Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1881-03-01
THE ADMINISTRATION OF PRESIDENT
HAYES

by the country that it has been success
full and creditable one. There has been SO
persistept determination on the part OF
those who had approved the course OF
his predecessor, to belittle Mr.. Hayes, to
sneer at his efforts to secure various re-
forms. to magnify his foibles, and to ig-
more his good qualities, that tendency
has grown up to regard him as a partlcu-
larly weak and infrm person, and to
take for granted the assertions SO freely |
made that his administration was fail
ure 1t must be admitted that Mr.. Hayes
has not fulfilled the anticipations CT the
friends of reform who hoped that the dec
laratious with which he entered othce
indicated resolute and indomitable pur-
nose. But before he is condemned on this
score it is necessary to consider dispas-
sionately the extent and nature of the
obstacles with which he was confronted,
and above all to ascertain whether he re-
ceived the support to which he was enti-
tied from the men who have so resented
his alleged infrmity of purpose.
1t must be remembered that Mr.. Hayes
found himself almost at the beginning OF
his administration opposed by the Repub-
licans in Congress. His Civil Service re-
form programme was regarded by them as
an assault upon their privileges. They
undertook to defy whatever public opinion
was ranged on the side of the Executive,
and they declared war upon his admins
tration in the most uncompromising way.
The history of the long struggle between
President Hayes and his party leaders in
! the Senate has not yet been written faith
fully, but when it is candidly related the
country will realize, perhaps for the first
time, that it required no little courage and
persistence in the President to face the
! storm which was thus let loose upon him,
and that no really weak man could have
endured it as he did, to the bitter end. In
that encounter he made it apparent that he
was not "machine" President, and if
subsequently he diverged from civil SER
vice reform principles, and required at IN
tervals to the old methods, the marvel
rather is that the concessions he made
were so small, than that he should have
made any.
| When, however, we come down to the
facts of his administration, we are compelled
to acknowledge that it has had all the
essential elements of success. He found
the Republican party disorganized, shat
tered, tottering to its fall under the load of
abuses it was carrying. He found the in
dependent vote becoming more FESTIVE and
impatient every year, and tending more
and more to cut loose from an organization
which seemed to have been delivered over,
body and soul, to the machine politi-
clans, and which was rapidly ceasing to
represent anything more lofty or more pa
triotic than office hunger and the lust of
spoils. He fourd the South torn entirely
from the Republican grasp, subjected to
shotgun rule, despite the various attempts
at coercion which had been made during
the two preceding administrations, and ap-
parently hopelessly lost. He found dissat-
isfaction and anger with Republican mis-
rule prevailing at the North and West !;
States which had held their places in the
party line for years, dropping out of it (;
pivotal sections going Democratic, and
general Generalization impending. And
now let US regard the condition in which
he leaves the party and the country.
His administration has been without
scandal of any kind. If he has some
times made mistakes in his appointments,
at least it cannot be said that he has shown
any disposition to appoint dishonest men
to Office The morale of the civil service
has been distinctly raised during his term.
The country has been economically and
efficiently and honestly governed. The
South has been deprived of all its excuses
for lawlessness. The great Northern and
Western States which were lost to the
Republican party when he entered office,
have been recovered. The independent
vote has been restored to its old place.
The party has been revived and CONSOLE
dated. The phalanx of Republican States
has been reconstructed. The laws have
been equitably administered. No job
berry has been permitted. The people have
regained their confidence in the organize
ton which at the beginning of his admin
istration seemed on the point of being re-
pudiated.
We have in fact had four years of quiet
prosperity, of political sobriety, of admin
istratiye purity and integrity, under Presi,
dent Hayes, and if this does not constitute
a successful and creditable administration
we do not know what does. Had the
nation supported the President more earn
essly in his efforts to introduce and extend
the principles of Civil Service reform, it is
certain that his success in that direction
would have been greater. As it is, how
ever, the country owes him esteem and re-
spect for the purity and singlemindedness
of his government, and for the stimulating
example he has set. General Garfield
may, and probably will, give us more
brilliant administration, but he cannot give
us a more honest one. President Hayes
has done much under conditions SO per-
verse and rebellious that it would have
been scarcely surprising had he surren-
dered in despair to the malign influences
arrayed against him. But he did not sur
render, and therefore he has shown the
country that man of mediocre abilities
and by no means exceptional firmness can
surpass even man of genius in governing
a country, if only his conception of his
duty is clear and lofty.
THE VICTORIOUS BoERs.
The Beers have inflicted another severe
defeat upon the British forces under
General Colley. Fortunately for himself,