St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1878-06-21
The Session Reviewed
BY ONE OF THE KEENEST WASHINGTON
OBSERVERS.

J. OBSERVERS.
Mr.. Nordhofrs Dispatch to New York Herald
The evenly balanced condition {
parties in both housewife demo
cratic majority of only twelve in tn
House and republican majority of tw
or three in the Scarborough to hav
. produced better results. In such stat
of parties in Congress, if the presiden
a is man who knows his own mind an
D has positive policy, he can impress
upon the country. 1t is very certain
that if Mr.. Bayard, or some man Xix
him, had been president the presen
session could easily have been turne'
} to great and positive use to the coun
, try. An administration with polio,
could have carried every point of tina
policy with ease. The majority o
members in both houses were sincerely
, DESTROYS to help and benefit the country
and were ready, tolerably regardless o
party lines, to support definite policy
and it only needed leader; and thu
two houses, being of opposing politics
no one could impress himself on bott
, except the president. Unfortunately
for the country, Mr.. Hayes has no views
He is honest and in favor of economy
but he has no policy, and declared
frankly at the outset that he meant to
have none. His notion is that the ex-
ecutive is to execute the laws, that
the Congress is to adopt them without
influence from him, and he has per-
sistently adhered to this theory. He
vetoed the silver bill because it attack
ed the national credit, but any of his
predecessors would easily have pre-
vented its passage. He may veto the
river and harbOr bill, because he is OPP
posed to indiscriminate and wasteful
appropriations, but it will be passed
over his veto. Probably no president
ever exercised so little influence upon
legislation, and probably no president
ever had so great opportunities of in
huencing a Congress for the good of the
country if he had chosen to. A con-
siderable part of the session he spent
in a private war with the Senate over
the appointments, in which at last the
Senate brought him to submission and
the best that can be said of him is that
he held out much longer than Gen.
Grant. He failed in the struggle, just
as Grant broke down, because he want
ed to appoint his own friends and ia
vOrites; and to get them confirmed the
Senate forced him at the last to appoint
also men pleasing to itself. Civil-ser-
vice reform, after many promises, has
once more failed, and will fail until the
tenure of Office act is repealed.
The struggle within the republican
party in the earlier months of the ses-
sion resulted in the complete victory of
Senator COnkling, who made himself
master of the Senate and of his party,
and has continued so, without appear
ing in the least to care for the suprema-
cy which he secured. Mr.. COnkling led
the Senate in putting Mr.. Kellogg into
the seat which rightfully belonged to
Mr.. SpOtfOrd, and he succeeded here
because the president, with combined
optimism and timidtity refused to move
his own few friends and supporters to
oppose Kellogg. Next came the strug-
gle over the New York nominations,
and here Mr.. Conkling tonight battle
which gave him, with democratic help,
the supremacy in his party. He beat
the president, and Mr.. Hayes felt his
defeat very keenly, and acknowledged |
its force by declining to try again.
Thereafter Mr.. Conkling ruled in the
as well as in the Senate,
the presidents nominations were re-
jected or pOcketed, as he ch1se, and
when ut last Mr.. Hayes surrendered
and sent in nominations of kind sat
to Mr.. COnkling, the senator
did not even do him the poor honor of
them. He deputed this duty
to his allies and friends, Senator Spencer
and others. Mr.. COnkling's victory has
been one of the completest which the
Senate ever gained over a president,
and it has borne its fruits. 1t has made
him the leader and master of his party
N the Senate, and, so far as he chose
20 be, in the House also, though there
MIR. Blaine's influence is still felt by the
and his advice has con-
SANITY been sought by them.
American politics inevitably center
lbOut the next presidential election
md whatever Congress has done or
omitted to do has been moved by the
aspirations of the leaders on both sides.
Considering that no questions of public
Importance now divide parties, and
hat so far as principle or policy goes a
'Itlzen might almost as easily vote for
me platform us the other, it is cOmical
hat the whole strength and effort of
10Th sides i'll this Congress has been
,ut forth to maintain party lines. The
democrats in the House chose Gen. Field
loor-keeper, less because they liked
him than because, being nominated,
hey were urged to stick together ''tO
,rove that they were party" So, too,
he Potter resolution was adopted, not
because it had the hearty consent of
he party, but because it was thought
necessary to beat the republican oppo-
ition to it. As for the republicans, in
he Senate they put in Kellogg to show
hat they were party, and i'm general
hey were always ready to show their
eeth to their opponents in that House.
ct on all measures of public and gen.
'ral Importance both parties broke up
the least hesitation. Neither
,arty has been able to hold a caucus
ogether in the whole eight months,
md 1t has not even been made re-
Droach to any one in either party that
he voted as he chose on any ''real ques-
ion"
Out of all this has come decided
good. Several important measures,
such as the tariff, the Brazilian subsidy
md others, have shown in a very posi-
i've way the tendencies of the two par
ties. The country has been able to see for
Itself that, whatever platforms may say,
the spirit aud policy of the republicans
and democrats is essentially opposed.
thus the greater number of the dem
ocrats supported the tariff bill almost
all the republicans opposed it the
greater number of the republicans sup
ported the Brazilian subsidy; the greater
number of democrats opposed it; the
democratic House opposed jobs and
subsidies; the republican Senate favor
ed liberal appropriations and internal