The age-herald., 1898-01-09
DECLINE OF THE SENATE.
The House Equal in Ability to Any of Its
 Predecessors.

fNoah Brooks in New York Times.
 When an old-timer visits Washington he finds it interesting to sit while in the galleries of the senate or the house and recall the men and the scenes with which he was familiar during the years, let us say, beginning with Lincoln's first presi- dential term and ending with the accession of Andrew Johnson to the office of presi- dent Those were "the old days of the war; and to an elderly person like my self the drama then passing so swiftly now seems like a far-off dream. Any one who can recall the men and the measures of that day must be impressed with the fact that very few of the actors in that mighty drama are now living. Young people, hear ing the name of some statesman once prominent, some military or naval hero, and asking about him, have but one an- swer "He is dead"
 But the feeling of depression that comes over one who remembers with pride and pleasure the senate of 1S61-5 as he looks over the senate of today is not wholly due to sentimental musings on the muta- tions of time, the shortness of human life Not only does one miss the great men of the elder time, but he sees almost none who adequately fill the places vacated by the paSSlnS or the mlSnty men or old. It IS one of the commoneSt traits of human nature to overrate the past and underrate tao present; and more than one old man who shakes his head mournfully and la ments that "there were gia.ts IS those days" was probably just as certain in those days" that weakness and corrup- tion characterized the men whose geratness he now regards with SO much regretful veneration. Ther, again, the age in which Lincoln, Seward, Chase, Sumner and men like them won their fame developed a race of statesmen which in these piping times of peace the country does not so strenuously need, perhaps, and certainly does not de- velop. This is the view commonly taken by the cheerful optimst, who believes that benevolent Providence watches over the fortunes of the republic as well as over fools, children and drunken men.
 Let us look over the rolls of the senate as it was constituted in the years which I have just mentioned. But, fiji st. let me be understood as disclaiming any sympathy with those who insinuate, if they do not openly charge, that there is corruption among the congressman of the present gen. eration. It should be frankly said that the senators and representatives of the present day are an honest and well-mean- ing body of men; that corrupt measures stand no chance whatever in either branch of congress, ans that the men who would be willing to barter their votes for any con- slderation are so few that they cut no fig- ure whatever in any careful scrutiny of congress. Agail, whatever may have been true of the relative estimates placed upon the patriotism and mental abilities of sen etor~ and representatives, say thirty-five years ago, and the senators and repre- sentatives If the present day, it cannot be justly said that the character of the house of representatives shows any marked deterioration. Having in mind such mem bers of tho lower house as Thaddeus Stew ems, Of Pennsylvania; Henry Winter Davis, Of Maryland; Elihu B. Washburne. of H. iino!s; Clement ;4 Vallandigham al.d John A. Bingham, r Ohio, and other notable men on both siaes of the house in their Gay. aver that the present house, as re- gai1s high abilities, faithfulness and in- Sustry, will not suffer by comparison with any of it's predecessors
 Unf, rtunately all this is rot true of the serate into whose rolls of membership we nove just proposed to look. 4 few years eso with the ineurSion into the senate of several milIionares and n 1.tlti-:riliionares, came the apDesitcness of the st ena of "a rich mans club applied to the body