as follows:

YEAS — 12.
Brown,
Call,
Coke,
George,
Gorman,
Jackson,
Jonas,
McPherson,
Slater,
Vance,
Vest,
Voorhees.

NAYS — 28.
Aldrich,
Allison,
Anthony,
Bayard,
Cameron of Pa.,
Cameron of Wis.,
Chilcott,
Conger,
Edmunds,
Frye,
Harrison,
Hawley,
Hill,
Hoar,
Jones of Nevada,
Kellogg,
Lapham,
Logan,
Miller of Cal.,
Miller of N.Y.,
Morgan,
Platt,
Plumb,
Rollins,
Sewell,
Sherman,
Van Wyck,
Windom.

ABSENT — 36.
Barrow,
Beck,
Blair,
Butler,
Camden,
Cockrell,
Davis of Ill.,
Davis of W. Va.,
Dawes,
Fair,
Farley,
Ferry,
Garland,
Groome,
Grover,
Hale,
Hampton,
Harris,
Ingalls,
Johnston,
Jones of Florida,
Lamar,
McDill,
McMillan,
Mahone,
Maxey,
Mitchell,
Merrill,
Pendleton,
Pugh,
Ransom,
Saulsbury,
Saunders,
Sawyer,
Walker,
Williams.

So the amendment to the amendment was rejected.

Mr. MAXEY. I move to add the following additional section to the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut:

SEC. —. That no officer, clerk, or other person in the service of the United States shall give or hand over to any other officer, clerk, or person in the service of the United States, or to any Senator or member of the House of Representatives, or Territorial Delegate, or other person acting for said Senator, member, or Delegate, any money or other valuable thing on account of, or to be applied to the promotion of any political object whatever.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the amendment of the Senator from Texas [Mr. MAXEY] to the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut [Mr. HAWLEY].

Mr. MAXEY. The purpose of the amendment to the amendment is a protection of the employés of the Government. If they are prohibited from paying out of their earnings to any Senator, Representative, or Territorial Delegate, or person acting for such, then we effectually put a stop to the political assessment business, so far, at least, as these Congressional committees are concerned. That is the object of my amendment.

Mr. ALLISON. May I call the attention of the Senator from Texas to line 8 of the first section of the amendment suggested by the Senator from Connecticut? It seems to me that what he proposes is fairly covered now.

Mr. MAXEY. I will say to the Senator from Iowa that I have compared, hastily I admit, the amendment offered by the Senator from Connecticut with t he bill of the Judiciary Committee. They are exactly in the same words, I think, down to section 4 of the hill, and station 4 is omitted entirely from the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut.

Mr. ALLISON. I understand that.

Mr. MAXEY. Why it was omitted I do not know.

Mr. ALLISON. I call the attention of the Senator to lines 7 and 8 of the first section of the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut which is that no such person "shall, directly or indirectly, solicit or receive." If nobody can receive I do not see how any one can give. If no officer can receive I do not see how any officer can give to another.

Mr. MAXEY. At all events the Judiciary Committee, which is a very good law committee, put it both ways to carry out its idea.

Mr. ALLISON. I appreciate the Senator's view.

Mr. MAXEY. What I want to get at is the political assessment committees.

Mr. ALLISON. I understand the Senator's view; he wants to go as far as possible; but I think it is fairly covered by the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut. That is all I want to say.

Mr. MAXEY. I submit it to the Senate. It will do no harm if it does no good.

Mr. McPHERSON. Let the amendment of the Senator from Texas be reported.

The Acting Secretary read the amendment to the amendment.

Mr. HAWLEY. There is a shade of difference. There is something of addition to the first section of the amendment that I offered in this amendment offered by the Senator from Texas. The section he offers is found in the bill reported by the Judiciary Committee on the 23d instant.

Mr. MAXEY. It is section 4 of that bill.

Mr. HAWLEY. That is substantially the bill I reported from the Committee on Civil Service and Retrenchment which I offered December 9 and reported December 11, but the Judiciary Committee added this section 4. I judge, indeed I know from one of them, that the purpose of it was to thereby incorporate the substance of the act of 1876, for I see that the Judiciary Committee reports another section repealing that act, so that the whole subject may be included in one enactment. Is that correct?

Mr. EDMUNDS. Yes, that is it; it is all brought together.

Mr. HAWLEY. The Senator from Vermont says I represent the view of the Judiciary Committee correctly in that I ought not to have spoken for them, but I did it for the sake of saving that I do not know that I have any objection to the amendment offered by the Senator from Texas.

Mr. MAXEY. I was aware that the last section of the bill reported from the Judiciary Committee proposes the, repeal of the act of 1876; but what I want to get at is what I regard as a very excellent section of the Judiciary Committee bill, to wit, section 4. It is a good section and I want to reach that. Then, as to a repeal of the act of 1876, it is a matter I care nothing about.

Mr. HAWLEY. This is substantially the act of 1876, and I have no objection to it.

Mr. MAXEY. I simply present, as far as I can, section 4 of the Judiciary Committee bill.

Mr. BAYARD. I suggest to the Senator from Texas whether the incorporation of the words "directly or indirectly" would not be better than the form he now employs?

Mr. MAXEY. The phraseology I used is "or other person acting for said Senator, Member, or Delegate," and it may be shortened by substituting the words directly or indirectly," as suggested by the Senator from Delaware. I accept that. I think that is a very good suggestion, and I accept the words.

Mr. BAYARD. I understand that the amendment of the Senator from Texas embodies part of a bill reported from the Judiciary Committee by the honorable chairman of that committee with my concurrence. If the intention is to make it rather more thorough, it seems to me that by prohibiting the action of a Senator or a Representative or a Delegate in Congress you do it more thoroughly by prohibiting him from doing this thing directly or indirectly, instead of using the language of the Senator from Texas in regard to the action of another. I merely desire to suggest that to him.

Mr. MAXEY. I accept that phraseology. It covers the same idea exactly.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The amendment to the amendment will be read as modified.

The ACTING SECRETARY. After the word "shall," in line 2 of the amendment to the amendment, it is proposed to insert "directly or indirectly;" and in line 5 to strike out the words, "or other person acting for said Senator, Member, or Delegate;" so as to read:

That no officer, clerk, or other person in the service of the United States shall, directly or indirectly, give or hand over to any other officer, clerk, or person in

644

the service of the United States, or to any Senator or Member of the House of Representatives, or Territorial Delegate, any money or other valuable thing on account of or to be applied to, the promotion of any political object whatever.

The amendment to the amendment was agreed to.

Mr. GEORGE. At the end of the first section of the proposed amendment I move to add:

Nor shall any such officer or employé, either directly or indirectly advise or be concerned in any disbursement or distribution of any money raised in violation of this section.

The amendment to the amendment was rejected.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question recurs on the amendment offered by the Senator from Connecticut [Mr. HAWLEY], as amended.

Mr. JONES, of Florida. I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. HAWLEY. Does not the Senator from Vermont wish to add a clause repealing section 6 of the act of 1870, as it is incorporated in the bill reported from the Committee on the Judiciary?

Mr. EDMUNDS. I do not wish to do so, because I will state, if I may interrupt my friend, that the Committee on the Judiciary in acting upon the resolutions that were sent to them thought it fit to report a complete bill upon the subject, as far as they could understand it, of political assessments. That is a separate thing from this civil-service bill critically considered. Of course it is a branch of the general regulation of the civil service. If the civil-service bill should pass the Senate, the Committee on the Judiciary would feel it to be its duty to endeavor to get the Senate to pass this separate bill besides, because, even if every clause of the bill we reported should be in the civil-service bill, that bill having other provisions might not pass the co-ordinate branch of the Legislature. We should therefore send it to them in a distinct shape, so that if we could not pass through both Houses the civil-service bill we could pass the political assessment bill and cut up by the roots the abuses that are now suppressed to exist. Therefore I do not mind about what is put into this bill on that point.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut [Mr. HAWLEY] as amended. The yeas and nays have been demanded by the Senator from Florida [Mr. JONES].

The yeas and nays were ordered.

Mr. COKE. Let the amendment be reported as amended.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The amendment of the Senator from Connecticut as amended will be read.

The ACTING SECRETARY. It is proposed to add the following additional sections to the bill:

SEC. 8. That no Senator, or Representative, or Territorial Delegate of the Congress, or Senator, Representative, or Delegate elect, or any officer or employé of either of said Houses and no executive, judicial, military, or naval officer of the United States, and no clerk or employé of any Department, branch , or bureau of the executive, judicial, or military or naval service of the United States, shall, directly or indirectly, solicit or receive, or be in any manner concerned in soliciting or receiving any assessment, subscription, or contribution for any political purpose whatever, from any officer, clerk, or employé of the United States, or any Department, branch, or bureau thereof, or from any person receiving any salary or compensation from moneys derived from the Treasury of the United States.

SEC. 9. That no person shall, in any room or building occupied in the discharge of official duties by any officer or employé of the United States mentioned in this act, or in any navy-yard, fort, or arsenal, solicit, in any manner whatever, or receive any contribution of money or any other thing of value for any political purpose whatever.

SEC. 10. No officer or employé of the United States mentioned in this act shall discharge, or promote, or degrade, or in any manner change the official rank or compensation of any other officer or employé, or promise or threaten so to do, for giving or withholding or neglecting to make any contribution of money or other valuable thing for any political purpose.

SEC. 11. That any person who shall be guilty of violating any provision of the foregoing sections shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, and shall, on conviction thereof, be punished by a fine not exceeding $5,000, or by imprisonment for u term not exceeding three years, or by such fine and imprisonment both, in the discretion of the court.

SEC. 12. That no officer, clerk, or other person in the service of the United States shall directly or indirectly give or hand over any other officer, clerk, or person in the service of the united States, or to any Senator or member of the House of Representatives or Territorial Delegate, any money or other valuable thing on account of or to be applied to the promotion of any political object whatever.

Mr. HAWLEY. I suppose the Senator from Texas intended his amendment to go before the penal clause and not after the section providing a penalty.

Mr. ALLISON. That ought to be changed.

Mr. MAXEY. Let it be transposed so as to come in before the last section of the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut, as it stands in the print.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. That transposition will be made.

Mr. GEORGE. In the first line of section 2 of the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut, after the word "shall," I move to insert "in the District of Columbia or;" so as to read:

That no person shall, in the District of Columbia or in any room or building occupied, &c.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on the amendment of the Senator from Mississippi to the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut as amended.

Mr. GEORGE. The object of that amendment is to extend the provisions of the section to all places over which Congress has exclusive jurisdiction. It was urged, in opposition to an amendment offered by the Senator from Florida that there was no constitutional power to put the prohibition in places outside the public buildings of the United States. Over the District of Columbia we have exclusive jurisdiction, I therefore offered the amendment with a view of including in the prohibition the whole of this District.

Mr. ALLISON. We have just as much jurisdiction over any other part of the country for this purpose as we have over the District of Columbia.

Mr. GEORGE. I think so, too, but that objection was made.

Mr. HAWLEY. I hope the amendment to the amendment will be voted down. We have discussed that question all the day.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on the amendment of the Senator from Mississippi [Mr. GEORGE] to the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut [Mr. HAWLEY].

Mr. GEORGE. I ask for the yeas and nays.

The yeas and nays were ordered.

Mr. JONES, of Florida. I wish to repeat what I said before in regard to this matter. Of course the amendment of the Senate from Mississippi is perfectly consistent with the theory of the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut, but I do not put the question of jurisdiction upon the ground that he does.

Mr. GEORGE. Will the Senator from Florida allow me to interrupt him?

Mr. JONES, of Florida. Certainly.

Mr. GEORGE. I believe our jurisdiction extends to all parts of the United States, but that argument against the Senator's view was made upon the other side of the Chamber, and seemed to have met with approbation over there, and in order to avoid the question of jurisdiction I have offered the amendment.

Mr. JONES, of Florida. As a friend of the bill I withdrew my amendment the other night. When I proposed to add the words "or elsewhere" to the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut, I had in mind the power of the Government to regulate this subject throughout the Union; but I found so much opposition to it from the other side of the Chamber that as a friend of the bill I did not desire to complicate its passage. Therefore, I withdrew it after discussing to my own satisfaction the question of jurisdiction involved in the amendment. I still believe, as I stated in the debate on Saturday night, that if we have any authority to legislate on this subject we derive it not from locality but from the power of the Government to regulate the subject as a Federal question, as stated by the Senator from Indiana [Mr. HARRISON], who spoke a while ago.

Mr. GEORGE. I agree entirely with the Senator from Florida.

Mr. JONES, of Florida. I withdrew my amendment, as a friend of the bill, because I did not want to complicate it, although it was founded much on the same reasons as those assigned by the Senator from Mississippi.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on the amendment of the Senator from Mississippi to the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut, on which the yeas and nays have been ordered.

The Principal Legislative Clerk proceeded to call the roll.

Mr. ROLLINS (when Mr. FAIR'S name was called). The Senator from Nevada [Mr. FAIR] is paired with the Senator from Virginia [Mr. MAHONE].

Mr. MAXEY (when his name was called), I am paired with the Senator from Massachusetts [Mr. DAWES].

Mr. WALKER (when his name was called). I am paired with the Senator from Iowa [Mr. McDILL].

The roll-call was concluded.

Mr. ROLLINS. The Senator from Kansas [Mr. INGALLS] is paired with the Senator from Tennessee [Mr. HARRIS]. The Senator from Kansas would vote "nay," and the Senator from Tennessee would vote "yea."

Mr. BLAIR. I am paired with the Senator from Georgia [Mr. BARROW]. If he were present, I should vote "nay."

The result was announced — yeas 19, nays 26; as follows:

YEAS — 19.
Brown,
Call,
Cockrell,
Coke,
Davis of W. Va.,
Garland,
George,
Groome,
Jackson,
Jonas,
Jones of Florida,
Lamar,
Morgan,
Pendleton,
Pugh,
Slater,
Vance,
Vest,
Voorhees.

NAYS — 26.
Aldrich,
Allison,
Anthony,
Cameron of Pa.,
Cameron of Wis.,
Conger,
Davis of Ill.,
Edmunds,
Frye,
Harrison,
Hawley,
Hoar,
Kellogg,
Lapham,
Logan,
Miller of Cal.,
Miller of N.Y.
Morrill,
Platt,
Plumb,
Rollins,
Sewell,
Sherman,
Van Wyck,
Windom.

ABSENT — 31.
Barrow,
Bayard,
Beck,
Blair,
Butler,
Camden,
Chilcott,
Dawes,
Fair,
Farley,
Ferry,
Gorman,
Grover,
Hale,
Hampton,
Harris,
Ingalls,
Johnston,
Jones of Nevada,
McDill,
McMillan,
McPherson,
Mahone,
Maxey,
Mitchell,
Ransom,
Saulsbury,
Saunders,
Sawyer,
Walker,
Williams.

So the amendment to the amendment was rejected.

645

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question recurs on agreeing to the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut [Mr. HAWLEY] as amended.

Mr. HAWLEY. There should be a verbal correction made in section 11, or the penal section, as I call it. It refers as it stands to the three previous sections; it should refer to the "four previous sections." This is a mere verbal correction, which I hope will be made. I wish to insert "four" before the word "foregoing."

The PRESIDING OFFICER. That correction will be made. The question recurs on the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut, on which the yeas and nays have been ordered.

The Principal Legislative Clerk proceeded to call the roll.

Mr. MAXEY (when his name was called). I ask the Senator from Massachusetts present [Mr. HOAR] if he knows how his colleague [Mr. DAWES] would vote on this amendment?

Mr. HOAR. I suppose he would vote "yea," I have no knowledge, except the general similarity of his views with those of others on both sides of the Chamber.

Mr. MAXEY. I should vote "yea" myself; but I do not know how he would vote.

Mr. HOAR. I think the Senator from Texas may safely regard his pair as not applying to this question.

Mr. MAXEY. I vote "yea," understanding from the Senator present that his colleague would vote the same way.

The roll-call was concluded.

Mr. ALLISON. My colleague [Mr. McDILL] is paired with the Senator from Arkansas [Mr. WALKER]. If my colleague were present, he would vote for this amendment.

The result was announced — yeas 50, nays 0; as follows:

YEAS — 50.
Aldrich,
Allison,
Anthony,
Bayard,
Brown,
Call,
Cameron of Pa.,
Cameron of Wis.,
Chilcott,
Cockrell,
Coke,
Conger,
Davis of Ill.,
Davis of W. Va.,
Edmunds,
Frye,
Garland,
George,
Gorman,
Groome,
Harrison,
Hawley,
Hill,
Hoar,
Jackson,
Jonas,
Jones of Florida,
Kellogg,
Lamar,
Lapham,
Logan,
McPherson,
Maxey,
Miller of Cal.,
Miller of N.Y.,
Morgan,
Morrill,
Pendleton,
Platt,
Plumb,
Pugh,
Rollins,
Sewell,
Sherman,
Slater,
Vance,
Van Wyck,
Vest,
Voorhees,
Windom.

NAYS — 0.

ABSENT — 26.
Barrow,
Beck,
Blair,
Butler,
Camden,
Dawes,
Fair,
Farley,
Ferry,
Grover,
Hale,
Hampton,
Harris,
Ingalls,
Jones of Nevada,
McDill,
McMillan,
Mahone,
Mitchell,
Ransom,
Saulsbury,
Saunders,
Sawyer,
Walker,
Williams.

So the amendment was amended was agreed to.

Mr. BLAIR. I move to add as an additional section to the bill the following:

SEC. —. That no person habitually using intoxicating beverages shall be appointed to, or retained in, any office, appointment, or employment to which the provisions of this act are applicable.

Mr. BROWN. Will the Senator allow me, before he makes his remarks, to offer an amendment to the amendment?

Mr. BLAIR. Certainly.

Mr. BROWN. I move, in the second line of the amendment which is offered by the Senator from New Hampshire, to insert after the word "beverages" the words "to excess;" so as to read:

That no person habitually using intoxicating beverages to excess shall be appointed to, or retained in, any office, &c.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on the amendment of the Senator from Georgia to the amendment of the Senator from New Hampshire? Is the Senate ready for the question?

Mr. BLAIR. Before the question is taken upon either the amendment or the proposed amendment to the amendment I wish to say a few words.

Of course the original language of the amendment itself implies all that is contained in the proposition of the Senate from Georgia. It is a prohibition of the employment or appointment in the service of the United States of any one to whose case the provisions of this act, if it should become a law would be applicable. The habitual rise of intoxicating liquors would probably be conceded to be the use of intoxicating liquors to excess, so that I hardly think the Senator's proposition improves or increases the force of the amendment as it now is.

This bill is one primarily having reference to the selection of candidates for office. It is an effort to introduce the method of appointment of those employed in the service of the Government the principle of competitive examination in contradistinction to the practices have heretofore obtained, either the direct voluntary appointment by the head of a Department, or by the President, or upon the recommendation of members of Congress, or by political control in whatever manner it may be exerted. But in the progress of the debate there have been various other provisions incorporated with the bill, so that the proportion which I make now does not seem to me to be any less relevant than some at least of those which have been received and incorporated into it, as for instance that relating to the residence of the appointee.

We have adopted a provision which distributes the appointees of the Government throughout all portions of the country among all the States and Territories alike upon the basis of population. That is a very substantial thing of itself to do. That is unphilosophical, and I think that it may be in itself wrong, because the appointments to national employment, it seems to me, if we are to obtain the best appointees, should be from the most intelligent, the most careful, the best qualified; and they may or they, may not all be found in any particular locality. The distribution which we have made of these appointees throughout all portions of the country compels, from a community of the same population which largely can not even read and write, the appointment of as many appointees of the Government in the civil service as may be taken from another State or locality where the grade of intelligence may be very much higher. We may suppose the case of a State with a population where 50 per cent are unable to read and write, and another State with a like population where the percentage of illiteracy is scarce any whatever, 4 or 5 per cent it may be, or as low as 3 per cent, as it is in some instances. Yet this bill gives to the illiterate States the same proportion of appointees in the civil service as to the more intelligent. This effort to distribute the employment of the employés of the Government upon a geographical basis necessarily is unphilosophical and must fail. So we have just incorporated in the bill provisions calculated to remove what I believe to be a great evil, that is, the matter of political assessments and the exertion of Senatorial and Representative influence in the appointment of those who are selected in the civil service.

It must be conceded that if the primary purpose of the bill is the improvement of the civil service, and we are to incorporate a variety of provisions in the bill looking to that end, the suggestion which I make in this proposition is as important to the country, is as well calculated to improve the civil service as a whole as any provision whatever contained in the bill.

There has been much discussion of the principles of Jefferson from time to time, and they have been alluded to in this debate; and he has been quoted as saying that capacity and integrity form the grand criterion for appointment to office and not political, sentiment or affiliations. That is true; but later in Jefferson's life, at the close of his administration, Mr. Jefferson announced another principle as still more important, I have his language here. I am not able to refer to the precise place in his works where it may be found, but I know it has been common stock in the temperance literature of the country for many years. At the close of his administration Mr. Jefferson wrote:

The habit of indulging in ardent spirits by men in office has occasioned more injury to the public than all other causes; and were I to commence my administration again with the experience I now have the first question I would ask respecting a candidate would be: Does he use ardent spirits?

That would be the first question propounded by Mr. Jefferson to-day were he the President of the United States or the head of one of the Departments, or in any position of authority making appointments in the civil service.

Of course in the limited time allowed me it is impossible to present this subject as it ought to be presented. I would say further that the Congress of the United States having, as I understand it, without an amendment of the Constitution little power to legislate on the general subject of the use or abuse of intoxicating liquors throughout the land, I think it is the duty of Congress when there comes an opportunity for us to say and establish in the statutes of the country anything which is for the encouragement of the cause of temperance, as it is called, and for the discouragement, the denationalization, the delegalization, and the destruction of the evils of intemperance, it should be so established. Here is an opportunity to say in an enactment of the United States a word which it is for the benefit of the civil service of the United States to say, and I think we shall fail in a high duty, however trivial the amendment may seem to some, if we fail affirmatively to put in this bill the provision which I offer in this amendment.

It is a matter of statistical truth that in this country the grand amount of production in the last year was about $7,000,000,000. Of that amount about $1,100,000,000 has been expended in the wages of laboring men. During the same period there has been consumed in this country the amount of $1,483,000,000 in what is neither more nor less than the patronage of the tippling-shop. To that extent have the wages and the productions of the American nation been absorbed and destroyed by this unnecessary and accursed habit. We only expend about $80,000,000 in this whole country in the cause of education, common school and all others combined, the higher and lower forms of education. We pay annually about $100,000,000 for the support of all religious institutions, churches, clergymen, and all manner of expenditure for the cause of religion, whether Catholic or Protestant. We pay about $750,000,000 directly over the counter for intoxicating drinks. The other amount, nearly $750,000,000, which makes up the $1,483,000,000 which I have specified, is chargeable to the extra expenditure made necessary in the administration of the criminal law for the

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protection of society, for the support of the idiotic, the insane, and other forms of direct expenditure resulting from the use of ardent spirits.

For the American people to keep sober three years, or two years and a half, would pay the balance of the national debt. Really the destruction of human life every year in this country as a result of the improper and unnecessary use of intoxicating liquor is as great as it was in any one year of the war. Year after year in the unnecessary use of intoxicating liquors in this country we are carrying a burden as great, as that of the war of the rebellion itself.

I think that I am justified in offering this proposition, and that the Congress will not be justified in its rejection.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator's time has expired. The question is on agreeing to the amendment of the Senator from Georgia [Mr. BROWN] to the amendment of the Senator from New Hampshire [Mr. BLAIR].

The amendment to the amendment was agreed to.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question recurs on the amendment of the Senator from New Hampshire [Mr. BLAIR] as amended.

Mr. CONGER. Let it be reported as amended.

The ACTING SECRETARY. It is proposed to add the following as section 13:

That no person habitually using intoxicating beverages to excess shall be appointed to or retained in any office, appointment, or employment to which the provisions of this act are applicable.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is the Senate ready for the question on agreeing to the amendment as amended? [Putting the question.] The ayes appear to have it.

Mr. PENDLETON. I call for the yeas and nays.

The yeas and nays were ordered.

Mr. EDMUNDS. I should vote for this examination with pleasure if it did not imply a negative of many other vices that men sometimes possess beside habits of intemperance, and which would seem to be excluded from the consideration of the examining boards by the adoption of this amendment. The bill, as it now stands, if I correctly understand it, requires this commission and the President, and the heads of Departments to examine into every quality that concerns the fitness of a candidate for the performance of his duties in a reputable way. If you put into the bill alone the provision that if the person is given to habits of excessive use of liquors he shall not be appointed, it raises the legal implication that if he be a thief, or an adulterer, or a robber, or a gambler, or a common scandal in a thousand ways to all mankind, they have no right to pass upon that.

The trouble about this matter is that you are raising a negative legal implication that being perfectly good in itself, and perfectly covered by the bill, in itself now, is to let everybody but the man who drinks to excess, come in. All the gang of plunderers, and thieves, and vagabonds are by this implication of law, as far as that goes, if they can pass the scholastic examination, to come in if only they are not given to habits of intoxication.

Habits of intoxication, of excessive drink, are, of course, a great vice and nuisance as everybody knows; but there are some other vices and nuisances that are just about, if not quite as bad; and to raise an implication in this bill that however wicked and evil a man may be who can pass a suitable examination if he does not drink to excess he shall come in and there is no right to exclude him for that cause, leads me to be obliged to vote against the amendment of my friend from New Hampshire, while as a proposition of itself if it were not already in the bill I would go for it with the greatest pleasure, as everybody else would.

Mr. PENDLETON. If I may be permitted, I withdraw the call for the yeas and nays upon the amendment.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The call for the yeas and nays is withdrawn if there is no objection. There being no objection, the call is withdrawn. The question is on agreeing to the amendment as amended.

Mr. MAXEY. I want to say before the vote is taken that the case as stated by the Senator from Vermont does not seem to me to be exactly right. A man could not be a thief without being a corrupt, dishonorable man. A man may be a thoroughly honorable man and drink whisky to excess. So I think there is a difference between the cases, and the amendment is a very good one.

Mr. BLAIR. Is it to be understood that under the arrangement made on Saturday it would be improper for me to offer a word in reply to the Senator from Vermont?

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Hampshire would be in order now, as he spoke upon the amendment offered by the Senator from Georgia. He has not spoken yet upon the amendment as amended.

Mr. BLAIR. I have no desire to precipitate a lengthy debate on this subject. I have only a word further to say.

The Senator from Texas has struck upon the natural and most obvious distinction between the proposition which I offer and the implications which have been alluded to by the Senator from Vermont. I believe that many of the best men living or who ever did live have been or are now addicted to the habitual use of intoxicating liquors to excess; but notwithstanding that fact this farther one is true, that in the civil service of the United States there are many good men who are incompetent to the discharge of their own duties and who by their influence seriously interfere with the discharge of duties on the part of others by reason of the excessive use of intoxicating drinks.

I do not think that in the Departments at Washington there is a larger proportion of men addicted to intoxication, nor as large, perhaps, as in the community generally; and yet heads of Departments and others not quite so high in official station have frequently assured me that one of the most serious difficulties which they had to contend with is this habit on the part of many of their best employés; that while to be sure they have the right of dismissal and they sometimes exercise it, it is an ungracious and unpleasant thing to do; that if there was something in the statutes of the land which was in itself a serious admonition to this class of Government employés it would have a very powerful tendency to restrain the habit on the part of those who are addicted to it. Outside of Washington, in the custom-houses and in the larger post-offices, it is a difficulty frequently complained of by those who have to administer the civil service that many of their employés are addicted to this bad habit, not always so far as the person himself is concerned immorally very bad habit; sometimes it is a disease, sometimes a thing for which the man in to be pitied rather than to be censured; it is a misfortune. Very often they say on account of the prevalence of this habit among that class of employés the civil service is very seriously injured.

It is impossible for us to ignore the fact that there is no subject upon which the American people are feeling any more sensitively or profoundly at present than this of the evils of the excessive use of intoxicating drink. It has come to be a political question. It is a dangerous one for any one of the great parties to deal with. I think that there is a practical alliance — that is my opinion — between those who take one view of this question and the Democratic party, and it is a question whether those who take the opposing view will organize an independent party or ally themselves as they have hitherto with the Republican party, or what they will do. But it is evident that that class of people, and as considerate a class, as conservative a class, as important a class as there is in the United States, and about as numerous a class, both North and South, and one that is to increase in numbers, is determined that this subject-matter of the evils of intoxicating drinks shall be dealt with, and it will be dealt with.

It has seemed to me that it would not only be wrong but impolitic even, if we are to appeal to the lower class of motives, for us, now that we have this opportunity, to fail to speak one word showing that the Congress of the United States, irrespective of party I hope, at least sympathizes with those who would destroy the destroyer of the American people.

Mr. EDMUNDS. I sympathize entirely with all that the Senator from New Hampshire has said, and my only reason for feeling obliged to vote against his amendment is the one that I stated before, that it raises a legal implication —

Mr. HOAR. I am very sorry to make the point, but I make it on my friend from Vermont, whom everybody would know I would not interfere with, whether he is entitled to speak.

Mr. EDMUNDS. I have not spoken any ten minutes yet.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Vermont has addressed the Senate once upon this amendment, and under the understanding which was entered into on Saturday the Chair supposes that he is not at liberty to address the Senate again.

Mr. EDMUNDS. Am I at liberty to address the Chair and move an amendment?

The PRESIDING OFFICER. An amendment would be in order.

Mr. EDMUNDS. Then I address the Chair, and move to amend the amendment of the Senator from New Hampshire by inserting, after the word "excess," the words "or guilty of any other evil habit," which I will ask the Chief Clerk to report; and then I believe I shall be entitled to the floor.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The amendment to the amendment will be reported.

The ACTING SECRETARY. After the word "excess" it is proposed to insert "or guilty of any other evil habit;" so as to read:

That no person habitually using intoxicating beverages to excess or guilty of any other evil habit, shall be appointed to or retained in any office, appointment, or employment to which the provisions of this act are applicable.

Mr. MORGAN. Would the Senator from Vermont object to having the word "stealing" inserted after the words "guilty of?"

Mr. EDMUNDS. First, I wish to know of my friend from Massachusetts whether I am to speak?

Mr. HOAR. Will the Senator from Vermont yield to me to appeal to him to let us take a vote on this matter without farther debate?

Mr. EDMUNDS. No. I wish to know whether I may speak now?

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Vermont is in order to address the Senate.

Mr. EDMUNDS. Mr. President, I have offered this amendment in order to relieve the amendment of the Senator from New Hampshire from the dear implication in point of law that it bore before, so as to invest the commissioners with the power of rejecting a person, not only on the ground of bad habits in regard to drinking but in regard to any other bad habit that is known among men as an evil and improper thing.

I think myself that the bill as it now stands covers all that; but on

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the assumption that it does not, as the amendment of the Senator from New Hampshire implies; it is necessary to add this provision in order to preserve the entire jurisdiction of the commission over the personal habits and conduct in every way, for good or evil, of the persons who come before them for places, and who might be able to pass the scholastic examination that is provided. That is all I have to say.

Mr. BLAIR. Of course it is an easy thing for an enemy to the proposition possessing the acuteness of the Senator from Vermont to belittle and to defeat the force and effect of the amendment by propositions of the kind he has now submitted; but he will hardly find that those whom he addresses, however dull they may be, will lack sufficient acuteness to see that his purpose is to destroy my proposition rather than to incorporate with it his own.

This proposition does not undertake any supervision of the personal habits of the employés of the Government or those who desire to be employed by the Government. It is simply a provision for the benefit of the public service, a condition which may be imposed upon those who ask for employment just as properly as that we may require that they be of a certain age, that they possess a certain degree of intellectual qualification, that they reside here or there, or are for any reason, on the whole, fit to be employed in the discharge of the civil service of the United States. We require, to be sure, a good moral character as a rule. That may include the habit of abstinence from the use of intoxicating drink to excess. There is nothing of that in the statutes, to be sure; but we could enact that an applicant for office should possess a good moral character. I have no objection to a thing of that kind being incorporated in this statute; but the purpose of this amendment to the amendment is not to secure the adoption of provisions of that description; it is simply to prevent the incorporation into this bill of the specific qualification which my amendment proposes.

Now, sir, whether that thing of itself is of sufficient importance to require the legislative mention is the question for the Senate. I think that it is. I think the condition of feeling and sentiment in this country is quite as strong upon this one thing as it is with reference to the levying of political assessments on office-holders, and the honorable Senator as chairman of the Committee on the Judiciary has spent a great deal of time and has very carefully elaborated a bill upon that subject. If that is wrong he might just as well suppose that the general sense of propriety on the part of Senators and Members and others concerned would restrain them from the commission of that crime or that evil as to suppose that any such general sentiment will prevent the appointment of men disqualified by reason of the excessive use of intoxicating liquors, because they will be, by existing provisions or an existing public sentiment, prevented from the appointment of men who are guilty of stealing, theft, murder, adultery, and so on. Now, here is this specific evil. Public sentiment is admitted to be strongly against it. I think it ought to be mentioned in this bill, and I hope that any such trivial method of its destruction will not be attempted, or, at all events, if attempted, will not be adopted by the Senate, as that suggested by the Senator from Vermont.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on the amendment of the Senator from Vermont [Mr. EDMUNDS] to the amendment of the Senator from New Hampshire [Mr. BLAIR].

Mr. EDMUNDS. Let us have the yeas and nays on that.

The yeas and nays were ordered.

Mr. MAXEY. The objection I have to the amendment of the Senator from Vermont is that it leaves to the board entire discretion of what is an evil habit. I have no doubt a board, might be gotten up who would take voting the Democratic ticket habitually to be a very evil habit. There is too much latitude. And I think probably the Senator from Vermont might think that would be an ample cause to reject a man as one having a very evil habit. The amendment is too broad.

Mr. JONES, of Florida. It seems to me the Senator from New Hampshire might very well afford to leave this matter to be regulated by the President and the board of commissioners, who are authorized by this bill to prescribe all necessary rules and regulations governing this subject. The bill, as we all know, never was intended to be a measure full of specific clauses covering every imaginable case that might arise under it; and inasmuch as we have decided to leave a number of questions to be prescribed by the rules authorized to be made by the President and the commission, it seems to me we can very well afford to remit this to that jurisdiction.

Mr. BLAIR. I should like to remind the Senator that we have already incorporated in this bill a great deal of matter which does not have any bearing whatever upon the performance of duties by the commissioners to which he alludes.

Mr. EDMUNDS. Is that in order?

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair thinks not.

Mr. JONES, of Florida. Is that any reason why we should add to it?

Mr. BLAIR. I think it is.

Mr. JONES, of Florida. I think myself a great many things have been put in the bill that have no proper place there, and I am not in favor of increasing the evil; I would rather diminish it.

Mr. BLAIR. Will the Senator allow me to ask him if he designs to be understood that those provisions incorporated in the bill for which he has voted are evils? Are they not, on the contrary, good provisions, although somewhat different in their nature from the original design of the bill which is to bear directly on the manner of selection of those who are employed?

Mr. JONES, of Florida. Not evil in themselves.

Mr. BLAIR. Not evils, but good things; and the Senate has voted them in the bill. If this is an evil, vote it out; if it is a good thing, let us have some more of it.

Mr. JONES, of Florida. Then let us regulate the whole subject here and not undertake to give to the President and the commission any authority whatever. If we are to prescribe all the qualifications that shall be in existence in a person, why not dispense with these rules and these regulations altogether? What are you going to leave to the commission and to the President to do? It is a very difficult matter to begin with, as we all know, to undertake to intrude upon the executive power. This bill has been very delicately drafted, recognizing that difficulty; hence I have been in favor from the beginning of taking it as it came from the committee rather than to obstruct it and render its passage difficult by putting into it amendments which ought not to be there.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on the amendment of the Senator from Vermont [Mr. EDMUNDS] to the amendment of the Senator from New Hampshire [Mr. BLAIR], on which the yeas and nays were ordered.

The yeas and nays were taken.

Mr. WALKER. I am paired with the Senator from Iowa [Mr. McDILL]. If he were here, I should vote "yea."

The result was announced — yeas 32, nays 16; as follows:

YEAS — 32.
Allison,
Anthony,
Bayard,
Brown,
Call,
Cameron of Pa.,
Cameron of Wis.,
Cockrell,
Coke,
Conger,
Davis of Ill.,
Davis of W. Va.,
Edmunds,
Garland,
Gorman,
Groome,
Hawley,
Hill,
Jackson,
Jonas,
Jones of Florida,
Kellogg,
Lapham,
Logan,
McPherson,
Morgan,
Pendleton,
Pugh,
Slater,
Vance,
Vest,
Voorhees.

NAYS — 16.
Blair,
Chilcott,
Frye,
George,
Harrison,
Hoar,
Jones of Nevada,
Miller of Cal.,
Miller of N.Y.,
Morrill,
Platt,
Plumb,
Rollins,
Sewell,
Sherman,
Windom.

ABSENT — 28.
Aldrich,
Harrow,
Beck,
Butler,
Camden,
Dawes,
Fair,
Farley,
Ferry,
Grover,
Hale,
Hampton,
Harris,
Ingalls,
Johnson,
Lamar,
McDill,
McMillan,
Mahone,
Maxey,
Mitchell,
Ransom,
Saulsbury,
Saunders,
Sawyer,
Van Wyck,
Walker,
Williams.

So the amendment to the amendment was agreed to.

Mr. HAWLEY. I changed my vote from "nay" to "yea" before the result was announced for the purpose of doing what I am about to do. I move a reconsideration of the vote last taken, and on that motion I will say a very few words. I do it in the general interest of the hill, in my opinion.

I should not perhaps have offered the original proposition of the Senator from New Hampshire because I should have considered it the ordinary and obvious duty of any administrators of this law to discharge any man guilty of habitual intoxication. I should have supposed it to be one of the common rules of good administration. But if you stop and think upon it there is really some force in the Senator's argument that that particular vice stands upon somewhat different ground from the ordinary range of crimes or moral offenses, because as suggested by the Senator from Texas a man may be a man of entire honor as understood among men, and yet sometimes may be guilty of intoxication or fall habitually into that habit in general, and we do know as a matter of fact that the public service has been more or less afflicted with intemperance, &c., in such a way that often there has been an endurance of the offender and an undue tolerance given to him. We have heard it argued again and again in the Senate that there was too much of this in the Army and in the Navy, for example; that the regulations were not strict enough, or that they were not fully and rigidly enforced. The proposition having been made by the Senator from New Hampshire, I think it should be fairly and respectfully treated, and I see no way but to adopt it. I might of course suggest, as the Senator from Vermont does, that you should go through the whole catalogue of offenses and habits that disqualify a man from public service, but I acknowledge and I now insist that there is a reason for singling this out.

The amendment just adopted says, "guilty of any other evil habit," or words to that effect. The adoption of that would compel me to vote against the whole. I do not say it was the object of the Senator from Vermont to put this in such shape that the Senate would be obliged to reject it, but I think I might be justified in inferring that from his remarks. I think it would be the next thing to a ridiculous provision in law to say that any man guilty of a bad habit shall not be admitted into the public service; it is one of those general propositions that it is safe to make, but there is nothing like it to my knowledge in the statute-book anywhere.

I move to reconsider because I hope the Senate will strike out that

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clause and take the amendment of the Senator from New Hampshire as amended by the Senator from Georgia, that any person guilty of drinking habitually to excess shall not be admitted into the service.

Mr. EDMUNDS. Mr. President, I wish to state to the Senator from Connecticut and the Senator from New Hampshire that I did not move this amendment for the purpose either of defeating the amendment of the Senator from New Hampshire or of making the thing ridiculous. If I possessed the acuteness or intellect of these two distinguished Senators, perhaps I might have seen some such bugbear in it, but I did not and I moved it in perfect good faith in order not to handicap these commissioners in the doing of their duty by making a statutory exclusion of one thing which implied a withdrawal of their jurisdiction as to every other thing of a similar evil nature that affects the public service. I am sorry that my mind is not acute enough —

Mr. BLAIR. The Senator will permit me?

Mr. EDMUNDS. Yes.

Mr. BLAIR. The Senator is entirely wide of the purport of the amendment. He speaks of it as applicable to the commissioners in the discharge of their duties. It has no reference to them. It has reference to the actual employment, with which they have nothing whatever to do only to ascertain, the intellectual qualifications of the applicant, as I understand.

Mr. EDMUNDS. I bow my head with great respect to the opinion of the Senator from New Hampshire as to the scope of this bill. I had the impression that it was one of the chief missions of these commissioners not only to examine upon a series of questions candidates, but to determine, whether they were fit and worthy people to be employed in the public service.

Mr. BLAIR. Mr. President —

Mr. EDMUNDS. If the Senator will pardon me long enough to state one thing before he takes up my time, as the Senator from Massachusetts called me to order for speaking out of it, I will proceed to say that if there is any one thing in this bill which I have misunderstood it is what the Senator from New Hampshire now imputes to it, that this commission, a civil-service commission that is to be the strainer through which people are to enter the public service, is confined entirely and exclusively to arithmetic and grammar and geography and all the other subjects of scholastic information that people are to be examined about and nothing else. If that is the bill, I confess I am greatly mistaken in the scope of this bill. I thought that this commission really meant something and was intended to mean something; and if the Senators will pardon me for reciprocating their good opinion about my views and motives, if that be the construction of it which they impute to it, I should say that they did not intend to make it a sham but they have made it such, and that the mission of this great commission appointed by the President and the Senate was solely as a board of school-masters to find out whether they could add up a sum in common arithmetic and could do vulgar fractions and so on and so on. I do not impute any such thing to my friends. They do not mean that, and the bill does not mean it. There is to be a test of fitness for the public service in all respects; not grammar, not arithmetic, not any one of the scholastic operations as such alone, but everything that enters into the fitness of a person to be employed in the public service.

Now, the Senator from New Hampshire comes with an amendment and says a man shall not, be admitted if he in guilty of an excessive use of intoxicating liquors. That is very good; it was all in the bill before; but being put in as an addition, it appeared to me clear that it would imply that if he had that quality and the scholastic qualities, he might be a notorious gambler — which I will take for my only illustration — and yet he is to come in; that does not count against him at all; and yet we know by the history of this Government that as bad as the evil of intoxication or an excessive use of liquor inside of the limit of intoxication is, more public money has been lost, more families have been ruined and made wretched by public officers, who never drank a drop in their lives, being tempted into the gambling shops of this town, and other places wherever they are stationed in the army and elsewhere all over the country, than by all the intoxicating liquor they ever drank in the whole course of their existence. That is the fact. I remember one or two instances in this town of people whose habits in respect to the use of liquor were as correct as those of my friend from New Hampshire or Connecticut, who have lost hundreds of thousands of dollars to the United States by gambling, whose families have been made wretched and are still wretched on account of defalcations occasioned in that way.

What I wished sincerely to get at was not to leave this bill in a shape that one sole and exclusive test should be applied as it regards the habits and conduct of the candidate, but that all tests should be applied. That was all; and that is all my proposition is. I do not think either is necessary. I would not vote for any commissioner who I believed would undertake the appointment of a candidate, who had passed ever so good an examination, who was addicted to the excessive use of intoxicating liquors. As it now stands, neither would I vote for the appointment of a commission who would let in a man, who had never seen or tasted a drop of anything of that kind in his life who was addicted to the evil habit of gambling in the 10,000 gambling shops that there are in this town, and that can be set up much easier than a whisky shop, because the material is easier far to be had and more easily concealed in all the frontier posts of the Army and of the civil service on the exterior, and on the interior too, for that matter, of the United States.

There is the difficulty, and that is what I wish to reach. I think the bill reaches it without either of these amendments; but if you are to have one you had better have both, in order that this commission may have a complete jurisdiction of the personal conduct and habits of the candidate, in order that he may be fit in all respects for the performance of his public duties.

Mr. BLAIR. Mr. President —

Mr. EDMUNDS. You have said your say.

Mr. BLAIR. I know. Perhaps the Senator would be glad to exclude me from the utterance of a word when he is the champion of free speech.

Mr. EDMUNDS. I would not. I was called to order myself because I spoke more than once.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Hampshire, the Chair is sorry to say, is not in order.

Mr. EDMUNDS. I do not make the point.

Mr. BLAIR. I am aware that I am not in order in rising to speak further; but I desired to place myself right in reference to the amendment by asking a question during the remarks of the Senator from Vermont, and he declined to yield, and now I should be glad with the indulgence of the Senate to say that this amendment applies not simply to those who are to be appointed, but to those who are already in office, and says that they shall not be retained in office if they have this habit. It applies to both classes. With regard to the scope of the commission nobody has said in stronger terms than the Senator from Vermont, I think, that this commission was simply advisory; that the power of appointment, which is all that is mentioned in this amendment, is still vested in the President or in the heads of Departments. So I think I was justified in suggesting that he did not quite comprehend the scope of the amendment.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on the motion made by the Senator from Connecticut [Mr. HAWLEY] to reconsider the vote by which the amendment offered by the Senator from Vermont to the amendment of the Senator from New Hampshire was agreed to.

The motion was not agreed to, there being on a division — ayes 14, noes 25.

Mr. SHERMAN. Mr. President, the evil of intemperance in a man holding a public office is so common and so great that I was disposed and am disposed to vote for the proposition of the Senator from New Hampshire. There are a great many other evils which ought to exclude any man from public office or from private companionship; but it follows as a matter of course in the opinion of all mankind that when a man is a thief or a gambler — and I think a gambler is the most dangerous of all, and no man can be trusted with money either of his own or other people's who gambles — these things undoubtedly ought to exclude men from public office. The vice of intemperance in this country is one so prevalent not only in private life but in public life that I should be glad to vote for a general proposition and place it upon the statute-book that any man who is habitually intoxicated or drinks to excess shall be excluded from appointment, and still more that all the officers of the Government should distinctly understand that when a man is habitually intoxicated in the discharge of a public duty he should be promptly discharged by the head of his Department. Nothing in so unpleasant as to perform the duty of removing a man for intemperance, because intemperance is a vice which, though very common, sometimes falls upon those most distinguished for merit, sometimes upon men the most competent. It is important to restrain men who are unfortunately addicted to a vice that they cannot resist. It is often important to restrain them by a distinct intimation that any violation of this law shall be followed by prompt discharge. As an executive officer I was myself often placed in that position where with extreme reluctance I was compelled by my sense of public duty to remove a man for intemperance, sometimes men of the highest qualifications, of the keenest wit and ability and intelligence, who were guilty of this offense, there being no statutory provision pointing out the necessity of removing and it resting simply upon the inconvenience to the public Service. Now, especially in the Departments, it seems to me that the invitation ought to be made by law to the heads of Departments to justify them promptly in removing a man habitually intoxicated. Many cases of that kind occur, especially in the Army and Navy.

Mr. LOGAN. This does not apply to the Army and Navy.

Mr. SHERMAN. I know it does not, but it applies to all civil offices embraced in this bill. I would vote for the same law in respect to officers of the Army and Navy.

Mr. LOGAN. That is the law as to them.

Mr. SHERMAN. They can only be court-martialed for the offense; and experience shows that the officers sitting on court-martial in cases of intemperance very rarely pronounce against their fellow-officers unless it is a case of extreme and outrageous intemperance, where a man lowers himself so much as to fall within the charge of being guilty of conduct unbecoming an officer and a gentleman.

Mr. LOGAN. How can you make the law stronger?

Mr. SHERMAN. I do not say anything about the law in reference to the Army. I only illustrated my argument by showing that this evil

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exists not only in the civil service but in all branches of the public service, especially in the Army and Navy.

Mr. EDMUNDS. And the Senator will allow me to say that to our great shame — I say that with respect to everybody here — when Army officers have been dismissed the Senate has authorized the President over and over again to restore them against all I could do.

Mr. SHERMAN. That may be so, and it is so. There is a sympathy for these officers even among their fellow-officers. It is first difficult to convict them. Then the President in many cases is appealed to by the friends of the officer. He sometimes refuses to remit the punishment of the offense, and after that the Senate, sympathizing more or less with the officers concerned, has sometimes actually passed bills for the purpose of restoring them to the Army.

Notwithstanding the amendment of the Senator from Vermont, I think it would be well enough to put the provision, including his amendment, as that has been adopted by a majority of the Senate, on this bill; and I do not agree with the Senator from Connecticut that because of this amendment the whole provision should be excluded. There is nothing in the bill which points to an examination of a man's character. It is not to be involved in the general language of the bill. I have looked at it very closely.

The examination is a competitive examination. That competitive examination implies a competition as to skill, not as to habits, moral habits or habits of intemperance or the like, but fitness for the position, ability to perform the clerical duties imposed. It seems to me the value of this provision is that it will encourage executive officers in removing men who are plainly guilty of habitual intemperance. As a matter of course I would make the language pretty strict. I would not allow any man to be removed merely because he had fallen upon a single occasion, or on one or two occasions because of his social habits, or at his own fireside at home; but where a man habitually, in the language of this amendment, drinks to excess, is intoxicated habitually, or uses intoxicating beverages constantly, it seems to me it ought to be put on the statute-book that that man forfeits his office, so that when he comes before the head of the Department, or the President, to appeal to him to forgive this degradation, the President, or the head of the Department may say "No; the law declares that a person who is habitually in the use of intoxicating liquors shall no longer retain his place in the public service"

I therefore feel inclined and shall vote for this amendment, though I would have preferred that the amendment of the Senator from Vermont had been omitted; but since it has been adopted it makes it no worse, it only includes causes that any head of Department would remove a person for. I take it any head of a Department, especially of the Treasury Department where money is involved, would remove any man for gambling and for many other vices that need not to named; but this is an injunction on the head of a Department to exercise the power of removal in case a man is habitually drunk or is guilty of any of those vices which are recognized among all mankind as vices to be condemned. It is an injunction that he should exercise the power given him by law to remove the offender from office.

Mr. HARRISON. I want to suggest that it seems to me the language of the amendment of the Senator from Vermont which has been adopted by the Senate is not sufficiently clear, and I make that criticism with the greatest deference to one who is so characteristically clear in all that he says. He uses the words "evil" and "evil habits." I suggest that he change that word "evil" to "immoral." I think there are a great many habits which are evil that are very far short of being immoral. I think the language as used there would include many such habits. There is the habit of using tobacco, which I think many of its votaries would say was an evil habit. Either the word "criminal" or the word "immoral" should be used. If that word were substituted I think the amendment would secure the approbation of the Senate.

Mr. EDMUNDS. If I may say a word with the permission of the Senators from New Hampshire and Massachusetts, I am perfectly willing to consent to insert immoral "instead of "evil," as it may be a better word. I moved the amendment on the spur of the moment to guard the bill against a misconstruction that might to put upon it afterward.

Mr. LOGAN. I would like to make a suggestion to see whether or not the word "evil" is not equally as good as the word "immoral." There are habits that are not criminal and might not be considered immoral that I look upon as being almost as detrimental to the public service as those which have been mentioned. For instance I can give one: suppose a clerk or any employé of the Government is in the habit of borrowing money from his fellows all the time and never repaying it, which has occurred very frequently, and men have been tried and discharged from the Army for that evil habit., I think it is one for which a man should be discharged from the public service. I think the word "evil" covers that, and the other words would not. If I were at the head of a Department and one of my employés was in the habit of obtaining money, from his fellows wherever he could and not repaying, I would remove him from office for that evil habit. It is an evil habit, and one which is very common in Washington city.

If I agree with the Senator from New Hampshire that where an employé of the Government is in the habit of drinking intoxicating liquors to excess he ought not to be in the service, that he ought not to be retained in the service, at the same time it seems to me when you put that one proposition in this bill you exclude all the others.

Mr. HARRISON. Does not the Senator from Illinois think that the course of conduct which he has described would be fairly covered by the use of the word "immoral?" I think it would.

Mr. LOGAN. I think that it would under certain construction. I would construe it so, but other persons might not. I would consider it dishonest, and therefore immoral; yet at the same time it might be construed otherwise. Some persons might say, "Well, he can not pay because he is not able to pay; he intends to; he is not dishonest in reference to the matter; he does not intend to act dishonestly, but he can not pay;" and therefore it would not be immoral, taking that view of it.

Mr. HARRISON. Would not those same pretensions establish that it was not an evil habit?

Mr. LOGAN. I do not think so. There is a very great distinction between the word "evil" and "immoral," so far as the performance of duty is concerned. I might consider it immoral and somebody else might consider it not immoral, because it is not considered immoral generally for a man to become indebted to an extent that he can not pay. Thousands of men who are considered good men are in that condition and we pass bankrupt laws to relieve them, not on the ground that it is immoral, to contract debts which can not be paid, but because it is impossible for them to pay. Your bankrupt law is passed not because it is an immoral act for a man to become indebted but because you want to relieve him and give him an opportunity again to go into business. So I do not agree with the Senator from Indiana.

The PRESIDING OFFICER: The question is on the amendment of the Senator from New Hampshire [Mr. BLAIR] as amended.

Mr. HOAR. What became of the motion to reconsider?

The PRESIDING OFFICER. That was voted down.

Mr. EDMUNDS. In order to accommodate the views of my friend from Indiana [Mr. HARRISON] I will ask unanimous consent to have the amendment adopted by the Senate, modified by striking out the word "evil" and inserting the word "immoral," if that will satisfy and accommodate his views.

Mr. HARRISON. I think that will meet the case.

Mr. EDMUNDS. I think it means the same thing, but I am quite willing to agree to it.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection? The Chair hears none; and that amendment will be made. The question is on the amendment as amended.

The amendment as amended was agreed to.

Mr. PLUMB. I move to add as an additional section to the bill:

SEC. —. That whenever there are already two or more members of a family in the public service in the grades covered by this act, no other member of such family shall be eligible to appointment to any of said grades.

Mr. LOGAN. "Two or more." If the whole family is in, there will be nobody else to apply. [Laughter] I think if you would leave it "two," without the "or more," it would be all right.

Mr. PLUMB. I know there are many cases where there are more than two of one family in office.

Mr. LOGAN. And the family not exhausted? [Laughter.]

Mr. PLUMB. No, not exhausted.

Mr. HOAR. What does the Senator mean by "family?"

Mr. PLUMB. In regard to that, I supposed some one would ask that question, and I will respond to it by saying that I want something for these commissioners to do and I want them to settle that. I want to strike at a prevalent evil of persons, coming here to Washington or living elsewhere, bringing up their children and by arts and appliances of various kinds getting the whole of them in the public service. My attention was called to this practice some time ago, and I have some information on the subject which I shall not detain the Senate by exhibiting now. There are already a very large number of cases where from five to fifteen members of the same family are in the public service. It always happens very singularly that they are persons related to other persons who are very high in the public service and consequently have the power to get members of their family into the service.

Mr. PLUMB. I think it will be very rarely found that many soldiers of one family ever got into the service.

Mr. HOAR. I spoke of the widows and orphans of soldiers.

Mr. PLUMB. I think there are but very few cases of that kind. They are not the people who get in generally.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on the amendment of the Senator from Kansas [Mr. PLUMB].

The amendment was agreed to.

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Mr. PLUMB. I offer the following as an additional section:

That all persons appointed as the result of the examination herein provided for shall hold office six years, unless sooner removed for cause, and at the expiration of said period may be reappointed to the same grade or office without re-examination; but no person shall be permitted to remain in the service more than twelve years, and shall be ineligible to reappointment to any of the grades for which examination is herein provided after much service.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on the amendment of the Senator from Kansas [Mr. PLUMB].

The question being put, it was declared that the noes appeared to prevail.

Mr. PLUMB. I should like to have the yeas and nays.

The yeas and nays were not ordered.

Mr. PLUMB. I give notice I will offer the amendment in the Senate.

The amendment was rejected.

Mr. GEORGE. I offer the following amendment to be added at the end of section 9 of the bill, which is section 2 of the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut [Mr. HAWLEY]:

Provided, That the sending by mail or otherwise to any such officer or employé of any letter or note, whether written or printed, containing such solicitation, or the receiving by mail from any such officer or employé of any such contribution, shall he held to be a solicitation or reception prohibited by this section.

Mr. EDMUNDS. Read the text, so that we shall see where it comes in and how it all reads.

The Acting Secretary read as follows:

Sec. 9. That no person shall, in any room or building occupied in the discharge of official duties by any officer or employé of the United States mentioned in this act, or in any navy-yard, fort, or arsenal, solicit, in any manner whatever, or receive any contribution or money or any other thing of value for any political purpose whatever: Provided, That the sending by mail or otherwise to any such officer or employé of any letter or note, whether written or printed, &c.

Mr. GEORGE. I think that amendment ought to commend itself to the friends of the bill. It is intended to prevent any evasion of the provisions of the ninth section by sending to the party at his residence or post-office letters or notes asking for contributions. I think that necessary in order to make the section effective.

Mr. ANTHONY. Then if you want to get a man out of office all you have to do is to send him a letter of tins kind, and if he takes it out he has committed an offense. I think the amendment is absurd.

Mr. GEORGE. No; the offense is when he responds by a contribution.

Mr. ANTHONY. The amendment says "receiving such letter." A letter comes to the post-office and a man takes it out.

Mr. GEORGE. Let it be again read.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The amendment will be again read.

The Acting Secretary read the amendment of Mr. GEORGE.

Mr. LOGAN. If the Senator himself should receive a letter from an employé of the Government with a $10 bill in it, stating that he wanted it to be used for political purposes, under that pro vision the Senator himself, without having any complicity with this party, would be subject to fine and imprisonment.

Mr. GEORGE. It takes two parties to a receiving. There must be a giver and there must be a receiver. The amendment does not prohibit the receiving of letters; it prohibits the receiving of contributions. If a contribution should be sent to me as suggested by the Senator from Illinois, and I should decline to take it, I would not be within the provision of the amendment. It is only when I take it, when I accept it, when I become a party to the illegality by using it or appropriating it, that I become a participant. The amendment, as I remarked, does not apply to the reception of a letter, but the reception of the contribution as a contribution.

Mr. ANTHONY. If a clerk receives a letter with a Contribution in it he receives the contribution, and if he takes it out of the office and opens it he revives it.

Mr. GEORGE. You can not make a man receive anything.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair will call the attention of the Senator from Mississippi to the fact that he has already addressed the Senate twice on this amendment.

Mr. HAWLEY. I am not given to quotations from the Latin, but "Timco Danaos et dona ferentes." I am very much afraid of the men who do not like the bill, and I say so sincerely. I do not know whether the Senator is in favor of it or not; but I mean by that remark that I consider his amendment inimical to the general purpose of the bill. We have discussed over and over again by the day the relations of persons not in office in the Government to this whole subject; and the amendment punishes by a fine of $5,000 and imprisonment for three years a citizen of the United States who happens to send, or if you choose purposely sends a paper addressed to Republicans or Democrats in general soliciting contributions for carrying on the campaign. I say that that act on the part of a citizen of the United States not in office is not an offense, political or otherwise, for it brings no compulsion on the clerk. It is an act absolutely honest in itself, not a malum in se and should not be made a malum prohibitum. There is no wrong in it. There may be high moral merit in it, for the cause may be such as induces a citizen in his belief to exert every positive exertion in behalf of it. He has a right to ask everybody — he has a right to ask the Government employé. What we do object to and have been trying to prevent absolutely in that a man in the employ of the Government who can oppress that employé shall ask him for money or have anything to do with his giving it. My criticism has already been made here that it is quite ridiculous to say that a man in the service who happens to receive a thing of that sort shall be punished.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on the amendment offered by the Senator from Mississippi [Mr. GEORGE].

Mr. PLUMB. I move to amend the amendment by striking out so much as relates to the receiving of letters or contributions.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Kansas moves to amend the amendment of the Senator from Mississippi. The amendment to the amendment will be read.

Mr. LOGAN. How will it read then?

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Secretary will report it.

The ACTING SECRETARY. It is proposed to strike out "or the receiving by mail from any such officer or employé of any such contribution," and in the last line, to strike out the words "or reception;" so as to make the amendment read:

Provided, That the sending by mail or otherwise to any such officer or employé of any letter or note, whether written or printed, containing such solicitation shall be held to be a solicitation prohibited by this section.

Mr. LOGAN. Then there would be no sense in it at all. There was very little originally, but there would be none in it then. Any letter containing such solicitation is solicitation!

Mr. FRYE. Why not vote it down?

Mr. LOGAN. That is the easiest way to do it.

Mr. PLUMB. If there are not two offenses described by the amendment, I do not understand the force of the language at all. I propose to eliminate one of them out of it if I can; and if the Senator from Illinois is very much concerned about the manner in which the amendment is left after that, he has the opportunity to amend it and make it so that it will conform to what he regards as sensible.

Mr. LOGAN. I am not concerned about it; but I will say to the Senator from Kansas that this solicitation does not affect me. I have not been a contributor to political campaigns for several years, and I have notified all clerks who did ask me not to pay a cent. So you can not lay it to my door. Not only that, but inasmuch as the Senator has mentioned that point I will say that while Senators a few days ago were talking about the new reform, though I do not claim to be a reformer, I sent for a Journal, and I have it here, showing that in 1868, in the House of Representatives, I introduced a bill almost exactly like the bill now before the Senate. This Journal before me shows it.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on the amendment of the Senator from Kansas [Mr. PLUMB] to the amendment of the Senator from Mississippi [Mr. GEORGE].

The amendment to the amendment was rejected.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question recurs on the amendment of the Senator from Mississippi [Mr. GEORGE].

The amendment was rejected.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. If there be no further amendment the bill will be reported to the Senate.

Mr. BROWN. I gave notice the other day that I desired to offer another amendment, which I propose to read and submit a few remarks upon before the bill is reported to the Senate. As I have stated my views on more than one occasion upon the floor, I do not wish now to go over the same ground that I have already occupied.

Congress can pass no law for the reformation of the civil service that will amount to anything unless it meets with popular approval, and you can pass no law that will meet the popular approval of the people of the United States until you pass one that is founded on principles of equity and justice as between the different classes of people and the different parties in the United States. If you intend to pass a civil-service bill, you can not do it when either political party has the control of all the offices and employments of the Government, unless you make some provision for the party that has none of them to receive something like an equal share before you put the bill into operation as non-partisan in its character. If the bill is passed now as it is before the Senate this will not be true. It is a well-known fact, as I have states heretofore, that the Republican party of the United States, as has been shown by the last two elections for President, does not contain a majority of the voters of the United States; that the Democratic party and the Greenback party and other parties taken together have two or three hundred thousand more voters than the Republican party. The Republican party has now almost all the offices and fills almost all the employments of the Government. Now, presenting it to a plain, common-sense man, no matter what party he belongs to, if his disposition is to deal justly, he will tell you there is an inequality in that; that as the majority bear their part of the burdens, that is not right; that there ought to be something done to equalize things better in putting a system of this sort into effect. That is what I am now trying to do and what I propose by this amendment.

I see no other way to do it except to make it the duty of this commission and the board of examiners to have some regard to the political position of the applicant until there is something in the nature of an approximation to equality in the distribution of the places. If the offices and employments were how divided with anything like equality a the different parties and classes in the United States it would be eminently

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proper to say by this act that politics shall have nothing whatever to do with the selections or appointments. In other words the selections after that time ought to be strictly non-partisan, and he who wins the prize of the competitive examination ought to have it. That would be proper then; but I contend that it is not proper while a majority of the people of the United States have no share in the patronage and official positions of the United States Government. I propose as a remedy this amendment:

As nearly all the public positions are now filled by Republicans, it is further enacted that when the board of examiners uncertain by competitive examination (which shall be free to all applicants) the two, or if there be more than two of equal qualification and merit then from those of the highest grade of qualification, they shall select from among those best qualified one whose political affiliations are with the political party having the lowest number in position till there is at least an approximation to un equal share in the patronage of the Government among those who bear equally its burdens; and after said approximation to equality is reached it shall not in future be legal for such board to inquire into or consider the political position of any applicant for position.

I think, with due deference to those on the other side, that this is only just and proper. I do not think you am expect to satisfy the people of this country by the passage of an act that continues men in office, and you have made no provision here for a time when they shall all be brought up and examined within any reasonable period, and everybody take his chances at getting a place. They may be continued indefinitely from year to year or for the next ten years without any examination to determine the qualifications of any one of them. When that is the state of the case, I say that I think every just man who takes a fair view of this subject will conclude that it is right that there be some regard to the political opinion of the applicants until there is an approximation — I do not ask for an exactness, but an approximation to equality in this matter.

This seems to me so obvious and so just that I trust even the Senators on the other side of the Chamber will recognize the propriety of it, and that if they really desire an equitable, just, proper civil-service reform they will vote for it in such shape that the country will regard it as right, and then in future let us practice when we reach the approximation a plan that is entirely non-partisan.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on the amendment of the Senator from Georgia [Mr. BROWN].

Mr. LOGAN. I do not know how long it would take to put that amendment in practical operation; nor do I know that the statement made in it is correct that nearly all the office-holders under this bill, as they are termed, or employés I would call them of the Government, are Republicans. I know that in the Interior Department for four years, while Secretary Schurz was in control of that Department, there was no distinction made in the appointments there so far as political parties were concerned; and I think perhaps there were more Democrats appointed than Republicans during his term of office. If the Senator means civil-service reform, and I presume he does — and that seems to be the object of all the Senators who advocate this bill — it is to put away partisanship so far as the employés of the Government are concerned and let them be appointed according to their qualifications, their moral character, &c. This provision would not only not do away with partisanship, but it would bring it into play and require you to appoint one person on an examination from some political organization.

He says it shall be from that party having the fewest number of votes. What organization that would be I do not know. Perhaps it might be the temperance organization; it might be the independent organization; it might be the anti-monopoly organization; it might be the Mormon-saints-of-Utah organization, for that has got to be a political party. Nobody can tell any thing about who may come in under that. I suppose they might organize a Mormon party and a man come forward and say, "I belong to the smallest party, because I am the only man who belongs to it," and therefore he would be appointed. That is about the meaning of this amendment. A person might say, "We had a convention here day before yesterday; we organized a new party; we passed resolutions; here is our platform; we have appointed a president, treasurer, secretary, &c.; we have started a new party; there are twelve of us, and we all twelve of us want to be appointed and we propose to go into this examination." I presume such a gentleman would get the appointment under this amendment as belonging to the smallest party.

The idea of having a commission here to determine who has the most votes in any party that might be organized any night for the purpose of getting an appointment strikes me as being perfectly absurd. That is the reading of the amendment; that is what it means. It does not say how old a party shall be; it does not say when it shall be organized, how many people shall belong to it, where it shall exist, whether it shall be in a Territory or in a State, or whether it shall spread all over the Country. There is nothing confining you to numbers, nothing confining you to the age of the party. It is perfectly impracticable and can not be put in operation. It is an impossibility. I can get up a party tonight — so can any Senator here — and get twenty, thirty, fifty men to go and meet and pass resolutions and give ourselves a new name and present a candidate to-morrow, and under, that he would be appointed. Is that civil-service reform?

Mr. Brown. Mr. President —

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair will call the attention of the Senator from Georgia to the fact that he has already addressed the Senate in support of his amendment.

Mr. BROWN. I move to strike out the last sentence of my amendment, and on that I propose to be heard.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The amendment offered by the Senator from Georgia to his amendment will be read.

The Acting Secretary read the amendment to the amendment.

Mr. BROWN. I am not at all astonished at the speech made by the Senator from Illinois, because he always represents his party's interests faithfully and very ably. I have noticed him; I always admire him; I admire his ingenuity, his ability, and the fidelity with which he stands by the Republican party. He says we should act in a manner entirely non-partisan in putting into operation a civil-service reform like this. That suits the interests of his party better now; there is no question about that, because they have the offices. He does not seem to know whether they have a majority of those to be affected by this bill or not, after a long term of administration —

Mr. LOGAN. It has nothing to do with it according to this bill.

Mr. BROWN. I think, with all due deference to the Senator from Illinois, he is the only Senator who does not know that fact. I think the world knows, Congress knows, the people of the city of Washington know that probably nine-tenths of all the employés in the Departments are Republicans, and let a man go there and recommend a man not a Republican and see what a response he will get. There have been a great many changes made since this administration came in; but I should like any man to point me to the Democrats appointed there since the present administration came in.

Mr. JONES, of Florida. Allow me to ask how many Democrats will come in if it goes on as in the post and this bill does not become a law?

Mr. BROWN. If this goes on in that way and the bill does not become a law, in two or three years we shall get them all if we want them. I should not probably desire to have them all. I would then be willing probably to take the same position to some extent that my friend from Illinois does, that in organizing a civil-service reform it might be better not to have any thing partisan in it. However, I believe I should be a little more liberal. I should be willing to risk it when the Democrats come into office. I will then be willing for them to organize a civil-service reform upon the strict principles I have mentioned here, if the Republicans will not do it now; that is, do justice to the Republican party, which I understand they refuse to do to the Democratic party. I should be willing to see that when we come in. I would not be willing to see the spoils system practiced as rigidly as this Administration has practiced it; I do not think it ought to be; but I would desire, no matter what party is in power, in organizing this reform, to see something like justice done.

So far as the Senator's remarks about the half-dozen little parties or the parties any man can organize in a night are determined, that is not in my amendment. If the party is very small, one appointment would give it its quota, or bring it up to an approximation, and all the small fractious of parties could be disposed of with half a dozen appointments, or very few. But when you strike the Democratic party there you strike a party that a majority of the voters of the United States belong to, and there after all is where it comes to substantially. You would have to recognize the claims of the Democrats until there was some approximation to the name number of Democratic office-holders that there are Republican office-holders. That is all it means. It is simply an appeal to justice and fair play, and an appeal to equity in the distribution of these positions at the start. In other words, I ask that we start upon a principle of reform that is just to all parties, and then that we practice after that upon a strictly non-partisan platform. That is all I ask.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on the amendment of the Senator from Georgia to his amendment.

Mr. BROWN. I withdraw that.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question then is on the amendment offered by the Senator from Georgia.

The question being put, a division was called for, and there were 14 ayes.

Mr. BROWN. Before the vote is announced I would like to know how many in the Chamber are willing to see this principle of equality and justice carried out toward the Democratic party, and therefore I ask for the yeas and nays.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Nineteen Senators have voted in the negative. The Senator from Georgia calls for the yeas and nays.

Mr. EDMUNDS. I insist that no quorum voted. The yeas and nays are asked for. They will develop a quorum.

The yeas and nays were ordered, and the Principal Legislative Clerk proceeded to call the roll.

Mr. WALKER (when his name was called). I am paired with the Senator from Iowa [Mr. McDILL]. Otherwise I should vote "yea."

The roll-call was concluded.

Mr. BROWN. On this question my colleague [Mr. BARROW] is paired with the Senator from New Hampshire [Mr. BLAIR].

Mr. MAXEY. I am paired with the Senator from Massachusetts [Mr. DAWES]. If he were here, I should vote "yea."

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Mr. ROLLINS. The Senator from Nevada [Mr. FAIR] is paired with the Senator from Virginia [Mr. MAHONE], and the Senator from Kansas [Mr. INGALLS] with the Senator from Tennessee [Mr. HARRIS].

The result was announced — yeas 17, nays 26: as follows:

YEAS — 17.
Brown,
Call,
Coke,
Davis of W. Va.,
Garland,
George,
Groome,
Jackson,
Jonas,
Lamar,
McPherson,
Morgan,
Pendleton,
Pugh,
Vance,
Vest,
Voorhees.

NAYS — 26.
Aldrich,
Allison,
Anthony,
Bayard,
Cameron of Pa.,
Cameron of Wis.,
Chilcott,
Conger,
Edmunds,
Frye,
Harrison,
Hawley,
Hill,
Hoar,
Jones of Nevada,
Lapham,
Logan,
Miller of Cal.,
Miller of N. Y.,
Morrill,
Platt,
Plumb,
Rollins,
Sewell,
Sherman,
Windom.

ABSENT — 33.
Barrow,
Beck,
Blair,
Butler,
Camden,
Cockrell,
Davis of Ill.,
Dawes,
Fair,
Farley,
Ferry,
Gorman,
Grover,
Hale,
Hampton,
Harris,
Ingalls,
Johnston,
Jones of Florida,
Kellogg,
McDill,
McMillan,
Mahone,
Maxey,
Mitchell,
Ransom,
Saulsbury,
Saunders,
Sawyer,
Slater,
Van Wyck,
Walker,
Williams.

So the motion was rejected.

Mr. HAWLEY. I hope the bill will be reported to the Senate.

Mr. MORGAN. I desire to give notice that in the Senate I will move an amendment which I had the honor to offer a few days ago.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. It can be moved without notice being given.

The bill was reported to the Senate as amended.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. Is there any particular amendment that has been adopted in Committee of the Whole which any Senator wishes a separate vote upon?

Mr. LOGAN. Let us vote on the amendments in gross.

Mr. BAYARD. I desire a separate vote on the amendment offered by the Senator from New Hampshire [Mr. BLAIR].

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. That will be reserved.

Mr. VANCE. I desire a vote on the amendment I offered on Saturday.

Mr. LOGAN. That was not agreed to.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator can offer it again in the Senate.

Mr. VANCE. Very well.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question now is on concurring in the amendments which have been agreed to as in Committee of the Whole. The Senator from Delaware [Mr. BAYARD] has requested that one amendment be excepted. The question is on concurring in the other amendments.

Mr. HAWLEY. I have been advised to suggest a verbal amendment in the text of the first section.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. That can be done after the committee amendments are disposed of.

The unexcepted amendments were concurred in.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question recurs on concurring in the amendment, upon which a separate vote is asked by the Senator from Delaware, which will be read.

The Acting Secretary read the amendment, as follows:

SEC. 13. That no person habitually using intoxicating beverages to excess, or guilty of any other immoral habit, shall be appointed to or retained in any office, appointment, or employment to which the provisions of this act are applicable.

Mr. BAYARD. Mr. President, I trust the Senate, upon a little deliberation, or at least that portion of the Senate who desire to see a step taken in the direction of reform indicated by this bill, will not adopt an amendment which is, to say the least, utterly impracticable of execution, and to speak frankly seems to throw over the whole movement the discredit of insincerity.

The Senator from New Hampshire offered an amendment preventing any person habitually using intoxicating beverages from being appointed to or retained in any office. What does that mean? Does not the Senator from New Hampshire, and does not every one else know that it is in the abuse and not the use of these things that danger lies? Is there a physician or a man of sense anywhere in this land who does not know the high uses, the excellent, the healthful, the moral uses of God's gifts in all their shapes? He has not attacked the abuse; he has sought to discredit the use, and to him I say that

God is paid
When man receives
To enjoy is to obey.

But the Senator from Georgia moved an amendment which the Senate accepted that they shall not be used "to excess," and that no person habitually using intoxicating beverages to excess shall be appointed to office; and then comes the Senator from Vermont to add "or shall be guilty of any other immoral habit." [Mr. BROWN rose.] I have but ten minutes. I will sit down and hear my friend.

Mr. BROWN. My amendment was not accepted by the Senator from New Hampshire, but adopted by the Senate.

Mr. BAYARD. I do not mean to misstate the Senator's position. His amendment was not accepted by the Senator from New Hampshire, but was voted in by the Senate. Then followed the amendment of the Senator from Vermont, "or shall be guilty of any other immoral habit."

Mr. President, is the amendment practicable? How shall you apply it? Where is your measure? Who shall be the judge? There is the imputation of a scandal upon the appointing power of the American people, no matter under what administration, when you presuppose that habitual drunkards or men of well-known immoral habits must necessarily excluded by statute from the public service lest they should otherwise be selected for the public service.

Sir, there is a punishment for such maladministration of public power which does not lie in statutes and need not be prescribed by Congress, for as long as our countrymen are the people that I hold them to be, and that I prefer to believe them to be, the Administration that appoints men of known immorality and habitual drunkards to office will meet its speedy punishment without the necessity of a statute.

Sir, this is not intended — no, I will not say that — it will not result in bringing the slightest improvement of your civil service. On the contrary, this amendment undertakes to establish a test which can be used as a pretext by any superior officer for the purpose of removing a person against whom he shall have a spite or preventing his appointment.

Why speak of "intoxicating beverages?" Are there not other excitants? Are there not well-known habits more secret, more easily concealed, as fatal to the human brain and to the health of the human system and to the good conduct of business as that of drinking wines or liquors? Read the accounts from physicians and asylums in every quarter; see the growth of the opium habit; see the various drugs that are used secretly for the purpose of stilling pain or producing cerebral activity and excitement; say whether one or the other is the more dangerous and reprehensible, intoxicating beverages or their more potent and dangerous substitutes?

I say, so far as the public safety is concerned, and if we are compelled to a choice of evils, let us have the open vice rather than the sneaking, secret habit. Far better for the character of your people; far easier to arrest the evil that is open than that which is secret. I say that any administration which is at all inclined to respect and execute a bill of this character will not hesitate to discharge any man from office who has such habits, intellectual, moral, or physical, as render him unfit or un-trustworthy for the performance of public duties; and if the statement is made that he is so, and the person discharged demands a publication of the cause of his removal, the unanimous sentiment of the American people will sustain the discharge of such a man, and for the same reasons would approve the refusal originally to appoint such an applicant.

Further than that, with such an unfit class of persons in office, if the discharge is not made there would very soon be a visitation of unpopularity of "the sober second thought" of the people, and the sober first thought too, that would bring to its senses any administration that should tolerate such a set as habitually drunken or immoral men among its officials.

Mr. President, there is no necessity for such an amendment as this. It is inquisitorial, it is tyrannical, it is capable of gross abuse. We have no need for it. The power of correction is already ample.

I know there has been too much partisanship, is to-day, and has been all the way through for many years, growing up under a system which has converted the offices of the country into the spoils of party; but this bill was intended, by those who framed it to arrest that evil. It is in deference to public opinion most emphatically expressed that this bill receives the attention it now does before the Senate. Do not, therefore, by the adoption of impracticable amendments stand in the way of that reform which all of us must feel is urgently demanded for the safety, the honor, and the welfare of the Government under which we live.

Mr. HAWLEY. Mr. President, I believe I have the right under the rules to move to strike out the words "or guilty of any other immoral habit."

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The amendment can be amended.

Mr. HAWLEY. I move to strike out these words, and on that motion I wish to say that, concurring in much that the Senator from Delaware has said, I am nevertheless entirely satisfied that the amendment as it would be then, as drawn by the Senator from New Hampshire and amended by the Senator from Georgia, should be in the bill. It can do possibly no hurt. I think it will do good in strengthening public officials in enforcing discipline in this regard. But the words "guilty of any of other immoral habit" are vicious in anything resembling criminal legislation by reason of their great indefiniteness. They specify no offense. They give a general indiscriminate power to the persons having charge over these employés that is liable to abuses. If this bill should go into effect as a statute we should by and by hear quite possibly of some superior officer exercising a discretion under this "or guilty of any other immoral habit," as a convenient refuge for malicious discharges. I think that clause had better be stricken out, and I am quite satisfied with the section with it out.

Mr. FRYE. I desire to ask the Senator from Connecticut a question. If I remember the language, it is "the habitual use of intoxicating

653

beverages to excess." In Connecticut, under the law of Connecticut, would not that convict a man as a common drunkard and send him to jail?

Mr. HAWLEY. Yes, sir; it is a criminal offense there.

Mr. FRYE. And in Connecticut would it not entitle a wife to a divorce from her husband?

Mr. HAWLEY. Quite right.

Mr. FRYE. Yet we are putting on an amendment here defining that which under the laws of all the New England States would be a crime and providing that the Departments shall exclude from office men who are guilty of this crime and that this commission shall not recommend for appointment men equally guilty. If the Senator from New Hampshire, with his accustomed courage, had moved to provide that no man who used as a beverage intoxicating liquors at all should be appointed to office under this bill, I would have voted for it and sustained it with all my heart; but it seems to me that this provision is mere nonsense.

Mr. HAWLEY. Does the Senator refer to the whole provision, or to the phrase "guilty of other immoral habits?"

Mr. FRYE. I do not care anything about "guilty of other immoral conduct." I think that is intended to harm it any way; but the use of intoxicating liquors as a beverage to excess I say is simply what makes a common drunkard under the laws of New England, and of course such a man would be excluded.

Mr. HAWLEY. The trouble, as I said in my original remarks on this subject is that we take it for granted that the administration would put out such a man anyhow; but there can be no critical objection made to that amendment regaining in if you strike out the words "or guilty of any other immoral habit." I can not express myself with the severity I feel about it, because it would be uncourteous to do so; but it has a tendency to make the measure ridiculous, to put excessive power in the hands of men who might exercise it unreasonably.

Mr. MAXEY. I think the Senate should look with a great deal of care before deliberately adopting the amendment proposed by the Senator from Vermont. It puts a vague discretionary power in the board. It creates a board to pass upon the morals of every applicant for office without guide or compass in respect to what shall control that board in this examination. These objections are too important, and it does seem to me that that amendment ought to be voted down.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question is on striking out of the amendment the words "or guilty of any other immoral habit."

The amendment to the amendment was agreed to.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question recurs on concurring in the amendment made as in Committee of the Whole as amended.

Mr. BLAIR. Before the question is taken on that amendment I wish to say a few words.

The Senator from Delaware [Mr. BAYARD] commenced his remarks by objecting to this amendment upon the ground that it threw an apparent air of insincerity over the whole thing, and he was quite pointed in his criticism of the amendment "as the Senator from New Hampshire offered it." I do not suppose that he meant to insinuate that the Senator from New Hampshire had acted insincerely in the proposition of this amendment. If he did so, I simply take pains to assure him that he is mistaken in matter of fact.

I am not alone in entertaining somewhat different views from those the Senator from Delaware evidently has in regard to the effect of intoxicating liquors upon the human system when used in any quantity. If he will take the pains to become as intelligently informed upon this subject as he is upon most matters which he discusses he will find that the vast preponderance of weight of all scientific investigation or certainty upon this subject at the present time is that alcohol is simply and solely a poison; that it operates as a poison upon the human system; that it never operates beneficially upon the human system save when it operates as a poison — that is, as a medicinal agent. In such cases it may do good; but to the healthy system alcohol is, by the highest scientific authorities of the day and from the most recent and reliable investigations, pronounced a poison and not a food in any sense. My own relief is that the use of it as a drink is always hurtful save in those instances where it is used medicinally. I am sincere in that belief, I beg to assure the honorable Senator, as I have no doubt he is sincere in holding to the other and erroneous doctrine, if we are to believe science rather than the opinions which may have hitherto prevailed among men.

In regard to the particular language used in the amendment it was taken from the language of Jefferson himself. He said in substance, that the habitual use of intoxicating or ardent spirits had wrought more evil to the American people, so far as office-holding was concerned, than all other causes combined. I designed to use his language, because I thought it less open to criticism than any I might adopt myself.

The Senator from Maine [Mr. FRYE] thinks this proposition means nothing, for the reason that it is simply providing that a man who is guilty of a crime shall be excluded from office-holding, and that that would be done anyway. It is a matter of fact, however as the Senator from Ohio [Mr. SHERMAN] stated in the public service is largely, or to a considerable extent at all events, vitiated by the fact that men, and often good men, axe retained in the service who are incompetent to the performance of their duties by reason of the excessive use of intoxicating liquors.

I think, and it seems to me to be the general opinion of the Senate that some statutory expression of sentiment on the part of the Government of the United States in this direction may have a healthful, reformatory effect upon the civil service of the country. I think in the case of many of that class of men who are already in the service and who are oppressed by the habit that it will help to keep them free from its effects, competent to retain their offices and to perform their duties. I think it will strengthen them, as well as those to be appointed hereafter on the part of heads of Departments, in the discharge of their disciplinary duties. It will, I say, give them much strength in the discharge of their duties, and in every direction I think it is some tribute to the general sentiment of the country as well as in the other particulars I have mentioned, and it will be a good thing to do to adopt the amendment. At all events, I think the Senator from Delaware will give me the credit of being as sincere, in what I have offered and in what I have said here as I know him to he in everything he does him self.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question is on concurring in the amendment. [Putting the question.] The noes seem to have it.

Mr. CONGER. Let us have the yeas and nays. I desire to say before the vote is token upon this question that here is a proposition adopted by every business community in the United States and in the civilized world, that employés addicted to the common and habitual use of ardent spirits to excess shall not have charge, of the business of any man or corporation. In all our mills and all our factories throughout the entire lumber regions of the Northwest no man, whatever his views may be in regard to the question of temperance, but insists as a first rule that ardent spirits shall not be used in camp even in the woods.

Now the Senate proposes to vote out of this reform bill a proposition which is accepted and received and acted upon by every great business corporation in the world. I should like to have my own vote recorded and have recorded the votes of other Senators upon that proposition.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. Is the demand for the yeas and nays seconded?

The yeas and nays were ordered.

Mr. BROWN. Let the amendment be reported.

The Acting Secretary read as follows:

SEC. 13. That no person habitually using intoxicating beverages to excess shall be appointed to, or retained in, any office, appointment, or employment to which the provisions of this act are applicable.

The Principal Legislative Clerk proceeded to call the roll.

Mr. WALKER (when his name was called). I am paired with the Senator from Iowa [Mr. McDILL]. If he were here I should vote "yea."

The roll-call was concluded.

Mr. MAXEY. I am paired with the gentleman from Massachusetts [Mr. DAWES]. I should vote "yea" on this amendment if he were here, but I shall not vote, because I am paired.

Mr. ROLLINS. The Senator from Kansas [Mr. INGALLS] is paired with the Senator from Tennessee [Mr. HARRIS]. The Senator from Nevada [Mr. FAIR] is paired with the Senator from Virginia [Mr. MAHONE].

The result was announced — yeas 35, nays 9; as follows:

YEAS — 35.
Aldrich,
Allison,
Anthony,
Blair,
Brown,
Cameron of Pa.,
Cameron of Wis.,
Cockrell,
Coke,
Conger,
Davis of Ill.,
Edmunds,
Frye,
Garland,
Gorman,
Groome,
Harrison,
Hawley,
Hill,
Hoar,
Jackson,
Jones of Nevada,
Lapham,
Logan,
Miller of Cal.,
Miller of N.Y.,
Morgan,
Morrill,
Platt,
Rollins,
Sewell,
Sherman,
Vest,
Voorhees,
Windom.

NAYS — 9.
Bayard,
Call,
Chilcott,
Davis of W. Va.,
Jonas,
Lamar,
Pendleton,
Pugh,
Vance.

ABSENT — 32.
Barrow,
Beck,
Butler,
Camden,
Dawes,
Fair,
Farley,
Ferry,
George,
Grover,
Hale,
Hampton,
Harris,
Ingalls,
Johnston,
Jones of Florida,
Kellogg,
McDill,
McMillan,
McPherson,
Mahone,
Maxey,
Mitchell,
Plumb,
Ransom,
Saulsbury,
Saunders,
Sawyer,
Slater,
Van Wyck,
Walker,
Williams.

So the amendment was concurred in.

Mr. HAWLEY. It has been suggested by a gentleman whose advice I respect that there should be a verbal correction in the first section of the bill as originally reported. The first clause provides for the President appointing these commissioners by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, and then proceeds to say:

The President may remove any commissioner; and any vacancy in the position of commissioner shall be so filled by the President as to conform to said conditions for the first selection of commissioners.

I move to insert after the word "President," where it occurs in the fifteenth line, and before the words "as to conform," the words "by and with the advice and consent of the Senate."

The amendment was agreed to.

654

Mr. MORGAN. I move to add the following as an additional section:

That no recommendation of any person who all shall apply for office or place under the provisions of this act, except as to the character of the applicant, which may be given by any Senator or member of the House of Representatives, shall be received or considered by any person concerned in making any examination or appointment under this act.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question is on agreeing to the amendment of the Senator from Alabama [Mr. MORGAN].

Mr. MORGAN. I have made a slight modification in the amendment as I offered it before, by giving to the Senator or Representative the privilege of recommending voluntarily an applicant as to his character.

We have in our political system an evil practice which necessarily leads to the abuse and corruption of the civil service, and which, by a mild euphemism, we call "patronage."

Even under this suspicious name it is sometimes openly demanded by legislators as a perquisite of the high offices to which they have been elected.

The evil is around us, but it is too near for us to give a distinct view of its real magnitude. Still our involvement in its baneful influences is only the more conspicuous to the people from the distance at which they view the situation.

Patronage may not be a dangerous power when it is properly used by those to whom it is intrusted by the Constitution if they are held to strict accountability for its exercise, but when it is usurped by those upon whom such responsibility can only be indirectly fixed it is as dangerous to the Republic as any form of corruption that can be named.

I am thoroughly convinced that one of the worst and most inveterate enemies to civil-service reform to be found in our political system is the influence of patronage. It means only this when a Senator employs it. The power of money to be used for personal ends in procuring and retaining high offices in the hands of legislators. This evil has invaded every department of the Government, but its worst effects are felt in Congress when the legislator condescends to bargain for personal support and the other party to the agreement demands office as the price of that support.

In a speech limited to ten minutes I can not have the time to present even in the briefest way the facts which these statements are rested, but I confidently rest this statement on the observation of every Senator in this body.

One case, at least, is on record, and I hold that record in my hand. It was made in Alabama, and consists entirely of the statements under oath of members of the Republican party. It is a case that shows the whole evil of the use of patronage by a Senator, but is only one of a number in our recent history that have led to the most serious consequences.

A Senator (my colleague for a time), in order to procure an election to this body, organized a revolution in Alabama, and was aided by the military power of the United States through all its stages of progress.

He began by using the national troops to drive the people away from counties which he believed were likely to return members to the Legislature who would oppose his election. When the elections were over, and he found that he had not a majority of those who were elected to the houses of the General Assembly he employed his patronage to induce persons to unite with him in organizing a body at the United States court-rooms in Montgomery, which set up, its claim as being the lawful Legislature, while the regular Legislature, co-operating with the governor and other departments, was organized and in session at the capital.

In this conflict his strength consisted in his asserted power to bestow the Federal offices in Alabama according to his pleasure. The sequel proved that his promises were kept in the main, for almost every man in that revolutionary body was rewarded with appointment or employment in the offices of the United States soon after it elected him to the Senate.

I can not dwell on the facts to prove these statements under the limit placed on my time in this debate, but I am ready to prove them whenever I have the time and a proper occasion to do so is offered.

That Senator only failed to overwhelm Alabama with anarchy and bloodshed because the people had a hope that they could outlive his evil work, and they felt that it was better to forbear to correct by force what time might accomplish for them by waiting for its vindication. They were right! After this organization had given him a certificate of election to the Senate it dissolved, leaving him as the only monument of its existence. The sole work of its hands was to vote for him for the Senate. It perished, and he still lives; but it seems that since his patronage has declined the friendship of the Government of the United States has failed him, and he seeks asylum in foreign countries.

The fearful peril to which he was enabled by the power of Senatorial patronage to expose Alabama and the shame and degradation to which this evil brought them has, I confess, inspired me with the deepest abhorrence and fear of a practice that has proven so dangerous to the welfare and honor of the country.

I know that the evils of patronage are inseparable from the bestowment of office; but the danger consists in the abuse rather than the use of the power. Offices must exist, and they must be within the power of somebody to confer them on others; and it is not necessarily wrong or harmful that the bestower should give them to his friends in preference to all others. But the temptations to abuse such power are so great and so present with good as well as bad men at all times that it is of the highest importance that the power should be exercised alone by those to whom it is expressly given and that it should be under the restraints of direct official responsibility.

When an official has a right to bestow offices and does it for the mere selfish advancement of his personal fortunes, all of the evils and much of the culpability of bribery are necessarily included in the act.

The appointee gets what is to him so much money, and so much power and influence as are the incidents of his office, and in consideration thereof he gives a mortgage, either express or implied, to his patron upon his services as his retainer and supporter for all that he is worth to him in his political aspirations.

The only thing that marks the difference between such prostitution of official power over men and the crime of bribery is the presumed absence of a corrupt intent in the mind of the parties.

When a Senator claims that he has the right to bestow or to demand the bestowal of an office upon his friend as so much patronage belonging to him he claims the right to take the money of the people contributed for the benefit of the country and devote it to his own personal service. That is, in effect, an unlawful conversion of public money to private use. A Senator has as much right to a percentage of the salary of his appointee as he has to purchase with an appointment the loyalty of the appointee to his personal fortunes in his political enterprises.

It is no answer in morals and far less in respect of patriotic devotion to the welfare of the country to say that the end will justify the means. It is a false assumption for any man to make, that the good of the country depends upon the service he may render in any office at the expense of the Constitution and the laws.

No treason was ever yet born of human ambition that was not ready with this false plea for its justification.

The Constitution has confided the appointing power to certain designated tribunals; Congress is not one of them, except as to the officers of each House. Neither the Senate nor any Senator can make appointments for any other department of this Government. When, therefore, a Senator claims such power, or that he shall control such power, further than to advise and consent to an appointment when acting in the Senate as an integer of that body, what is that but usurpation?

It makes no difference whether the patronage is claimed as a means of rewarding one's political adherents for past or future services, the evil is the same. The wrong done to the public is not condoned by the fact that the Senator is moved by gratitude to reward his friends. Usurpation of this kind can never be justified by the fact that the usurper intends to do well with the power he may gain by transgressing the limits of his own authority and encroaching on the rights and duties of other departments.

If he has rewards to bestow let him find the means of doing so within the limits of his own constitutional authority.

It is the President that the Constitution holds responsible to the people for all appointments in the judicial and executive departments, and he should have the control of such matters, except in those cases where the laws have relieved him from such responsibility.

I am for keeping this entire subject within reach of the responsibility of the Executive, subject to the regulations that Congress may prescribe.

It was after anxious and mature consideration and debate that the appointing power and the power of removal from office was given to the President.

I find an account of it in Bancroft's History of the Constitution of the United States, which I will read very briefly.

All agreed —

Says the historian —

in giving the President power to fill up, temporarily, vacancies that might happen during the recess of the Senate.

Had the consent of the Senate been made necessary to displace as well as to appoint, the Executive would have suffered degradation; and the relative importance of the House of Representatives a grave diminution. To change the tenure of office from the good opinion of the President, who is the employer and needs efficient agents in executing the laws, to the favor of the Senate, which has no executive powers, would create a new fealty alien to the duties of an officer of the United States.

"The three distinct powers, legislative, judicial, and executive," said Ellsworth, as Senator, in 1789, explaining the Constitution which he had done so much to frame, "should be placed in different hands. He shall take care that the laws be faithfully executed are sweeping words. The officers should be attentive to the President, to whom the Senate is not a council. To turn a man out of office is an exercise neither of legislative nor of judicial power it is like a tree growing upon land that him been granted. The Advice of the Senate does not make the appointment; the President appoints; there are certain restrictions in certain cases, but the restriction is as to the appointment and not as to the removal." — 2 Bancroft's History of the Constitution of the U.S., 191,192.

The President may be impeached for an appointment made corruptly. A Senator is not amenable to impeachment. He may be expelled for a corrupt act, but he is not thereby disqualified from holding office. In reference to the right of a Senator to intrude advice upon a President as to the nominations he may make to the Senate I do not find it necessary on this bill to make any argument. I will only say that it is more a question of taste than of right or duty.

A President would deserve impeachment who would seek a pledge from a Senator, in advance of a nomination, that he would vote for the

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confirmation of the President's friend on personal considerations. Such a practice would soon destroy the Government. Why is it, then, that a Senator may importune a President to nominate the Senator's friend to office, and so pledge his vote in advance to his confirmation and yet may claim that he is doing an innocent thing, and is merely harvesting his rightful patronage as a perquisite of his high office?

As to the minor employments to which this bill relates Congress has given the power of selection and also of removal, not to the President, but to the heads of Departments. The President has only a moral influence over them. Our own enactments which firmly declare a public policy as to this subject deserve at least our own respect, and should restrain Congressmen from all interference with the heads of Departments in selecting the employés, except to see that the law is honestly obeyed. It is the President's duty to see that the laws are faithfully executed. But Congressmen do interfere with these matters and by importunity and even by harsher means they manage to have a large control over all such employments. They violate the spirit and even the letter of the statutes to realize the personal advantages of their claim to patronage.

Can it be denied that they have pressed this demand to the extent of depriving the heads of Departments almost entirely of their lawful and just discretion in making even the minor employments to which this bill relates? Will it be denied that the very evils this bill is intended to remedy are largely due to the eager and importunate personal demands of Congressmen to have the places filled with their friends and favorites?

I will not charge that the presence of any corrupt persons in the Departments is due to the intentional wrong of any Congressman. I will only say that books are kept in the Departments in which Congressmen are regularly charged up with every appointment, so that they shall not largely overdraw their accounts, and it is as likely that they will put in unworthy people and that the heads of Departments will.

This book-keeping and charging up of appointments to each Congressman who has a political credit in these political banks is a distinct and undeniable admission that the patronage system is recognized by the Department as the only one that exists. It is a shame to the country that any books should be kept in a Department to show how the patronage is divided among Congressmen and to apportion to each man of the administration party his due proportion of the spoils.

If we would compel the heads of Departments to purify and regulate the civil service in accordance with the welfare of the country, they have at least the right to ask us that we will abstain from interfering with their right to make the employments for which the country holds them responsible.

Under this bill the examiners have great power. They are all, except the chief examiner, to be taken from official circles. Do we not know that they are also under the power of Senators at whose request they were appointed to office?

The findings and reports of the examiners will be warped if not dictated by those to whom they owe their official existence. If Senators are not prepared to yield this power of personal control over the civil service, but will insist on appointments being doled out in settlement of their demands for patronage, it is in vain that we are endeavoring to do anything to purify the civil service or to remodel it on any basis that will make it better than it has been.

Mr. HARRISON. I wish to say just a word, partly in the way of explanation. When this subject was voted upon, when the bill was in Committee of the Whole I was out when the amendment was reported, but I understood that it went further than the amendment proposed now. I think we should not abrogate the right to give a certificate of character to any friend or constituent who applies for it.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. That is the amendment now proposed.

Mr. HARRISON. I understand that is the present amendment. It was not so before. I agree with the amendment in the shape in which it is now. As that exception is contained in it my vote will be for the amendment, and my concurrence will go for it as it did not go before.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question is on agreeing to the amendment of the Senator from Alabama [Mr. MORGAN].

The amendment was agreed to.

Mr. CALL. I desire to say a word on that amendment.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. It has been adopted.

Mr. EDMUNDS. The Senator from Florida may move to reconsider. He has a right to comment on the bill as it has been amended.

Mr. CALL. There was no opportunity to vote against the amendment. I wish to say a few words, but I shall not detain the Senate for any length of time.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator can move to reconsider the vote, and then he will be in order.

Mr. CALL. Then I move a reconsideration of the vote by which the amendment was adopted.

I wish to say that the amendment of the Senator from Alabama in my opinion is entirely wrong and unconstitutional, and that it is not in the line of constitutional action indicated by the commentators upon the Constitution for whom we have most respect. I find in Story's commentaries on the Constitution the following:

But at all events, it will be a consolation to those who love the Union and honor a devotion to the patriotic discharge of duty, that in regard to "inferior officers" (which appellation probably includes ninety-nine out of a hundred of the lucrative offices in the Government), the remedy for any permanent abuse is still within the power of Congress, by the simple expedient of requiring the consent of the Senate to removals in such cases.

So far from limiting the power of the Senate in regard to appointment to or removal from office, the line of reform has been indicated in requiring the consent of the Senate to and in extending the power of the Senate over these offices.

Mr. President, I do not agree with the Senator from Alabama. If a man can not come here and represent the public interests in his recommendations for appointment to these inferior offices he is not fit to be a Senator. It is his duty to his State and his people to see that their fair share of the public offices of the country is allotted to them with due regard to the ability and capacity of the people of his State to till them. I do not desire for one to divorce myself from the opportunity to have justice done to my State and people so far as consistent with the performance of the public service.

I will ask to the extent of ten minutes a little indulgence in regard to the debate which occurred a few days ago. The Senator from Alabama [Mr. MORGAN] upon that occasion said:

It is, perhaps, not doing the Senate exact justice to reiterate the position which I have had occasion several times to state in reply to the Senator from Florida, that the Congress of the United States has never vested in the heads of Departments the power to make the appointments of clerks of classes 1, 2, 3, and 4; that it has never exercised its constitutional right to vest what he calls the appointing power in the heads of these Departments.

That would seem to settle that controversy. There is nothing left in it after that proposition is stated.

The Senator from Vermont [Mr. EDMUNDS] said:

It is within the competence of the law to create an office to establish the terms and tests and conditions upon which it shall be filled.

I have not intended, as it regards the officers to whom my friend refers, to leave any such impression, and I am not conscious of having said anything which would justify any such impression, for I maintain with him, whatever may be our differences in regard to what are called Presidential appointments to be confirmed by the Senate, that it is entirely within the competence of the law making power to say precisely who and how every other office in the United States shall be filled.

I shall not detain the Senate except to put upon record the following decision of the Supreme Court upon this very point:

In all these Departments —

The War, the Navy, the Interior, State and Treasury, say the Supreme Court in the case of Hennen, decided in 1839 —

power is given to the Secretary to appoint all necessary clerks (1 Story, 186); and although no power to remove is expressly given, yet there can be no doubt that these clerks hold their office at the will and discretion of the head of the Department.

These clerks fall under that class of inferior officers the appointment of which the Constitution authorizes Congress to vest in the head of the Department.

And all inferior officers appointed under each, by authority of law, must hold their office at the discretion of the appointing power. Such is the settled usage and practical construction of the Constitution and laws. — 13 Peters,259, 260.

Chief-Justice Marshall said in The United States vs. Maurice et al., in 1823:

An office is defined to be "a public charge or employment," and he who performs the duties of the office is an officer. If employed on the part of the United States, he is an officer of the United States.

If a duty be a continuing one, which is defined by rules prescribed by the Government, and not by contract, which an individual is appointed by Government to perform, who enters on the duties appertaining to his station, without any contract defining them, if those duties continue, though the person be changed, it seems very difficult to distinguish such a charge or employment from an office, or the person who performs the duties from an officer. — 2 Brockenbrough's Reports, 102, 103.

Again, in the case of Marbury vs. Madison, Chief-Justice Marshall said:

The appointment being, under the Constitution, to be made, by the President personally, the delivery of the deed of appointment, if necessary to its completion, must be made by the President also.

Where an officer is removable at the will of the Executive, the circumstances which complete his appointment is of no concern; because the act is at any time revocable.

By the Constitution of the United States the President is invested with certain important political powers, in the exercise of which he is to use his own discretion, and is accountable only to his country in his political character and to his own conscience. To aid him in the performance of these duties he is authorized to appoint certain officers, who act by his authority and in conformity with his orders.

In such capes their acts are his acts; and whatever opinion may be entertained of the manner in which executive discretion may be used, still there exists, and can exist, no power to control that discretion. — 1 Cranck's Reports, pts: 158, 162, 165.

I will not read further. These decisions conclusively settle the question that this is an executive discretion, whether in the President or in the heads of the Departments; that an employment is an office; that the authority of the head of a Department to employ a clerk constitutes the clerk an inferior officer in the sense of the Constitution, and that the continuing character of the service is the distinction between a temporary employment and a permanent office.

The House of Representatives and the Senate have both concurred in so interpreting the Constitution. Judge Story says further:

After a most animated discussion the vote finally taken in the House of Representatives was affirmative of the power of removal in the President, without

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any co-operation of the Senate, by the vote of 34 members against 20. In the Senate the clause in the bill affirming the power was carried by the casting vote of the Vice-President. — 3 Story's Commentaries on the Constitution, 394.

I merely wish to say that by the whole course of authority on this subject this was a discretion vested in the executive department, either in the President or in the heads of Departments, and that there could be no authority to control the right of removal otherwise than by fixing a tenure for office.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question is on reconsidering the vote by which the amendment of the Senator from Alabama was agreed to. [Putting the question.] The noes seem to have it.

Mr. EDMUNDS. I wish to address the Chair before he declares the vote. I vote for a reconsideration in order that the language may be made to clearly mean what the Senator from Alabama intended. I think that the point where he has interlined in his amendment, what a Senator or Representative may do, with what follows it, leads clearly to a grammatical construction entirely opposite to what the Senator intended. In order to have that corrected so that there can not be any question about it I have voted for a reconsideration.

Mr. SHERMAN. I suggest that the Secretary can transpose the clause.

Mr. EDMUNDS. I should like to see how it is transposed first.

Mr. HAWLEY. Let us have it read.

Mr. SHERMAN. Let it be read transposing the sentence.

The Acting Secretary read as follows:

That no recommendation of any person who shall apply for office or place under the provisions of this act, which may be given by any Senator or member of the House of Representatives, except as to the character of the applicant, shall be received or considered by any person concerned in making any examination or appointment under this act.

Mr. MORGAN. I have no objection in the world to the transposition. I think it means the same thing.

Mr. EDMUNDS. Let us see if we want to reconsider the vote.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Chair will put the question again. The question is on the motion of the Senator from Florida [Mr. CALL] to reconsider the vote by which the amendment of the Senator from Alabama [Mr. MORGAN] was adopted.

The motion to reconsider was agreed to.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. Does the Senator from Alabama accept the suggestion of the Senator from Vermont?

Mr. MORGAN. I accept the transposition suggested by the Senator.

Mr. EDMUNDS. Let it be read so that we shall all see that it is in the right place now.

The Acting Secretary read as follows:

That no recommendation of any person who shall apply for office or place under the provision of this act, which may be given by any Senator or member of the House of Representatives, except as to the character of the applicant, shall be received or considered by any portion concerned in making any examination or appointment under this act.

Mr. CALL. I ask for the yeas and nays on agreeing to the amendment

The yeas and nays were ordered, and the Principal Legislative Clerk called the roll.

Mr. BLAIR. I am paired with the Senator from Georgia [Mr. BARROW].

Mr. ROLLINS. The Senator from Kansas [Mr. INGALLS] is paired with the Senator from Tennessee [Mr. HARRIS]. The Senator from Virginia [Mr. MAHONE] is paired with the Senator from Nevada [Mr. FAIR].

The result was announced — yeas 26, nays 16; as follows:

YEAS — 26.
Aldrich,
Anthony,
Cameron of Pa.,
Conger,
Davis of Ill.,
Frye,
Harrison,
Hawley,
Hill,
Hoar,
Jackson,
Jones of Nevada,
Lapham,
Logan,
McPherson,
Miller of Cal.,
Miller of N.Y.,
Morgan,
Morrill,
Pendleton,
Platt,
Plumb,
Rollins,
Sherman,
Vance,
Windom.

NAYS — 16.
Brown,
Call,
Cameron of Wis.,
Chilcott,
Coke,
Davis of W. Va.,
Garland,
Gorman,
Groome,
Jonas,
Jones of Florida,
Lamar,
Pugh,
Sewell,
Vest,
Voorhees.

ABSENT — 34.
Allison,
Barrow,
Bayard,
Beck,
Blair,
Butler,
Camden,
Cockrell,
Dawes,
Edmunds,
Fair,
Farley,
Ferry,
George,
Grover,
Hale,
Hampton,
Harris,
Ingalls,
Johnston,
Kellogg,
McDill,
McMillan,
Mahone,
Maxey,
Mitchell,
Ransom,
Saulsbury,
Saunders,
Sawyer,
Slater,
Van Wyck,
Walker,
Williams.

So the amendment was agreed to.

Mr. EDMUNDS. I wish to say on the pending question, whatever it is, that I did not vote for the amendment, not because I am not in favor of the purpose and object of it to prevent Senator from "legging it," as the phrase is, and begging offices from the President and heads of Departments, but because I was afraid in the way it stood at last at another point that my attention was not called to until after the call of the yeas and nays was begun, that it would prevent the President of the United States from asking you, sir, himself initiating the inquiry, who you thought would be a proper person to appoint as one of the commissioners under this act. It seems to prohibit him from receiving a recommendation that he himself invites as to one of these officers; I will say nothing about the matters.

I doubt extremely either the constitutionality or the wisdom of that provision, and so I did not vote, because I was not clear enough as to what it might mean to lead me to vote against it, because the general idea of preventing our begging and harassing people for offices. I am in favor of and have practiced upon now for more than five years. That is all I wish to say as an explanation of my not voting.

Mr. ALLISON. I wish to call the attention of the Senator from Ohio [Mr. PENDLETON] to section 3 of the bill. We have provided in section 1 that the President, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, shall appoint three commissioners, with salary or compensation of $3,500 per year. As the bill stands this commission is authorized to appoint a chief examiner, with a salary of $4,000 a year and all his traveling expenses, and it is made his duty to travel about the country looking after examining boards and so on. I submit to the Senator from Ohio that this officer under the bill is the most important officer provided for, and it seems to me that we ought to have some different arrangement with reference to his appointment. If it does not interfere with the plan of the bill I should like to propose that the chief examiner, if he is to be continued, and if it is a wise thing to have a chief examiner, shall be appointed by the President, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, and that he shall stand precisely as the other officers stand. I have heard a great deal here said about interfering with the prerogative of the President of the United States with reference to officers, and I find a most singular anomaly with regard to this chief examiner. The bill in section 3 provides that "after an opportunity of being heard in explanation of any charge against him he may be removed by the commission for cause, to be entered on its minutes, and a successor may be employed. The chief examiner shall be entitled," &c.

A chief examiner once appointed by the commissioners can not in any way be removed or disturbed except for cause. If there is any thing in the mere constitutional question which we have heard discussed over and over again, it seems to me that it is rather straining a point to provide that the examiner shall be held up and excepted from all the provisions of the remainder of this bill. So I submit whether it would not be wise to have this officer appointed by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, and then to strike out whatever is here with reference to removal and let him take his chances with the vast multitude of public officers who stand under the Constitution.

Mr. PENDLETON. Do I understand the Senator from Iowa to object to that portion of the bill which is contained in lines 7, 8, 9, and a portion of line 10?

Mr. ALLISON. I do not object —

Mr. PENDLETON. I speak of it in no sense of controversy, but with a desire as far as I can of meeting the views of the Senator from Iowa.

Mr. ALLISON. My idea, if the Senator will allow me, is that carefully guarded as is everybody else connected with this bill and connected with the public service, we should not set up this examiner as above and beyond and outside of every official in the United States. I may be wrong about this; there may be some reason why this officer should be exempt; but I do not see it.

Mr. PENDLETON. Would it remove the objection of the Senator from Iowa if lines 7, 8, and 9 and a portion of line 10, down to and including the word "employed," were stricken out?

Mr. ALLISON. I should vote for striking out those lines.

Mr. PENDLETON. Very well; I am perfectly willing that a vote shall be taken upon the suggestion of the Senator from Iowa that those lines be stricken out, and I shall not object.

Mr. ALLISON. I ask the Senator from Ohio now if he regards this as in harmony with the rest of the bill?

Mr. PENDLETON. I do not consider it out of harmony with the general purpose of the bill.

Mr. ALLISON. As it stands?

Mr. PENDLETON. As it stands.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. Does the Senator from Ohio make a motion?

Mr. ALLISON. I move to strike out those words.

Mr. MILLER of New York. Let the portion proposed to be stricken out be read.

Mr. PENDLETON. I have no authority for accepting the amendment, but I agree to it.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The proposed amendment will be read.

The PRINCIPAL LEGISLATIVE CLERK. In section 3, beginning in line 7, it is proposed to strike out the following words:

After an opportunity of being heard in explanation of any charge against him, he may be removed by the commission for cause, to be entered on its minutes, and a successor may be employed.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question is on agreeing to the amendment striking out the words which have just been read.

The amendment was agreed to.

Mr. LOGAN. I said the other day that I would at the proper time move to amend the bill in reference to the salary of the commissioner so as to make it $4,000 instead of $3,500. I now move that amendment.

657

Mr. PLUMB. If I mistake not the amendment which the Senator refers to was itself voted down.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. It was voted down as in Committee of the Whole. The Senator from Illinois renews it in the Senate.

Mr. PLUMB. I refer to the amendment which I offered.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The whole amendment was rejected and the Senator can now move to insert.

Mr. LOGAN. I stated at the time that I should in the Senate move to amend by making the salary $4,000; and I now move that amendment.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Illinois moves to amend the bill in lines 18 and 19 of section 1, so as to make the salary of the commissioners $4,000 instead of $3,500.

Mr. DAVIS, of West Virginia. I think we had better have the yeas and nays on that. I ask for the yeas and nays; and I wish to say that the salary provided by the bill is as great as that of any of the auditors, I believe, and perhaps most of the comptrollers.

Mr. LOGAN. Oh, no!

Mr. DAVIS, of West Virginia. It is far above the general run of the chief bureau officers in all the Departments, and perhaps the duty will not be one-tenth as great.

Mr. HAWLEY. I submit that we ought to have able men for the commission in its years of experiment and growth.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. Is the demand for the yeas and nays seconded?

Mr. LOGAN. I have no objection to taking the yeas and nays; but I want to correct the statement of the Senator from West Virginia.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. By unanimous consent only can that be done, as the Senator from Illinois has spoken once.

Mr. LOGAN. I have not spoken on this subject at all, and I do not want to make a speech now. I merely wish to say that the Senator from West Virginia is mistaken about the salary of the auditors and comptrollers. Some of the auditors get $5,000 a year, and as to the chief bureau officers, one of them gets $6,000 a year. There is no salary of an auditor or chief officer of an important bureau so low as that fixed by the bill as the pay of these commissioners.

Mr. DAVIS, of West Virginia. I think the Senator is mistaken about the auditors.

Mr. LOGAN. I am not.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question is on agreeing to the amendment of the Senator from Illinois, on which the yeas and nays have been demanded.

The yeas and nays were ordered, and the Principal Legislative Clerk proceeded to call the roll.

Mr. MAXEY (when his name was called). I am paired with the Senator from Massachusetts [Mr. DAWES]. If he were present, I should vote "nay" on this amendment.

The roll-call was concluded.

Mr. BROWN. On this question my colleague [Mr. BARROW] is paired with the Senator from New Hampshire [Mr. BLAIR].

The result was announced — yeas 21, nays 24: as follows:

YEAS — 21.
Aldrich,
Allison,
Anthony,
Cameron of Pa.,
Chilcott,
Conger,
Davis of Ill.,
Frye,
Harrison,
Hawley,
Hill,
Hoar,
Jones of Nevada,
Lapham,
Logan,
Miller of Cal.,
Miller of N.Y.,
Morrill,
Platt,
Sewell,
Windom.

NAYS — 24.
Bayard,
Brown,
Call,
Cameron of Wis.,
Cockrell,
Coke,
Davis of W. Va.,
Garland,
George,
Gorman,
Groome,
Jackson,
Jonas,
Jones of Florida,
Lamar,
McPherson,
Morgan,
Pendleton,
Plumb,
Pugh,
Rollins,
Vance,
Vest,
Voorhees.

ABSENT — 31.
Barrow,
Beck,
Blair,
Butler,
Camden,
Dawes,
Edmunds,
Fair,
Farley,
Ferry,
Grover,
Hale,
Hampton,
Harris,
Ingalls,
Johnston,
Kellogg,
McDill,
McMillan,
Mahone,
Maxey,
Mitchell,
Ransom,
Saulsbury,
Saunders,
Sawyer,
Sherman,
Slater,
Van Wyck,
Walker,
Williams.

So the amendment was rejected.

Mr. ALLISON. In order to place these salaries in harmony with each other I move, in section 3, line 11, to strike out "$4,000" and insert "$3,500," so as to make the salary of the chief examiner the same as that of the commissioner who are to appoint him.

Mr. PLUMB. I move to amend that amendment by making the salary $3,000. There ought to be a difference in the salary to correspond with the difference in dignity of these officials.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question is on the amendment of the Senator from Kansas to the amendment of the Senator from Iowa, fixing the salary of the chief examiner at $3,000.

Mr. LOGAN. In order that we may be correct in these things I desire to call the attention of the Senate to the law in reference to what the discussion was between the Senator from West Virginia and myself.

Mr. DAVIS, of West Virginia. Will my friend allow me to say that the law has no bearing upon what the salaries now are? We all know that the law was made when we had what was known as the "salary grab," and of course that law does not affect the salaries. Each appropriation act fixes the amount paid.

Mr. LOGAN. I beg the Senator's pardon; the law gives a fixed salary, and if Congress does not appropriate it the officers can go before the Court of Claims and get it. The law gives it to them. The law provides that there shall be connected with the Treasury Department six auditors, naming them, and that they shall be entitled to $1,000 a year each for salary. We turn over to the Commissioner of Pensions and we find that he is entitled to $4,000.

Mr. ALLISON. He gets $5,000.

Mr. LOGAN. He gets $5,000, but $4,000 is fixed here. The Commissioner of Internal Revenue gets $6,000; the First Comptroller gets $6,000. You can not find an officer occupying a high position in any of these Departments who gets so low a salary under the law as the Senator from West Virginia would indicate.

Mr. PLUMB. The chief examiner in this case is nothing more nor less, as I think, for all the practical purposes of this bill, than the chief clerk of this commission. Of course he will be a person of acquirement, but so are the chief clerks of the different Departments of this Government. The chief clerk of the War Department, who has added duties besides those ordinarily pertaining to his duties as chief clerk, only gets $2,750 a year. If I had uttered my own conviction upon this question in moving the amendment without reference to what has been done as proposed by the Senator from Iowa, I should have said that $2,500 was an ample price. The duties certainly, if the commissioners perform their duties, will be largely of a clerical kind, and none of them of a kind that involve anything like the responsibility or the exercise of the judgment which is required in the offices of the various auditors and comptrollers of the Treasury Department, and the amount instead of being more than $3,000 ought to be far less. Two thousand five hundred dollars is ample in my own judgment; but I accepted the scale which the Senate had fixed for the others, and was content with modifying the proposition of the Senator from Iowa to the extent of $500.

Mr. DAVIS, of West Virginia. I felt confident I was right, when I said that the salaries of the auditors was less than $4,000. I find in the Book of Estimates for the present year that the salary of all the auditors, I believe without an exception, is $3,000, six of them, and the heads of bureaus get somewhat less than that perhaps.

Mr. HAWLEY. The Senator from Kansas is much mistaken as to the functions of the chief examiner under this bill. He is a good deal more than a chief clerk. He is supposed to be a man equally well qualified with the commissioners themselves, capable of understanding this whole subject and directing it and attending to the various local examinations, which is a great deal more than a chief clerk. I think it is not a good plan in inaugurating a measure as important as this to shrimp the salaries. We want good men.

Mr. PLUMB. I will modify the amendment so as to make the salary $2,500.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Kansas moves to amend the amendment of the Senator from Iowa so as to reduce the salary of the chief examiner to $2,500.

Mr. FRYE and Mr. HAWLEY called for the yeas and nays, and they were ordered.

The Principal Legislative Clerk proceeded to call the roll.

Mr. MAXEY (when his name was called). As I stated before, I am paired with the Senator from Massachusetts [Mr. DAWES]. I should vote "yea" if I were not paired.

The roll-call was concluded.

Mr. VANCE (after having voted in the affirmative). I desire to withdraw my vote, as I voted under a misapprehension. I am paired with the Senator from Louisiana [Mr. KELLOGG].

Mr. BROWN. I announce once more the pair of my colleague [Mr. BARROW] with the Senator from New Hampshire [Mr. BLAIR], not on this particular vote, but it applies generally to this question. It is the usual pair, as I understand, and will stand for some days.

The result was announced — yeas 19, nays 26; as follows:

YEAS — 19.
Brown,
Call,
Cockrell,
Coke,
Davis of W. Va.,
Edmunds,
Garland,
George,
Gorman,
Groome,
Jackson,
Jonas,
Lamar,
McPherson,
Morgan,
Plumb,
Pugh,
Vest,
Voorhees.

NAYS — 26.
Aldrich,
Allison,
Anthony,
Bayard,
Cameron of Pa.,
Cameron of Wis.,
Chilcott,
Conger,
Davis of Ill.,
Frye,
Harrison,
Hawley,
Hill,
Hoar,
Jones of Florida,
Jones of Nevada,
Lapham,
Logan,
Miller of Cal.,
Miller of N.Y.,
Morrill,
Pendleton,
Platt,
Rollins,
Sewell,
Windom.

ABSENT — 31.
Barrow,
Beck,
Blair,
Butler,
Camden,
Dawes,
Fair,
Farley,
Ferry,
Grover,
Hale,
Hampton,
Harris,
Ingalls,
Johnston,
Kellogg,
McDill,
McMillan,
Mahone,
Maxey,
Mitchell,
Ransom,
Saulsbury,
Saunders,
Sawyer,
Sherman,
Slater,
Vance,
Van Wyck,
Walker,
Williams.

So the amendment to the amendment was rejected.

658

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question recurs on the amendment of the Senator from Iowa [Mr. ALLISON].

Mr. PLUMB. I move to amend that by making the sum $3,000 instead of $3,500.

The amendment to the amendment was agreed to, there being on a division — ayes 21, noes 20.

Mr. PLUMB. Now I move to strike out all that part of the bill which refers to the examiner, being the first two paragraphs of section 3; and I will say briefly that it seems to me the whole theory of this bill is that the examiner is a man who does the work and that is a feature of it to which I object. I think it will not impair the efficiency of the bill, but my own sincere belief is that it will add to it a hundred-fold if we strike out that provision. We shall have under this bill, if it shall be passed as it is now, three commissioners to sit around and boss the job and one examiner to do the work. If we want this bill to be a reform of the civil service of the country we want the responsibility of that service put upon the persons upon whom it ought to be placed. I am in favor of putting that responsibility upon them and not putting into this bill an official staff to have all the work and all the responsibility and these other persons draw the pay without doing anything.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Chair forgot to put the question on the amendment of the Senator from Iowa [Mr. ALLISON] as amended. The Senator from Iowa moved to amend by fixing $3,500, and the Senator from Kansas moved to amend that by inserting $3,000, which was agreed to by the Senate. The question recurs on the amendment of the Senator from Iowa as amended by the Senator from Kansas.

The amendment as amended was agreed to.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question now is on the amendment of the Senator from Kansas to strike out all in relation to the chief examiner in section 3.

Mr. PENDLETON. I hope that amendment will not be adopted. I think the power of the commission to appoint an examiner and give him instructions, whose duty it shall be to aid the local boards in making the examinations, is a very essential part of the bill. I do not say this without some thought. Many of the other amendments affecting the mere machinery of the bill were not essential to its application; but this I think is a very important matter, one that really goes to the efficiency of the bill. I hope the amendment of the Senator from Kansas will not be adopted.

The amendment was rejected.

Mr. BROWN. I desire to offer an amendment in line 40 of section 2 on page 4. Commencing at line-39 the language is:

Eighth, there shall be non-competitive examinations in all proper cases before the commission, when competition may not be found practicable.

When it might or might not be found practicable I suppose will depend usually upon the will of the examiners or of the commissioners. That is indefinite enough to cover the whole field and leave them to do exactly as they please, either to have competitive examinations or to examine each man separately as they may think proper. I move to strike out the words "competition may not be found practicable" and insert "when competent persons do not desire to compete after notice has been given of the existence of a vacancy under such rules as may be prescribed by the commissioners as to the manner of giving notice."

Mr. EDMUNDS. Suppose you say "do not compete" instead of "do not desire to compete."

Mr. BROWN. I accept that. It seems to me that the text stands exceedingly indefinite, and I trust there will be no objection to making the change.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question is on the amendment of the Senator from Georgia [Mr. BROWN], which will be read.

The ACTING SECRETARY. In section 2, line 40, after the word "when," it is moved to strike out "competition may not be found practicable" and insert:

When competent persons do not compete after notice has been given of the existence of the vacancy, under such rules as may be prescribed by the commissioners as to the manner of giving notice.

The amendment was agreed to.

Mr. ALLISON. In line 20 of section 2, I suggest the following amendment: After the word "selections" insert "according to grade;" so as to read:

Second, that all the offices, places, and employments so arranged or to be arranged in classes shall be filled by selections according to grade from among those graded highest as the results of such competitive examinations.

Mr. BROWN. Will the Senator please explain what he means?

Mr. ALLISON. I mean that the man graded the highest shall have the first appointment.

Mr. BROWN. How is that to affect the competitive examinations?

Mr. ALLISON. Under that, as I understand, the man who stands highest, wherever he may come from, whether outside or inside, shall receive the appointment. That is my idea.

Mr. EDMUNDS. It does not exclude the outsider at all.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question is on the amendment of the Senator from Iowa [Mr. ALLISON].

The amendment was agreed to.

Mr. BROWN. I have one amendment of which I gave notice the first day I discussed this question. I offer it now. It relates to the very question we have just had up as to the competitive examinations embracing those outside as well as inside the Departments. We struck out the other day the provision in reference to grades. As it now stands the bill is silent on that question; but it gives, if it becomes a law, the commissioners power to prescribe rules in reference to the condition of this whole matter, with the consent of the President. I think as the bill stands they might prescribe rules that would make promotions according to the different grades among those already in office, or they might leave it to competitive examination, embracing outsiders as well as insiders; but there is nothing in this act if it becomes a law, as I now read it, that denies to them the power by a rule to fix that and to confine it to those who are inside entirely, or to embrace those outside as well, if they think proper to do so. The bill is simply silent on that subject, as I read it. I think it ought to be made definite. If Senators mean, as I understand a number of them do on the Republican side from the votes they have already cast, that there shall be competition in the examinations as well by outsiders as insiders —

Mr. EDMUNDS. You mean for promotion; as it is called.

Mr. BROWN. My amendment is intended to meet that case. It says nothing about parties, as another amendment that I offered did, and it reads thus:

And when a vacancy occurs in either of said classes it shall be filled with one of the three persons, or if there be a larger number of equal merit then from the class who stood highest on the competitive examination; and the selection for appointment shall not be confined to the persons in office or place at the time in the Department in which the vacancy occurs, but other persons, citizens, desiring the position, shall, on their application, be permitted to participate in the competitive examination, and shall receive the appointment if the examination shows that they possess qualifications superior to the competitors who may be in position at the time of the examination.

That is simply to give outsiders and insiders by the express provision of the statute the like opportunities to compete, and not to leave it doubtful so that the commissioners might by a rule make it different or confine it to a particular class.

Mr. HAWLEY. I listened as well as I could to the Senator's reading; it is a long and complicated amendment, and I do not understand it. It is dangerous to pass such amendments at this stage of a bill without more deliberate consideration. We have already established a principle that there may be outside competition. If we have commissioners who will not steal, I think they will do it fairly. I do, therefore, seriously beg the friends of this bill to stop tinkering and let us comer to a final vote.

Mr. BROWN. Will the Senator from Connecticut point to the provision in the bill where you have established a competitive examination between those outside and those inside if the commissioners do not choose to allow it?

Mr. HAWLEY. We struck out the provision as to the lowest grade, and they will take notice of what that means.

Mr. BROWN. You have struck that out and left it silent, leaving them to make rules.

Mr. HAWLEY. If I had known the Senator from Georgia as an ardent friend of the measure I would not have watched so anxiously; but he began with avowed hostility to this whole bill, and therefore I have to listen closely to anything he proposes.

Mr. BROWN. I can only reply that, whether I fancy the bill wise or not, if it has to pass and become the law of the land I desire to amend it wherever I think it is defective and make it as good a bill as we can get if we have to have it. I would rather have none of it, it is true, than to take it in the shape we are going to get it. I would rather have it bettor than it is in several particulars, and therefore I offer amendments. I think this amendment will better it.

The proposition is to come in at the end of section 7, and I ask the Secretary to read it in connection.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. It will be so read.

The Acting Secretary read section 7 and the proposed amendment.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question is on the amendment of the Senator from Georgia [Mr. BROWN].

Mr. BROWN. I ask for the yeas and nays.

The yeas and nays were ordered; and being taken, resulted — yeas 19, nays 25; as follows:

YEAS — 19.
Bayard,
Brown,
Call,
Cockrell,
Coke,
Davis of W. Va.,
Garland,
George,
Groome,
Jackson,
Jonas,
Jones of Florida,
Lamar,
McPherson,
Morgan,
Pendleton,
Pugh,
Vest,
Voorhees.

NAYS — 25.
Aldrich,
Allison,
Anthony,
Cameron of Pa.,
Cameron of Wis.,
Chilcott,
Conger,
Davis of Ill.,
Edmunds,
Frye,
Harrison,
Hawley,
Hill,
Hoar,
Jones of Nevada,
Lapham,
Logan,
Miller of Cal.,
Miller of N.Y.,
Morrill,
Platt,
Plumb,
Rollins,
Sewell,
Windom.

ABSENT — 32.
Barrow,
Beck,
Blair,
Butler,
Camden,
Dawes,
Fair,
Farley,
Ferry,
Gorman,
Grover,
Hale,
Hampton,
Harris,
Ingalls,
Johnston,
Kellogg,
McDill,
McMillan,
Mahone,
Maxey,
Mitchell,
Ransom,
Saulsbury,
Saunders,
Sherman,
Slater,
Vance,
Van Wyck,
Walker,
Williams.

So the amendment was rejected.

659

Mr. HAWLEY. I ask to make a correction, which is simply one of logic or rhetoric, in the arrangement of some of the sections. There are three sections, which I may call the miscellaneous sections, one concerning intemperance, one providing that there shall not be more than two of a family in office, and one about recommendations to office. I ask that they be placed before the eighth section, that these three sections be placed at the close of the bill proper, leaving after them the provisions about assessments, &c., and the numbers of the sections of the bill amended accordingly.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. By unanimous consent that can be done.

Mr. EDMUNDS. What is the proposition?

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. Simply to arrange the sections differently.

Mr. HAWLEY. Three miscellaneous sections to come at the close of the bill proper and after them the provision as to assessments, &c.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. By unanimous consent that is agreed to, as to the arrangement of the sections.

The Senator from North Carolina [Mr. VANCE] notified the Chair that he wished to offer an amendment, but the Chair does not see him.

Mr. CONGER. In the amendment adopted forbidding the consideration of recommendations by Senators and Representatives it says "except as to character." I move to add the words "or residence." I think members of the House and of the Senate might very properly certify as to the residence, inasmuch as the law requires it —

Mr. MORGAN. An affidavit is required on that point.

Mr. HARRISON. An affidavit is required.

Mr. CONGER. But the affidavit may be false. I think Senators and Representatives would be apt to know and might certify.

Mr. MORGAN. I have no objection to it.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. Is there objection? The Chair hears none, and the amendment is agreed to. If there be no further amendment the question is on the engrossment and third reading of the bill.

Mr. JONAS. Mr. President, I have consumed no time in this debate, but have waited patiently in hope to see the bill so perfected by amendments that I might be able to vote for it. It has not assumed such a form; and I desire briefly to give the reasons which compel me to vote against it. I have desired to give it my support because I know that a sentiment prevails throughout the country demanding a reform in our civil service; and if it had depended on my friend the distinguished Senator from Ohio [Mr. PENDLETON], who has charge of this bill, I think it might have been so perfected as to enable me, and perhaps other gentlemen on this side of the Chamber who in part agree with me, to vote for it. He has consistently voted for all amendments which proposed to liberalize the bill and make it effective for good, and not, as I am compelled to believe it will prove to be, a mere pretense and sham.

The Senator from Ohio voted for the amendment offered by the Senator from Alabama [Mr. PUGH]. If that amendment had prevailed I should have voted for the bill; but it was defeated by the unanimous vote of the Senators on the other side of the Chamber.

Those Senators seem to have taken possession of this measure in their new-born zeal for reform. They seem to have taken it out of the hands of the Senator from Ohio and its original friends; and they have voted down every amendment which has been proposed by or which has commanded the assent of this side of the Chamber.

Mr. President, the amendment of the Senator from Alabama proposed to transfer this experiment to the people who are now in office, instead of reserving it for trial in the future upon those who may be applicants for appointment to vacancies which may occur in official positions. If there is anything in the popular demand for reform, if there is anything in the demand which has so awakened the apprehensions of Senators on the other side of the Chamber, and the party to which they belong, it is a demand that the civil service of this country shall be changed, shall be reformed, shall be corrected. If there is nothing wrong in the present civil service of the country we require no legislation; if there is nothing that can be effected by legislation, then we can wait for the reform which will be brought about by a change of policy and a change of parties in the administration of the country.

But we have been led to believe that the people were rising in indignation against this army of officers who now fill the places of the country, alleging that they have been organized into a band, a political machine for the purpose of controlling and influencing not only elections but nominations. They have been filled with disgust at the manner in which this political machine has been assessed, and the money raised therefrom in a large measure to control and carry elections and secure nominations. If the people have spoken at all, it is against the present civil service of the Government; and yet when a proposition is made to change this civil service or to subject its officers to the same examination which is proposed for future appointments to civil office in the Departments, it is voted down unanimously by the Republican party.

I deal with this bill in good faith, Mr. President; I am not voting against it as a politician or a party man. I believe that the civil service of this country is to a large extent incompetent, if not corrupt, and I will favor any measure which proposes an examination into the competency and character of the persons who fill the positions under it. But this is to be denied to us. All of the people who are in office are to remain. They are to constitute a privileged class, if they are not to be submitted to the same competition or the same examination which is proposed for candidates for appointment. Well, sir, I do not believe that the people wish this sort of civil-service reform.

Mr. GEORGE. Will the Senator from Louisiana allow me to ask him a question?

Mr. JONAS. Certainly.

Mr. GEORGE. Suppose this bill is defeated, will the present incumbents of these offices be subject to any examination?

Mr. JONAS. They will not, nor will they if this bill is passed. I said that I want to act in good faith. I know it has been said on this side of the Chamber that there is nothing in this bill which prevents the removal of every one in office should the Democratic party come into power. I deny it, Mr. President. If I supported this bill in good faith, I would consider that I was constituting a class of office-holders who could not be affected by political changes. I would consider, and I do to-day, that by the passage of this bill we are creating the people who now hold the offices of this country into a permanent organization of officers into whose sacred precincts new blood may intrude, only when vacancies occur and new candidates are presented for examination.

Mr. JONES, of Florida. Is it within the competency of Congress to take away from the Executive the power of removal and appointment?

Mr. JONAS. I am not talking of the Executive power over removals or appointments; this bill has been carefully guarded in that respect; this bill does not touch the Executive prerogative. It only concerns the clerks and employés in the Departments of the Government, and in the custom-houses and post-offices of the country where over fitly persons are employed. Having, as I have, in the city in which I reside, a custom-house which constitutes a great house of refuge into which all the political outcasts of post political campaigns have been gathered and rewarded for their various outrages upon the people, I am unwilling to perpetuate it to such uses; I am unwilling to say that its inmates shall not be subjected to an examination as to capacity and integrity when we propose to pass a bill to examine all candidates who are to be admitted to their fraternity. I am unwilling to perpetuate this office-holding class, and I say it in good faith, and I say to the Senators on the other side who believe as I do, and not as my friends around me, that if this bill passes, in my opinion it will do away with the power of removal, on the part of chiefs of Departments and heads of bureaus, of their subordinates and clerks should a new administration or a new party come in.

I am not speaking as a party man, Mr. President; I am perfectly willing to vote for a bill to require competitive examinations now, but I would compel those who now fill the offices of the land, those who are now clerks in the various Departments, those who now fill the various post-offices and custom-houses, and other subordinate positions, to go before the examining board and be examined as to their competency, their capacity, and their integrity. The people have denounced this office-holding machine, and they will not be satisfied to have it perpetuated.

Mr. President, a great deal has been said about forced assessments levied upon the office-holders. I do not know but what to a large extent this has been a voluntary assessment. I do not know but what these office-holders constitute an organization formed for political purposes, and who assess themselves. I am aware that involuntary assessments may have been wrung from the scrubbing women and drawn from the daily laborers. But these people are not reached by the provisions of this bill. They require no examination. But when I find the office-holders in the Departments organized into New York societies, into Pennsylvania societies, into Ohio societies, into Maine societies, into Indiana and Illinois political clubs for the purpose of aiding their party both by going home to the elections and by raising contributions among themselves for political uses, I see that there is a great political machine which requires investigation and change; and this bill so far from giving relief, in my opinion, perpetuates this machine organization, fastens it upon the country, makes of its members a privileged class, and I believe wall take away the power from an incoming administration, even to cleanse and weed it out. For that reason I shall be compelled to vote against the bill, although there are some of its features which I would gladly vote for separately.

Mr. VOORHEES. Mr. President, there are many features, some at least, voted into this bill by way of amendment which I concur in. I have voted for them for the purpose of bettering this bill, so that, if it is to become a law, it will have as much good and as little evil in it as possible. I regard that as the appropriate course to pursue in legislation. But with all the improvement which has been made to it, especially in the matter of political assessments, it has not been freed from that insurmountable objection to my mind which has been so fully stated by the Senator from Louisiana [Mr. JONAS], and which I have in a less forcible manner heretofore stated myself. I do not propose to restate those objections.

I should have been glad to have seen the amendment of the Senator from Alabama [Mr. PUGH] adopted. The mind of the dominant party

660

in this Senate, however, was notably illustrated this afternoon upon the subject of retaining all the political advantages which they now have in the distribution of the Federal patronage. When the Senator from Georgia [Mr. BROWN] introduced a measure which I thought extremely fair, looking the question of an equal division of the patronage of this Government square in the face, it was voted down, and with that departed my last hope of being able to support this bill.

I desire to say that if there was a separate vote upon some measures that are in this bill, and they came forward as separate legislation, I should support them, but as they do not cure the other evils I shall vote against the bill.

The bill was ordered to be engrossed for a third reading, and was read the third time by its title.

Mr. EDMUNDS. Could the Secretary conveniently read the bill at length, with the numerous amendments which have been introduced? I do not ask it but at the same time —

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. It will take a long time.

Mr. EDMUNDS. It is a bill of importance and with so many amendments —

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. It will take a very long time to read it in full.

Mr. EDMUNDS. I yield to the judgment of the Chair as I always do, and simply then wish to say that I shall vote for this bill cheerfully and gladly, notwithstanding what the Senator from Indiana and the Senator from Louisiana have said; but I am a little afraid that it is not adequate to the abuses we have in view, but it is one step in advance. I should like to have the yeas and nays on its passage.

Mr. VOORHEES. As the Senator from Vermont has alluded to me, I will say that I never had the slightest doubt of his voting for this bill, or any other Senator on that side.

Mr. EDMUNDS. You could not have, because we are for real civil service reform.

The yeas and nays were ordered.

Mr. BROWN. Before the vote is taken on the passage of the bill, I desire to submit a very few remarks.

I have not expected from the commencement, seeing as I did the united and tenacious support that the Republicans as a body gave the bill, that we should be likely to get it in a shape that we could vote for it. I had, however, hoped that we might get it in a shape that it would be less objectionable than it now is, but as it stands I desire to make this protest against it.

I have submitted a proposition that I thought was fair, honest, and just, that would look to the division of the patronage of the Government among those who bear the burdens of the Government with some sort of equality; that looked to an approximation of a division of it before the service should go into effect on a strictly non-partisan principle. My amendment provided after that approximation had been reached that it should go into effect on a non-partisan principle. That was voted down by a vote strictly party, with the exception of one single Democrat voting with the Republicans. That seemed to me to be a fair proposition, and the result appeared to show very clearly that the Republicans do not intend that there shall be any fair or equitable distribution of this patronage. They intend still to hold it in their hands as they have held it for many years, and they a minority of the tax-payers and people of the United States. They have notified the country by this vote that they intend to hold on to this advantage by a legislative enactment, so that if any misfortune should attend them in the future elections they will be prepared for it.

For that reason, Mr. President, I can not vote for the bill; for that reason I do not see how the Democratic party of this Union can yield it their support or in any way give it their assent.

Then, as I stated when I offered my last amendment, while we have stricken out that provision which regulated promotion by grades, confining it to insiders, we have left the bill entirely silent on that question, with power in the hands of the commissioners to establish such rules, with the consent of the President, as they may think proper. They can very easily establish rules which confine the competitive examination entirely to those who are inside. It seemed to me if the professions be correct that the Republican party are willing to have the competition in the examination extend to outsiders as well as insiders they ought to have sustained it, they ought to have supported it. They did not, however. That amendment was rejected by, I think, a strict party vote. I believe every Democrat in the Chamber who voted voted in favor of the amendment, and every Republican present and voting voted against the amendment. Therefore it seems to me to be very dear that it is not the purpose of the Republican party to permit this bill to be put into a shape that the Democracy shall have any fair chance, though they take their share of the burdens of the Government, in enjoying the patronage or the benefits of the Government.

For these reasons — I do not care to elaborate them, while I could assign many others — I can not vote for this bill.

Mr. COKE. Mr. President, I have withheld any expression on this bill until it has been perfected and ready for the final vote, intending, if possible, to support it. I find it in a shape which enables me to cast my vote for it. As an honest man, I feel it my duty, in order that no one may be misled by my action on it, to give my reasons for the vote I shall cast, so that both may go on record together and be mutually explanatory.

I regard the bill, taken as a response to the great public demand for civil-service reform, as utterly worthless and ineffectual, binding upon nobody, leaving the subject exactly where it stands now, the foot-ball and plaything of partisan purpose and ambition. It does not and will not stand in the way of a Republican President; for have we not been told by both the Senator from Iowa [Mr. ALLISON] and the Senator from Illinois [Mr. LOGAN], both distinguished leaders in their party, that this bill simply enacts into law a system now and for years past followed in the great Executive Departments of the Government in filling the offices? Nor will it stand in the way of a Democratic President when one shall be elected any more than it has done in that of Republican Presidents who have under its operation filled all the offices with partisan employés.

I feel no pleasure in characterizing this bill in that way. I desired greatly a bill which would have been effective and given a hope of real genuine reform. A number of amendments which would have given force and vitality to the bill have been offered and voted down, notably those of the Senators from Georgia and Alabama, and one proposed by myself subjecting the present incumbents of the offices to the rules and conditions prescribed in the bill. Another and still more important amendment offered by the Senator from Missouri [Mr. VEST], embracing among other things the substance of an amendment offered by the Senator from Oregon [Mr. SLATER], which would have put an end to political assessments, has been voted down. Every effort to inject by amendment anything like effectiveness into the bill has met the solid resistance of the other side of the Chamber, and the bill before the Senate is the one I must vote on.

I will vote for it because it is an effort, feeble and futile it is true, yet still an effort in the right direction, which although doing no good does no harm and may encourage its authors to greater, more intelligent, and consequently more effective work in the same direction in future. Having said this much at the same time and in the same public manner that I cast my vote for the bill, I shall after its passage feel that I am guiltless of having aided in creating the false impression that it meets the just demands of the country for reform.

In short, I am willing if anything can be accomplished under this bill to give its friends the benefit of a trial, avowing at the same time my own conviction that it will be found utterly worthless.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question is on the passage of the bill.

The Principal Legislative Clerk proceeded to call the roll.

Mr. VOORHEES (when his name was called). On the final passage of this bill I regret that I am paired with the Senator from Virginia [Mr. JOHNSTON], who is absent. I thought perhaps he would be here, and if he were here, I should have the pleasure of voting against it.

Mr. WALKER (when his name was called). I announce the pair of the Senator from North Carolina [Mr. VANCE] with the Senator from Louisiana [Mr. KELLOGG]. The Senator from North Carolina if present would vote "nay," and the Senator from Louisiana would vote "yea." I am paired with the Senator from Iowa [Mr. McDILL]. Being assured that he would vote "yea," I vote "yea."

Mr. JONAS (when Mr. WILLIAMS's name was called). The Senator from Kentucky [Mr. WILLIAMS] desired me to say that he was paired with the Senator from Nebraska [Mr. SAUNDERS]. If present, the Senator from Kentucky would vote "nay."

The roll-call was concluded.

Mr. BROWN. As this is an important issue, I desire again to announce the pair of my colleague [Mr. BARROW] with the Senator from New Hampshire [Mr. BLAIR]. My colleague if present would vote "nay."

Mr. FRYE. My colleague [Mr. HALE] is absent from the city. He is paired with the Senator from Kentucky [Mr. BECK]. If he were present, my colleague would vote "yea."

Mr. MILLER, of California. My colleague [Mr. FARLEY] is absent, being very ill, and is paired with the Senator from Michigan [Mr. FERRY]. I do not know how either of them would vote. Both are absent.

Mr. CAMERON, of Wisconsin. My colleague [Mr. SAWYER] is absent from the city. He is paired with the Senator from West Virginia [Mr. CAMDEN]. If my colleague were present, he would vote in favor of the passage of this bill.

Mr. MAXEY. I am paired with the Senator from Massachusetts [Mr. DAWES] . If he were here, I should vote "nay."

Mr. HOAR. My colleague [Mr. DAWES], if here, would vote "yea."

Mr. DAVIS, of West Virginia. I am requested by the Senator from Kentucky [Mr. BECK] to announce his pair with the Senator from Maine [Mr. HALE]. The Senator from Kentucky would vote "nay" if here.

Mr. MAXEY. I did not announce the vote of the Senator from Massachusetts [Mr. DAWES] because the bill having been amended since he left, I did not feel authorized to announce it.

661

Mr. JACKSON. My colleague [Mr. HARRIS], who is absent from the city, is paired on this question with the Senator from Kansas [Mr. INGALLS].

Mr. CAMERON, of Pennsylvania. My colleague [Mr. MITCHELL] is absent from the city, but I understand he is not paired. I supposed he was. If he were here, he would vote for the bill.

Mr. PUGH (after having voted in the negative). I am informed by the Senator from Ohio [Mr. PENDLETON] that the Senator from South Carolina [Mr. BUTLER] understands that I agreed to pair with him if I decided to vote against the passage of the bill to-day. I am indifferent to make any other record than I have made.

I withdraw my vote and announce that I am paired with the Senator from South Carolina, and that if he were here, I should let my vote stand against the bill.

Mr. BLAIR. As started by the honorable Senator from Georgia [Mr. BROWN], I am paired with his colleague [Mr. BARROW]. If he were here, I would vote for the bill.

The result was announced — yeas 38, nays 5; as follows:

YEAS — 38.
Aldrich,
Allison,
Anthony,
Bayard,
Cameron of Pa.,
Cameron of Wis.,
Cockrell,
Coke,
Conger,
Davis of Ill.,
Davis of W. Va.,
Edmunds,
Frye,
Garland,
George,
Gorman,
Groome,
Harrison,
Hawley,
Hill,
Hoar,
Jackson,
Jones of Florida,
Jones of Nevada,
Lamar,
Lapham,
Logan,
Miller of Cal.,
Miller of N.Y.,
Morrill,
Pendleton,
Platt,
Plumb,
Rollins,
Sewell,
Vest,
Walker,
Windom.

NAYS — 5.
Brown,
Call,
Jonas,
McPherson,
Morgan.

ABSENT — 33.
Barrow,
Beck,
Blair,
Butler,
Camden,
Chilcott,
Dawes,
Fair,
Farley,
Ferry,
Grover,
Hale,
Hampton,
Harris,
Ingalls,
Johnston,
Kellogg,
McDill,
McMillan,
Mahone,
Maxey,
Mitchell,
Pugh,
Ransom,
Saulsbury,
Saunders,
Sawyer,
Sherman,
Slater,
Vance,
Van Wyck,
Voorhees,
Williams.

So the bill was passed.

Mr. BROWN. I offer an amendment to the title of the bill. I think the title ought to conform to some extent to the body of the bill. I move to strike out the words "A bill to regulate and improve the civil service of the United States" and insert the words "a bill to perpetuate in office the Republicans who now control the patronage of the Government." [Laughter.]

Mr. ALLISON. Before that motion is made I move to strike out the preamble.

Mr. EDMUNDS. The preamble must be agreed to separately. It has not been agreed to yet.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question must be put on agreeing to the preamble.

Mr. EDMUNDS. No preamble is necessary in a bill of this kind.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question is on the adoption of the preamble.

The preamble was rejected.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question now is on the title of the bill. The Senator from Georgia [Mr. BROWN] moves to amend the title. The question is on the amendment, which will be read.

The ACTING SECRETARY. It is proposed to amend the title so as to read "A bill to perpetuate in office the Republicans who now hold the patronage of the Government."

The amendment was rejected.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The title will stand as reported.

Mr. EDMUNDS. I wish to give notice that to-morrow I shall move as a supplement to this, in order that the House of Representatives may have both measures and failing one they may pass the other, to proceed to the consideration of the bill reported from the Judiciary Committee to prevent political assessments. Having given that notice I move that the Senate do now adjourn.

Mr. SEWELL. I ask the Senator to withdraw his motion for a moment.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from New Jersey asks the Senator from Vermont to withdraw his motion.

Mr. SEWELL. In accordance with the understanding had on the floor of the Senate when the civil-service bill was taken up, I wish to move that the bill for the relief of Fitz-John Porter be now taken up.

Mr. EDMUNDS. My motion is to adjourn. I can not give way.

Mr. McPHERSON. I hope the bill named by my colleague will be made the special order for to-morrow.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. It is moved that the Senate adjourn. The question is on that motion.

The motion was agreed to; and (at 6 o'clock and 58 minutes p. m.) the Senate adjourned.

666

December 28, 1882.

POLITICAL ASSESSMENTS.

Mr. EDMUNDS. Now let the bill before the Senate be read.

The bill (S. 2288) to prevent officers or employés of the United States from collecting moneys from other officers or employés of the United States, and to prevent officers and employés of the United States from paying moneys, to other officers or employés of the United States for political objects, was considered as in Committee of the Whole.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. If no amendment be proposed, the bill will be reported to the Senate without amendment.

Mr. BECK. I supposed some member of the committee would offer as a substitute for that bill the bill which I originally introduced and had referred to the committee; but as I presume that will not be done, I desire to offer a substitute for the bill. I send it to the desk.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. It is moved to strike out all after the enacting clause and insert what will be read.

The Acting Secretary read as follows:

That it shall not be lawful for any person holding any office under the United States, or any employé thereof, to contribute or pay to any committee or person, or into any fund, any money, property, or valuable thing for any political purpose whatsoever, or to pay any assessment or percentage upon the income or emoluments of his office or position for any political purpose, or to give, lend, advance, or pay any money, property, or valuable thing with the intent, or with the assent, permission, or understanding that the same may be applied to or for any political purpose whatsoever, or to himself or herself apply the same to any political purpose. No head of a Department or other superior officer shall himself collect, or permit or allow any other person to collect or receive, from any officer or employé in his Department or under his supervision, or from any other officer or employé whatsoever, any assessment, percentage, contribution, gift, loan, or advance of any money, property, or valuable thing with the intent, understanding, or permission that the game shall or may be used for any political purpose.

SEC. 2. That any person, who shall violate any provision of this act shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, and, on conviction thereof, shall be punished by imprisonment for a term not exceeding six months, and, in the discretion of the court, by a fine not exceeding $5,000, and on conviction shall be forever thereafter disqualified from holding any office of honor, profit, or trust under the United States. Any officer of the United States who shall violate any provision of this act shall, in addition to such imprisonment and fine, be deemed and taken to have vacated the office by him held.

Mr. EDMUNDS. I do not wish to take up the time of the Senate; this subject was discussed sufficiently before.

The only essential difference, between the substitute offered by the Senator from Kentucky and the bill of the committee is that his substitute prohibits any person holding official position from making any contribution out of his private funds to any political purpose. If I being a Senator and holding an official position wish to contribute at Burlington, Vermont, for the success of a Democratic candidate for mayor of that town because I think he may be the best man, to pay the expense of hiring teams to go and bring in the people who are sick, to pay for printing ballots or any other legitimate object of the expenditure of money in carrying on a government, I am to be punished for doing it.

I do not believe that Congress has power to interfere with the right of a citizen, if he be an office-holder, to freely give his private money to private persons for political objects. I do not think it is within the constitutional range of Congressional power. It interferes with the political liberty of the citizen, for the office-holder is still a citizen; and the bill that we passed yesterday and this bill only go to the extent, and they do go fully to that extent, of preventing anything in the nature of coercion or duress or the exertion of political influence upon people employed by the United States to induce them to do things that otherwise they would not freely do.

Now to go the step further and say that no such person in the service of the United States shall exert one of the original and fundamental rights of a citizen of contributing of his means in a lawful way and to another private person, his friend or neighbor, to promote the interests of what he considers to be the true and real party of the country, whatever it may be, or the true and real party of his town or State, is going altogether too far, both in a constitutional and I think in a political sense. The Supreme Court in the case of Curtis held the act of 1876 to be valid. I hold the opinion that they delivered, in my hand; and while they do not say in terms that such a provision as that of my friend from Kentucky would violate the political rights of the citizen — because no such question was before them though it was somewhat discussed — the whole tenor of the opinion convinces me that the court carefully intended to draw the line, as they do in their discussion, between the personal political rights of a citizen holding office to exercise his own free will in a way that you could be sure it was free in what he chose to give out of his private purse to these matters without duress or coercion. So I hope the Senate will not agree to this substitute. I have stated the only essential difference between it and the bill, except as to mere matters of form.

Mr. BECK. Mr. President, I have no desire to argue the question. I said yesterday all I care to say about it. The bill presented by the Judiciary Committee is really no improvement on the law of 1876 except in its details. It names a good many more persons and makes a great many more professions; but the act of 1876 is defective, as was shown in the Curtis case, Mr. Curtis, as stated by the Senator from Connecticut [Mr. HAWLEY], who seemed to know him well, was only the treasurer of the Republican State committee of New York, and never himself solicited contributions from any one. Indeed, he discountenanced them all he could, and wherever he had jurisdiction he took pains to tell all the employés that they were not obliged to contribute nor expected to do so unless they so desired; and yet he was fined a thousand dollars under the law of 1876 for doing that.

The message of the President very clearly indicated the fact to Congress that the act of 1876 was a failure, and that until contributions were stopped anything less would not strengthen the law of 1876 nor cure the evil. I think it must be apparent to the Senate that so long as the employés of this Government believe — and as the President says it goes without saying that they do believe — that they can not hold their places unless they do contribute, the evil is not reached which the law of 1876 and the professions of Senators on both sides, mean to reach.

I do not propose to argue the matter. I know the Senate will vote down my amendment. The RECORD of this morning contains my views in brief in regard to the whole subject, and the Senate can do as they like.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question is on the amendment of the Senator from Kentucky offered as a substitute for the bill.

The question being put, a division was called for.

Mr. EDMUNDS. I think we had better have the yeas and nays. It is a very interesting constitutional question.

The yeas and nays were ordered, and the Principal Legislative Clerk proceeded to call the roll.

Mr. BECK (when his name was called). I am paired with the Senator from Maine [Mr. HALE]. I believe he is against the substitute, and therefore I do not vote. If he were here, I should vote "yea."

Mr. JACKSON (when the name of Mr. HARRIS was called). My colleague [Mr. HARRIS] is necessarily absent. He is paired with the Senator from Kansas [Mr. INGALLS].

Mr. JOHNSTON (when his name was called). I am paired with the Senator from Pennsylvania [Mr. MITCHELL]. If he were here, I should vote for the substitute of the Senator from Kentucky.

Mr. McMILLAN (when his name was called). I have been paired for some days with the Senator from North Carolina [Mr. RANSOM]. I see he is present in the Chamber and I am at liberty to vote. I vote "nay."

Mr. MAXEY (when his name was called). I am paired with the Senator from Massachusetts [Mr. DAWES]. If he were here, I should vote "yea."

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Mr. CAMERON, of Wisconsin (when the name of Mr. SAWYER was called). My colleague [Mr. SAWYER] is absent from the city. He is paired with the Senator from West Virginia [Mr. CAMDEN]. If he were present, my colleague would vote "nay."

Mr. VEST (when his name was called). I am paired with the Senator from Connecticut [Mr. HAWLEY]. I should vote "yea" if he were here.

Mr. WALKER (when his name was called). I am paired with the Senator from Iowa [Mr. McDILL].

Mr. WILLIAMS (when his name was called). I am paired with the Senator from Nebraska [Mr. SAUNDERS]. If he were here, I should vote "yea."

The roll-call was concluded.

Mr. BLAIR (after having voted in the negative). I am paired with the Senator from Georgia [Mr. BARROW]. I voted by mistake, and withdraw my vote.

Mr. PLATT. As announced by the Senator from Missouri [Mr. VEST] my colleague [Mr. HAWLEY] is paired with the Senator.

Mr. ALLISON. The Senator from Delaware [Mr. BAYARD] is absent necessarily to-day, and I am paired with him on general political questions. I do not wish to commit him to this amendment, but I shall refrain from voting in his absence.

Mr. GROOME (after having voted in the affirmative). Under a general understanding between the Senator from Now York [Mr. MILLER] and myself that neither will vote in the absence of the other upon a political question, discovering that he is absent from the Chamber, I ask leave to withdraw my vote.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. Leave is granted.

Mr. DAVIS, of West Virginia. My colleague [Mr. CAMDEN] is paired with the Senator from Wisconsin [Mr. SAWYER] on all political questions.

Mr. ROLLINS. The Senator from Virginia [Mr. MAHONE] and the Senator from Delaware [Mr. SAULSBURY] are paired.

The result was announced — yeas 18, nays 23; as follows:

YEAS — 18.
Brown,
Call,
Cockrell,
Coke,
Davis of W. Va.,
Garland,
George,
Gorman,
Jackson,
Jonas,
Jones of Florida,
McPherson,
Morgan,
Pendleton,
Ransom,
Slater,
Vance,
Voorhees.

NAYS — 23.
Aldrich,
Anthony,
Cameron of Pa.,
Cameron of Wis.,
Chilcott,
Conger,
Davis of Ill.,
Edmunds,
Frye,
Harrison,
Hill,
Hoar,
Lapham,
Logan,
McMillan,
Miller of Cal.,
Morrill,
Platt,
Rollins,
Sewell,
Sherman,
Van Wyck,
Windom.

ABSENT — 35.
Allison,
Barrow,
Bayard,
Beck,
Blair,
Butler,
Camden,
Dawes,
Fair,
Farley,
Ferry,
Groome,
Grover,
Hale,
Hampton,
Harris,
Hawley,
Ingalls,
Johnston,
Jones of Nevada,
Kellogg,
Lamar,
McDill,
Mahone,
Maxey,
Miller of N.Y.,
Mitchell,
Plumb,
Pugh,
Saulsbury,
Saunders,
Sawyer,
Vest,
Walker,
Williams.

So the amendment was rejected.

Mr. PUGH. I offer the following amendment with no intention whatever of discussing it; I simply desire a yea-and-nay vote upon it. In section 1, at the end of line 11, I propose to insert "or any national bank or officer or employé thereof, or any railroad corporation chartered by the United States or any officer or employé thereof;" so as to make the clause read:

And no clerk or employé of any Department, branch, or bureau of the executive, judicial, or military or naval service of the United States, or any national bank or officer or employé thereof, or any railroad corporation chartered by the United States or any officer or employé thereof, shall, directly or indirectly, solicit or receive, or be in any manner concerned in soliciting or receiving, any assessment, subscription, or contribution for any political purpose whatever, from any officer, clerk, or employé of the United States, or any Department, branch or bureau thereof, or from any person receiving any salary or compensation from moneys derived from the Treasury of the United States.

The same words come in at the end of line 18 of the same section; and I also move to insert the amendment there.

The yeas and nays were ordered, and the Principal Legislative Clerk proceeded to call the roll.

Mr. BECK (when his name was called). I am paired with the Senator from Maine [Mr. HALE]. If he were here, I should vote "yea."

Mr. JOHNSTON (when his name was called). I am paired with the Senator from Pennsylvania [Mr. MITCHELL].

Mr. MAXEY (when his name was called). I am paired with the Senator from Massachusetts [Mr. DAWES]. If he were here, I should vote "yea."

Mr. VEST (when his name was called). I am paired with the Senator from Connecticut [Mr. HAWLEY]. But for the pair I should vote "yea."

Mr. WALKER (when his name was called). I am paired with the Senator from Iowa [Mr. McDILL]; otherwise I should vote "yea."

Mr. WILLIAMS (when his name was called). I am paired on all party questions with the Senator from Nebraska [Mr. SAUNDERS]. I can not see any party politics in this, but as the Republicans are all voting "nay," I shall withhold my vote. I would vote "yea" were it not for the pair.

The roll-call was concluded.

Mr. BLAIR. I again announce my pair with the Senator from Georgia [Mr. BARROW]. I shall not do so on subsequent roll-calls.

Mr. ALLISON. I again announce my pair with the Senator from Delaware [Mr. BAYARD]. I do not know how he would vote on this question, but I should vote "nay" if he were here.

Mr. VEST. Before the vote is announced I wish to state that I have a general pair with the Senator from Kansas [Mr. PLUMB] who is not in his seat. I stated that I was paired with the Senator from Connecticut [Mr. HAWLEY], but in fact my pair in with the Senator from Kansas.

The result was announced — yeas, 17, nays 24: as follows:

YEAS — 17.
Brown,
Call,
Cockrell,
Coke,
Garland,
George,
Jackson,
Jonas,
Jones of Florida,
McPherson,
Morgan,
Pendleton,
Pugh,
Ransom,
Slater,
Vance,
Voorhees.

NAYS — 24.
Aldrich,
Anthony,
Cameron of Pa.,
Cameron of Wis.,
Chilcott,
Conger,
Davis of Ill.,
Davis of W. Va.,
Frye,
Harrison,
Hill,
Hoar,
Lapham,
McMillan,
Miller of Cal.,
Morrill,
Platt,
Rollins,
Sewell,
Sherman,
Van Wyck,
Windom.

ABSENT — 35.
Allison,
Barrow,
Bayard,
Beck,
Blair,
Butler,
Camden,
Dawes,
Fair,
Farley,
Ferry,
Gorman,
Groome,
Grover,
Hale,
Hampton,
Harris,
Hawley,
Ingalls,
Johnston,
Jones of Nevada,
Kellogg,
Lamar,
McDill,
Mahone,
Maxey,
Miller of N.Y.
Mitchell,
Plumb,
Saulsbury,
Saunders,
Sawyer,
Vest,
Walker,
Williams.

So the amendment was rejected.

Mr. MORGAN. I offer the following amendment: in section 4, line 5, after the word "Delegate," insert "or to any other person in any place over which the United States has exclusive jurisdiction;" so that the clause will read:

SEC. 4. That no officer, clerk, or other person in the service of the United States shall give or hand over to any other officer, clerk, or person in the service of the United States, or to any Senator or member of the House of Representatives, or Territorial Delegate, or to any other person in any place over which the United States has exclusive jurisdiction, any money or other valuable thing on account of, or to be applied to the promotion of any political object whatever.

Mr. EDMUNDS. That includes the District of Columbia and all the Territories.

Mr. MORGAN. That was intended to exclude the District of Columbia, the Territories, and those places mentioned in section 2 of the bill — "rooms or buildings occupied in the discharge of official duties by any officer or employé of the United States mentioned in this act." I voted with some doubt for the substitute offered by the Senator from Kentucky, not because I am not convinced of the power of Congress to control all persons who are in places within its exclusive jurisdiction in their interference, either by giving to or receiving money from officers or employés of the United States; but because I was apprehensive that that substitute asserted on the part of Congress a jurisdiction within the States that I am not clearly satisfied ought to be admitted. The control of elections within the States and under State statutes, it seems to me, ought to be entirely within the power of the States. I can scarcely think of an exception to that proposition. I know we have asserted upon the statute-books a certain control over the conduct of elections in reference to those offices which are said to be offices of the Government of the United States, and those officers who have functions to discharge in connection with the Government of the United States; but I am not prepared fully to admit that the Congress of the United States can punish even its own officers for their conduct in elections which concern only State and municipal affairs, and I had some apprehension that the amendment which was offered by the Senator from Kentucky might have that extent at least by interpretation.

The amendment which I now bring forward is entirely free from that objection. My amendment proposes to inflict a punishment for offenses committed within those places where the Government of the United States has exclusive jurisdiction upon all persons who in anywise interfere with the officers and employés of the Government, either by giving or by receiving money to be employed or applied to the promotion of any political object whatever.

I do not hold to the doctrine that the Congress of the United States may not, within a place over which it has exclusive jurisdiction, declare certain acts to be criminal, and therefore punishable, connected with the conduct of the Government or of any office of the Government. I believe that the Congress of the United States, or any government, in fact, which assumes to exercise control over its officers, has the right to declare, in deference to public policy, what acts or omissions on the part of those officers shall be considered as criminal, and to punish them accordingly. I do not understand that it is any interference with the personal rights of a citizen as guaranteed in the Constitution or by the

668

laws, when he is holding an office or when he is transacting any business with an officer, to say that certain acts which he shall perform are declared by the statute to be unlawful. I do not think that such declarations are outside of the legitimate domain of the legislative power. If I did I should feel afraid that the Government of the United States and the governments of the different States would find themselves sometimes debarred from the power of enforcing a great line of public policy by what we might term the private or reserved rights of the citizen obstructing the performance of duties which the citizen undertook to perform when he accepted appointment to office.

In the argument of this question — and I do not propose to go into the argument of it fully at all — I have noticed I think an omission to give due attention to the well-known distinction between crimes whether they are mala in se or mala prohibita. It certainly is not a crime in itself for a citizen of the United States, acting in good faith, to give or to hand over money for political purposes to any officer of the Government of the United States, and yet it is within the competence of Congress to declare that that is a crime because of the tendency of acts of that kind to pervert the offices of the country into machines for the control of political adventures and affairs.

I find in section 12 of this bill, as proposed by the committee —

That no person shall, in any room or building occupied in the discharge of official duties by any officer or employé of the United States mentioned in this act, solicit, in any manner whatever, or receive any contribution of money or any other thing of value for any political purpose whatever.

That section admits the whole of the proposition couched in my amendment. If a person "within a public building occupied in the discharge of official duties by any officer or employé of the United States mentioned in thin act" shall not solicit or in any manner receive a contribution of money or other thing for political purposes, he must give up a certain portion of what might be called the rights inhering in his citizenship in deference to the declared public policy on this subject. There is no ground for excluding a man from receiving money for political purposes from another private person "within a room or building occupied by any officer or employé of the Government of the United States" which is not admitted and included in the amendment which I have had the honor to present to the Senate.

The officers of the United States are certainly subject to control. Section 2 admits that any person in the United States is subject to control provided he be within a building or room occupied in the discharge of official duties by an officer or employé of the Government of the United States. If that may be done in a room or building so occupied, it must be upon the ground that the Government of the United States has exclusive jurisdiction there, and this may equally be done in the District of Columbia, in the Territories, and in any fort, dock-yard, or arsenal, or in other places where the Government of the United States has this exclusive jurisdiction, and for the same reasons.

Section 2, as I understand it, is based entirely upon the ground that the Congress of the United States has the absolute right to control the action of private persons when they are found within those places over which the Government has exclusive jurisdiction and control.

Mr. JONES, of Florida. Will the Senator allow me to ask him a question?

Mr. MORGAN. Yes.

Mr. JONES, of Florida. This is a very important matter. I am with the Senator on this amendment; but in the case of a building rented or owned, if you please, by the General Government, where its officers are employed and over which there has been no jurisdiction ceded by the State, does he think there is exclusive jurisdiction for all purposes in such buildings within a State?

Mr. MORGAN. I was not stating any opinion or conviction of my own on this subject; I was arguing this amendment upon the admissions which are contained in the second section of this bill. The Committee on the Judiciary have brought in the second section of this bill as setting forth sound constitutional doctrine; and upon that assumption, without saying that I expressly concur with the committee on that point, I propose to go further and not to limit the power to control private persons to those placed mentioned in the second section of the bill, but to extend it to all places over which the Government of the United States has exclusive jurisdiction.

Now to make the matter a little more plain, if I can, I will read that section again:

SEC. 2. That no person shall, in any room or building occupied in the discharge of official duties by any officer or employé of the United States mentioned in thin act, solicit, in any manner whatever, or receive any contribution of money or any other thing or value for any political purpose whatever.

Not from an officer of the Government of the United States or an employé thereof, but from anybody. No person within the sacred precincts of a room or building occupied by the officers and employés in the discharge of their official duties shall receive from any other person any money or contributions or other thing of value for any political purpose whatever.

Now, sir, there can not be a broader declaration of the doctrine which my amendment includes than is found in that second section of this bill; and the whole effect and scope of my amendment is merely to enlarge the force and operation of the second section of the bill so as to include all places over which the Government of the United States has exclusive jurisdiction, instead of limiting it to the rooms or buildings occupied at the time in the discharge of official duties by an officer or employé of the Government of the United States.

So I take it that the Judiciary Committee have gravely and solemnly and beyond all contradiction furnished us the doctrine upon which my amendment is based. The only question that remains to be discussed is one of policy, and that is whether this doctrine should be held to apply to all places within the exclusive jurisdiction of the United States, or whether it shall be confined in its application to a room or building in which these officers are found employed at the time that one private person receives money from an officer or from another private person to aid in carrying on political campaigns. That is the whole of it.

I find myself relieved by the admissions made by the Committee on the Judiciary from any necessity of arguing the constitutionality of the amendment which I have had the honor to offer. It is affirmed in the second section of this bill.

The question then remaining is simply one of policy. I think upon that point the Senate can scarcely doubt. It cannot be denied that the evils of soliciting, and receiving money for political purposes are found to be more largely indulged in and to have a worse effect within the District of Columbia than any other place that can be named in the United States. If we can prevent any person who is in office in the District of Columbia or in the service of the Government of the United States from giving to any private person within this District any money to be used in political campaigns, we shall have so thoroughly broken up the center ground upon which these expeditions against the peace and welfare of the country are conducted as that hereafter we shall have no trouble in making the application of this doctrine throughout the entire length and breadth of the United States, at least in all places where the Government has exclusive jurisdiction.

Do we not know, Mr. President, how perfectly convenient and easy it is, has been, and will be for private persons not in any wise connected with the Government of the United States to have the sanction of an express or implied authority from a political committee, and through that to have the sanction, it may be, and often is, of the Administration itself, in the collection of money from the officers and employés of this Government in the District of Columbia, to be used for political purposes? Shall we undertake merely to prevent an officer from receiving money from an officer when that does not meet the evil in question at all, and when it is quite convenient for that officer to step outside of the house or building where he is employed, and in the recess of his employment to go to a private citizen who is the known agent of a political party and make his contributions there? Does the evil that we are trying to check consist in the place where the money is paid, or does it consist in the fact that the money is paid for political purposes? Are we deceiving ourselves and the country by assuming that money paid outside of the walls of a building has no evil effect, when money paid within the walls would have all the bad effects we have realized in the last several years from this procedure?

Now, let us be candid with ourselves, Mr. President, and meet this question upon solid ground. The Committee on the Judiciary find sufficient warrant in the Constitution for the provision of the second section of this bill to punish a private person for receiving or giving money or for soliciting money within the precincts of a public building. After that concession on the part of this committee it seems to me that the country can not excuse us if we do not extend that same constitutional power, and for the same reason that the Government has exclusive jurisdiction over the entire area of the territory of the District of Columbia at least, 90 that we can prevent persons here from hanging about these Departments or about the hotel corridors or in the headquarters of political parties, there to receive what the officers and employés of the Government know full well they have no power to refuse except at the expense of their offices, money to be used in campaign political purposes.

I could go much farther than this and vindicate the second section upon grounds broader than that which the committee have intimated in the language of that section. I could, according to my own convictions of the constitutional power of this Government, go even further than the committee have gone, and I would feel myself I think entirely safe in making the declaration that the Congress of the United States has the power to prevent any communication between a person holding office or employment under it and a private person which is calculated to work detriment to the public policy of this country. The constitutional ground is a clear one, in my judgment, and it interferes with no private right. But I need not take that ground, for my amendment relates to the bill as it is brought in by the Committee on the Judiciary, and I do not wish to commit the Committee on the Judiciary if I could to any broader premises than they themselves have assumed in the second section, but I merely desire to enlarge the scope and field of the operation of that section so that it shall include all places within the exclusive jurisdiction of the Government of the United States.

Mr. EDMUNDS. Mr. President, I will only occupy two minutes. The Senator from Alabama is entirely mistaken in supposing that the second section of the bill reported by the committee involves any such doctrines as he maintains. It does not. It only involves the doctrine

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that the United States has a right to regulate the performances of people in buildings that are occupied by it for official purposes; and there is a very wide distinction between the dominion that the United States as a business government has over a building that it uses for public purposes and its political dominion over all the Territories of the United States and the District of Columbia. They are totally different things. The committee therefore are not committed to any such doctrine as my honorable friend maintains; and the effect of his amendment, upon the merits of it, would be to deprive every citizen of the United States who lives in any of the Territories or in the District of Columbia, who is in any employment under the Government of any kind, great or small, from giving anything of his means, of his own free will and accord for any political purpose. With an unfriendly judge and an adverse political jury, I should have no doubt that in some of the Territories and possibly in the District of Columbia a man might be convicted for luring a horse and buggy to go to the polls, if he spent his money for that sole political object and purpose, to get himself there, perhaps to peddle votes, certainly to vote himself.

That will not do, Mr. President. If I did not know the hunger of my friend from Alabama and his political associates to purify the politics of this country, as the long life of their party has shown, I should expect that they were trying to drag the bill down by indefensible provisions. That is all I have to say.

Mr. MORGAN. Mr. President, I have a very strong "appetite" for purifying the political service of this country, and I trust that in 1884 I shall be thoroughly gratified by the success of the Democratic party, who will take possession of this Government and work its purification.

Mr. EDMUNDS. You will die of starvation. [Laughter.]

Mr. MORGAN. Not by any means, because the Democratic party is composed of five million voters, scarcely one of whom I venture to assert holds his allegiance in that party by reason of any expectation of advantages to come. They have been drawn together not by any temptations of office or money or power. They have been united in the Senator's own country and in the Northern States by their adhesion to principle, and they have stood there battling against enormous majorities year in and year out with a thoroughly maintained organization and without the hope of local or national reward through a long series of years. We have in masses the material from which we can draw and place men in the offices of the United States Government who will do their duty to this Government from a sense of conviction of duty. We shall not be at all distraught, because of the want of proper material entirely satisfactory to the American people to fill up the offices of this country, and from which it may be expected that a higher and better order of civil service will obtain in this country hereafter than we have had the privilege of enjoying for many years. I therefore, sir, confess to a very strong "appetite" for the arrival of that day in which these five million patriotic men may be gratified with the opportunity of serving their country according to their convictions of duty, and not because of the rewards which are held out to them of an official character or otherwise.

Now, sir, will the Senator from Vermont contend that under the reading of this second section it is merely the power to regulate the conduct of persons within the precincts of a building that is intended to be provided for? If so, upon what ground is it that he makes that contention? Is it for the purpose of preventing the interruption of public business? A man might go into a public building in this city and very quietly slip a note into the hands of an officer or employé and say to him, "It is your duty to the Republican party," or the Democratic, as the case might be, "to make a contribution of your means for the support of a campaign that is now being conducted in this country." There would be no disturbance of the official business of the person so approached. The place at which that act would be performed would have no significance at all in characterizing the act as being either lawful or unlawful, moral or immoral, dangerous or otherwise. It is not the intent and purpose, it seems to me from the language of the second section, merely to protect the officers within the precincts of the public buildings against disorder and personal interruption, but it is the exercise and the announcement of a jurisdictional power there to control these acts because of the fact that that place is within the exclusive jurisdiction of the Government of the United States. It can not be that this committee have found any evil of that sort to remedy. Legislation is supposed to take place for the purpose of securing some advantage to the country or for the remedy of some evil. This second section appears to be directed to the remedy of an evil. Have we heard any complaint in this country that officers or employés of the Government were disturbed in the public buildings so that they could not discharge their ordinary duties by the presence of solicitors and importunate men asking money from them to carry on political campaigns? Is it the preservation of the peace within these offices that the honorable Senate from Vermont is struggling so to secure in this bill? Or is it the higher duty which he and I owe to this country to try to repress an evil which makes against a sound public policy whenever and wherever we find ourselves in the possession of sufficient power and jurisdiction to enact and enforce a law for its suppression.

I think that this honorable committee in the presentation of this second section did not undertake to legislate against an evil which never had any existence and about which there was never any complaint, but that their legislation was directed to the fact that it was vicious in itself, corrupting to the public service, and dangerous to the public welfare; that the money should be paid, whether the solicitation was made quietly and gently by a note or through a whisper, or whether the money was drawn from a man's pocket by a grasp upon his throat and a thrust at his pocket-book. We have all the necessary laws to preserve the peace in public buildings. No, sir; the evil that we are legislating against, and that which it is said the country requires us to legislate against, is not the disturbance of the peace within the precincts of the public buildings, but it is the corrupt solicitation of money for political purposes — I call it "corrupt," because that is the way the country characterizes it — the corrupt solicitation of money from men who are paid to do a duty and upon whom these assessments are levied, because they get pay from the Government, and have not got the power to protect themselves against such demands. That is the matter.

It seems to me it is a begging of the question to narrow down the broad confession of jurisdiction announced in section 2 of this bill to the poor, miserable purpose of merely preserving the peace within the public buildings by preventing a man from going there and intimating or whispering, or receiving even without an intimation or a whisper, money to be employed in conducting election campaigns.

I fear, Mr. President, that this is a tub to the whale. I fear that section 2 was put in this bill merely to inform the public that there was a disposition on the part of the committee reporting this bill to do something, some little thing, in the direction of the repression of the evil of asking or receiving money by private persons or from those who hold office. But, sir, the lawyer who comes to construe that section after we are dead and gone, if it shall find its way on the statute-book, will never feel the slightest embarrassment in finding that the ground upon which Congress assumed jurisdiction to give this little relief was in fact that Congress had the right to do it because the place was simply within the exclusive jurisdiction of the Government of the United States. That is the gist and principle of section 2, and the admission can not be narrowed down to the ground which the Senator from Vermont now weeks to narrow it to by the construction which he proposes to put upon it. The language does not admit of this construction, whatever may have been the intent of the committee. They have been very unfortunate in the use of language if it admits only of the narrow construction put upon it by the honorable Senator from Vermont. It is broader than that, and, being broader, it is founded in all of its breadth upon true constitutional principles.

Let us come to the task now of relieving the civil service in the District of Columbia from the odious burden which has been too often inflicted upon it in the form of contributions made by employés of the Government into the hands of private persons or persons who are not the employés of the Government for mere political purposes.

Take the case of Mr. Gorham when he was Secretary of the Senate and was also chairman, I believe, or secretary, of the Congressional executive committee of the Republican party. Mr. Gorham was not an officer of the United States Government within the meaning of this act. He was here an officer of the Senate of the United States, chosen to that place under a constitutional right on the part of the Senate to elect him to it. The President could not turn him out, nor could the heads of the Departments, nor could all the powers of the Government except the Senate. Although he held the position of Secretary of the Senate, he was, as to the employés of this Government in Washington city, a private citizen, and yet he held a powerful office, an office of great dignity and weight in its political significance.

Can it be said that Mr. Gorham could get a man from one of the offices of this city into his Secretary's office and could there demand and receive of him money to conduct a political campaign, and that Mr. Gorham would not violate the public policy as much in doing that us if he would go to the office in which that person was employed and there demand the same contribution? The demand in both cases is made in a public office, a place that should not be interrupted by business of that character, a place not set apart as a canvassing ground for political parties. In each case the place itself deserves protection, as much in the one case as in the other. Yet under the construction which the Senator from Vermont places upon section 2, if this act had been then in force, Mr. Gorham's conduct in making the solicitations which he testified to before a committee of the Senate would have been entirely innocent, provided it was not done within the building where an officer of the Government of the United States was in actual employment. Suppose that the political agent of a campaign committee should go into the Interior Department after office hours and after all the clerks had actually discharged their duty for the day, but while one of them was still loitering about the building and in a room not occupied at that moment of time for official business, but occupied merely for the convenience of the clerk, and this agent should make the demand upon the clerk for the money to carry on a political campaign, would section 2 be violated? Unquestionably it would, but not because at the moment that the demand was made the building was occupied for an official purpose, but because it was a building over which the Government of the United States had exclusive jurisdiction.

That is the principle in section 2. If the honorable Senator from

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Vermont and the Committee on the Judiciary do not desire to commit themselves to that doctrine, they have immediate occasion to employ some words in explanation of the text of section 2 which shall convey their meaning more distinctly than it is conveyed here.

I reassert the proportion that any lawyer in the construction of section 2 of this bill will there find broadly declared the power on the part of the Government of the United States to punish any officer or private person who may, within the places where this Government has exclusive jurisdiction, go and make solicitation or receive or give money for political purposes.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question is on the amendment of the Senator from Alabama [Mr. MORGAN].

Mr. MORGAN. Upon that I ask for the yeas and nays.

The yeas and nays were ordered, and the Principal Legislative Clerk proceeded to call the roll.

Mr. JOHNSTON (when his name was called). I am paired with the Senator from Pennsylvania [Mr. MITCHELL].

Mr. MAXEY (when his name was called). I am paired with the Senator from Massachusetts [Mr. DAWES] on this bill. If he were present, I should vote on this amendment "yea."

Mr. WILLIAMS (when his name was called). But for my pair I should vote "yea."

The roll-call was concluded.

Mr. PENDLETON. I am paired with the Senator from Connecticut [Mr. HAWLEY].

Mr. GROOME (after having voted in the affirmative). The Senator from New York [Mr. MILLER] still being absent from the Chamber, I withdraw my vote.

Mr. ALLISON. I am paired with the Senator from Delaware [Mr. BAYARD].

Mr. VEST. I am paired with the Senator from Kansas [Mr. PLUMB], or I should vote "yea."

Mr. ALLISON. For the purpose of a quorum I will transfer my pair, so that the Senator from New York [Mr. MILLER] and the Senator from Delaware [Mr. BAYARD] will stand as paired on this vote.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Maryland [Mr. GROOME] is paired with the Senator from New York.

Mr. ALLISON. But the Senator from Maryland can then vote as well as myself.

Mr. GROOME. We will both vote. I know that will be satisfactory to my pair.

The result was announced — yeas 18, nays 22; as follows:

YEAS — 18.
Brown,
Call,
Cockrell,
Coke,
Davis of W. Va.,
Garland,
George,
Gorman,
Groome,
Jackson,
Jonas,
Jones of Florida,
McPherson,
Morgan,
Pugh,
Slater,
Vance,
Voorhees.

NAYS — 22.
Aldrich,
Allison,
Anthony,
Cameron of Pa.,
Cameron of Wis.,
Chilcott,
Conger,
Davis of Ill.,
Edmunds,
Frye,
Harrison,
Hill,
Hoar,
Lapham,
Logan,
McMillan,
Morrill,
Platt,
Rollins,
Sewell,
Van Wyck,
Windom.

ABSENT — 36.
Barrow,
Bayard,
Beck,
Blair,
Butler,
Camden,
Dawes,
Fair,
Farley,
Ferry,
Grover,
Hale,
Hampton,
Harris,
Hawley,
Ingalls,
Johnston,
Jones of Nevada,
Kellogg,
Lamar,
McDill,
Mahone,
Maxey,
Miller of Cal.,
Miller of N.Y.,
Mitchell,
Pendleton,
Plumb,
Ransom,
Saulsbury,
Saunders,
Sawyer,
Sherman,
Vest,
Walker,
Williams.

So the amendment was rejected.

Mr. GROOME. I move to add at the end of the second section of the bill the following:

Nor shall any person acting for or on behalf of any political committee or organization, or professing so to act, send through the mails of the United States any letter, circular, or other communication directed to and soliciting any contribution for any political purpose whatsoever from any officer, clerk, or employé of the United States, or any department, branch or bureau thereof, or from any person receiving any salary or compensation from moneys derived from the Treasury of the United States.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question is on agreeing to the amendment of the Senator from Maryland [Mr. GROOME].

Mr. GROOME. Mr. President, I only wish to say in regard to the amendment that I think the bill will fall very far short of what the people expect of this Congress and what they have a right to expect of us if we do not put into it some provision intended to prevent a course of conduct such as that indulged in in the last campaign by the Hubbell committee in sending through the mails of the United States circulars importuning Government employés to give a portion of their hard earnings for the purposes of a political canvass.

I think if we stop simply at the point of forbidding persons, from entering into the Departments for that purpose personally, and yet allow them practically to enter through the agency of letters or circulars, we might almost as well not pass the bill at all.

Hence it is with a view not to antagonize but to perfect the measure that I offer the amendment as I do, and I do not think it requires any further explanation.

Mr. JONES, of Florida. Mr. President I do not disagree with what has been said by the Senator from Maryland [Mr. GROOME], but I intended a while ago to say a few words with respect to the position taken by the Senator from Vermont [Mr. EDMUNDS] in regard to the second section of the bill, because I shall not take up the time of the Senate hereafter.

I understand the position to be that this power is in pursuance of authority to regulate the official conduct of persons in these buildings. This section undertakes to make an act, not otherwise criminal, criminal when committed within a public building of the United States. I desire to repeat now what I said the other day when this matter was before the Senate, that is a thing which can not be done except by the exercise of the highest sovereign power, and can only be done in those places over which the United States have exclusive jurisdiction.

With respect to the third section of the bill, I should like to ask the Senator from Vermont if the word "officer" as used here can be held to include the President of the United States? Because if so it would present to my mind a very serious and embarrassing objection to this part of the bill. The second section refers to the third, and it says:

That no person shall, in any room or building occupied in the discharge of official duties by any officer or employé of the United States, &c.

Then the third section says:

That no such officer —

That is, no officer of the United States or employé of the United States —

That no such officer or employé of the United States shall discharge or promote or degrade or in any manner change the official rank or compensation of any other officer or employé, &c.

However anxious I may be in common with those around me to reach legitimate civil-service reform, I shall not throw myself in the path of the Constitution to do it. If the officer who controls the executive power of this Government has the right under the Constitution to remove, it would be a most serious question if an issue should be made between the inferior employé and that high official as to the causes of removal. That high officer might say when the removal took place, "He has not been removed for political reasons;" the official below might say that he was; and when the issue is made, if you are permitted to enter into a consideration of the reasons for exerting the removing power, how is that issue to be decided when a controversy springs up between the subordinate and the person or officer who has the power to remove? Insubordination would follow. The inferior would become the master of the superior. Great difficult may arise in the practical administration of this section unless it is sufficiently guarded to prevent them.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The question is on the adoption of the amendment of the Senator from Maryland [Mr. GROOME].

Mr. GROOME. I ask for the yeas and nays.

The yeas and nays were ordered, and the Principal Legislative Clerk proceeded to call the roll.

Mr. ALLISON (when his name was called). I am paired with the Senator from Delaware [Mr. BAYARD].

Mr. BROWN (when his name was called). I am paired on this question with the Senator from Vermont [Mr. MORILL].

Mr. GROOME (when his name was called). I am paired with the Senator from New York [Mr. MILLER]. Otherwise I should vote "yea."

Mr. MAXEY (when his name was called). I am paired with the Senator from Massachusetts [Mr. DAWES]. If he were here, I should vote "yea."

Mr. VEST (when his name was called). I am paired with the Senator from Kansas [Mr. PLUMB]. If he were here, I should vote "yea."

The roll-call was concluded.

Mr. WALKER. In making the pair with the Senator from Iowa [Mr. McDILL] I reserved the right to vote to make a quorum. I vote "yea" for that purpose.

The result was announced — yeas 17, nays 24; as follows:

YEAS — 17.
Call,
Cockrell,
Coke,
Davis of W. Va.,
Garland,
George,
Jackson,
Jonas,
McPherson,
Morgan,
Pendleton,
Pugh,
Ransom,
Slater,
Vance,
Voorhees,
Walker.

NAYS — 24.
Aldrich,
Anthony,
Cameron of Pa.,
Cameron of Wis.,
Chilcott,
Conger,
Davis of Ill.,
Edmunds,
Frye,
Harrison,
Hawley,
Hill,
Hoar,
Jones of Nevada,
Lapham,
Logan,
McMillan,
Miller of Cal.,
Platt,
Rollins,
Sewell,
Sherman,
Van Wyck,
Windom.

ABSENT — 35.
Allison,
Barrow,
Bayard,
Beck,
Blair,
Brown,
Butler,
Camden,
Dawes,
Fair,
Farley,
Ferry,
Gorman,
Groome,
Grover,
Hale,
Hampton,
Harris,
Ingalls,
Johnston,
Jones of Florida,
Kellogg,
Lamar,
McDill,
Mahone,
Maxey,
Miller of N.Y.,
Mitchell,
Morrill,
Plumb,
Saulsbury,
Saunders,
Sawyer,
Vest,
Williams.

So the amendment was rejected.

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The bill was reported to the Senate without amendment, ordered to be engrossed for a third reading, read the third time, and passed.

Mr. GARLAND. Before leaving the subject of political assessments, I wish to state to the Senator from Kentucky [Mr. BECK] that the resolution which was offered by himself and the amendment of the Senator from Maine [Mr. HALE], both of whom were out attending a meeting of the Committee on Appropriations on Saturday when I made the report from the Judiciary Committee, that the resolution has been reported back with a substitute and is now on the Calendar. The committee having done its duty with the matter it is now in the control of the Senate.

Mr. SEWELL. Mr. President —

Mr. EDMUNDS. Will the Senator from New Jersey pardon me a moment about the bill which has just passed? I went down to my committee-room and did not get back in time. There is a comma in line 3 of section 2, after the word "solicit," which separates that word from the words "in any manner whatever." The comma ought to go out, and I ask unanimous consent that the change may be made.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. Unanimous consent is given for that change.

Mr. EDMUNDS. Then there is a misprint in section 5, line 1. The word "person" is misspelled.

The PRESIDENT pro tempore. That correction will be made.