The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1866-12-15

properly, bad man improperly, no matter how
we legislate. The President Is pretty sure TO
strive TO please the majority, and, unless our
whole theory of government be erroneous, the
majority, on the whole, in the long run is pretty
sure to be right. The danger of making hi n
ineligible for reelection is that the opinion of
the majority would then become of comparatively
little consequence to him, aud q bad man might
use his office, during his whole term, for the
sole purpose of enrlching himself or aggran-
dizing his favorites.
To be sure, a man base enough for this is not
likely to reach go high place; but 1t must not
be forgotten that very bad men go into poll les
IN our day, that some OF them may reach the
Presidency, and that we do not as yet know
how bad President would behave who knew
he had no chance of reelection. Many people
imagine that the worst ones must always have
known that there was no hope for them, bat
some popularity about this Office which pre-
vents all prominent politicians from ever Civ
ing up the hope OF getting it, and, after they
have got 1t, IRON giving up the hope of keep
ing it,
In the second place, it would be rather dan
gerous for the country TO deprive itself of the
power OF using the experience of a man whom
1t has tried and found both skiful and faithful,
and TO bind itself to make a total change of ad-
ministration, no matter what the nature of the
crisis may be in which the term ends. We have
just had in Mr.. Lincoln's case signal example
OF the mischief that may follow the removal of
President whom the country has thorOue hly
tired, to make way at time of great difficulty
for an unknown and untred and inexperienced
successor No people ever made q greater DIS
play OF wisdom than this people did in re-elect-
ing Lincoln, and we doubt If any incident in
American history made so deep an impression
on the mind OF foreign observers. His death at
the beginning of his second term has been of
some use in showing us the danger OF Swapping
horses when crossing the stream" to use his
own illustration. 1t put at the helm Of affairs a
man of whom the country at large knew moth
inc. Of whose real phara Ctpr and ohiI,tiaS
his own friends knew very little; who had none
OF the official experience or training which
bad made Lincoln almost twice as valuable
man in 1864 as he was in 1850; and who brought
to the conduct of the Government at the most
delicate crisis in our history an entirely new
order OF ideas and motives. We all know the
result. 1t may be spid, 1t is true, that Mr.
johnson would not have been chosen to succeed
MIR. Lincoln by regular popular election; per-
haps not But a man as incompetent and dis.
appointing might have been. Most people
thought In 1859 they could predict how William
H. Seward would behave were he at the head of
the republic in such crisis as that through
winch we are now passing; but they would
have been mistaken. He would, If we may
judge from the part he has played during the
last year, have proved simply more learned
and more polished Andrew Johnson, AS long
as nominating conventions are what they are
as long, IN short, as the task of choosing Off
Gals has to be delegated to professional politi-
clans-the public can never tell who may turn
up at the head of affairs. In nine cases out of
ten 1t will be man little known outside his
own State, and he may be Lincoln or he
may not
The true remedy for the evils with which Con-
gress is now seeking to deal would seem to be
not to make the President ineligible for re-
election, ana thus deprive him of the strongest
motive for behaving WELL and to force the peo-
pie to dispense with his services, it NAV be- at
the very moment when his experience and char
acter are most needed, but to reduce his patron
age TO minimum. 1t is with his patronage
that bad President does all his mischief; with
out the unlimited power of appointment and
dismissal his powers of mischief would be
very small, his powers for good as large ever.
A reform which would compel candidates for
office to submit to an examination, and which
while leaving the President his power of dis
missal, would compel hm to do what decent
regard for public opinion compels European
monarchs to do-as5ign cause, either in incom-
potency or misconduc, for dismssng O man
would reduce the abuses of the present system
to as low point as human nature will permit,
Leave the public service in its pre- sent eondi-
ton, and make the President ineligible for
re-electlon, and you simply make it tenfold
more botbei of intrigue and lnsubordinaton
and corruption than ever. The bill reported by
Mr.. Edmunds seems as near an approach to per.
fection, perhaps, as is either practicable or de-
srable. Patronage-the power of constantly,
and with or without cause, making and filling
vacancies in the civil serVice-is the curse of our
politics. 1t debauches and demoralzes every
body, from the President down to the common
councilman, and converts public life into mere
SdHC lOI pItCcos IL IL U6 pOSSlDle 10 SUOD IL at
Washington, we shall not despair of witnessing
its extinction in the several States. The crea-
tion of an official class which is involved In
making tenure OF office dependent on good be-
havior is, no doubt; an evil; but it is a small
evil compared with the present system, and our
society has grown too busy and complicated to
make 1t possible to administer our affairs by any
but trained functlonaries whose bread depends
on their good behavior and on nothing else.
AS supplement to this reform there should
be another, condning the Vice. President to the
presidency of the Senate and deprivin him of
the succession III case of the Presidents death,
The plan of the Constitution has now heen
thrice tried, and has twice proved total failure
The possibility of the Vice Presidents succeed
ing to the Presidency ought to be borne in
mind in nominating him, but it never is aud so
remote is the contingency that it is not in
human nature that it should be-. No man should
ever be allowed to I'LL the presidential office
who has not been chosen for it directly No
man should get into it By an accident, wthoat
ever having submitted his qualifications for it
10 a popular vote. When the President dies
new election should take place-an lnconVeni-
enCe, no doubt, but not likely TO prove very
great one, as VIC see. There have been only
three vacancies made by death in the Office in
eighty years, and an additional election every
twenty years would be a small price to pay for
assurance against such accidents as Mr..
johnson.
The North Carolina Bill-Opening of an
Important Question.
From the Times.