New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1879-04-02
THE STRUGGLE IN THE HOUSE.

THE STRUGGLE IN THE HOUSE.
A NUMBER or ABLE SPEECHES ON THE ARMY BILL
-TRYE WELL LISTENED TO AND HEARTILY AP-
pLAUDTD-THE DEMOCRATS APPLAUD TIE REV
DICTIONARY SPEECHES.
IBY TELEGRAPH THE TRIBUSE.i
WASHINGTON, April 1.-The debate in the House
to-day on the political amendments to the Army
bill showed that the Democrats have not yet re-
covered from the Generalization into which they
were thrown last Saturday by the speech OF General
Garfield which still continues to be the general
theme Of conversation in Washington.
The first hour to-day was occupied by Rcprosen-
tatives Bedford, of Colorado, and Humphrey, Of
Wisconsin. whose remarks were confined to dis
cussion of the merits of the subject.
1t was generally understood that Representatives
Chalmers and Hurd had been selected by the Dem
ocrats to reply to tho speech Of General
Garfield but as soon as Mr.. Humphrey
bad finished representative Muldrow, of
Mississippi, rose and essaycd that task.
His speech and that of Representative Chalmers, of
the same State who followed him, were mainly de-
voted to attempt to show that in its present ac-
ton the Democratic majority is only following
precedents made by the Republicans when they
enacted the laws it is now proposed to repeal.
This attempt, of course, failed, because in the
first place when these laws passed the cxecu-
tive and legislative departments of the Government
were in full accord, that there no coercion of
one by the other and in the second place, III the
case of the Army Appropriation bill of 1867 referred
toby Mr.. Chalmers) which President Johnson signed
under protest the provision to which be objected
was attached to the bill purely a matter of con-
venlence. The Republicans, having more than two
thirds of the members of both houses could have
enacted the provision separately in constitutional
manner and it was not attached to an appropria-
tOn bill for the purpose of compelling the President
TO give his assent to measure which could not be
enacted in any other way. The attempt
of the Democrats now to cOerce the
President is entirely different matter, and 1t
is the first time in the history Of the Government
that unconstitutional methods and revolutionary
threats have been reSorted TO as means of enact
ing any measures of legislation.
Both Mr. MudrOw and MT. Chalmers devoted a
large share of their time to denouncng the acts
of the Republicans, who, they sad had during the
war and afterward done their utmost to destroy the
Constitutional Union" and erect military
despOsm on its ruins. According to this logic the
North instead of the SOuh had tried to subvert the
| Government The speech of Mr.. Chalmers espe-
ciay sounded strangely in the Capitol of the United
States. Some portions of it would have been more
| appropriate in Richmond in war times
Representative Frye, Of Maine. replied to Messrs
speech. Referring to their abusive assaults on the
Republican party he said that he did not feel COM
PEELED to suffer them in silence, and having heard
! from two gentlemen from Mississippi, he desired
| that the House should listen to still another,
who declared his purposes more honestly and plainly
! than they. He sent to the Clerks desk and had
| read an editorial from Mississippi paper, which
| has already appeared in Tux TRIBUNE Taking tue
| phrase, Yes. thank God, we have captured the
Capitol" as text. Mr.. Frye proceeded to review in
! a mastery manner the various attempts of the
! South to achieve that end beginning with the Dul
| LITIGATION acts Of South Carolina and closing
with the present time. One Of the most effective
and impressive passages of his speech devoted
to a review of the arrest of Burns under the Fug
tive Slave law, in Boston, when, he said, the pas
saces to the Court House were filled with soldiers.
and the approaches to it guarded by artillery; when
| LOO citizens of Massachusetts,
| into the service of the United States, and
with United States marines took military
possession of the streets of Boston, and
when on the arrival Of the fugitive i'll Virginia, bon
fires were built and shouts of rejoicing went up from
all over the South over the victory wOn MIR. FTyes
speech held the close attention of the House. and he
was warmly applauded by the Republicans, espec-
ally when he declared that the Confederates have
not yet captured the Capital. and when he predicted
| that they never will.
Representative Hurd, of Ohio then took the floor
| and delivered the strongest speech that has yet
been made on the Democratic side. He argued
first that the laws it proposed to repeal uncOn
stitutiOnal; second, that they give dangerous
power TO Federal officers and third that they are
dangerous and destructive to civil liberty lie
argued that the right of suffrage depends on State
laws. and not on the Constitution OF laws Of the
United States; that free elections (hs did not say
faiP') aRenecessary to free government, and that
it is but step from tho presence of troops at the
polls the of troops TO control elections" Mr.
fIurd failed TO show that the proper mode Of deter
mining whether a law is unconstitutional is 10 re-
peal il 10y provision in appropriation bill instead
of having it decided by the proper judicial