Rensselaer Republican, Volume 18, Number 24, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 18 February 1886 — PRESIDENT AND SENATE. [ARTICLE]

PRESIDENT AND SENATE.

Mr. Sherman Sets Forth Boldly and Distinctly the Republican Policy. Either Branch of Congress Has the Right to Any and Every Paper on File. (o He Warns the Democrats that They Are Pursuing a Course That Will React. The introduction in the Senate of the United States, on the Bth insfc, by Mr. Eustis of a resolution directing the Finance Committee to ask the Secretary of tho Treasury for -certain information concerning the alleged refusal of the New Orleans Sub-Treasury to receive standard silver doUars precipitated a debate based upon the refusal of the administration to furnish Senate committees with information concerning the suspensions of Federal officials. During the debate of Mr. Eustis’ resolution Mr. Sherman arose to support the resolution, saying that lie thought the inquiry entirely proper, and that tho Senate had a perfect right to anything on the Executive files pertaining to tho subject under consideration or to Executive appointments, suspensions, or removals. He continued :

I think we have a right to seek information of any department of the Government, whether the information be on paper or by parol. Ido not think there is any doubt of that whatever. But for that we could not legislate—we could not even by executive session. I havo just as much right to go to any department and ask for any papers affecting that department, affecting legislative business, if I go there armed with the power of the Senate, as the Secretary of the Treasury or any department of the Government, or as the President of the United States. That has always, from tho foundation of the Government, been the festablished law. Any information that may affect the judgmont or conduct of a Senator or any* subject of public duty in_ information thatthe Presidents bound to communicate. There ought to be no secrets whatever in this Government of ours ; it is a government of tho people. There is no rule or provision for keeping secrets. We have no right to say to another department of the Government: “For ivhat-rea-son did you do this thing?’’ The President ha 3 no right to come to us and say : “Why did you pass this law?” He has no right to cross-ex-amine us. The departments are separate and distinct. But all the information contained on the files of any department is just as much tne property of a Senator as of anybody else. There is no secret in this Government hat can be juotected from legislative supervision. Mr. Saulsbury thought that the discretion ns to furnishing information concerning a suspended officer was vested wholly in the President. Mr. Sherman replied that nobody proposed to deny the right of the President to exercise Ills discretion. He was as independent as the Senate. But he ought not to prevent the Senate from having the same sources of information that he had. The Senate had a right to cad for that information. At the same time the Senate should be courteous. If the President should give as a reason for withholding information that it was confidential, the speaker would be content; but he had no right to withhold papers containing charges openly made, on which lie acted And which papers were on a public file, merely because they came to—him about an exectftivc matter. If they wore confidential they ought not to be filed and allowed to poison the fame of a man. If they ought not to Ive seen by Senators or the suspended officials they ought to be cast into the waste basket without action. Mr. Pugh said that Mr. Sherman did ngt claim that the Senate should call upon the President for any other than public documents. Tho character of these documents determined the right of the Senate to their possession. The President had the right to determino the character of the documents, and, hence, the right of tho Senate to possess them. Mr. Sherman-re-plied : Where did tho Senator from Alabama [Mr. Pugh] discover this new-fangled idea? Where are tho precedents that enable him to say that the hood of a department shall say what papers shall be given to the legislative department—- , that he shall say what papers from the files of a department shall be given to tho legislative department of the government? When, in all tho hundred years of this country's history, was such a doctrine presented before? The Senator from Alabama [Mr. Pughl was a member of the House many years ago. He wiU remember that, time and time again, we investigated tho administrations of Franklin Pierce and James Buchanan. We called, before ns all the papers, secret and public, in regard to that administration, and they were nover denied us by the last two Democratic Presidents. They never con. tended that they could withhold cne paper and give another. On the contrary, in obedience to law the Secretary* of the Navy sent to the House of Repreaentatives a private letter of James BSchanan’s which entered into the public records, and was commented upon and used. The idea of a distinction between papers, public and private, never occurred until during the present ..administration. Why, Mr. President, the lawis plain and mandatory. I happened to hold the office of Secretary of the Treasury at one time, and I was brought before both ,houses of Congress—fTfhe Senate and the House of Representatives—when they called on me for papers in a certain controverted ca.se—and I will not refer to it at any length, because it was in executive session. They not only called on me for the papers, but they called on mo to come in person, to explain the papers, and to give reasons why and wliStefore. I never conceived that I hod a right, at an executive officer, to put myself on my dignity and say: “I wilt”show you such papers aa will do rue'no harm and will keep back tne others." They say I was reckless sometimes, but I never was so reckless as that. What right has the PresMent to say for what purpose we shall use papers ? If we have the right to use those papers at all we have the right to use them for all they are werth. Is the President to have the right to say; “You shall use those papers for one purpose and not for another?" There is no such distinction. If the papers are on the public file we have the right to see them. They may be material or useful. Mr. Pugh asked Mr. 'Sherman whether he claimed for the Senate tho right to review the action of tho President in making removals. Mr. Sherman replied that it was unnecessary to go into that subject. Mo would s'ay yes without question.,however, as the right to do so was given to the Senate by a law Which he believed to have been constitutional when passed. Mr. Harris (Tenn.) then asked Mr. Sherman whether he claimed a right to review the grounds on which the President has made a suspension in vacation, which the law leaves wholly and exclusively to the discretion of the President. Mr. Sherman, in answer, said: It is not a question of what wo havd a right to review, but what information wo have a right to get from the executive department. I warrant you that I can Show in tho -history of the Senator from Tennessee [Mr. Harris] that he has been as p>r>is tout and insistent upon the right to examine these papers as any one „elsp, for ho has called for them himself over and over again, and they have never been denied. What we will do with these papers—whether we will steal them, or bum them, or destroy them —wo do not allow the Executive Department to put any inquiries to ns. We do not put any inquiries to the President of the United States, because the independence of that great office demands that he should not be inquired of for his reasons—demands.that he should be treated with resj>oct. But evejry paper on which he acts, on any duty whatever, executive or legislative, is ours as well as his. The papers filled with him t> induce the removal of an officer are the very papers we ought to consider in the very question at appointment. Whether ye should use them for one purpfcse or another is not now a matter of dispute. It may come up at toother time.