The Wellington enterprise. [volume] (Wellington, Ohio) 1867-188?, 1886-03-24
MR.. EpMuNps, TRIUMPH.
He Shows That the President Expects
the Senate to Work Like n Mole
Pugh's Reply.

He Shows That the President Expects
the Senate to Work Like n Mole
Pugh's Reply.
Senator Edmunds has at last justified
the exalted rank which common fame
accords to him among the statesmen OF
this country. The speech which he
made Thursday was the great effort Of
the session. 1t was listened to with q
depth Of interest and closeness Of at
tention suggestive of the more memoir
able days when such men as Webster,
Clay, Calhoun, Seward, Sumner and
Conkling brought the full might of
their forensic powers to bear upon a
subject.
The argument in defense Of the Sem
atorial right to call for information
touching suspension from office un-
der the Tenure-of-0 Office act is placed
upon one of the more fundamental
provisions of the constitution, and not
upon the construction of statute.
''He (the President) shall from time to
time, says section 8 of article 2, "give
to the Congress information of the
state of the Union" He shows with
irresistible logic that this covers the
Whole case at issue, the imperativeness
of the Presidents duty to give Congress
information upon any public matter
embraced in that general term, estate
of the Union" That ''state," as he
shows, is made up of every drop in the
bucket of the execution OF every'law,
and the performance of every officer
under the law. II this is not so where
can the line be drawnp
The test case on which this issue was
joined was the suspension, it will be re-
membered, of United States District
Attorney Dustin, of Alabama, and, as
Mr.. Edmunds is careful to point out,
the inquiry related to the Office, rather
than the officer. The point on which
information was sought was the con-
duct of that Office. Under the logic OF
refusal to give the information sought
neither branch of Congress has any
right TO inquire into the conduct of any
Office, especially of any United States
District Attorneys Office. Yet this
very Congress has been asked by this
very Department of Justice to make
an appropriation of S185, 900 to meet a
deficiency which has arisen entirely
within the period Of this Administra-
ton. Does President Cleveland think
Congress must meet this deficiency on
an ignorant assumption that it is all
rightp Must that body work in the
dark, like mole under the ground,
all for fear that the reasons for sus.
pensions made might come to the
knowledge OF the Senate and the coun,
tryp 1t would seem, in the light oi
Senator Edmunds' speech, that such i:
the plain English of it.
Senator Pugh's reply to Edmund,
does not meet the case, and 1t may bt
assumed that it did not meet the ex
pectation of Democrats. That side o
the Senate was never weaker than it il
to-day. In the days of Thurman tn,
Senator from Vermont had in his per
sonal friend political foe worthy hi
steel, and were Thurman in the Senat
now the debate would be titanic. bu
there is no one left on the Democrat
side who can .be at all compared wit
George F. Edmunds in forensic power
Add to this the fact that the cause il
self is utterly indefensible, and it fol
lows that very little can be eYpecte,
from that side Of the debate. = Chicag
Inter Oce1O