Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1873-07-02

to tell you, because am making full con-
fession, and public servant is not permit.
ted to have any privacy; bis meats and
drinks, his clothing, the shape of his shirt
collar, the style of his coat, all are paraded
before the public in correspondence and ridi-
culed in cartoons. In just three causes in
the Supreme Court of the United States last
year, which prepared for argument during
the summer, at home, received $40 SUI IN
cash. My clients were satisfied with my
services and my charges. They neither called
me thief, nor abused me in the press. This
enabled me to square my bank account for
the year, face bakers and butchers, doctors
and dentists, school-masters and music-teach-
ers, priests and printers, tailors and shoe
makers. In the celebrated slaughter-house
cases which came up from New Orleans, To-
volving the construction of the Fourteenth
Amendment to the Constitution, nay clients
paid me retaining fee of $4,000 before
had done anything save to write a receipt
for the money. And it is from mere acci-
dent that l am lawyer and can argue causes
in the Supreme Court, that am enabled to
pay my bills and remain in the Senate. The
services which l render on committees, es-
pecially the Judiciary Committee and the
| Committee on Privileges and Elections, are
| of the same kind as those rendered by law
yer. They involve the examination of legal
questions, the drafting of reports and opin-
| ions in matters involving millions of dollars,
and requiring great study and labor; and it
| must be quite apparent to any fair-minded
man that lawyer who can receive $1,000 or
$4,000 for the argument Of a single impor-
tant case ought, by devoting the same energy
and labor to the business of the people for
months, be able to earn $500. If you are
satisfied that your present delegation do not
fill the bill of public service, do not attend
to your interests and acquit themselves re-
putably, then you ought TO dismiss them and
send those who can and will but the men
who can and will, can and will earn $500
year.
a CONSTITUTIONAL VIEW.
The Constitution provides that members
of Congress shall receive compensation for
their service, to be ascertained by law, to be
paid out OF the Treasury of the United
States. When the first Congress assembled,
one of the absolute duties imposed upon
them was to fix their own compensation.
The Constitution declared that members
should receive compensation" 1t is
also declared that such compensation should
be - fixed by law" Congress could receive
40 compensation until the law was passed,
and Congress alone could pass the law; and
whether they passed such law on the first
or last day of their session, could make no
difference. If the Forty-second Congress
bad, on the first day of its session, passed
law fixing the compensation of Congressman
at $500, it would not have been objected
that it was voting back pay, and yet the re-
suit would have been precisely the same.
Each Congressman would have received the
same, and the Government would have paid
1t. 1t IS, therefore, practically lmmateral
whether the bill was passed on the first or
last day OF the session. Ii you were to en-
ploy an agent to take charge of your bust
ness abroad, with the distinct agreement
that he might take from your funds what
ever he thought he was entitled to for his
services, and that if he were not satisfied
with the sum at first fixed by him, be might
alter or change it any time during his term
OF service, you would hardly be justified in
in calling him thief if he should do what
you had agreed he might do. And yet this
Is precisely the case under consideration.
The law which fixes this compensation is,
like every other law, subject to amendment
at any time. This is a constitutional Ger
tainty. There can be no contract, express !
or implied, that Congress shall not do what |
the Constitution expressly declares it may
do. Such q contract, if made and reduced |
to writing, would be absolutely void But
not only would such a contract if actually |
made be both void and criminal but there is |
not the slightest foundation for the assertion
that such contract is even implied. Had |
the practice of the Government been well |
that no Congress should increase
It's own pay, though it might increase the
pay of subsequent Congresses, then 1t might
De said that such was the understa nding of
the people when particular Congress was
elected But the fact happens to be exactly
The reverse. There has never been an in
crease or decrease of pay that did not apply
20 the Congress voting it.
PREVIOUS INCREASES.
BY the act of August 16, 1885, the COM
lensat,On of Con gresSmen was increased from
s per day to $4,000 per year, and was ap-
,lied to that Congress, that is dating back
o March t, 1855, nearly eighteen months.
rhe pay was again increased from $4,000 to
$4,000 per annum, by the act of July %,
500 and applied to that Congress, that is,
ating back to March 4, 1865, nearly sixteen
months. la both these cases the increase of
ay was somewhat criticised by the press,
ut in neither case, so tar as am aware, was
ny objection made because the pay was ap-
lied to the Congress which voted it, 1t is
DO clear to require elaboration, that there is
o difference IN principle between voting
ack pay for sixteen or eighteen or twenty
)ur months. 1t the doctrine, now contend
d Tor, that member of Congress is under
ontrdct not to Increase his pay beyond the
mount fixed by law at the time he was
ected, be sound, and it it be true, as now
ontelded, that any member who takes backr
ay is thief, then every man who voted 70
against back pay 10 any former Congress,
nd afterwards received such back pay is
so thief. Thou shalt not steal - is a
command; and whatever amounts
} stealing now, has been stealing ever since
le government was established. Is any
an quite bold enough to denounce the men c
no have done this thing as thieves Will a
ny candid man brand them as receivers of +
o:en money? If so, there Is one consola- I
on for the members of the last Congress
though we are thieves, we are only thieves .
} all cur fathers were, and therefore not de- /
enerate sons. In 1866 | h
lie delegation from Wisconsin in the House .
Of G. c. Washburn, [. G. Sloan.
hlletus Sawyer, and Walter D. McIndoe. 4
II. Washburn voted for the bill; Philetus (
awyer against it; Sloan and McIndoe did I
ot vote. All four received the back pay .
tied by the bill. Is there any man here to-
gut willing to brand Gov. Washburn as a o
Jet willing to declare that Sloan. d
clndoe and Sawyer were the receivers of a
Glen money? If the names above mentioned q
e not cherished and hallowed in American
story, upon whose names rests the halo of c
merlcan glory? The men who have stood s
principle, the men of both parties who p
e most esteemed and whose memories are =
ost cherished are found in this list of men =
no received back pay. Therefore to brand
Re receiving of back pay as the receiving o f e
olen money is to brand those in whom We b
DRY as thieves. The list of those hereto. b
re supposed to deserve well of their coun
y and to have added to it's glory, but wh O q