"The requests and demands which by the score have for nearly three months been presented to the different Departments of the government, whatever may be their form, have but one complexion. They assume the right of the Senate to sit in judgement upon the exercise of my exclusive discretion and executive function, for which I am solely responsible to the people from whom I have so lately received the sacred trust of office. My oath to support and defend the Constitution, my duty to the people who have chosen me to execute the powers of their great office and not relinquish them, and my duty to the chief magistracy which I must preserve unimpaired in all its dignity and vigor, compel me to refuse compliance with these demands."
There is a ringing quality in the style of this message not generally characteristic of President Cleveland's state papers. It evoked as ringing a response from public opinion, and this effect was heightened by a tactless allusion to the message made at this time in the Senate. In moving a reference of the message to the Judiciary Committee, its chairman, Senator Edmunds of Vermont, remarked that the presidential message brought vividly to his mind "the communication of King Charles I to the Parliament, telling them what, in conducting their affairs, they ought to do and ought not to do." The historical reference, however, had an application which Senator Edmunds did not foresee. It brought vividly to mind what the people of England had endured from a factional tyranny so relentless that the nation was delighted when Oliver Cromwell turned Parliament out of doors. It is an interesting coincidence that the Cleveland era was marked by what in the book trade was known as the Cromwell boom. Another unfortunate remark made by Senator Edmunds was that it was the first time "that any President of the United States has undertaken to interfere with the deliberations of either House of Congress on questions pending before them, otherwise than by message on the state of the Union which the Constitution commands him to make from time to time." The effect of this statement, however, was to stir up recollections of President Jackson's message of protest against the censure of the Senate. The principle laid down by Jackson in his message of April 15, 1834, was that "the President is the direct representative of the American people," whereas the Senate is "a body not directly amenable to the people." However assailable this statement may be from the standpoint of traditional legal theory, it is indubitably the principle to which American politics conform in practice. The people instinctively expect the President to guard their interests against congressional machinations.
There was a prevalent belief that the Senate's profession of motives, of constitutional propriety, was insincere and that the position it had assumed would never have been thought of had the Republican candidate for President been elected. A feeling that the Senate was not playing the game fairly to refuse the Democrats their innings was felt even among Senator Edmunds' own adherents. A spirit of comity traversing party lines is very noticeable in the intercourse of professional politicians. Their willingness to help each other out is often manifested, particularly in struggles involving control of party machinery. Indeed, a system of ring rule in a governing party seems to have for its natural concomitant the formation of a similar ring in the regular opposition, and the two rings maintain friendly relations behind the forms of party antagonism. The situation is very similar to that which exists between opposing counsel in suits at law, where the contentions at the trial table may seem to be full of animosity and may indeed at times really develop personal enmity, but which as a general rule are merely for effect and do not at all hinder cooperation in matters pertaining to their common professional interest.
The attitude taken by the Senate in its opposition to President Cleveland jarred upon this sense of professional comity, and it was very noticeable that in the midst of the struggle some questionable nominations of notorious machine politicians were confirmed by the Senate. It may have been that a desire to discredit the reform professions of the Administration contributed to this result, but the effect was disadvantageous to the Senate. "The Nation" on March 11, 1886, in a powerful article reviewing the controversy observed: "There is not the smallest reason for believing that, if the Senate won, it would use its victory in any way for the maintenance or promotion of reform. In truth, in the very midst of the controversy, it confirmed the nomination of one of Baltimore's political scamps." It is certainly true that the advising power of the Senate has never exerted a corrective influence upon appointments to office; its constant tendency is towards a system of apportionment which concedes the right of the President to certain personal appointments and asserts the reciprocal right of Congressmen to their individual quotas.
As a result of these various influences, the position assumed by the Republicans under the lead of Senator Edmunds was seriously weakened. When the resolutions of censure were put to the vote on the 26th of March, that condemning the refusal of the Attorney-General to produce the papers was adopted by thirty-two ayes to twenty-six nays—a strict party vote; but the resolution declaring it to be the duty of the Senate in all such cases to refuse its consent to removals of suspended officials was adopted by a majority of only one vote, and two Republican Senators voted with the Democrats. The result was, in effect, a defeat for the Republican leaders, and they wisely decided to withdraw from the position which they had been holding. Shortly after the passage of the resolutions, the Senate confirmed the nomination over which the contest started, and thereafter the right of the President to make removals at his own discretion was not questioned.
This retreat of the Republican leaders was accompanied, however, by a new development in political tactics, which from the standpoint of party advantage, was ingeniously conceived. It was now held that, inasmuch as the President had avowed attachment to the principle of tenure of office during good behavior, his action in suspending officers therefore implied delinquency in their character or conduct from which they should be exonerated in case the removal was really on partisan grounds. In reporting upon nominations, therefore, Senate committees adopted the practice of noting that there were no charges of misconduct against the previous incumbents and that the suspension was on account of "political reasons." As these proceedings took place in executive session, which is held behind closed doors, reports of this character would not ordinarily reach the public, but the Senate now voted to remove the injunction of secrecy, and the reports were published. The manifest object of these maneuvers was to exhibit the President as acting upon the "spoils system" of distributing offices. The President's position was that he was not accountable to the Senate in such matters. In his message of the 1st of March he said: "The pledges I have made were made to the people, and to them I am responsible for the manner in which they have been redeemed. I am not responsible to the Senate, and I am unwilling to submit my actions and official conduct to them for judgement."
While this contest was still going on, President Cleveland had to encounter another attempt of the Senate to take his authority out of his hands. The history of American diplomacy during this period belongs to another volume in this series,* but a diplomatic question was drawn into the struggle between the President and the Senate in such a way that it requires mention here. Shortly after President Cleveland took office, the fishery articles of the Treaty of Washington had terminated. In his first annual message to Congress, on December 8, 1885, he recommended the appointment of a commission to settle with a similar commission from Great Britain "the entire question of the fishery rights of the two governments and their respective citizens on the coasts of the United States and British North America." But this sensible advice was denounced as weak and cowardly. Oratory of the kind known as "twisting the lion's tail" resounded in Congress. Claims were made of natural right to the use of Canadian waters which would not have been indulged for a moment in respect of the territorial waters of the United States. For instance, it was held that a bay over six miles between headlands gave free ingress so long as vessels kept three miles from shore—a doctrine which, if applied to Long Island Sound, Delaware Bay, or Chesapeake Bay, would have impaired our national jurisdiction over those waters. Senator Frye of Maine took the lead in a rub-a-dub agitation in the presence of which some Democratic Senators showed marked timidity. The administration of public services by congressional committees has the incurable defect that it reflects the particular interests and attachments of the committeemen. Presidential administration is so circumstanced that it tends to be nationally minded; committee administration, just as naturally, tends to be locally minded. Hence, Senator Frye was able to report from the committee on foreign relations a resolution declaring that a commission "charged with the consideration and settlement of the fishery rights... ought not to be provided for by Congress." Such was the attitude of the Senate towards the President on this question, that on April 13, 1886, this arrogant resolution was adopted by thirty-five ayes to 10 nays. A group of Eastern Democrats who were in a position to be affected by the longshore vote, joined with the Republicans in voting for the resolution, and among them Senator Gorman of Maryland, national chairman of the Democratic party.
* See "The Path of Empire," by Carl Russell Fish (in "The
Chronicles of America").
President Cleveland was no more affected by this Senate resolution than he had been by their other resolutions attacking his authority. He went ahead with his negotiations and concluded treaty arrangements which the Senate, of course, rejected; but, as that result had been anticipated, a modus vivendi which had been arranged by executive agreements between the two countries went into effect, regardless of the Senate's attitude. The case is a signal instance of the substitution of executive arrangements for treaty engagements which has since then been such a marked tendency in the conduct of the foreign relations of the United States.
A consideration which worked steadily against the Senate in its attacks upon the President, was the prevalent belief that the Tenure of Office Act was unconstitutional in its nature and mischievous in its effects. Although Senator Edmunds had been able to obtain a show of solid party support, it eventually became known that he stood almost alone in the Judiciary Committee in his approval of that act. The case is an instructive revelation of the arbitrary power conferred by the committee system. Members are loath to antagonize a party chairman to whom their own bills must go for approval. Finally, Senator Hoar dared to take the risk, and with such success that on June 21, 1886, the committee reported a bill for the complete repeal of the Tenure of Office Act, the chairman—Senator Edmunds—alone dissenting. When the bill was taken up for consideration, Senator Hoar remarked that he did not believe there were five members of the Senate who really believed in the propriety of that act. "It did not seem to me to be quite becoming," he explained, "to ask the Senate to deal with this general question, while the question which arose between the President and the Senate as to the interpretation and administration of the existing law was pending. I thought, as a party man, that I had hardly the right to interfere with the matter which was under the special charge of my honorable friend from Vermont, by challenging a debate upon the general subject from a different point of view."