The sun., 1903-02-08
The Senate.

The Hotspurs Of sociology have no
patience with the United States Senate.
1t il too slow for them. 1t stands in the
way OF the instant application Of the
latest nostrum. 1t refuses, as it has
long refused, to be the echo Of the fleet
ing sentiment or sentimentality most
in vogue among the doctrinaires and
the demagogues, 1t insists upon dis
charging its legitimate Constitutional
functions. 1t sifts and deliberates. 1t
thinks for itself instead Of rejecting
and registering meekly the often hasty,
rash and extreme proposals OF legisla-
ton that are sent to it by the House of
Representatives, body which has i'm
paired it's proper influence by its willing
ness to pass bills of doubtful Constitu-
tionality, hoping and expecting that the
Senate will kill them.
If the House knowingly and wilfully
consents to be irresponsible. the response
bility of the Senate becomes all the
greater. The House is usually willing TO
furnish what may be called the fashion,
able bills Of the moment. Just now bills for
the confusion OF trusts are fashionable.
Some OF the makers of them in the House
avow a readiness to rush them through,
leaving to the Senate the task of ponder
ing their Constitutionalty The House
Intentionally shrks its share of response
bility. Let the Senate have whatever un-
popularity comes from considering calmly
instead of accepting blndly the bills
which the House passes with reckless
meas that is only seeming, for the House
knows that the Senate is ordinarily safe
brake. The Senate does its duty. and
instead Of thanks it gets hard words.
BY the design Of the makers of the
Constitution, by the indirect method of
its election and the length of term OF its
members, the Senate was meant to be
and to do exactly what it is and does.
In part it is restraint upon the Presi-
dent. In much larger part it is check
and clog upon impulsive and shifting
popular feeling, the mood and fashion
Of the hour. The writers and speakers
who call it obstructive and un-
responsive are making compliment,
not reproach. It is largely its proper
business to obstruct. to delay, to delib-
crate. and to be mnresponsve to crude.
ll-consdered, ill-informed or passion
ate agitation. The builders of the
Constitution foresaw and provided for
the course Of the two branches of the
national legislature. One was to be
quick, one was to be slow; one the mir
ror, and the other the touchstone of
fuctuating popular opinion. The bam-
era of the Senate should blame the Con-
stitution. The Senate is what the Con-
stitution made it,
In view Of the great mass OF acts added
TO the statute book by each Congress,
it il curious how eager for more legisla-
ton some Of the censurers OF the Senate
are. They must have such and such a
bill. II the Senate takes time or dares
to oppose, why. be wiser than the men
who made the Constitution, alter it and
try to get a Senate directly responsible
to the people, another House. There
seems to be no inconsiderable school OF
reformers that would do away as far
N IpSSiDic Win representative RpNtTH-
ment, remove the system of checks and
balances that has worked so well and
proved so necessary and benefcent,
and substitute something resembling
government by town meeting. We are
accustomed to the fantasies of these
innovators, but it is strange and not
agreeable to find in a journal supposed
to be intelligent and conservative, the
Boston Transcript, criticism like this:
Parity by rules of It's own making and partly
through C,nanwtonai hcsn~. Il has acquired an
unrepubucan measure OF arbitrary power Of which
II frequently fails 10 make the hes, use"
That is, the Senate's Constitutional
power is unrepublican, II must follow
that the Constitution itself is unrepub-
Ican. The Tr1nscnpt adds to the list OF
the Senate's crimes that il has given
very cavalier treatment to the pledges
of Presidents. party conventions and
even individual members Of its own
party When did it become the Con-
stitutional duty Of the Senate to be bound
by the pledges of Presidents. Of political
conventions, or Of individual members?
Such absurdities are inevitable when
the Senate is attacked. for the Senate is
what tho Constitution intended it should
be. II fulfils faithfully its duties under
the Constitution. Its usefulness was never
greater than it " to-day. 1t is q buffer