federal authority and to exalt state rights. Their control, being proportionately much stronger in the Senate than in the House, had the practical effect of causing the Senate to exert a restraining and moderating influence upon congressional action, thus exhibiting it as the more conservative body.

Influences which tended to make the Senate illustrious were also developed by the new turn given to political activities. Throughout what may be called the middle period of our politics, extending from the Jacksonian era down to the Civil War, the dominant issues turned upon questions of principle that made the most thrilling appeals to the moral sentiments of the people, while their scope comprehended the very nature of the constitution and the respective rights of the general government and of the states. Political necessity, as well as the demands of public sentiment, tended to procure the selection of men strong enough to maintain themselves with credit in such a forum as the Senate had become, and so the line of statesmen came into being, whose powers were evoked by the slavery contest, making the debates of the Senate a school of political education for the nation.

During its first period the Senate does not appear to have been a very dignified body. The ceremonious politeness of the times was a crust of formality that sometimes gave way explosively

when passions boiled up, and such records of the debates as have come down to us indicate that controversy was apt to degenerate into peevish contention. The reputation of the Senate for gravity and decorum was the creation of its second period, when it had become a parliamentary forum. Those traits were the result of a reciprocity of consideration between men who sat as state ambassadors and whose character was strongly braced by state pride, and they were also upheld by the respect felt by statesmen for the means by which they obtained parliamentary distinction. By exalting the dignity of the Senate, they elevated the stage upon which they stood to address the nation. Privileges of unrestricted debate were not originally possessed by the Senate. The rules adopted at the first session provided that "in case of a debate becoming tedious, four senators may call for the question," and this expedient for shutting off debate was freely used. Writing under date of March 2, 1791, Maclay says, "Every one that attempts to speak is silenced with the cry of 'question.' But such restraints came to be regarded as incompatible with the dignity of a body

1 Maclay relates that, on his making a motion which injured the pride of the Senate, by putting them on an equality with the House in the matter of compensation, "such a storm of abuse never, perhaps, fell upon any member. 'It was nonsense,' 'stupidity,' 'it was a misfortune to have men void of understanding in the House.' Izard, King, and Mr. Morris said every rude thing they could." Journal, p. 141.

whose self-respect would keep it from abusing its privileges. Still cases may be found when debate was protracted to a tedious extent. After the Whig victory of 1840, Henry Clay complained that the minority was abusing the privilege of unrestricted debate, and he proposed the reintroduction of the previous question; but the proposition met with so much opposition that it was abandoned. It was felt, and not unjustly, that the privilege was safely confined by the dignity of the Senate. Debate, as a filibustering practice, carried on for the purpose of legislative extortion, was a moral impossibility.

This reputation of the Senate for dignity and conservatism not only helped to sustain the authority it had seized, but at one important juncture facilitated such an augmentation of it as to raise the Senate to an extraordinary pitch of power. During the Johnson administration, when by a combination of circumstances unlikely to recur, a parliamentary opposition to the executive was developed of such strength as to overbalance the weight of the presidential office, the victory of Congress was in effect the triumph of the Senate. Its advisory executive function was conveniently at hand for asserting congressional mastery of the situation. The Tenure of Office act was passed, virtually substituting the discretion of the Senate for that of the President in making removals from office. What was taken away from the President's

authority by the united force of Congress was thus given to the Senate, while the House as a body gained nothing. In this way there came about a development of oligarchical power under a republican form of government that was the wonder of the age. It seemed that while everywhere else upper Houses were decaying and their authority was becoming effete, the principle of aristocratic control was renewing its vigor in the constitution of the American Senate, making that body the envy and admiration of Tory statesmen the world

over.

This was the culmination of the overt authority of the Senate. As soon as the temporary exigency, which produced the Tenure of Office act, had passed by, the House sought to repeal it. In deference to the appeal of President Grant in his inaugural address, the Senate modified the requirements of the law, but insisted on the point that its consent should be essential to removals from offices. In his message of December, 1869, President Grant declared the law "inconsistent with a faithful and efficient administration of the government,' and the House soon after voted for its repeal by a majority of more than six to one. The Senate, however, adhered to its oligarchical power, and under it perfected the practice known as "the courtesy of the Senate," by which the power to make appointments to office in a particular state was in practice vested in the senators from that

state.1 The attempt of President Garfield to break down the senatorial usurpation caused a faction war which incited an assassin to take his life. The Senate, however, still clung to its powers and used them to harass President Cleveland's administration, evoking his memorable message of March 1, 1886. The issue had now become so menacing that considerations of party expediency compelled the Senate to surrender. The Tenure of Office law was repealed by the act of March 3, 1887.

The force of public opinion has not only repelled the extension of the powers of the Senate, but it has to some extent curtailed them. The Senate. would not now as a body dare to interfere with the President's selection of the members of his Cabinet, although originally the appointment of Cabinet officers was just as contingent upon its consent as the appointments of any other class of public officers. Neither would it dare openly to dispute the right of the President to select members of his own party to fill the public offices under his administration, although quick to find pretexts for embarrassing him in the exercise of that right. With

1 In a speech April 6, 1893, Senator Hoar said: "When I came into public life in 1869, the Senate claimed almost the entire control of the executive function of appointment to office. . . . What was called 'the courtesy of the Senate' was depended upon to enable a senator to dictate to the executive all appointments and removals in his territory." Congressional Record, Fifty-third Congress, p. 137.