The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1877-07-25
To the Editor of the Tribune.

SIR: The New York Tribune says:
President Hayes says that he will give the same
weight to the recommendations of Congressman
is the sum and substance of Civil Service Reform.
And very small and flimsy wisp of wool it
is for so much cry, and even that we hold by
uncertain pinch; for that enthusiastic Reform
sr, the Boston Journal gleefully reco,ds that
one of the new Civil Service Reform rulesis is GO
ing to provide "that the Recommendations Of
members of Congress shall not be considered"
The wind is tempered to the shorn lamb
however, by the kind information six
lines further on, that ''this rule
does not contemplate the entire absence Of
participation of Congressmen in appointments
as their opinions as to the qualifications of diff
ferent persons will be asked. but not regarded
or considered. A very Civil. Reform that gives
Congressman slap in the face and then asks
them what they are thinking abouti
Congress has always bean considered by the
truly high-minded American citizen, patriot
and Reformer, as a gronp of Incspables and
Irreclaimables, open to no other reason than
kicks and cuffs-that being the class which
free, intelligent, and incorruptible people
would naturally choose for itsisrepressntative
and agents. But during the opening of the
present Administrations, the Senate, especially,
seems to have taken ION "a new oficiousness,
and offensiveness; seems to.have sunk lower
if that we're possible, in the journalistic estima-
incidental evil, an extraneous burden hanging
on the verge of the Government, body whose
main duty is to get out of the gang-way, that
the Executive may have free course to run and
be glorified. "The Senate has adjourned sine
die. and the Hayes Administration is now in
uncontrolled possession of the Federal Govern
ment," cries the new convert to reform with
the air Of one who announces the last liberation
of his country from the yoke Of the usurper.
THE Senate having taken itself out of the
way,, says the old party hack, curveting and
prancing like an unbroken flly. The relig-
ious Reformer declares with awe that nothing
like this Opposition to the new PRESIDENT was
ever known before! sit is the autocracy of the
Senate in rebellion against the Executive"
Yet Congress is as Constitutional o body as
the Executive. 1t derives its authority from
the same source; its duties are prescribed, its
limits defined, and its status declared by the
same power. 1t is not self-constituted assem-
bly, living by suffrance, the gradual growth of
evil custom, poking impertinent fingers into
matters which do not belong to it. II is from
the beginning part and parcel of the Govern
ment 1t cannot abdicate its rights, powers,
trusts, any more than the President. Congress
can make law without the aid or assent of the
President; but the President cannot make law
without the concurrence of Congress. Con-
gress can make and unmake Presidents; but
Presidents have no power whatever-no con-
stitutional p0wer-over the DldteTieL of Con-
gress. The Constitution gives to the Senate
joint power with the President to make treat
les, to appoint ambassadors, judges and officers;
and his power to appoint inferior officers with
out CONSULTATION with Congress, is By Constitu-
ton vested in Congress itself. The Senate is
that branch of the Government which never
dies; which enjoys complete continuity of Or
ganlzed existence, beginning with the birth
hour OF the Republic, and lasting of necessity
till its final death-throb-if death-throb there
shall ever be, which God avert! The House of
Representatives may be In abey ance and lie un-
quickened for three-fourths of every alternate
year. The Presidency comes regularly to an
end, and has had more than one absolute in-
terregnum since Washington was tirst inaugu-
rated; but the Senate. which came into being
on that same bright April day OF 1888 has new
er since known and never can know break or
pause in the revolving years that mark the on
ward progress and may we not hope, the end
less life of the Republic. l can recall no more
eloquent passage of Senatorial speech than the
words of the brilliant Mr.. Ingalls, of Kansas in
bic superb description of the Senate's mmor-
tality. I.-r - T rafss-sr
In the light of all these facts it is grotesque
to see that the recommendations of Congress-
men are neither to be regarded nor considered.
Control Is one thing; CONSIDERATION quite an
other.
As to the Cabinet it has no Constitutional
existence Whatever. The Constitution SAYS:
The Senate of the United States shall ae COM
posed Each Senator shall have
one vote The times places and man.
ner OF holding elections for Senators ahd Represen
tatiyes shgt be prescribed The Con-
shall nominate, and by and NTH the advice and con-
sent or the Senate shall appoint. ~
But the only basis to be found 10 the Constitu-
ton for the existence of such q body as the
Cabinet, is in the declaration that:
ion in writing of the principal officer in each OF tbe
Executive Departments upon any subject relating to
the duties OF their respective Offices.
1t certainly would be rather droll TO see this
body, the separate existence of whose members
depends upon the Senate, whose existence as q
body is not recognized in the Constitution, and
all whose appointments require confirmation
by the Senate focking together and cogitat-
ing among themselves how to keep Congress
men from having any voice In the matter.
They will have to flock and futter q great
while before they will get over that little item
in the Constitution:
, Ihe President shall nominate, and, by and with
tne advlce and consent OF the Senate shall appoint
Congress NAV by law vest lhe appointment
9i sach inferior officers as they think proper In the
PRESIDENT aone in the courts OF law or IN the heads
OF departments.
Thus we seeIthat it Is Congress and not the
Executive which Is the real fountan-head of
appointments. SO far from Congress being