Middlebury register. (Middlebury, Vt.) 1886-1937, 1886-03-26

blood in defending the Union, which a
majority of the Presidents supporters
were striving to destroy.
OF course they are not going to do that
In order that they may act intelligently,
they have asked the President to furnish
them with the papers on file in the eXecu-
tive departments, which relate to the ap-
pointments and removals which he seeks
to make. and they have made the request
by virtue of the provisions of the
tenure-of-ofiice act. which empowered the
Senate to decide coniointly with the
President upon the propriety of making
removals. No removal can be made
without the consent of the Senate, and
the Senate very properly maintain
that they will consent to none unless the
facts which Influenced the President are
laid before them. Having by law the
same powers in the premises as the Presi-
dent, they should have the same light, at
any rate, as far as that light is afforded by
papers on file in the departments. The
Presidents answer, is, first, a quibble,
that the papers called for were his private
papers, although they relate to public
offices and were placed on file by himself
in the departments in accordance with
the custom which has existed ever since
the establishment of the government; and,
second, that outstanding the tenure
,,G.. l,n al. &c ha tttIf nf ia
necessity of removals, and the Senate
must not attempt to interfere with his
prerogative. In other words, he as
sumes to override the law because he
does not like it.
1t is this monstrous position taken by
the President which makes the debate in
the Senate so important. OF his own
volition he endeavors to nullify a law,
passed by both houses of Congress and
approved by former President-a law,
moreover. which neither he, nor any one.
to be passed upon, nor which the Demo
Gratis in Congress have tried to have re-
pealed. If the President can suspend the
operation of one law. he can all laws and
in time become an absolute monarch
For arbitrarily suspending the laws the
English beheaded Charles |. and drove hi,
son. James H., from the kingdom The
fact that the present case is a petty III
fringement does not make it any the less
important that it should be resisted anC
stopped. In constitutional governments
such as ours, long experience has showi
that eternal vigilance alone is the price
of liberty, and that acquiesence in the
most insignificant violations of the estab
lished law is apt to create precedent
which leads to greater violations by-and
by and at last TO the endangering of th'
very existence of the government.
Macaulay puts the point with grea
strength in his history, in discussing th'
reignS of the StuartS:
We have been taught by long cxperienc,
that we cannot without danger suffer an,
breach of the constitution to pass nnoticed
1t is now universally held that "a governmen
which unnecessarily exceeds its powers ough
to be resisted with severe parliamentary cen
sure. As we cannot, without the risk of evil
from which the imagination recoils, cmplo,
ply force AS II check on misgovernment
il is evidently our wisdom to keep all the con
stitutional checks on misgovernment in III
highest state OF efficiency, to watch with jeal
ousy the first beginnings of encroachment
and never to suffer Irregularities, even whel
harmless in themselves, to pass unchallenged
lest they acquire the force of precedents.
Mr.. Edmunds and his Republican col
leagues in resisting the efforts of tn
President to arbitrarily suspend the ten
ure-of-offce law because its provision
do not please him. are simply followin;
the example of the patriots of the Revo
luton. who refused to submit to tn
stamp-act although "A small thing in it
self. because it involved great princi
pie, whose establishment in favor of tax
alton would have been fatal to on
liberties.