The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1900-04-25


The Quay case was ssttlsd yesterday
against tue claimant By The oloss vote Of
IS 20 ~, four senator's not victims and IN
paired. The settlements is one that pre-
serves the presidents and safeguards
the Senate against q great danger that
wss threatening It. IL Quay With bis
popularity and influence could not gst
in there 10 little chance of any appointee
Of a governor und similar cireumstan-
ces getting In In the future: There were
great possibilities for evil in the admis-
sion Of Quay. II he had teen let In no
senator appointed by q governor no mat
tar under what conditioEs. could have
been kept out unless the Senate was
ready TO convict itself Of the grossest
inconsj stsDcy, and that might have re-
50 lied In time Ia changing the Senate,
from an elective body to an sppointive
body, the appointing power being the
governors Of stairs Deadlocss In legisla-
turts with consequent failure to elect
senators are getting more and more COM
mon, and II IL were ones s,ttlsd that in
spite Of the fact that Legislature had
bad an opportunity to chor $, a senator
and failed, the governor could appoint
they would become more common, for
there would then arise motive for
creating . deadlock solely for the purpose
OF enabling the governor to appoint. A
candidate for the Senate who had q
'apun" with the governor, would then
have two enancss Of getting into that
body, one by securing Q ma ority OF the
ballots Of the lsgislature. and tina other
by creating uesdiook. In states where
the SESSIONS OF the leg AZURE are biennial
and the term Of the governor is four
years, the Providence Journal points out
that . senator could be In the Sepats
at least four years on . temporary ap-
pointment, and II q governor friendly to
him were again chosen and deadlock
ore ated In the legislature he might get
another four years. sppointmsnt. thus
getting eight years, or two years longer
than the term OF q senator regularly
elected.
There can be little question what
would have been the result II the decision
had been to admit Quay with what that
would imply. A tremendous impstus
would have been given to the movement
to elect senator's by popular vote, which
would have rendered it well nigh irresisti-
| BILE.
good many OF the Senator'S, like Hoar
and Frye, voted to ssst Quay beosuse In
their belief the Constitution gives the
governor the right TO appoint whenever
o vacancy occurs, Their votes simply
expressed obediencs 10 the Constitution
as they interpreted 10. But there were
others not holding this view Of the Con-
stitution, who voted for him because he
was popular and powerful. These men
were false to their convictions and
their conduct merits nothing but condeni-
nation.
The result OF the defeat Of Mr.. Quay
personally reDIsius to be EesH. IL Will
undoubtedly strengthen the opposition
to him in Psnnsyivania, for the reason
that 1t gives 1t a chance to be effective,
chance which 1t would mt have had II
the decision had been in his favor, for
| then even II the next Legislature failed to
slect him he would have got bis
seat because the governor would
have appointed him. Under those
oircum stances IL would he use
iefs to oppose him In the Legislature
and being useless 1t would most likely
not nave been attempted,