The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1869-02-23
The TeuuTe-Of Office Act.

AHC AOHNiC- OAhCC hCJs
From The ~, Y World.
Saturdays debate in the Senate on the
pI opposed repeal OF this absurd law did not
advance matters, but merely developed the
tactics OF the opponents of repeal. They mean
to swamp it by the pretended pressure of other
business so long as General Grant pulls
Straight in the party traces the Senate will
confirm his appointments and sanction his
suspensions; but il intends to keep the bits
in his mouth and the rsius in its own hands,
to be vigorously used If he is not tractable.
Removals are often necessary; but the
Senate can make no removals, nor initiate
any, even with the Tenure. of Office act in
full force. Nothing is more contrary to the
genius OF republican institutions than long
and secure tenure of offices. The essence of
republicanism consists in the election OF
officers by the people at short intervals.
Their terms 30 not end in consequence of in
competency or Inaversation, but to enable
the people to decide whether they do not
prefer others. The people replace officers for
any reasons or for no reasons; for incapacity,
for personal dislike, for party politics, for the
merest caprice; aud nobody thinks that the
retired fuDctionaries are injured or have any
ground of complaint. No man suffers in his
reputation when the people do not re-elect
him, because it is their constant habit to give
Offices to new men for reasons which do not
reflect on the former incumbents. Particular
Individuals have no more right to offices
which are filled by appointment than to
Offices filed by election. The claims OF in
cumbents ale entirely irrelevant to the pre-
sent question; and equally irrelevant is the
pTetense that officers should be removed only
for positive derelictions of duty. This pre-
tense would be just as good an argument
against our whole elective system that is,
against republican government itself, as
against the repeal of the Tenure of-Ofi act.
With regard to offices filled by appointment,
the Constitution takes good care that incum-
bents shall not get in without the Senatorial
sanction, but it leans with it's whole weight
against keeping them in against the pleasure
OF the President. 1t is OF no public conse-
quence what officers are discharged, if good
men are put in their places. Hence the con-
stitutional gate was swung wide open for re-
movaIs, and was guarded only in case of
appointments. The theory of the Tenure-of-
Office act is, that removals should be made
only for reasons that reflect ON the character
of the incumbent, and after an investigation
to see that he suffers no injustice. But, by
the Constitution, there is only one class of
officers that hold by the tenure of good
behavior; the exceptional character of
judicial functions being the reason for
the exceptional tenure of judicial officers.
In all other cases, the further service of
officers may be as freely dispensed with
if they are upright and competent as if
they are not. The people are fee to remand
elected officers to private life quite irrespective
OF their qualifications, and the Constitution
gives the President the same liberty in respect
to appointed officers. IL is only when the
President, or the fixed terms of elected officers
or the peculiar tenure of the judges, keep
bad officers in place, that the Senate has any
thing to do with removals; and then only by
the Irial OF impeachments. The Senate cannot
coDstitutonally initiate removals by any pro-
cess. Before il can investigate and pass upon
the fitness of an officer to hold his place, the
House must impesoh him. By the Constitu-
tiOn il is only in impeachment cases that the
Senate can enter upon such Investigations az
ell. The Constitution renders it diltcult for
the President to make bad appointments by
subjectipg his appointments TO Senatorial
supervision. 1t renders it impossible for
him to keep bad men in office by
subje citing them TO removal by impeachment
"a process in which he has no partioip Ation.
But the Constitution does not concern itself
| to keep good men in Office merely because
| they are good with the single exception of
the iudees. And the reason stands out in
| such prominence that nobody can miss it. 1t
| il, that il is Of no public consequence whether
| ore fit man or another fit man performs tue
| duties OF any office. Removals OF good officers
can work 10 harm, ii other good officers are
substituted in their place. and hence the par
ticjpatiOn OF the Senate is limited to securing
a reasonable chance of good substitutes for
the officers whom the President removes. To
enable him TO put bad men out, to enable
lin to put suspected men out, to put out men
! who are barely passable aud indifferent, when
o hers of irst-rate competence can be had, and
above all, to keep the saluiary fear Of removal
hung over the public service as an incentive
to tsithfulness, the Constitution gives the
President an unlimited power of removal, and
aims to secure competent successors to the
removed officers by limiting his power of ap-
pointment, and preventing his bestowing offices
! uponincompetent favoritss. The participation
OF the Senate in ordinary removals accom-
plishes no desirable object 1t keeps the SER
vice demOIalized and disgraced by whisky
thieves and other scoundrels, whom the
Senate cannot remove and will not permit the
Prosideptto to remove. There is not man in
The whole revenue service whom II concerns
the public welfare to keep in Office, because
there are plenty of other men just as cOmpe-