Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1882-03-01
The Nomination Of Mr.. Conkling.

The president has nominated ex-senator
Conkling to the vacancy in the supreme
court occasioned by the resignation OF Judge
Hunt. That the senate will confirm the
nomination hardly admits Of doubt that
Mr.. Conkling's name was sent to the senate
with his knowledge is not generally believed
that he will accept the honorable position
rendered him is not considered certain.
None of those considerations, however, affect
the quality of President Arthur's action in
nominating his distinguished friend to
high judicial position. The nomination
was surprise. That the president might
in some way in his own chosen time honor
Mr.. Conkling with some high appointment,
was not deemed improbable. That Arthur
should refrain from doing that which the
warm, generous nature of Garfield, it is
credibly believed, had conceived, it was not
reasonable to expect. If it was a compen-
sation fit for Mr.. Garfield to contemplate,
its essential fitness is not changed by its
emanation from President Arthur. That
the nomination, nevertheless, could not be
made at any time for any place without
raising storm of criticism, was quite GER
tain. This political probability" has
been justified by events quite as signally as
the forecastings of the weather bureau.
There has been calm, candid, judicious and
reasonable criticism. There have been ex-
pressions of warm approval. Fractional ami
mostly and shallow craftsmanship have ar
raigned the president with a wild and
incendiary spirit more distinguished for its
vehemence and bitterness than for business,
or candor, or unsefishness. To the latter
class the nominee happens to be partisan
foe instead OF partisan friend. In its view
a nomination is good or it is bad as by it
personal or partisan ends are served or
thwarted. Such criticism, of which the
New York Tribune affords an eminent type,
has its fountain head in the boys Of personal
politics, and its waters are equally unwhole-
some whether they are discharged through
a silver fountain Of praise or brazen aque-
duct Of denunciation.
The presidents previous choice of su-
pereme court judge had encouraged people
to believe that his future selections would be
determined solely by the fitness of the can
didates for judicial duties, and without re-
gard to personal or political favors and
friendships. Open to criticism as the nom-
ination unquestionably is, there is, in its
worst phase, no element that did not exist
in Mt
ment of Mr.. Arthur's immediate prede-
cessor, and this is the severest thing that
can be said of it. 1t has not provoked the
general condemnation which followed the
nomination of Stanley Matthews, and the
personal integrity, the official purity, the in
tellectual capacity of the candidate for SUI
preme judicial honors are not questioned
even by his worst enemies. In all the cir
that Of Salmon P. Chase by President Lin
coin to the chief justiceship of the supreme
court. The candidates active participation
in politics, his long disassociation with ju-
dicial studies and subjects, and the warping
of his mind and judgment by the conflicts of
the stump and the caucus, have not been the
kind of training for seat on the supreme
Judicial bench, yet the freshness and vigor
Of Mr. Conkling's great powers may go far
to rectify the defects of training. His in
corruptible integrity and his eminent abil-
ity are assurances that the now sobered and
reflective politician may make an acceptable
judge, and that he may in course of time
add something of luster to body which, in
its later history, has not been distinguished
for judicial brilliancy.