The last session of the Forty-fifth Congress closed without making
provision for the expenses of the Legislative, Executive and Judicial
departments, or for the support of the army. Differences between the
two branches as to points of independent legislation had prevented an
agreement upon the appropriation bills for these imperative needs of
the Government. President Hayes therefore called the Forty-sixth
Congress to meet in extra session on the 18th of March (1879). His
Administration had an exceptional experience in assembling Congress
in extra session. In time of profound peace, with no exigency in the
public service except that created by the disagreement of Senate and
House, he had twice been compelled to assemble Congress in advance of
its regular day for meeting.
The House was organized by the re-election of Mr. Randall as Speaker.
He received 143 votes to 125 for James A. Garfield, while 13 members
elected as Greenbackers cast their votes for Hendrick B. Wright of
Pennsylvania. Among the most prominent of the new members were George
M. Robeson from the Camden district of New Jersey, who proved to be
as strong in parliamentary debate as he was known to be in argument at
the bar; Levi P. Morton from one of the New-York City districts, who
had all his life been devoted to business affairs and who had achieved
a high reputation in banking and financial circles; Warner Miller from
the Herkimer district, who was extensively engaged as a manufacturer
and had already acquired consideration by his service in the New-York
Legislature; Richard Crowley from the Niagara district, a well-known
lawyer in Western New York.
--Henry H. Bingham came from one of the Philadelphia districts with an
unusually good record in the war, which he entered as a lieutenant
in a Pennsylvania regiment and left with the rank of _brevet_
Brigadier-General. He served on the staff of General Hancock and was
wounded in three great battles.--John S. Newberry was a successful
admiralty lawyer from the Detroit district.--Roswell G. Horr, from one
of the Northern districts of Michigan, became widely known as a ready
and efficient speaker with a quaint and humorous mode of argument.
Thomas L. Young came from one of the Cincinnati districts. He was a
native of Ireland, a private soldier in the Regular Army of the United
States before the war, Colonel of an Ohio regiment during the war,
and was afterwards elected Lieutenant-Governor of Ohio on the ticket
with Rutherford B. Hayes.--Frank H. Hurd, an earnest and consistent
advocate of free trade, entered again from the Toledo district.--A. J.
Warner, distinguished for his advocacy of silver, came from the
Marietta district.
--William D. Washburn, a native of Maine but long a resident in the
North-West, came as the representative of the Minneapolis district. Of
seven brothers, reared on a Maine farm, he was the fourth who had sat
in the House of Representatives. Israel Washburn represented Maine,
Elihu B. Washburne represented Illinois, Cadwalader C. Washburne
represented Wisconsin. They were descended of sturdy stock and
inherited the ability and manly characteristics which had received
consideration in four different States.
The Democratic ascendency in the South had become so complete that out
of one hundred and six Congressional districts the opposition had only
been able to elect four representatives,--Leonidas C. Houck from East
Tennessee, Daniel L. Russell of North Carolina, Milton G. Urner of
Maryland, and Joseph Jorgensen of Virginia. These were the few
survivors in a contest waged for the extermination of the Republican
party in the South.
Among the new senators were some well-known public men:--
John A. Logan took his seat as the successor of Governor Oglesby. He
had been absent from the Senate two years, and returned with the
renewed endorsement of the great state which he had faithfully served
in war and peace. He had been in Congress before the rebellion. He
was first a candidate for the House of Representatives in the year of
the famous contest between Lincoln and Douglas, and was a partisan
supporter and personal friend of the latter. He changed his political
relations when he found himself summoned to the field in defense of the
Union. General Logan's services at that time were peculiarly
important. He lived in that section of Illinois whose inhabitants were
mainly people of Southern blood, and whose natural sympathies might
have led them into mischievous ways but for his stimulating example
and efforts. The Missouri border was near them on the one side, the
Kentucky border on another, and if the Southern Illinoisans had been
betrayed, in any degree, into a disloyal course the military operations
of the Government in that section would have been greatly embarrassed.
General Logan did not escape without misrepresentation at that critical
time, but the impartial judgment of his countrymen has long since
vindicated his course as one of exceptional courage and devoted
patriotism. His military career was brilliant and successful, and his
subsequent course in Congress enlarged his reputation. Indeed no man
in the country has combined a military and legislative career with the
degree of success in both which General Logan has attained.
--George H. Pendleton, who had served in Congress during the
administrations of Mr. Buchanan and Mr. Lincoln, retired temporarily
from public life after his unsuccessful canvass for the Vice-Presidency
on the ticket with General McClellan in 1864. He was the Democratic
candidate for Governor of Ohio in 1869, against Rutherford B. Hayes,
and now returned to the Senate as the successor of Stanley Matthews.
He entered with the advantage of a long career in the House, in which,
as the leader of the minority during the war, he had sustained himself
with tact and ability.
--Nathaniel P. Hill, a native of New York, a graduate of Brown
University and afterwards professor of chemistry in the same
institution, a student of metallurgy at the best schools in Europe,
became a resident of Colorado as manager of a smelting company, in
1867. He soon acquired an influential position in that new and
enterprising State, and now took his seat in the Senate as the
successor of Mr. Chaffee.
--Henry W. Blair, already well known by his service in the House, now
entered the Senate; and Orville H. Platt of Connecticut, who had never
served in Congress, came as the successor of Mr. Barnum.
Southern men of note were rapidly filling the Democratic side of the
Senate chamber: Wade Hampton had taken a very conspicuous part in the
Rebellion, had assisted in its beginning when South Carolina was
hurried out of the Union. He immediately joined the Confederate Army,
where he remained in high command until the close of the war, after
which he took active part in the politics of his State and was elected
to the Governorship in 1876. An extreme Southern man in his political
views, he was in all private relations kindly and generous. His
grandfather Wade Hampton was engaged in two wars for the Union which
the grandson fought to destroy. He was with the men of Sumter and
Marion during the Revolutionary war, and was a major-general in the war
of 1812, commanding in Northern New York. At his death in 1835 he was
believed to be the largest slave-holder in the United States, owning
it was said three thousand slaves.
--George G. Vest, a native of Kentucky, was one of the few gentlemen
who had occupied the somewhat anomalous position of representing in the
Confederate Congress a State that had not seceded. He was a member of
both House and Senate at Richmond. He was a good debater, of what is
known as the Southern type; logical, direct, forcible, withal showing
certain peculiarities of style and phrase characteristic of graduates
from Transylvania University.
--Zebulon B. Vance was born and reared in Buncombe County, North
Carolina. He belonged originally to that conservative class of
Southern Whigs whose devotion to the Union was considered steadfast
and immovable. He was a representative in Congress during Mr.
Buchanan's Administration, adhering to the remnant of the Whig party,
which went under the name of "American" in the South. He joined the
Confederate Army immediately after the war began, and a year later was
elected Governor of his State. He became extensively known through the
North, first by the rumors of his disagreements with Jefferson Davis
during the war, and afterwards by Horace Greeley's repeated reference,
in the campaign of 1872, to his "political disabilities" as an
illustration of Republican bigotry. He has been noted as a stump-speaker
and as an advocate. Since the war he has been so pronounced a partisan
as in some degree to lessen the genial humor which had always been
one of his leading personal traits.
--John S. Williams of Kentucky succeeded Thomas C. McCreery in the
Senate. He had gained much credit when only twenty-seven years of age
as Colonel of a Kentucky regiment in the Mexican war; but when the
rebellion broke out he joined the Confederates and served as a
Brigadier-General in the army of General Joseph E. Johnston. It was
said of him, as of many other Southern men of character and bravery,
that they had gallantly borne the flag of the Union in foreign lands
and the flag of Disunion at home. The genial nature of General
Williams won for him in Congress many friends beyond the line of his
own party.
Mr. Chandler of Michigan succeeded Mr. Delano as Secretary of the
Interior in the Cabinet of President Grant in the autumn of 1875, a
few months after his retirement from the Senate. He returned to the
Senate in less than two years from the close of President Grant's
Administration. Mr. Christiancy resigned to accept the mission to
Peru, and Mr. Chandler resumed his old seat on the 22d of February,
1879. He exhibited his full strength, physically and mentally, taking
active part at once in the debates, and in the extra session of March,
1879, assuming to a large extent the lead. In the long discussion on
the Army Bill he made a brief speech, which for force and point
excelled any of his previous efforts. In the campaigns of the ensuing
summer and autumn he was invited to almost every Northern State, and
exerted himself for too long a period. He died suddenly at Chicago on
the night of November 1, after having addressed a vast audience in the
evening. He had nearly completed his sixty-sixth year, and was
apparently in the vigor of life. His active political career embraced
about twenty-five years, and was added to a business life of unusual
industry and prosperity. The appreciation of his public character and
the strong attachment of his personal friends were shown in the
eulogies pronounced in both Senate and House. At the moment of his
death, Mr. Chandler had no doubt the most commanding political position
he ever held. He was a man of strong intellect, strong will, and
rugged integrity.
For the first time since the Congress that was chosen with Mr. Buchanan
in 1856, the Democratic party was in control of both branches. In the
House, with their Greenback allies, they had more than thirty majority;
in the Senate they had six. But under a Republican President they
were able to do little more than they had already effected with their
control of the House. With one branch they could hold in check any
legislation to which they were opposed, and even with the control of
both branches, if they fell short of two-thirds in either they could be
checked in any legislation which was in conflict with the
Constitutional views and opinions of the President. There was,
however, a certain line of legislation to which the mass of Republicans
might be opposed, and which might at the same time harmonize with the
conservative views of the President. And this they could accomplish.
The main point of difference which had caused the failure of the Army
Bill in the previous Congress was an amendment insisted upon by the
Democratic majority in the House concerning "the use of troops at the
polls," as the issue was popularly termed. It would be unjust to the
Republicans to say that they demanded military aid with the remotest
intention of controlling any man's vote. It was solely with the
purpose of preventing voters from being driven by violence from the
polls. But as has been already set forth in these pages, public
opinion in the United States is hostile to any thing that even in
appearance indicates a Government control at elections, and most of all
a control by the use of the military arm. The majority of Republicans
seemed to prefer that voters by the thousand should be deprived by
violence of the right of suffrage, rather than that their rights should
be protected by even the semblance of National authority present in the
person of a soldier.
It was demonstrated in the debate that it was only the semblance of
National authority which was present in the South. The number of
troops scattered at various points through the Southern States was not
as large as the number of troops in the Northern States, and, as was
readily shown, did not amount on an average to one soldier in each
county of the States that had been in rebellion. But this fact seemed
to have no weight; and the Democrats, having a majority in both
Senate and House, now appended to the Army Appropriation Bill the
amendment upon which the House had insisted the previous session:
"that no money appropriated in this act is appropriated or shall be
paid for the subsistence, equipment, transportation or compensation
of any portion of the Army of the United States to be used as a police
force to keep peace at the polls at any election held within any
State." As this enactment was in general harmony with the Southern
policy indicated by President Hayes upon his inauguration, he approved
the bill; and the elections in several of the Southern States were
thenceforth left, not to the majority of the voters, but to the party
which had the hardihood and the physical resources to decree any
desired result. But it was well known to all familiar with political
struggles in the South that the white men were not required to use
force after the protection of the National Government was withdrawn.
Colored voters were not equal to the physical contest necessary to
assert their civil rights, and thenceforward personal outrages in large
degree ceased. The peace which followed was the peace of forced
submission and not the peace of contentment. Even that form of peace
was occasionally broken by startling assassinations for the purpose of
monition and discipline to the colored race.
The reform of the Civil Service of the National Government occupied a
considerable share of public attention during the administration of
President Grant and was still further advanced under President Hayes.
The causes which led to the necessity of reform are more easily
determined than the measures which will effect a cure of admitted
evils. When the Federal Government was originally organized, the
President and Vice-President, Senators and Representatives, were
specifically limited in their term of service. The Federal judges
were appointed for life. All other officers were appointed without
any limit as to time, but, according to the decision of Congress, were
removable at pleasure by the Executive. During the administrations of
General Washington and John Adams, covering the first twelve years of
the Federal Government, there were practically no removals at all.
Partisan spirit was developed in the contest of 1800 and the change of
public opinion installed Mr. Jefferson as President.
There is no reason to doubt that Mr. Jefferson's personal views in
regard to removals from office were as conservative as those of his
two predecessors, but he was beset for place in an extraordinary manner
by the hosts of eager applicants who claimed to have contributed to his
triumph over John Adams, and who, like their successors in the later
days of the Republic, demanded their reward. Mr. Jefferson,
entertaining the belief that it was not fair that all the offices
should be held by Federalists, began a series of removals. There was
great outcry against this course by conservative men, who were averse
to the removal of competent and faithful public servants; and before
Mr. Jefferson had proceeded far in his scheme of equalization it became
widely known, through a letter which he had written in defense of his
course in removing the Collector of Customs at New Haven, that he was
intending to remove only a sufficient number to give his own supporters
a fair proportion of places under the Government.
As soon as this design was perceived it seems to have occurred to the
office-holders, most of whom had taken no decided stand upon political
issues, that they could effect the partition more readily than Mr.
Jefferson, by simply avowing themselves to be members of the party that
had elected him. There were certainly many instance of political
conversion among the office-holders of a character which would to-day
subject the incumbents of Federal places to personal derision and
public contempt. But the effect was undoubted; for between the clamor
of those opposed to the system of removal and the ready transfer of
political allegiance on the part of those already in place, Mr.
Jefferson abandoned the whole effort to change the public service
_after the removal of forty-seven officers_. Thenceforward, under his
administration and under the administrations of Mr. Madison and Mr.
Monroe, removals were so few as scarcely to be noted, and were made
only upon the proof or the presumption of a justifying cause.
In 1820 a change was wrought which ultimately affected, to a serious
extent, the tenure of office under the General Government. Thirty-one
years had passed since the Constitution was adopted, and during that
whole period there had only been some sixty-five removals from office.
It was inevitable, therefore, that a considerable proportion of the
incumbents had by reason of age become somewhat unfit for the discharge
of their duties. Many of them were Revolutionary officers and
soldiers, the youngest of whom must have been verging upon threescore
and ten. No provision had yet been made for retiring disabled officers
of the army, and pensioning the civil list was not even dreamed of.
What, then, should be done with these old men who had been holding
office for so long a period? Mr. Monroe was opposed, on principle, to
removals from office, and was too kindly disposed to disturb men who
had strong patriotic claims, and who had personal need of the
emoluments they were receiving.
As the Executive Department would take no step for relief, Congress
initiated action, and passed a bill which Mr. Monroe approved on the
15th of May, 1820, declaring that "all district attorneys, collectors
of customs, naval officers and surveyors of customs, navy agents,
receivers of public monies for lands, registers of the land offices,
paymasters in the army, the apothecary-general, the assistant
apothecaries-general, the commissary-general of purchases, to be
appointed under the laws of the United States, shall be appointed for
the term of four years, and shall be removable from office at
pleasure." It was further enacted that all commissions of these
officers bearing date prior to September 30, 1814, "shall cease and
expire on the day of their dates occurring next after the following
30th of September;" and others were made to expire after four years
from the date thereof.
The Cabinet of Mr. Monroe contained at that time three able men, each
ambitious for the Presidency--John Quincy Adams, Secretary of State;
William H. Crawford, Secretary of the Treasury; John C. Calhoun,
Secretary of War. As there was much opposition to the four-year law,
the friends of Mr. Calhoun and of Mr. Adams united in imputing its
authorship to Mr. Crawford, whose Department included far the largest
share of Executive patronage. The accusation was openly made that
Mr. Crawford intended to use the offices of the Treasury Department to
promote his political fortunes; and the friends of Mr. Calhoun and of
Mr. Adams, seeing that their chiefs had no corresponding number of
offices to dispose of, found their resource in virtuous denunciation of
the selfish schemes projected by Mr. Crawford. But there appears to
have been no substantial ground for the imputation--the official
registers of the United States showing that between the date of the
Act and the year 1824 (when Mr. Crawford's candidacy was expected to
ripen) only such changes were made in the offices of the Treasury
Department as might well have been deemed necessary from causes of age
and infirmity already referred to. Besides, Mr. Crawford during all
this period was in ill-health, with ambition chastened, and strength
constantly waning.
President John Quincy Adams, following Mr. Monroe, maintained the
conservative habit already established as to removals,--depriving very
few officers of their commissions during the four years of his term,
and those only for adequate cause. With the inauguration of General
Jackson in 1829, and the appointment of Mr. Van Buren as Secretary of
State, the practice of the Government was reversed, and the system of
partisan appointments and removals, familiar to the present generation,
was formally adopted. It became an avowed political force in those
States where the patronage of the Government was large. It had no
doubt a special and potential influence in the political affairs of
New York where the system had its chief inspiration, where the
"science" of carrying elections was first devised and has since been
continuously improved. The system of partisan removals was resisted
by Mr. Clay, Mr. Calhoun, Mr. Webster, and all the opponents of the
Democratic party as then organized; but it steadily grew, and became
the recognized rule under the well-known maxim proclaimed by Mr.
Marcy in the Senate of the United States in 1832: "_To the victors
belong the spoils_." In two years President Jackson had made ten
times as many removals as all his predecessors had made in forty years.
When the Whigs came into power by the election of 1840, President
Harrison discussed the question of patronage and its abuse, not merely
as tending to strengthen one political party against the other, but as
building up the power of the Executive against the Legislative
Department. Nevertheless with all the denunciations of the leaders
and the avowals of the new President, it is not to be denied that the
Whigs as a party desired the dismissal of the office-holders appointed
by Jackson and Van Buren. From that time onward, although there was
much condemnation of the evil practice of removing good officers for
opinion's sake, each party as it came into power practiced it; and
prior to 1860 no movement was made with the distinct purpose of
changing this feature off the civil service.
The Administration of Mr. Lincoln was prevented by the public
exigencies from giving attention to any other measures than those
necessary for the preservation of the Union, and during the war no
change was made or suggested as to the manner of appointment or
removal. The first step towards it was announced in Congress on the
20th day of December, 1865, when Mr. Thomas A. Jenckes of Rhode Island
introduced a bill in the House "to regulate the civil service of the
United States." A few months later, in the same session, B. Gratz
Brown, then a senator from Missouri, submitted a resolution for "such
change in the civil service as shall secure appointments to the same
after previous examination by proper Boards, and as shall provide for
promotions on the score to merit or seniority." While he remained in
Congress Mr. Jenckes annually renewed his proposition for the
regulation of the civil service, but never secured the enactment of any
measure looking thereto.
Neither of the two great political parties recognized the subject as
important enough to be incorporated in their platforms, until 1872,
when the National convention of the Republican party declared that "any
system of the civil service under which the subordinate positions of
the Government are considered rewards for mere party zeal is fatally
demoralizing, and we therefore demand a reform of the system by laws
which shall abolish the evils of patronage and make honesty,
efficiency, and fidelity essential qualifications for public positions,
without practically creating a life tenure of office." Thenceforward
the subject found a place in the creed of the party. But even prior to
this declaration of a political convention, Congress had on the 3d of
March, 1871, appended a section to an appropriation bill, authorizing
the President "to prescribe such regulations for the admission of
persons into the civil service of the United States as may best promote
efficiency therein and ascertain the fitness of each candidate in
respect to age, health, character, knowledge, and ability for the
branch of service in which he seeks to enter; and for this purpose he
may employ suitable persons to conduct such inquiries, prescribe their
duties, and establish regulations for the conduct of persons who may
receive appointments in the civil service."
Under this authority President Grant organized a Commission composed
of Messrs. George William Curtis, Joseph H. Blackfan, and David C. Cox.
But the Commissioners soon found that Congress was indisposed to clothe
them with the requisite power, and that public opinion did not yet
demand the reform. Their good intentions were therefore frustrated and
the Commission was unable to move forward to practical results. When
President Hayes came into power he sought to make reform in the Civil
Service by directing competitive examinations for certain positions,
and by forbidding the active participation of office-holders in
political campaigns. The defect of this course was that it rested upon
an Executive order, and did not have the permanency of law. The next
President might or might not continue the reform, and all that was
gained in the four years could at once be abandoned.
The settled judgment of discreet men in both political parties is
adverse to the custom of changing non-political officers on merely
political grounds. They believe that it impairs the efficiency of the
public service, lowers the standard of political contests, and brings
reproach upon the Government and the people. So decided is this
opinion among the great majority of Republicans and among a very
considerable number of Democrats, that the former method of appointment
will always meet with protest and cannot be permanently re-established.
The inauguration of a new system is hindered somewhat by an honest
difference of opinion touching the best methods of selecting
subordinate officers. Competitive examination is the methods most
warmly advocated, and on its face appears the fairest; yet every
observing man knows that it does not always secure the results most
to be desired. Nothing is vouched for more frequently by chiefs of
Government bureaus, than that certain clerks who upon competitive
examination would stand at the head do in point of efficiency and
usefulness stand at the foot.
Another point of difference is in regard to the power of instant
removal, many of the most pronounced reformers of the civil service
holding that power to be essential, and believing that it will not be
abused so long as the removing power cannot arbitrarily appoint the
successor. The matured opinion of others is that a tenure of office
definitely fixed for a term of years, during which the incumbent cannot
be disturbed except upon substantial written charges, will secure a
better class of officials. They hold that a subordinate officer is
stripped of his manhood by the consciousness that he may at any moment
be removed at the whim or caprice of some one superior in station. It
too often brings sycophants into the Government Departments, and
excludes men of pride and character. On the question of a life tenure
there is a similar division of opinion, which logically follows the
two positions just stated. A life tenure cannot be adopted as a rule,
unless pensions for a civil list shall follow.
There is also a belief with many who are most anxious to improve the
civil service, that the political influence of Government patronage,
as applied to the whole country, has been constantly misunderstood and
therefore exaggerated. At certain places where the customs and postal
services are large the appointing power can no doubt wield great
influence. New-York City is the strongest illustration of this; and in
less degree a similar influence is recognized at all the large cities
of the country, especially the cities of the seaboard. But even at
those points the political influence of the Federal patronage is far
less than that of the municipal patronage. During the many years that
the patronage, both of National and State governments, has been in the
hands of the Republicans in New York, the municipal patronage, steadily
wielded by the Democrats, has been far more potential in controlling
elections. And throughout the United States to-day the patronage
controlled by municipal governments largely outweighs in the aggregate
that of the General and State Governments at all points where they
come into conflict.
Towards the close of President Hayes' Administration the total number
of men connected with the Postal service of the United States was
about 64,000. Excluding mail contractors and mail messengers (whose
service is allotted to the lowest bidder), the number subject to
political influence was nearly 49,000. Of these, 5,400 had salaries
under $10 per annum each; 19,400 others had salaries under $100 per
annum each; 11,500 others had salaries under $500 per annum each; 8,100
others had salaries under $1,000 per annum each; 3,300 other had
salaries under $1,600 per annum each; 700 other had salaries under
$2,000 per annum each; 400 others had salaries under $3,000 per annum
each; 84 had salaries under $4,000 per annum each. Only 14 had
salaries of $4,000, and 2 (the Postmaster-General and the postmaster
at New York) had $8,000 per annum each. In a majority of the
Congressional districts of the United States there is scarcely any
patronage known except that of postmasters; and when more than one-half
of the total number of Postmasters have salaries under $100 per annum
each, the political influence derived therefrom cannot be great.
The remaining officers of the United States were at the same period
about 21,000 in number. The mass of these were in the Customs and
Internal Revenue, and in the various Executive Departments at
Washington. They had a larger average of salary than those engaged in
the Postal Service. But one-half of the whole number had less than
$1,000 per annum each, and less than one-third had salaries in excess
of $2,000 per annum. Large salaries under the Federal Government are
extremely few in number. Excluding the Federal Judiciary, whose
members are appointed for life, and excluding senators and
representatives, who are elected in their respective States, there are
not more than one hundred and fifty officials under the National
Government whose respective salaries equal or exceed $5,000 per annum.
The emolument cannot be regarded as large in a country that opens so
many avenues to fortune, and the places of this highest grade cannot
be regarded as numerous when (in 1879-81) there were not more than
three of them to every million inhabitants of the Republic.
While these figures demonstrate that the civil service of the United
States is moderately paid, they also demonstrate that it can be more
easily modified than if the emoluments were greater. A correct
apprehension of an evil is the first step towards its remedy, and it is
a serious mistake to apply to the interior States and the rural
districts the imputations and accusations which justly lie against the
service where of necessity a large number of officers are brought
together. If lack of zeal is found in many sections of the country on
this subject, it is because the people are never brought in contact
with the evils, the abuses, and the corruptions which are well known
to exist at points where the patronage is large, and where consequently
many citizens are struggling for place.
No reform in the civil service will be valuable that does not release
members of Congress from the care and the embarrassment of
appointments; and no boon so great could be conferred upon senators and
representatives as to relive them from the worry, the annoyance, and
the responsibility which time and habit have fixed upon them in
connection with the dispensing of patronage, all of which belong under
the Constitution to the Executive. On the other hand the evil of
which President Harrison spoke--the employment of the patronage by the
Executive to influence legislation--is far the greatest abuse to which
the civil service has ever been perverted. To separate the two great
Departments of the Government, to keep each within its own sphere, will
be an immeasurable advantage and will enhance the character and dignity
of both. A non-political service will be secured when Congress shall
be left to its legitimate functions, when the President shall not
interfere therewith by the use of patronage, and when the
responsibility of appointments shall rest solely with the Department
to which the Organic Law of the Republic assigns it.
The rapid settlement of California, stimulated as it was by the
discovery of gold, attracted a considerable immigration from China.
Industrious and patient laborers, the Chinese were found useful to the
pioneers; and they received for their work a degree of compensation
many fold greater than they had ever realized in their native land,
yet far below the average wages of an American laborer. The treaty
relations between China and the United States, negotiated originally
by Caleb Cushing in 1844 and afterwards by William B. Reed in 1858,
did not contemplate the immigration into either country of citizens or
subjects of the other. But in 1868 the treaty negotiated by Mr.
Seward as Secretary of State and Mr. Burlingame, acting as Minister
Plenipotentiary for China, recognized the right of the citizens of
either country to visit or reside in the other, specially excluding in
both, however, the right of naturalization.
Upon Mr. Seward's urgent request the following stipulation was inserted
in the Fifth Article of the Treaty: "_The high contracting parties
join in reprobating any other than an entirely voluntary emigration_.
. . . They consequently agree to pass laws making it a penal offense
for citizens of the United States or Chinese subjects to take Chinese
subjects either to the United States or to any foreign country, or
for a Chinese subject or citizen of the United States to take citizens
of the United States to China or to any foreign country _without their
free and voluntary consent respectively_."
The treaty was negotiated in Washington on the 28th of July, 1868, but
the ratifications were not exchanged until November, 1869. Fear of the
evils that might result from it followed so closely upon its conclusion
that General Grant, in his first annual message (December, 1869), gave
this warning: "I advise such legislation as will forever preclude the
enslavement of Chinese upon our soil under the name of coolies, and
also to prevent American vessels from engaging in the transportation
of coolies to any country tolerating the system." In his message of
December, 1874, the President recurred to the subject, informing
Congress that "the great proportion of the Chinese emigrants who come
to our shores _do not come voluntarily_ to make their homes with us or
to make their labor productive of general prosperity, but _come under
contracts_ with head men who own them almost absolutely. _In a still
worse form does this apply to Chinese women_. Hardily a perceptible
percentage of them perform any honorable labor, but they are brought
here for shameful purposes, to the disgrace of the communities where
they are settled and to the great demoralization of the youth of those
localities. If this evil practice can be legislated against, it will
be my pleasure as well as duty to enforce and regulation to secure so
desirable an end." In his message of December, 1875, he again invited
the attention of Congress to "the evil arising from the importation of
Chinese women, but few of whom are brought to our shores to pursue
honorable or useful occupations."
These repeated communications to Congress by the President were based
upon accurate information furnished from California, where the
condition of Chinese immigrants had created grave solicitude in the
minds of leading citizens. So serious, indeed, had it become in the
view of the people of California, that the Legislature of that State,
in January, 1876, memorialized Congress in favor of a modification of
the treaty with China, for the purpose of averting the grave evils
threatened from immigration--carried on against the letter and spirit
of the treaty. Before appealing to Congress California had attempted
the accomplishment of this end through laws of her own; but the
Supreme Court of the United States had decided that the subject was one
within the exclusive jurisdiction of Congress, and hence the State
could do nothing to protect itself against what a large majority of its
citizens regarded as a great danger. On the 20th of April, 1876, Mr.
Sargent of California submitted a resolution, asking the Senate to
"recommend to the President to cause negotiations to be entered upon
with the Chinese Government to effect such change in the existing
treaty between the United States and China as will lawfully permit the
application of restrictions upon the great influx of Chinese subjects
to this country." A few days later Mr. Sargent addressed the Senate
at length on the whole subject of Chinese immigration in California,
and presented in full detail the grievances of which the people on
the Pacific Coast complained.
The Senate, reluctant to take at once so decisive a step as was
involved in Mr. Sargent's resolution, adopted a substitute, moved by
Mr. Morton of Indiana, directing that "a committee of three senators
be appointed to investigate the character, extent, and effect of
Chinese immigration to this country." It was afterwards enlarged by
being changed into a joint committee with the addition of two members
from the House. Mr. Morton of Indiana, Mr. Sargent of California, and
Mr. Cooper of Tennessee were the senatorial members; Mr. Piper of
California and Mr. Meade of New York were the Representatives on the
joint committee. The Committee made a thorough examination of the
question, visiting California and devoting a large part of the
Congressional recess to the duty. Their report embraced a vast amount
of information touching the Chinese immigrants in California, their
religion, their superstitions, their habits, their relations to the
industrial questions, to trade and to commerce. A large number of the
reports were printed but nothing further was done for the session.
In the succeeding Congress, the first under President Hayes, the
subject was kept alive in both branches, in the first and second
sessions, by the introduction of bills and resolutions; but no
conclusions were reached until the last session. Early in December
(1878) a bill was introduced by Mr. Wren of Nevada, "to restrict the
immigration of Chinese into the United States," and was referred to
the Committee on Education and Labor. It was reported to the House by
Mr. Willis of Kentucky on the 14th of January, and on the 28th, after
brief debate (maintained in the affirmative by the California members
and in the negative principally by Mr. Dwight Townsend of New York),
the bill was passed by _ayes_ 156, _noes_ 72, considerably more than
two-thirds voting in the affirmative.
The bill called forth prolonged debate in the Senate. The senators
from California (Mr. Booth and Mr. Sargent), Mr. Thurman, Mr. Mitchell
of Oregon, and Mr. Blaine, took the leading part in favor of the bill;
while Mr. Hamlin, chairman of the Committee on Foreign Relations, Mr.
Conkling, Mr. Hoar, and Mr. Stanley Matthews, led in opposition. The
bill passed the Senate by _ayes_ 39, _noes_ 27. The principal
feature of the measure was the prohibiting of any vessel from
bringing more than fifteen Chinese passengers to any port of the
United States, unless the vessel should be driven to seek a harbor
from stress of weather. The bill further required the President to
give notice to the Emperor of China of the abrogation of Articles V.
and VI. of the Burlingame treaty of 1868. A large portion of the
debate was devoted to this feature of the bill,--the contention on one
side being that fair notice, with an opportunity for negotiation,
should be given to the Chinese Government, and on the other, that as
the treaty itself contained no provision for its amendment or
termination, it left the aggrieved party thereto its own choice of the
mode of procedure.
The argument against permitting Mongolian immigration to continue
rested upon facts that were indisputable. The Chinese had been
steadily arriving in California for more than a quarter of a century,
and they had not in the least degree become a component part of the
body politic. On the contrary, they were as far from any assimilation
with the people at the end of that long period as they were on the
first day they appeared on the Pacific Coast. They did not come with
the intention of remaining. They sought no permanent abiding-place.
They did not wish to own the soil. They built no houses. They
adhered to all their peculiar customs of dress and manner and religious
rite, took no cognizance of the life and growth of the United States,
and felt themselves to be strangers and sojourners in a country which
they wished to leave as soon as they could acquire the pitiful sum
necessary for the needs of old age in their native land. They were
simply a changing, ever renewing, foreign element in an American State.
They were ready to work at a rate of wages upon which a white man could
not subsist and support a family. Theirs was in all its aspects a
servile labor,--one which would inevitably degrade every workman
subjected to its competition. To encourage or even to permit such
an immigration, would be to dedicate the rich Pacific slope to them
alone and to their employers--in short, to create a worse evil in the
remote West than that which led to bloody war in the South. The number
at home was great. The cost of landing a Chinaman at San Francisco was
less than the cost of carrying a white man from New York to the same
port. The question stripped of all disguises and exaggerations on both
sides, was simply whether the labor element of the vast territory on
the Pacific should be Mongolian or American. Patriotic instinct, the
American sentiment dominant on the borders and outposts of the
Republic, all demanded that the Pacific coast should be preserved as a
field for the American laborer.
President Hayes vetoed the bill rather upon the ground of the
abrogation of a treaty without notice, than upon any discussion as to
the effects of Chinese labor. He did not doubt that the legislation
of Congress would effectually supersede the terms of the treaty, but he
saw no need for a summary disturbance of our relations with China.
Upon the communication of the veto to the House a vote was taken
thereon without debate; and upon the question of passing the bill
despite the objections of the President, the _ayes_ were 110, the
_noes_ 96. A considerable number of gentlemen who voted for the bill
on its passage had meanwhile changed their views, and they now voted
to sustain the veto. Among the most conspicuous of these were Mr.
Aldrich of Rhode Island, Mr. Abram S. Hewitt of New York, Mr. Blair of
New Hampshire, Mr. Landers of Indiana, and Mr. Townsend of Ohio.
Finding his veto sustained by Congress, President Hayes opened
negotiations with the Chinese Empire for a modification of the treaty.
To that end he dispatched three commissioners to China, gentlemen of
the highest intelligence, adapted in every way to the important duties
entrusted to them,--James B. Angell, President of Michigan University,
also appointed Minister Plenipotentiary to China, John F. Swift of
California, and William Henry Trescot of South Carolina. They
negotiated two treaties: one relating to the introduction of Chinese
into the United States, and one relating to general commercial
relations. Both treaties were ratified by the Senate, and laws
restricting the immigration of Chinese were subsequently enacted.
Some of the objections to the importation of Chinese on the Pacific
coast apply to certain types of laborers that have been introduced in
the Atlantic States from Hungary and other European countries. Where
the labor is contracted for in Europe at a low price and brought to
the United States to produce fabrics that are protected by customs
duties, a grave injustice is done to the American laborer, and an
illegitimate advantage is sought by the manufacturer. Protective
duties should help both labor and capital, and the capitalist who is
not willing to share the advantage with the laborer is doing much to
break down the protective system. That system would indeed receive a
fatal blow if it should be demonstrated that it does not secure to the
American laborer a better remuneration than the same amount of toil
brings in Europe. Happily the cases of abuse referred to are few in
number and have perhaps proved beneficial in the lesson they have
taught and the warning they have evoked. The allegation that the
exclusion of the Chinese is inhuman and unchristian need not be
considered in presence of the fact that their admission to the country
already provokes conflicts which the laws are unable to restrain. The
bitterest of all antagonisms are those which spring from race. Such
antagonisms can be prevented by wise foresight more easily than they
can be cured after their development is either intentionally or
carelessly permitted.
President Johnson made no appointments to the Supreme Bench during his
Administration. In 1870 President Grant appointed William Strong of
Pennsylvania and Joseph P. Bradley of New Jersey Associate Justices.
The former was an addition to the court; the latter succeeded Robert
C. Grier. In 1872 he appointed Ward Hunt of New York to succeed Samuel
Nelson. In 1873 he appointed Morrison R. Waite Chief Justice to
succeed Salmon P. Chase, who died in May of that year. In 1877
President Hayes appointed John M. Harlan of Kentucky to succeed David
Davis, and in 1880 William Woods of Georgia to succeed William Strong
(retired). President Hayes nominated Stanley Matthews to succeed Noah
Swayne, but the Senate not acting on the nomination, it was renewed
by President Garfield, and Mr. Matthews was confirmed in 1881.