Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1886-03-11
THE PRESIDENTS STAND.

L
| deplore honest government---PAita
| plsia Times.
| THE PRESIDENTS STAND.
| He Will Hand Down His Office to His Sue.
eeSsor Untrammeled-He Will Not BE
Driven by the Senate.
| 1t is evident from the report and res
| olutions laid before the Senate by Mr..
| Edmunds that the Republican majority
! is determined on factious opposition
| to the Administration. 1t is equally
plain that no public interest is to be
served by this opposition, for the Presi-
dent has more than intimated that he
is perfectly willing that the Senate
shall have any papers relating to re.
| movals which it asks as a matter OF
| courtesy but not of right. He man.
tains that as President certain execu-
| tive prerogatives are intrusted to him
which he must protect and hand down
unimpaired to his successor. They
be upheld. The constitution
provides that the Senate must
be consulted in the making of certain
/
advisory Or restrictive relation of the
| Senate toward suspensions or remov-
ais from Office. This leaves the Presi-
dent free to make suspensions and re-
movals, and it can readily be under
stood how any limit or restraint on. the
power of removal would render the
Executive weak. indecisive and ineffect-
i've.
But the chief purpose of the MAORI
ty in the Senate is to convict the Presi-
dent of bad faith in failing to redeem
his Civil-Service reform pledges. Not
that the Republican Senators are so
deeply enamored of this reform for it's
own sake, but they hope to use it to
the discredit of the President Fortu-
nately for Mr.. Cleveland they are
barking up the wrong tree. In his let
ter to George William Curtis, president
of the Civil-Service Reform League, he
made no pledge not to make any re-
movals for political reasons. On the
contrary, he expressly indicated that
he would remove certain class of of
fice-holders, whom he designated as
offensive partisans.
In spite of the most persistent press
ure from party very hungry and very
thirsty, Mr. Cleveland has stood by his
ante-election principles with remarka-
BILE steadfastness. At his Inauguration
he found the offices almost wholly in
the possession of Republicans. AS the
first year of his Administration draws
near its close two-thirds of these are
still IN office, and where Democrats
have taken the places of the remainder
very small percentage indeed are the
successors of suspended Republicans.
Moreover, in these cases it is believed
that the President is entirely willing
that the public shall know the causes
which in his opinion justified their sus-
pension on the ground of offensive
partisanship. This, however, is not
what the Republican Senators want OF
they would request" not ''demand,"
the papers relating to suspended of
ficials. They are only intent on forcing
the President to appear as refusing to
give information to the legislative
branch Of the Government, when in
fact he is anxious to give it if only
asked for it in a manner consistent with
The full preservation of his preroga-
tives. The President is understood to
be in full accord with the theory that
every paper relating to the appoint
ment, conduct or removal of Federal
officials shall be accessible, not only to
Congress but to the whole world.
How entirely factious is the aim OF
the Edmunds resolutions is proved by
that relating to removals of discharged
soldiers and sailors. This is craftily
worded to convey the impression that
such soldiers and sailors have been re-
moved, and without cause. It does not
make the charge boldly, but by way
of innuendo. 1t presents nothing that
can be denied because it fires in the
air. It formulates nothing but gen.
eral oratorical statement of recog.
nized principle. 1t hints at great
wrong, but stops short of averment II
is unworthy of the signature of Senator
Edmunds, or of any other Senator who
has signed it, except Mr.. Ingalls,, who
has always been one of the kind of men
"willing to wound and yet afraid to
strike''-one who loves to send arrows
flying in the Chicago Neaos.
THE Democratic Senators held
caucus lately and resolved to support
the President. The President himself
has assumed very determined posi-.
ton in connection with this matter.
He contends that the Senate has no,
authority to demand why or wherefore
he makes removals from office, and
according to the strict letter of the
law he is quite right. If the Senate
has any such right it is certainly not
to be found embodied either in the
constitution or any statute, or if it is,
the Senate has failed to indicate in what
part of the constitution or in what par
ticular statute it may be found. In fact,
it appears as if the majority of the
Senate were engaged in very useless
and, therefore, foolish quarrel with the
Executive Philadelphia Inquirer, Rep.
in the resignation of William
Dorsheimer, United States Attorney
for the Southern District of New York,
friends of the Administration will be
gratifed to see an effect of Ceveland's
principles upon an offensive Demo-
cratic partisan. 1t is impossible to es-
cape the conclusion that Mr.. Dorsheim-
erss retirement was forced by the re-
fusal of the President to aid in his con-
firm tifu eo long az he remained edit