The Marietta journal. [volume] (Marietta, Ga.) 1866-1909, 1870-06-24
CONGRESSIONAL MANNERS.

counsel ofDogbery, call the watch to-
gether, and thank God wc were well rid
Of villain. We were assured that the
halls of Congress, no longer echoing the
"crack of the plantation whip" would
cease to be "school for scandal" and
become an academy of fine arts for the
nation; that pistols and spitto9ns.would
be seen no more beneath the &dSmo of
the capitol that all the ways of Con-
gressmen would be ways Of pleasantness,
and all their paths BE- peace.
Well, the millennium Wendell Phillip,
has come. What = u natural leader of
New England desired in his youth, that
he has to fullness in his old age. Never
was the ciietam Of Goethe more exactly
fulfilled. A ncgsOmrevels in the seat
once filled by t63fcrson Ds&@. A
.'MassacLusetts -qalRee, "who iwouldaRot
hesitate 70 leapnaca0ss the bottSnIess'pit
were penny Wis pn the 5fhrtQ rsidc
of it, represents tic State Sof Sumner
Gaming Brooks. Is Congress civilized ?
So far from it that it would be impossi-
bic to Gull from the whole Congressional
history of the ten years between 1850
and 1860 so many cases of outrageous
indecency in the language and demcan-
or of Senators and members of Congress
on the floor of either House rs may be
gathered from the reports of as many
sessions since that time. We speak
now of the bearing of our national lcgis-
lators towards ono another. Meanwhile
there has grown up new scandal, quite
rare if not wholly unknown before the
war, in the freedom with which the
names of persons and members of either
House arc dragged into debate and in
tie abuse which is lavished by members
of either House upon such persons.--
Two striking instances of this scandal
occurred, the one in the Senate and the
other in the House, only the day before
yesterday.
In the Senate motion was made by
Senator Forty, Of Connecticut, leading
Republican, who occupies the place so
long and so ably filled by Senator Dix
on, that an investigation be made into
certain outrages alleged to have been
pcrpetrated in St. Domingo by an Off
Ger of the Presidents staff upon an
American citizen named Hatch. Upon
this another Republican Senator, the no.
tcrious Chandler, of Michigan, sPrang
up and pronounced Hatch to be "a
worthless scoundrel" Senator Ferry
fortunately had the spirit to defend his
constituent against what he properly
described as "thc exceedingly vile Ian
guage" of the muddIe-pated Scion of
Michigan. But the libel was mono the
less uttered and sent flying all over the
country on the wires Of the telegraph
While this was going on in the upper
house," the Glover house" was edited
by a performance lower still. Mr.. Fitch
Of Nevada, also Republican, got up to
"a question of privilege" concerning a
ettcr published in Republican ncwspa-
per, the New York Evening Post. This
cttcr he sent to the desk to be read
md after declaring that it misstatcd and
him, he loudly pronounced
The author of it to be "a wicked and
,owardly liar" disgrace to his pro-
'ession," and IA yclping coyote"
Now, writer who states falschood
a member of Congress, or
any other man, undoubtedly is a ''Iiar."
But m the society of gentlemen words
Of this sort are commonly avoidcd-mot
because they are too hard for the offence
or too severe for the offender, but be-
cause they are disagrceabIc to the limo
cent hearers. Gentlemen refrain from
using them before mixed companies pre-
cisely as they refrain from using their
fists OF their boots or the blackthorn
sticks. 1t is quite possible to conceive
of an impertinencc offered to a gentle
man in a ballroom which might be
properly enough resented by knocking
the offender down out of hand. But it
is not possible to conceive of gentle
man who should so resent such an i'm
pertinence in such place. There are
perfectly natura! feelings as well as per-
fectly natural functions, which every de-
cent man instinctivcly controls in the
presence of his creatures, and
from just regard to their convenience
and comfort. The difference, indeed,
between a gentleman and blackguard,
which is marked in more ways than the
latter class of people are apt to suspect,
is in no way more clearly marked than
is this. Not less clearly, however, is it
marked in the care of a gentleman to
abstain from, and in tho disposition of a
blackguard to indulge in, violent vitup-
Grafton of absent or defenceless people.
The Constitution of the United States
expressly protects members of Congress
from being called in question in any
other place for words used by them in
debate on the floor of either house.