THE LATE HON. WILLIAM PITT FESSENDEN, SENATOR OF MAINE.
Remarks in the Senate on his Death, December 14, 1869.
MR. PRESIDENT,—A seat in this Chamber is vacant. But this is a very inadequate expression for the present occasion. Much more than a seat is vacant. There is a void difficult to measure, as it will be difficult to fill. Always eminent from the beginning, Mr. Fessenden during these latter years became so large a part of the Senate that without him it seems to be a different body. His guiding judgment, his ready power, his presence so conspicuous in debate, are gone, taking away from this Chamber that identity which it received so considerably from him.
Of all the present Senate, one only besides myself witnessed his entry into this Chamber. I cannot forget it. He came in the midst of that terrible debate on the Kansas and Nebraska Bill by which the country was convulsed to its centre, and his arrival had the effect of a reinforcement on a field of battle. Those who stood for Freedom then were few in numbers,—not more than fourteen,—while thirty-seven Senators in solid column voted to break the faith originally plighted to Freedom, and to overturn a time-honored landmark, opening that vast Mesopotamian region to the curse of Slavery. Those anxious days are with difficulty comprehended by a Senate where Freedom rules. One more in our small number was a sensible addition. We were no longer fourteen, but fifteen. His reputation at the bar and his fame in the other House gave assurance which was promptly sustained. He did not wait, but at once entered into the debate with all those resources which afterwards became so famous. The scene that ensued exhibited his readiness and courage. While saying that the people of the North were fatigued with the threat of Disunion, that they considered it as “mere noise and nothing else,” he was interrupted by Mr. Butler, of South Carolina, always ready to speak for Slavery, exclaiming, “If such sentiments as yours prevail, I want a dissolution right away,”—a characteristic intrusion doubly out of order,—to which the new-comer rejoined, “Do not delay it on my account; do not delay it on account of anybody at the North.” The effect was electric; but this instance was not alone. Douglas, Cass, and Butler interrupted only to be worsted by one who had just ridden into the lists. The feelings of the other side were expressed by the Senator from South Carolina, who, after one of the flashes of debate which he had provoked, exclaimed: “Very well, go on; I have no hope for you.” All this will be found in the “Globe,”[185] precisely as I give it; but the “Globe” could not picture the exciting scene,—the Senator from Maine erect, firm, immovable as a jutting promontory against which the waves of Ocean tossed and broke in dissolving spray. There he stood. Not a Senator, loving Freedom, who did not feel on that day that a champion had come.
This scene, so brilliant in character, illustrates Mr. Fessenden’s long career in the Senate. All present were moved, while those at a distance were less affected. His speech, which was argumentative, direct, and pungent, exerted more influence on those who heard it than on those who only read it, vindicating his place as debater rather than orator. This place he held to the end, without a superior,—without a peer. Nobody could match him in immediate and incisive reply. His words were swift, and sharp as a cimeter,—or, borrowing an illustration from an opposite quarter, he “shot flying” and with unerring aim. But while this great talent secured for him always the first honors of debate, it was less important with the country, which, except in rare instances, is more impressed by ideas and by those forms in which truth is manifest.
The Senate has changed much from its original character, when, shortly after the formation of the National Government, a Nova Scotia paper, in a passage copied by one of our own journals, while declaring that “the habits of the people here are very favorable to oratory,” could say, “There is but one assembly in the whole range of the Federal Union in which eloquence is deemed unnecessary, and, I believe, even absurd and obtrusive,—to wit, the Senate, or upper house of Congress. They are merely a deliberative meeting, in which every man delivers his concise opinion, one leg over the other, as they did in the first Congress, where an harangue was a great rarity.”[186] Speech was then for business and immediate effect in the Chamber. Since then the transformation has proceeded, speech becoming constantly more important, until now, without neglect of business, the Senate has become a centre from which to address the country. A seat here is a lofty pulpit with a mighty sounding-board, and the whole wide-spread people is the congregation.
As Mr. Fessenden rarely spoke except for business, what he said was restricted in its influence, but it was most effective in this Chamber. Here was his empire, and his undisputed throne. Of perfect integrity and austerest virtue, he was inaccessible to those temptations which in various forms beset the avenues of public life. Most faithfully and constantly did he watch the interests intrusted to him. Here he was a model. Holding the position of Chairman of the Finance Committee, while it yet had those double duties which are now divided between two important committees, he became the guardian of the National Treasury, both in its receipts and its expenditures, so that nothing was added to it or taken from it without his knowledge; and how truly he discharged this immense trust all will attest. Nothing could leave the Treasury without showing a passport. This service was the more momentous from the magnitude of the transactions involved; for it was during the whole period of the war, when appropriations responded to loans and taxes,—all being on a scale beyond precedent in the world’s history. On these questions, sometimes so sensitive and difficult and always so grave, his influence was beyond that of any other Senator and constantly swayed the Senate. All that our best generals were in arms he was in the financial field.