COMMITTEE SERVICE IN THE SENATE
I was appointed upon the Committee on Privileges and Elections,
March 9, 1877, and have continued a member of it ever since.
I was appointed on the same day a member of the Committees
on Claims, Indian Affairs and Agriculture. I made a special
study in the vacation of 1877, expecting to master, as well
as I could, the whole Indian question, so that my service
on that Committee might be of some value. But I was removed
from the Committee on Indian Affairs, by the Committee who
made the appointments, in the following December. This was
very fortunate, for the country and for the Indians. Mr.
Dawes, my colleague, not long after was placed upon the Committee.
He was a most intelligent, faithful and stanch friend of the
Indians during the remainder of his lifetime. He was ready,
at the Department and on the floor of the Senate, and wherever
he could exert an influence to protect and baffle any attempt
to wrong them. His quiet and unpretending service to this
unfortunate and oppressed race entitles him to a very high
place in the affectionate remembrance of his countrymen.
The Committee on Agriculture was then of little importance.
I remained a member of it for a few years, and then gave it
up for some service in which my constituents were more immediately
interested.
In December, 1878, I was put on the Committee on Patents,
and remained upon it for a little while. The Committee had
to deal occasionally with special cases of applications for
extension of patents by statute, which demanded a knowledge
of the patent law, and industry and sound judgment on the
part of the Senator to whom they were committed for report.
But they were not of much public interest or importance.
In December, 1879, I was put on the Committee on the Revision
of the Laws; in December, 1883, on the Joint Committee on
the Library; in December, 1884, on the Committee of the Judiciary,
of which I have been a member ever since; in December, 1888,
on the Committee on Relations with Canada; in December, 1891,
on the Committee on Woman Suffrage; in December, 1895, on
the Committee on Rules.
I was on the Committee on Claims for ten years, from March
9, 1877, to March 4, 1887. It is impossible to establish
by the record the part any man performs, who is a member of
a deliberative body consisting of several persons, in influencing
its decisions, or in establishing the principles on which
they are based. But I believe I may fairly claim, and that
I could cite my associates on the Committee to bear testimony,
that I had a great deal to do, and much more than any other
person, in settling the doctrines upon which the Senate acted
in dealing with the great questions of the claims of individuals
and States and corporate bodies growing out of the War. Upon
the rules then established the Government claims amounting
to hundreds upon hundreds of millions of dollars were decided.
The victorious Republic dealt justly and generously with the
vanquished and misguided men who had assailed it and sought
its destruction.
The general doctrines by which Congress was governed were
these:
1. No rightful claim accrued to anybody for the destruction
or injury to property by military movements, or operations,
in a country which was the theatre of war.
2. A fair price was to be paid for supplies for the use of
the Army in the field (1) to loyal persons, (2) to disloyal
persons, if it were shown by a certificate of the officer who
took them, or otherwise, that they were taken with the purpose
of paying for them. Inhabitants of States in rebellion were
presumed to be disloyal, unless their loyalty were shown affirmatively.
3. A like rule was followed in determining the questions
of payment for the use of buildings, occupied as soldiers'
quarters, or for other official purposes, by the Army, or
injury to them caused by such occupation.
4. Property taken by the Army was paid for at its actual
value to the Government, and not necessarily at its value
to owner.
5. No claim accrued by reason of the destruction of property
whether of loyal or disloyal persons, to prevent its falling
into the hands of the enemy.
6. An exception to the principle above stated, founded not
on any strict principle or established law or conduct of Governments,
but on sound public policy, was adopted in the case of institutions
of charity, education and religion.
I first affirmed that doctrine in the House of Representatives,
in the case of the College of William and Mary of Virginia,
against the almost unanimous opinion of my political associates.
I thought that such a principle would be a great protection
to such institutions in all future wars, that it would tend
to heal the bitter recollections of the Civil War and the
estrangements then existing between the sections of the country.
I have lived to see the doctrine thoroughly established, the
College of William and Mary rebuilt by the Government, and
every church and school and hospital which suffered by the
military operations of the Civil War reimbursed, if it has
presented its claim.
If I have been able to render any public service, I look
upon that I have rendered upon the Committee on Claims, although
it has attracted but little attention, and is not of a nature
to make great public impression, as perhaps more valuable
than any other.
The duties of that Committee, when I was upon it, were very
laborious. I find that in the first session of the first
Congress, I made reports in seventeen cases, each of them
involving a study of the evidence, a finding of the facts, and
an investigation, statement and consideration of important
principles of law, in most cases to be applied to a novel state
of facts. I think that winter's work upon the Committee on
Claims alone required more individual labor than that required
to perform the duties of his office by any Judge of a State
Court, of which I have any knowledge; and that the amount
of money, and importance of the principles involved very far
exceeded that involved in the aggregate of the cases in the
Supreme Court of any State for a like period.
I was a member of the Committee on the Library for several
years. For two or three years I was its acting Chairman
during the summer, and in that capacity had to approve the
accounts of the Congressional Library, and the National Botanic
Garden.
To that Committee were referred applications for the erection
of monuments and statues and similar works throughout the
country, including the District of Columbia, and the purchase
of works for art for the Government. They used to have a
regular appropriation of fifteen thousand dollars annually,
to be expended at their discretion, for works of art. That
appropriation was stopped some years ago.
My service on that Committee brought me into very delightful
relations with Mr. Sherman and Mr. Evarts. I introduced and
got through a bill for a monument and statue to Lafayette
and, as acting Chairman of the Library Committee was, with
the Secretary of War and the Architect of the Capitol, a member
of the Commission who selected the artists and contracted
for the statue and monument. A resolution to build the monument
passed the Continental Congress, but was not carried into
effect by reason of the poverty of the Confederacy in that
day. In Washington's first Administration somebody called
attention to the fact that the monument had not been built,
to which my grandfather, Roger Sherman, answered: "The vote
is the monument." I was led by the anecdote to do what I could
to have the long-neglected duty performed. The statue and
monument, by two French artists of great genius, now stands
at one corner of Lafayette Square. The statue of Rochambeau
has just been placed at another corner of that square.
I was also fortunate enough, when I was on the Library Committee,
to secure the purchase of the Franklin Papers for the Department
of State. William Temple Franklin, the Doctor's son, died
in London, leaving at his lodgings a mass of valuable correspondence
of his father, and other papers illustrating his life, especially
in France. They were discovered in the possession of the
keeper of his lodgings, many years after, by Henry Stevens,
the famous antiquary and dealer in rare books. Stevens had
got into difficulties about money, and had pledged the collection
for about twenty-five thousand dollars. It had been offered
to the Government. Several Secretaries of State, in succession,
including Mr. Blaine, had urged Congress to buy it, but without
avail.
One day Mr. Dwight, Librarian of the State Department, came
to see me at the Capitol about some not very important matter.
While I was talking with him, he said that the one thing he
wished most was that Congress would buy the Franklin Papers.
He added "I think if I were to die, the words 'Franklin Papers,'
would be found engraved on my heart." I said I thought I could
accomplish the purchase. So I introduced a resolution, had
it referred to the Library Committee, and we had a hearing.
It happened that Edward Everett Hale, who probably knew as
much about the subject and the value of the papers as anybody,
was then in Washington. At the same time John Russell Bartlett
was here, who had charge of the famous Brown Collection in
Rhode Island. They were both summoned before the Committee,
and on their statement the Committee voted to recommend the
passage of the resolution. It passed the Senate. The provision
was then put upon the Sundry Civil Appropriation bill. With
it, however, was a provision to buy the Rochambeau Papers,
which had been sent to this county on the assurance of Mr.
Sherman, who was Chairman of the Committee on the Library,
that Congress would purchase them. There was also a provision
for buying the papers of Vans Murray, Envoy to France in Napoleon's
time; and for buying two other quite important manuscript
collections. When the bill got to the House, all these things
were stricken out. The Conference Committee had a great strife
over them, the House refusing to put any of them in, and the
Senate insisting upon all. At last they compromised, agreeing
to take them alternately, including the first one, rejecting
the second; including the third, rejecting the fourth, and
so on. In this lottery the Franklin Papers were saved, and
Mr. Sherman's Rochambeau Papers were stricken out, much to
his disgust. But he got an appropriation for them in a subsequent
Congress.
The Committee on Rules have the control of the Capitol, and
the not very important power of assigning the rooms to the
different Committees. Beyond that they have not, in general,
much to do. There have been few important amendments to the
rules in my time, of which I was the author of two.
One of them provides that an amendment to any bill may be
laid on the table, on special motion, without carrying the
bill itself with it. The motion to lay on the table not being
debatable, this enables the Senate to dispose promptly of
a good many propositions, which otherwise would consume a
good deal of time in debate. There had been such a provision
as to appropriation bills before. When I first suggested
this change, Mr. Edmunds exclaimed in a loud whisper, "we
won't do that." But I believe he approved it finally.
The other was an amendment relating to order in debate, made
necessary by a very disagreeable occurrence, which ended in
the exchange of blows in the Senate, by two Senators from
the same State. I had long in mind to propose, when the occasion
came, the last clause of this amendment. If Senators are
to be considered to any degree as ambassadors of their States,
it would seem proper that they should not be compelled to
hear any reproachful language about the State they represent.
Such attacks have given rise to a great deal of angry debate
in both Houses of Congress.
The following is the amendment:
No Senator in debate shall directly or indirectly by any
form of words impute to any Senator or to other Senators
any conduct or motive unworthy or unbecoming a Senator.
No Senator in debate shall refer offensively to any State
of the Union.
I was also for several years a member of the Committee on
Woman Suffrage. That Committee used to hear the advocates
of Woman Suffrage who liked to have their arguments reported
and sent through the mails as public documents under the franking
privilege.
Although a very decided advocate of the extension of the
right of suffrage to women, I have not thought that it was
likely that that would be accomplished by an amendment to
the National Constitution, or indeed that it was wise to
attempt to do it in that way. The Constitution cannot be
amended without the consent of three-fourths of the States.
If a majority can be got in three-fourths of the States for
such an amendment, their people would be undoubtedly ready
to amend their State Constitutions by which, so far as each
State is concerned, the object would be accomplished. So
it seems hardly worth while to take the trouble of plying
Congress with petitions or arguments.
But my longest service upon Committees has been upon the two
great Law Committees of the Senate,--the Committee on Privileges
and Elections, and the Committee on the Judiciary.
I have been a member of the Committee on Privileges and Elections
since March 9, 1877. I was Chairman for more than ten years.
I have been a member of the Committee on the Judiciary since
December, 1884, and have been its Chairman since December,
1891, except for two years, from March 4, 1893, to March 4,
1895, when the Democrats held the Senate.
While I was Chairman it was of course my duty to represent
and defend in debate the action of these Committees on all
the important questions referred to them. I have also, by
reason of my long service, now more than twenty-six years,
on the Committee of Privileges and Elections, been expected
to take part in the discussion of all the Election cases,
and of all matters affecting the privileges and dignity of
the Senate, and of individual Senators. The investigations
into alleged outrages at the South, and wrongs connected with
them, have been conducted by that Committee. So it has been
my fortune to be prominent in nearly all of the matters that
have come up in the Senate since I have been a member of it,
which have excited angry sectional or political feeling. Matters
of finance and revenue and protection, while deeply interesting
the people, do not, in general, cause angry feeling on the
part of the political leaders. To this remark, the state
of mind of our friends, whom we are in the habit of calling
Mugwumps, and who like to call themselves Independents, is
an exception. They have commonly discussed the profoundest
and subtlest questions with an angry and bitter personality
which finds its parallel only in the theological treatises
of the dark ages. It is lucky for some of us that they have
not had the fires of Smithfield or of the Inquisition at their
command.
So, at various times in my life, I have been the object of
the most savage denunciation, sometimes from the Independent
newspapers, sometimes from the Democratic newspapers, especially
those in the South, and sometimes from the press of my own
party whom I have offended by differing from a majority of
my political friends.
But such things are not to be taken too seriously. I have
found in general that the men who deliver themselves with
most bitterness and fury on political questions are the men
who change their minds most easily, and are in general the
most placable, and not uncommonly are the most friendly and
pleasant men in the world in private intercourse. I account
it my great good fortune that, although I have never flinched
from uttering whatever I thought, and acting according to
my own conviction of public duty, that, as I am approaching
four score years, I have, almost without an exception, the
good will of my countrymen, certainly if I may trust what
they tell me when I meet in private intercourse men from different
parts of the country, or what they are saying of me just now
in the press. But it is quite possible that I may say or
do something before I get through which will change all that.
So whether my sunset, which is to come very soon, is to be
clear or under a cloud, it is impossible even to guess.
During this period I have taken a leading part in all questions
affecting the security of the right of suffrage conferred
by the Constitution of the United States on the colored people,
of honesty in elections, of questions affecting disputed titles
to seats in the Senate, and the extension of suffrage to women.
A very interesting question, now happily almost forgotten,
came up at the December session of 1878, and was renewed at
the following March session of 1879.
In 1878 the Democrats had a majority in the House of Representatives,
while the Republicans had the Presidency and the Senate. In
March, 1879, there was a Democratic majority in the Senate
and in the House, but a Republican President. The Democratic
Party chafed exceedingly under the National laws for securing
the purity of elections and for securing impartial juries
in the courts of the United States. In the December session
of 1878, the House inserted a provision repealing these laws.
They insisted, in conference, on keeping in this provision,
and refused to consent to the passage of the Executive, Legislative
and Judicial Appropriation Bill, unless the Senate and the
President would yield to their demand. Mr. Beck of Kentucky,
one of the conferrees on the part of the Senate, representing
what was then the Democratic minority, but what became at
the March session the majority, stated the doctrine of the
House, as announced by their conferrees--adding that he agreed
with it--that unless the States should be allowed to conduct
their own elections in their own way, free from all Federal
interference, they would refuse under their Constitutional
right to make appropriations to carry on the Government.
This was in defiance of the express provision of the Constitution
that Congress might at any time alter the regulations prescribed
by the State Legislatures as to time, place and manner of
holding elections for Senators and Representatives.
Mr. Beck declared that that course would be adopted and adhered
to, no matter what came of the Appropriation Bills. He was
followed by Mr. Thurman of Ohio, the leader of his party in
the Senate, and Chairman of the Judiciary when it came into
power. He said it was a question upon which he had thought
long and deeply, one of the gravest which ever arose for the
consideration of the American Congress, and added:
"We claim the right, which the House of Commons in England
established after two centuries of contest, to say that we
will not grant the money of the people unless there is a redress
of grievances . . . . England was saved from despotism and an
absolute monarchy by the exercise of the power of the House
of Commons to refuse supplies except upon conditions that
grievances should be redressed . . . . It is a mistake to suppose
that it was a fight simply between the Throne and the Commons;
it was equally a fight between the Lords and the Commons;
and the result of two centuries of contest in England was
the rule that the House of Lords had no right to amend a Money
Bill."
This startling proposition claimed that it was in the power
of the House of Representatives to control the entire legislation
of the country. It could, if the doctrine of Mr. Beck and
Mr. Thurman had prevailed, impose any condition upon an appropriation
for the Judges' salaries, for the salaries of all executive
officers, for carrying on the courts, and for all other functions
of the Government.
I made a careful study of this question and satisfied the
Senate,--and I think I satisfied Mr. Beck and Mr. Thurman,
--that the doctrine had no support in this country, and had
no support even in England. An examination of Parliamentary
history, which I studied carefully, afforded the material
for giving a narrative of every occasion when the Commons
exerted their power of withholding supplies as a means of
compelling a redress of grievances, from the Conquest to the
present hour. I did not undertake in a speech in the Senate
to recite the authorities in full. But I summed up the result
of the English and American doctrine in a few sentences, which
may be worth recording here.
"First. The Commons never withheld the supplies as a means
of coercing the assent of the Crown or the Lords to _legislation._
"Second. The supplies withheld were not the supplies needed
for the ordinary functions of government, to which the ordinary
revenues of the Crown were sufficient, but were for extraordinary
occasions, as to pay the King's debts, or to conduct foreign
wars.
"Third. That when the hereditary revenues of the Crown,
or those settled on the King for life at the beginning of his
reign, ceased to be sufficient for the maintenance of government
and for public defence, the practice of withholding supplies
ceased.
"Fourth. There has been no instance since the Revolution
of 1688 of attaching general legislation to a bill for raising
or appropriating money, and scarcely, if ever, such an instance
before that date. When such an attempt has been made it has
been resisted, denounced and abandoned, and the English Constitutional
authorities, without exception, are agreed that such a proceeding
is unwarrantable, revolutionary and destructive of the English
Constitution.
"It is true that the luxury or ambition of Kings or their
indulgent bounty to their favorites led them to assemble
Parliament and to ask additional supplies from their subjects.
It is also true that these requests furnished the occasion
to the Commons to stipulate for redress of grievances. But
the grievances so redressed had no relation to the laws of
the Realm. These laws were made or altered by the free assent
of the three estates in whom the law-making power vested by
the Constitution. The grievances of which the Commons sought
redress, whether from Tudor, Plantagenet or Stuart, were the
improper use of prerogatives, the granting of oppressive monopolies,
the waging of costly foreign wars, the misconduct of favorites
and the like. The improvident expenditure of the royal patrimony,
the granting the crown land or pensions to unworthy persons,
is a frequent ground of complaint.
"But there is a broader and simpler distinction between the
two cases. The mistake, the gross, palpable mistake, which
these gentlemen fall into in making this comparison, lies
at the threshold. The House of Commons, in its discretion,
used to grant, and sometimes now grants, supplies to the King.
The American Congress, in its discretion, never grants supplies
to the President under any circumstances whatever. The only
appropriation of the public money to which that term can properly
apply, the provision for the President's compensation, is
by design and of purpose placed wholly out of the power of
Congress. The provision is peremptory that--
"'The President shall, at stated times, receive for his services
a compensation, which shall neither be increased nor diminished
during the period for which he shall have been elected, and
he shall not receive within that period any other emolument
from the United States, or any of them.'
"Alexander Hamilton, in No. 72 of the 'Federalist,' declares
that the very purpose of this enactment is to put it beyond
the power of Congress to compel the President 'to surrender
at discretion his judgment to their inclinations.'"
Almost immediately after I entered the Senate the case came
up of the title of William Pitt Kellogg to a seat in the
Senate from Louisiana.
In January, 1877, a Republican Legislature was organized
in Louisiana, which recognized Mr. Packard as the lawful Governor
of the State. Packard had been elected, according to the
claim of the Republicans, at the same election at which the
Republican electors, who cast their votes for President Hayes,
had been chosen. That Legislature elected Kellogg. When
President Hayes refused to continue his support of the Republican
government in Louisiana by military force, the Democrats organized
the Legislature, a Democratic Governor took possession of
power, and the Republican State Legislature melted away. It
had done little or nothing, except to elect Mr. Kellogg.
Under these circumstances, the Democrats on the Committee
on Privileges and Elections, and in the Senate, claimed that
the recognition of the Democratic Governor had an ex post
facto operation which determined the title and right of the
Legislature who undertook to elect Mr. Spofford, Mr. Kellogg's
competitor. The Republicans, on the other hand, claimed that
nothing which occurred afterward could operate to determine
the question of the lawfulness of the Kellogg Legislature,
or its power to elect a Senator. That must be settled by
the law and the fact. Upon these we thought Kellogg's title
to be clear. Kellogg was seated. But when the Democrats
got a majority, two years later, the Committee on Privileges
and Elections, under the lead of Benjamin H. Hill of Georgia,
undertook to set aside this judgment, and to seat Mr. Spofford.
Mr. Hill made a long and, it is unnecessary to say, an able
report, setting forth the view taken by himself and by the
majority of the Committee, and recommended the admission of
Mr. Spofford. I advised the Republican minority to decline
to follow the Democrats into the discussion of the evidence,
and to put the case alone and squarely on the authority of
the previous judgment of the Senate. This I did in the following
report:
The undersigned, a minority of the Committee on Privileges
and Elections, to whom was referred the memorial of Henry
M. Spofford, claiming the seat now occupied by William Pitt
Kellogg, submit the following as their views:
On the 30th day of November, 1877, the Senate passed the following
resolutions.
_"Resolved,_ That William Pitt Kellogg is, upon the merits
of the case, entitled to a seat in the Senate of the United
States from the State of Louisiana for the term of six years,
commencing on the 4th of March, 1877, and that he be admitted
thereto on taking the proper oath.
_"Resolved,_ That Henry M. Spofford is not entitled to a
seat in the Senate of the United States."
The party majority in the Senate has changed since Mr. Kellogg
took the oath of office in pursuance of the above resolution.
Nothing else has changed. The facts which the Senate considered
and determined were in existence then, as now. It is sought,
by a mere superiority of numbers, for the first time, to thrust
a Senator from the seat which he holds by virtue of the express
and deliberate final judgment of the Senate.
The act which is demanded of this party majority would be,
in our judgment, a great public crime. It will be, if consummated,
one of the great political crimes in American history, to
be classed with the Rebellion, with the attempt to take possession
by fraud of the State Government of Maine, and with the overthrow
of State Governments in the South, of which it is the fitting
sequence. Political parties have too often been led by partisan
zeal into measures which a sober judgment might disapprove;
but they have ever respected the constitution of the Senate.
The men whose professions of returning loyalty to the Constitution
have been trusted by the generous confidence of the American
people are now to give evidence of the sincerity of their
vows. The people will thoroughly understand this matter,
and will not likely to be deceived again.
We do not think proper to enter here upon a discussion of
the evidence by which the claimant of Mr. Kellogg's seat
seeks to establish charges affecting the integrity of that
Senator. Such evidence can be found in abundance in the
slums of great cities. It is not fit to be trusted in cases
affecting the smallest amount of property, much less the
honor of an eminent citizen, or the title to an object of so
much desire as a seat in the Senate. This evidence is not
only unworthy of respect or credit, but it is in many instances
wholly irreconcilable with undisputed facts, and Mr. Kellogg
has met and overthrown it at every point.
GEORGE F. HOAR,
ANGUS CAMERON,
JOHN A. LOGAN.
The Democratic majority presented their report, without asking
to have it read. Then we of the minority presented ours,
and had it read. It attracted the attention of the Senate
and of the country. My report contains but a few sentences.
That of the Democratic minority occupies eight columns of
very fine print in the Congressional Record. The result was
that some of the Southern Democrats, including Mr. Bayard
of Delaware, General Gordon of Georgia, General Wade Hampton
of South Carolina, and Mr. Pendleton, of Ohio, refused to
support their associates in the extreme measure of unseating
a Senator when nothing had happened to affect the judgment
which seated him, except that the majority of the Senate had
changed. Some of the Democratic gentlemen, however, while
resting upon the old judgment of the Senate, and while refusing
to set that aside, thought the Democratic charges made out
on the evidence, and that Mr. Kellogg's conduct and character
deserved the severest denunciation. Senator Pendleton, of
Ohio, however, with a courage and manliness that did him infinite
credit, after stating what his Democratic brethren said: "I
am bound to say that I have read the evidence carefully, and
there is nothing in it that in the least warrants any imputation
upon the integrity of that Senator."
In speaking of my Committee service, perhaps I ought to say
that I was appointed one of the Regents of the Smithsonian
Institution in the year 1881. I liked the position exceedingly.
I was very much interested in the work of the Institution,
and enjoyed meeting the eminent scholars and men of science
who were its members. After I had been a member a year or
two a very eminent Republican Senator complained that I was
getting more than my share of the prominent places in the
gift of the Senate, and specified the Regency of the Smithsonian
Institution as an instance. I thought there was great justice
in the complaint, and accordingly I resigned and Justin S.
Morrill was put in my place. It was a very fortunate thing.
Mr. Morrill's influence secured the construction of the National
Museum building, which I do not think it likely that I could
have accomplished. That Museum was then in charge of the
Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution.
A somewhat similar thing happened to me later. In the year
1885 the Nominating Committee of the Senate, of which Senator
Allison was then Chairman, proposed my name for the Committee
on Foreign Relations. I should have liked that service very
much. I should have liked to study the history of our diplomacy,
and the National interests specially in charge of that Committee,
better than anything else I can think of. But I was then
a member of the Committees on the Judiciary, Privileges and
Elections, Library, Patents and the Select Committee to Inquire
into the Claims of Citizens of the United States against Nicaragua,
no one of which I desired to give up. On the other hand,
Senator Frye of Maine, a very able Senator to whom the Republicans
of Massachusetts were under special obligations for his services
in their campaigns, was not at that time placed in positions
on Committee service such as his ability and merit entitled
him to. Accordingly I told the Committee I thought they had
better amend their report and put Mr. Frye on the Committee
on Foreign Relations instead of myself. That was done.
I incline to think that if that had not been done, and I
had remained on the Committee for Foreign Relations, that
I could have defeated the Spanish Treaty, prevented the destruction
of the Republic in the Philippine Islands, and the commitment
of this country to the doctrine that we can govern dependencies
under our Constitution, in which the people have no political
or Constitutional rights but such as Congress choose to recognize.
I am not sure that modesty or disinterestedness has much
place in the matter of the acceptance of high political office.
We often hear a gentleman say: "I am not fit to be Judge;
I am not fit to be Governor, or Senator, or member of Congress.
I think other men are better qualified, and I will not consent
to stand in their way." This is often said with the utmost
sincerity. But anybody who acts on such a feeling ought to
remember that if he accept the office, it will not be filled
by a worse man than he; if he accept the office, it being
a political office, he is sure that the office will be filled
by a man who will desire to accomplish, and will do his best
to accomplish, the things he thinks for the public good. He
should also remember, so far as the matter of ability is concerned,
that other men are likely to be much better judges of his
capacity than he is himself. If men are likely often to overrate
their own capacity, they are also very often likely to underrate
it.
Let me not be understood as commending the miserable self-
seeking which too often leads men to urge their own claims
without regard to the public interests. A man who is his
own candidate is commonly a very bad candidate for his party.
One vote, more than once, would have saved the country from
what I think its wretched policy in regard to the Philippine
Islands. There was just one vote to spare when the Spanish
Treaty was ratified. One Senator waited before voting until
the roll-call was over and the list of the votes read by the
clerk, before the finally voted for the treaty. He said he
did not wish to butt his head against the sentiment of his
State if he could do no good; but if his vote would defeat
it, he should vote against it. If there had been one less
vote, his vote would have defeated it. The Treaty would have
been lost, in my opinion, if Senator Gray, one of the Commissioners
who made it, who earnestly protested against it, but afterward
supported it, had not been a member of the Commission. The
resolution of Mr. Bacon, declaring our purpose to recognize
the independence of the Philippine people, if they desired
it, was lost also by a single vote. The Philippine Treaty
would have been lost but for Mr. Bryan's personal interposition
in its behalf. It would have been defeated, in my judgment,
if Speaker Reed, a man second in influence and in power in
this country to President McKinley alone, had seen it to be
his duty to remain in public life, and lead the fight against
it.
So I think it is rarely safe for a man who is in political
life for public, and not for personal ends, and who values
the political principles which he professes, to decline any
position of power, either from modesty, doubt of his own
ability, or from a desire to be generous to other men.
My twenty years' service on the Committee on the Judiciary,
so far as it is worth narrating, will appear in the account
of the various legal and Constitutional questions which it
affected.