Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1883-06-06

THE CHARACTER OF Mr.. EDMUNDs.-
republican, and for many years he has
been the most weighly republican advo
cate in the Senate. His speech for the
electoral commission bill in 1877 contained
the whole argument, and the weight Of
his individual opinion gave it immense
force lie has the independence OF
assured conviction. His intellectual quail.
ity is singularly firm and incisive. He is
entirely at home in parliamentary body.
and his long career IS absolutely untouched
by hint of self seeking. No higher
tribute could be paid to any public man
than the universal conviction in 1876,
amid all the intrigues and plots for the
presidential nomination, that he meant
what he said in declaring that he did not
desire it.
Mr.. Edmunds is fifty five years old. and
he has sat in the Senate for seventeen
years. During that long term his con-
structive talent has been as evident as his
ascendency in debate and his mastery of
constitutional law. He is not an orator,
but he is a thoroughly equipped debater,
an acute and remorseless critic of fallacy
and iustian and Ignorance with memory
like we'll ordered arsenal, in which
every weapon stands brightly FURNISHED
and ready for instant use. His elevation
to the presidency of the Senate was but a
fitting honor from his party associates.
and it properly fills the gap-which would
have been perlous had it been left untitled
produced by the expiration of Mr..
Davis's senatorial term.
Tho most sirik inu fact in tho oaroor of
Mr.. Edmunds is that while he is one of
the most conspicuous, constant, and POSI-
tive participants in the discussion of the
Senate, and Irregular" republican,, there
is no republican leader who is so univer.
sally acceptable to the party. In 1880 he
was understood not to be averse to the
third.term project, yet he was the choice
of the strongest anti.third ,termers. He
is neither offensivcly "stalwart" nor
"half. breed" Among republican chiefs
his position is unique, and it is due to the
fact that he holds himself entirely aloof
from the wretched business of opois.
His position was not made by patronage,
and it does not depend upon machine. ;"
His ascendency is actual, not Fictitious
His state is Justly proud Of him, as Mas
ssachusetts was formerly proud of Webster
and afterward of Sumner, and, like them,
he takes his own course. He is, however,
very conservative of the Senate and of its
powers. His mind is too acute not to see
the reason of reform, and he Is too just
not to admit it, but his temperament
sometimes protests, so that he may be
called reformer if he can have his own
way. This habit is doubtless often trying
to his associates, and leads to the charge
of hypercriticisin. But Mr.. Edmunds
was one of the earliest friends of reform
in the civil service, and the bill offered by
Mr.. Pendleton in 1880 was substantially
the one that was proposed by Mr.. Ed
munds ten years before. Probably his
chair in the Senate is more agreeable to
Mr.. Edmunds than that of presiding
officer, and it is possible that upon the
assembling of the Senate in December
next he may prefer to relinquish his new
honor. But whether upon the floor or in
the presidency of the Senate, Mr.. Ed.
munds is the republican leader of whom
his whole party is proud.