Morning journal and courier., 1886-03-10

SENATOR EDmU UNDS OPENS FIRE. The Great Battle Begun in the Senate A Strong Argument For the Rights of the Senate-The Chamber Crowded With Persons Interested in the Dis- cassiOn.
 WASHINGTON, March g, 1886. SENATE.-The galleries, with the excep- tion of the one set apart for the diplomatic corps, were packed to-day owing to the in terest felt in the discussion of the Judiciary committees report attacking the President for his refusal to furnish papers relating to the suspension of District Attorney Ruskin of Alabama. MT. Edmunds sat in his seat
 behind barricade of books. After prelimi- nary business, which was not of much i'm portance, Mr. Edmunds rose at o'clock and
 began by saying that the calm and orderly
 administration of the functions of the gov
 ernment was matter which deeply con-
 cerned both houses of Congress. MT. Ed
 munds, after reading the statutes and corre spondence bearing on the case, proceeded to
 argue that the President had not removed
 Mir. Duskin, but had merely suspended him.
 b1r. Duskin still remains United States at
 torney. He stood in the attitude of military
 officer under arrest, as the President might
 place General Sheridan to-day; but this would
 not take General Sheridan out of the army.
 The question was whether the official papers
 in the department of justice bearing on the
 administration of the officers whom the Sen
 ate were asked to remove should be sent
 to the Senate There was but one answer to
 this question. Discussing the question of
 the relevancy of the papers called for, MT.
 Edmunds said that this was a matter to be
 decided by the Senate and nobody else. He
 doubted whether the warmest administra-
 ton men would maintain that it was any
 part of the duty of the President or head of a department to determine whether official
 information the departments were required
 to furnish by either house of Congress was to be furnished or withheld ac
 cording to that officers opinion as to
 whether it would or would not be
 useful to them in their deliberations. Pass
 ing on to discuss the official or private char acter of the papers desired by the Senate,
 Mir. Edmunds said the papers called for in
 this case were papers filed in the Attorney
 Generals office and the statutes made the
 Attorney General and not the President the
 custodian of these papers. The people
 who made the statutes had perhaps
 been laboring under the delusion-but MT.
 Edmunds thought not-that papers in
 public department must of necessity be public
 papers, official papers and certainly that would
 be true with respect to papers "fled;;" and,
 he added, the papers called for in this case
 are there, they are 't6led." MT. Edmunds
 then inquired, what is an official papera and
 asked the presiding ofhcer-Mr. Sher-
 man-whether he would consider a let
 ter addressed to him as president
 pro tempore relating to a measure pending
 1,ae1 ktaC Ia
 Mr. Edmunds doubted whether in such an
 instance MT. Sherman would think it within
 the fitness of things to carry such letter to
 his house or put it in hls pocket Cor put it in your fire and destroy it." The President
 and the minority of the Judiciary committee
 said the suspension of an officer act solely within the discretion of the President. The majority agreed with them i'll this, but more than this-the suspension of an officer was an ''official' act. The statutes said it was, the President said it was, and of course it was an official act Every paper therefore addressed to the officer exercising that official function must be an official pa per, no matter how vile or false it may be. It did not belong to the man, whether President Attorney General but to the of ! fcer in his character as an officer. The At torney General gave no hint that any part of | the papers called for were private or unofh- cial or even confidential Public papers official papers-were called for, and such papers only were spoken of in the response. Did those papers relate to the motives of the President in suspending Duskins Did any body suppose that the President or any of his friends had filed a statement of his motivea By no means. That would be ab- surd The papers therefore stated facts on the statement of the Attorney General that ! they related exclusively to the suspension stated facts or alleged to the conduct of the officer suspended. Since the Senate was Had fn ct HaDt in placing this man permanently every paper l existing there relating to him on the admission of the Attorney General related to ! the conduct of the office while in possession of Duskin. But the papers, said ! Mr. Edmunds, were refused because they ! would not only give the facts, but would l make us to understand the reasons of the | President for exercising his official act. | Therefore the proposition was that the Senate | being called on in the exercise of it's jurisdic 1 ton to judge of the official conduct of Dus- kin the President having already been called | on within his Jurisdiction to pronounce judg ment on similar question about the same 1 the Senate could not have the papers because l if it did they would disclose the grounds on l which the President acted. of that" said | Mir. Edmunds, ''is not proposition which | would stagger the credulity and amaze the understanding of any intelligent man in s 1 government of law or government of req | son, I am quite unable to comprehend 1 what would be-"
 All the operations of the government, MT. Ednunds continued, were executive, and had 1 it come to this that because the President ! was the chief executive of the government Congress could know nothing to the facts l and circumstances relating to the execution
 of the lawsa Because if they did they might l be able to comprehend the reasons of the
 President in carrying out the law. Why,
 such statement wes shocking and yet that
 was the logic of this whole thing. The At
 torney General had said that the public in- l terest would not be subserved by sending
 papers to the Senate. According to this the
 public interest would not be subserved by
 telling the Senate-whlch was asked to help
 remove an officer-what the truth was, lest the truth should disclose to the Senate and
 possibly the public what the Presidents req
 sons were in exercising an official act
 Taking wider view of the question Mir. 1 Ed1nun ds maintained that the jurisdiction of 1 Congress was broader than that of the Presi-
 dent Congress made the laws and the Presi- l dent had only the executive power and either l bouse of Congress had right to know every thing that was in the departments of the l government. There was pending in Con-
 gress a bill providing for deficiency of
 S1S5. 900 in the department of justice. 1 Duskin was one of the persons to draw from
 that fund.- the very man whose agency would l make an economical or extravagant expendi-
 ture of public money. If this desired in- 1 formation as to DuSK1n was Qen1ed the Den
 1 ate. it must be denied as to Dorsheime1 and every other district attorney. If the Senate
 had sent precisely this resolution and ap-
 piled it to all the districts in the United : States, if the Attorney General and the
 President are right now, they would bs :; right in saying then, f'No, we can give you no information, because if we do you may e be able to know the reasons why Q l so many of these marshals and district at k torneys have been suspended, and that ii j. purely within the province of the Presiden r of the United States" That was the logi.
 of our good friends, the minority of tn
 committee, and their good friend and ally . the President of the United States, who I. with 8 courage certainly unique, had inter l. jected his supplementary report to the re ?. port of the minority committee before tn ,f Senate had even considered it. Was it DOS $ sible to carry on the government in that z way? MT. Edmunds thought not.
 {. The minority, MT. Edmunds continued n said there had been calling for papers ii d such a case as this that had been obeyed un | til 1S67 That was true, because until 1S6 ? there was no statute authorizing the Pres c dent to suspend any official at all.
 Tr1 rJa AEo o1o .e L.