The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1901-05-08

no woros TO express his establishment
and CONSERVATION.
The two papers were given to the
secretary of the Senate to read. They
were read, and for ten minutes dead
silence reigned in the United States
Senate-none knowing what to say
Then pandemonium ensued. On the
hoor of the Senate and in the corridors
OF the House where there were SO
many congressman waiting, looking
after the appointments in the different
districts, there was buzz of discus
sion, and all sorts of demonstrations
made by the adherents of both fac
lions.
1T was terrible scene, and one
which 1 presume has been seldom wit
messed in the halls of Congress. Ros-
coe Conkling was considered as one OF
the leading factors in the national adj
ministration, and his resignation left
a vacuum that nobody understood how
/ 1t could be filled, and subsequent his
tory has demonstrated that 1t never
has been filled.
He was the most scholarly, AFRO
CANT, aggressive, and after Alexander
Hamilton, the greatest exponent of the
federalist theory of government that
/ this country has ever known. He was
an aristocratic Republican. He had his
, own ideas of the distribution of pat
ronage and rather than submit to the
domination of a Garfield in the APP
pofntment of Robertson, instead of
Merritt, as collector of customs of the
port Of New York. he resigned the
! leadership of the Republican party In
the national Congress.
"A NATIONAL TRAGEDY.
'Of course everybody is familiar
with the tragedy which followed, and
which was the outcome of the factional
feud. when the crazy assassin Guiteau
got the idea into his added brain fpat
! it would be a grand thing to rid the
country of a president who had be-
come unpopular with an important sec
ton Of his own party
("On July 2 Garfield was shot down
while waiting in the depot with Mr..
Blaine to take a train for a summer
resort, whittier he intended going for
rest and recuperation after all the wor-
ry and anxiety which he had suffered
during the first few months of his adj
ministration.
Immediately there was revulsion
OF feeling throughout the country. and
Garfield became a martyr and Guiteau
felon. During the long, weary days
that followed, while the President lay
breathing his life away in the cottage
at Elberon, N. j.. bulletins were sent
out to every city In the Union, day at
ter day, giving the physicians state
ments concerning his condition.
AT last, on September 18th, the sad
news was heralded abroad that he had
passed away, and the country was
plunged into the deepest mourning.
and the rulers of other nations sent
messages of coincidence, and Chester
A. Arthur, of New York, became Presi-
dent of the United States.
AN IDEAL EXECUTIVE
"Of all the public men whom have
ever met, President Arthur came near
er filing my ideal of the chief execu-
tive Of great nation than any other.
There was a rare dignity in his air and
bearing, and his presence was COM
handing and at the same time affable,
SO that he commanded the respect of
/ all who came in contact with him.
Always scrupulously well dressed,
when his equipage appeared on Penn
sylvania avenue it looked like such as
should belong to the President of the
United States. He had grand char
not do him justice for the good work
which he accomplished in his very try
ing position as the successor of Gar
, field and the inheritor of all the feuds
and schisn,s that had grown out OF the
differences of opinion existing among
the leaders OF the party.
My term expired with the closing OF
the extra session of the Senate which
resulted in the resignation of Senators
Conkling and Plat. but / had many
opportunities for observing the striking
traits of character of some of the big
gest men who ever occupied seats In
the United States Senate.
STRIKING IRREGULARITIES.
There was old Senator Beck of
Kentucky, for instance, who used to
walk into the cloakroom Of the Senate
every morning with two extra shirts
under his arm. He was such an invet-
crate tobacco chewer that he would
spoil the front of the shirt ne wore
before he. reached the. Capitol. and he
would retire to- the cloakroom ana
change his shirt before taking his seat,
During the day. while listening to or
participating in the debates, he would
ruin that shirt so that he would have
to go into the cloakroom after adjourn
! ment and again change his shirt be-
fore venturinR out on Pennsylvania
avenue in anything like a presentable
appearance
Then there was your distinguished
'commoner.' Alexander n. Stephens,
who always created stir when ne ap-
peared on the floor of the House. ana
when it was announced that he was
going to sneak the galleries were al
ways crowded, and he was listened to