The Louisiana Democrat. [volume] (Alexandria, La.) 1845-1918, 1886-04-07
WHAT IT MEANS.


preston Used by President Cleveland
Which the Careless Can Not Appreciate.
Newspaper and political wits have
busily, but without much effect, been
poking fun at President Cleveland for
using the phrase innocuous desue-
tude" in his late message to the
United States Senate. The words
are certainly not the most common
IN our language, and they may never
have been before used in such
close connection. But they are very
good words. They possess shades
of meaning which no other words
possess, and no other words would
have expressed the exact logical and
legal idea at the time occupying the
Presidential mind. In reference to the
Tenure-of-O Office act of 1867, and to the
present act on the same subject-which
had never since its enactment in it's
present form in 1869 been applied to
restrict the Presidents power of re-
moyal or suspension from of1ice-he
said:
And so it happens that after period of
nearly twenty years Of almost innocuOus
desuetude these laws are brought forth, APP
parentIy the repealed as well as the unre.
pealed, and put in the way of an Executive
who is willing, it permitted. to attempt an
| improvement in the methods OF administra-
| ton.
A critical examination of the phrase
shows the fitness of its use. TO COM
mence at the last word first, it may be
said that the word ''desuetude," while
regarded as a synonym for ''disuse,'
implies considerably more. 1t carries
with it the idea not only of disuse, but
hint of neglect and abandonment. 1t
has legal significance as quoted in
Websters Dictionary from the writings
of Bishop Taylor, who, in speaking of
an obsolete church regulation, said:
'The desuetude abrogated the law which
before custom had established. Used in
regard to a law, it means something
than that the law had become a dead
letter. Under the common law desue-
tude absolutely repealed and abolished
a legal rule or custom. Property may
also be lost by desuetude. A man who
''sleeps on his rights, in legal phrase
ology, is regarded as having lost them
by not claiming them. Atrophy of a
limb is caused by its disuse. Chart
cred rights and franchises may be lost
by what the law calls '.nonuser.'' A
law is paralyzed and loses its power
by desuetude. This was the exact
word to express President Cleveland's
meaning in regard to the Tenure-of-
Office act, and he put it in the right
place.
Why the President used the adjective
"innocuous'' as qualifying or describ-
ing the condition of the act in question
is more open to conjecture and crit.
cism. Yet 1t seems to have a meaning
in this case. Radically, it means not
hurtful. 1t is rather medical than a
legal word. 1t properly is more appli-
cable to thing than to acondtion Its
best use is in describing a medicine or
a doctrine, not in describing the quail
ties of man, or of an agency or law.
Still, there is hint, or the shadow of a
meaning which it adds to the other
word in the phrase, showing that
it was not idly and uselessly APP
piled. It adds to the force Of
the intimation that the law in
question, through desuetude, had
become something more than dead
letter. 1t intimates that the law could
not be restored to vitality, either for a
harmful or an aggressive purpose. II
was saying in substance that the law
had become absolutely atrophied from
disuse, had been struck by hopeless
paralysis, and was dead beyond the
possibility of restoration or re-enact-
ment. In this light and intelligently
interpreted the phrase "innocuous des-
uetude," as used by the President, ap-
pears to possess peculiar vigor, pro-
priety and significance. Byron says
that "words are things" and Pres
ident Cleveland evidently used them as
such when he put these two words to-
gether in his Senate message. Chicago
Journal.