Sacramento daily record-union., 1881-09-29
A STRANGE SEQUENCE OF EVENTS.


sone recent events. When Senator Conk- /
ling determined to resign from the Sen
ate. he Of course was aware that the with
drawal OF himself and Platt would leave
his party in the minority. Bat it is to be
presumed that he thought no serious re-
suits would follow, for at that tims the
shrewdest forecast could not have perceived
any important changes in the near future.
Yet that resignation proved to be perhaps
the most disastrous step in all political
history. For while it would be cruelty
and shamefully Just to attempt to fasten
upon Conkling any responsibility for the
assassination Of President Garfield, It is a
simple statement OF obvious fact to say
that 60 fer as can be seen that tragedy
would not have been enacted but for the
struggle which followed the New York Sen
ator' s resignation The miserable Guiteau no
doubt distorted in his own mind all the cir
cumstancea on which he tried to reason, but
his own utterances fully justify the con-
clusion that he was led to his murderous
attack upon the President by belief that
he would be protected by the faction in
| whose supposed interest he was acting.
! He declared himself, after the assassina
tion, to be "stalwart of the stalwarts,
and he repeatedly expressed the belief
that when Arthur was President, he
! tGuiteau) would not only be liberated, but
would be rewarded. Guiteau no doubt
acted throughout upon his own warped
view Of the situation. He was so satu-
rated with egotistic presumption that he
thought the President ought to have given
him some important position. But it is
eelf. evident that he never would have
thought of assassination as means of
| helping himself hal he not believed that
the constitutional successor to the Presi-
dency would reverse the policy OF General
| Garfield.
1t is not possible to hold anyone else
accountable for Guiteaus crime. He
represented no existing sentiment. But it
is necessary to the proper understanding
of history that the connection between
the events of the time should be fully
recognized. We have no doubt that both
Conkling and Arthur were Mortified and
revolted by the murder OF President Gar
field, and it is even credible that they
felt the blow more heavily than those who
had been on perfectly friendly terms with
the President. But it is none the less
true that this and other mis:ortunes grew
directly or indirectly out Of the quarrel
which led to the resignation of Conkling
and the subsequent long struggle at Al
bany, and that among the ulterior con-
sequences Of Mr.. Conkling's blind step
must be counted the election of Demo-
cratic Vice President, and the consequent
possibility that the choice of the majority
OF the people may be nullifed before the
close of the present Presidential term. 1t
is because of the resignation of Messrs
Conkling and Platt that the Democrats
are enabled to organize the Senate. Their
ability to control the organization makes it
certain that the presiding officer Of the
Senate will be 4 Democrat. The presiding
officer of the Senate will be Vice. Presi-
dent. And in the event of the death Or dis
ability of President Arthur, this Democrat
must become President Of the United
States.
Nor is it allowable to say that no such
contingency can be contemplated. After
what has occurred since the 4th of last
March no man can venture to dogmatize on
the possibilities of the future. Nothing
seemed less probable four months ago than
the death Of President Garfield and the
election Of a Democrat as Vice President
The death of President Arthur before the
! expiration Of his term of Office IS certainly
as probable as either of these events then
appeared to be. Since the next Vice
President will unquestionably be a Demo-
crat, in fact, the country will have to real
ize that his accession to the Presidency is
among the distinct possibilities. In all this
it may be said that there is no useful spec
ulation, since it is impossible to place the
responsibility for anything that has hap
pened upon the shoulders of any public
man But that proposition is too sweep
ing. There is responsibility, and 1t can be
brought home. Mr.. Conkling is amenable
to one charge which he cannot escape, and
that is the charge of having resigned from
the Senate, not only without Justification,
but in the face of the fact that by 30 doing
he was giving the Democrats a majority.
! He could nos have known what was to
follow his resignation, but he did unques-
tionably know that 1t would reduce his
party in the Senate to impotence. There
was his one grave mistake, and events have
shown what disastrous consequences one
such mistake may have. The moral of the
whole episode is that partisans who are
intrusted with responsible positions are
bound to hold those positions for their
party, since they can never tell what mis-
Had Mr.. Conkling remained in the Senate,
as it was his duty to have done, and had
President Garfield died, there wonld have
been at least the consolation OF knowing
that the succeeding Administration was
Republican, and that harmony Of policy
would have been maintained in the Gov
ernment. It is of course possible that the
election of Democrat as Vice President
viii produce no i'll effects, but it must be
admitted that in view of the uncertainty
of human life It constitutes new element
of doubt and apprehension, and it is
equally plain that this element never could
have been introduced had Mr.. Conkling not
| forgotten his obligations to the Republican
party in his intense desire to secure vim
dicasion of his personal course.
TIE GERMAN GOVERNMENT.
4 correspondent states that the reason
why the German Government has no. sent
telegraphic messages of coincidence on the
death OF President Garfield probably is that
| there happens to be no German Minister