U. S. Senate Speeches and Remarks of Carl Schurz

Mr. SCHURZ. Mr. President, every Senator who has spoken upon the subject before us has treated it as a matter of most painful interest; and quite naturally so, for nobody could approach it without reluctance. It is hardly possible that there should be the least personal or political bias in this debate, at least none unfavorable to the gentleman most nearly concerned. As far as I know, the conduct of the Senator from Kansas on this floor has been uniformly inoffensive and courteous. He has, I presume, no personal enemy here. We also know that in case he should be removed from his seat in the Senate, the legislature of Kansas is certain to put a successor into his place who will be of exactly the same party complexion, and there can, therefore, be no political loss or gain involved in a change as to party strength on this floor. If there ever was a case which might be treated upon its own merits, it is this.

We have to meet here, first, a question of law; secondly, a question of fact; and then, also, what I might call a question of policy as to the rigorous or lenient application of the law to the facts and the person.

In discussing the question of law, I invite the Senate to assume a state of facts as fully established. Suppose a person has taken his seat here, elected by a State legislature, presenting when he appeared among us regular credentials in the correctest form, and proving by the unusual evidence that in his election every prescription of law had been fully complied with. Suppose, then, it is subsequently shown that the election of that person was effected and carried by gross bribery; suppose a clear case discloses itself of a purchase with money of a seat in the Senate of the United States. Then the question arises: Has the Senate any power to protect itself by the exclusion of such a person?

An argument has been submitted by the Senator from Kansas, and as that argument goes further in its assumptions than any other, I will discuss it first.

He says the Senate cannot unseat that person by declaring the election invalid, because the Senate has not the Constitutional power to go behind the regular certificate of election, signed by the governor and bearing the great seal of the State; and, secondly, he says that the Senate cannot expel such a person by a two-thirds vote, because the act of bribery was committed before that person was a Senator, and the jurisdiction of the Senate cannot date back to an offense committed antecedent to the election; ergo, the Senate has absolutely no power at all in such a case. If I understood the argument submitted by the Senator from Kansas correctly, these were its salient points. What follows? The Senate must sit still, and with absolute quietness and submission suffer not only that person to take his seat, but, as the case may be, must suffer one after another of these seats to be filled by men who have acquired them by bribery, purchase, fraud and not by honest election, for to each one of those cases the same reasoning will apply which is now applied to this. However outrageous their proceedings, however glaring their corrupt practices may have been, we must treat such political merchants as brother Senators; we must suffer them to exercise the same influence upon the legislation of this Republic which is exercised by others; and all this, no matter what may become of the honor of the highest legislative body of this Republic; no matter what may become of the confidence of the people in their lawmakers, and therefore of their respect for the laws; no matter what may become of the purity and integrity of representative government and of republican institutions.

This, sir, is the argument submitted by the Senator from Kansas. It would seem to me as if the mere statement of the consequences which necessarily must flow from such an assumption would in itself be sufficient to show that in the very nature of things it cannot be correct; that the wise men who made the Constitution of this country cannot have left the highest law-giving body of the land in so pitiably helpless a condition. The mere supposition appears on its very face absurd.

Now, in inquiring into the power of the Senate to act upon such a case, I shall not consume any time in a discussion of the English precedents which have been quoted here, and this partly for the reason that I am not as learned and have not made myself as familiar with their details as others; but mainly because I consider those precedents by no means conclusive, when we have before us a document which gives us all the law we need; and that is the Constitution of the United States.

The Constitution provides in the first place that the Senate, as well as the House of Representatives, shall have the discretionary power to expel a member by a two-thirds vote. That power is not limited to this or that offense; but it is vested in the discretion of each house of Congress, and it has already been demonstrated with irrefutable arguments that although an act of bribery by which a person lifted himself into one of these seats was indeed antecedent to his becoming a Senator, nevertheless that act of bribery, being the very stepping-stone upon which he rose into his legislative office, is so intimately connected with his becoming and being a Senator that the two things cannot be separated; that therefore this power to expel a member must necessarily apply. This is so clear, so self-evident, that not a word more is required.

But the Constitution of the United States provides also that "each House shall be the judge of the elections, returns and qualifications of its own members"; and in discussing that clause I shall give particular attention to the remarks submitted to us to-day by the Senator from Pennsylvania [Mr. Scott].

It strikes me that in this discussion one thing, with regard to the meaning of the Constitutional clause just quoted, has been overlooked; and that is the very important fact that this clause of the Constitution applies to both houses of Congress exactly alike; that its meaning for both houses of Congress must be exactly the same; for it reads that "each House shall be the judge of the elections, returns and qualifications of its own members." No difference is made between the two.

What, then, can that clause of the Constitution mean? We have to judge of three different things: first, of the "qualifications," and what they are the Constitution itself states; then of the returns, and what they are we all know; but we have also to judge of the elections -- "elections" kept distinct from "qualifications," and from "returns." The qualifications may be complete; the returns may be in the most perfect order upon their face; and yet the Senate as well as the House of Representatives, both under the same clause of the Constitution, which must necessarily mean as to both houses the same thing, have to apply their judgment also to the election of their respective members. What does it mean, I ask? Must it not mean that the judgment of each house shall not only go to the forms, but also to what I might call the essence, of an election? Has not each house to judge whether that which pretends to be an election is in truth and reality an election or not? If the word "election" in that clause of the Constitution means anything, it must mean that; if it does not mean that, it means nothing. Now does anybody question, has anybody ever doubted, that the House of Representatives has always held so under the Constitutional clause which applies to both houses alike? The House of Representatives has always exercised the power, under this clause, to judge whether a man had been really and honestly and legally elected by a majority of the legal votes cast. Has it ever been questioned that the House of Representatives had the power, under this clause, to declare an election illegal and void, if that election had been controlled by bribery and fraud? As far as I know, nobody in the world has ever questioned it; and you will notice that power was exercised by the House of Representatives by virtue of identically the same clause of the Constitution under which we, as Senators, are to exercise our judgment.

Now, one thing has been accepted as a legal maxim from time immemorial, and that is, that fraud vitiates a contract, vitiates a bond, a judgment. Who will deny that fraud would vitiate also that which we might call a conditional relation between a constituency and a Representative, and the Legislative branch of the Government? But if each house is Constitutionally the judge, not only of the qualifications and of the returns, but also of the essence of an election, must it not have power to judge whether an election is vitiated by fraud or not? The House of Representatives has always acted on that principle by virtue of the Constitutional provision conferring upon the Senate and the House the same power in the same language. Then I will ask, why not the Senate?

But it is objected that the position of a Senator is widely different from the position of a Representative; that a Senator represents a State; that the election of a Senator by a State legislature according to law is the conclusive act of a State sovereign in its sphere, and that, if duly certified, it cannot be questioned. It is claimed that there is a certain mysterious power attaching to the great seal of a State affixed to a certificate of election which is foreign to the certificate of election of a Representative. I need not say to the Senate that I am as firm an advocate and defender of Constitutional State-rights and of local self-government as any member of this body; but I affirm that the Constitution does not give a State sovereign control over its Senators, but it does just the reverse. True, the Constitution provides "that the Senate of the United States shall be composed of two Senators from each State, chosen by the legislature thereof for six years, and each Senator shall have one vote." In so far Senators may be regarded as the representatives of their respective States, and undoubtedly they are. But the Constitution does not regard the election of a Senator as in every respect a matter of discretion with the State. The Constitution does not permit a State to appoint a Senator just as it pleases. The Constitution gives Congress the power to regulate by law the manner in which Senators shall be elected, just as it gives Congress the power to regulate by law the manner in which Representatives shall be elected. The only difference is as to the place of election. Congress has made such laws, prescribing on what day of the session of a legislature the election of a Senator shall be proceeded with, how the votes shall be taken in both branches separately, how in joint convention, and so on.

Why does the Constitution put the election of Senators thus under the control of Congress just as it does the election of members of the House of Representatives? Because the Constitution does not regard a Senator as a mere diplomatic agent of the State, of one sovereignty near another sovereignty, appointed to take care of the interest of that State only, and remaining under the control of that State. By no means. The Constitution regards the Senate of the United States not as an assembly of State agents, but as a branch of the Legislative department of the General Government. It regards a Senator here as being appointed to take part in legislation concerning the interests of all the States and of all the people, and, when once elected as a member of that Legislative department, that Senator is, during his Constitutional term of office, entirely, completely out of the control of his State, just as the member of the House of Representatives is out of the control of his district constituency.

The Constitution indeed provides that the number of Senators from each State shall be two, undoubtedly to preserve as much as possible a certain equality of the influence of the different States upon the legislation of the country. It indeed provides that Senators shall be elected by the State legislatures, looking upon the legislatures as more representative of the individuality of the States, and also possibly to secure to the highest law-giving body of this country a superior class of men. But in point of fact it is absolutely certain, and it cannot be denied, that, while the constituencies are different, the relation of a Senator, when once elected, to his constituency is in no essential point different from the relation a member of the House of Representatives to his, and I defy denial of this fact. Neither the Senator nor the Representative can be recalled. The Representative and the Senator are equally out of the reach and the control of their respective constituents. With regard to the Senator, therefore, the sovereignty of the State becomes utterly inoperative as soon as the fact of his election is accomplished. When the Senator has once been elected, even before he is sworn into office at that desk, the State has no power to reconsider that election, nor to recall him.

And now, sir, when it is discovered that the election of a Senator has been effected by fraud or bribery, has a sovereign State the power to undo its own act to set itself right? Not at all. Not even the discovery made before the Senator has taken his seat would enable the legislature to reconsider its election. It can, in such a case, only memorialize the Senate of the United States, setting forth the facts, and then the Senate only can act in the case upon its own knowledge and judgment, for the Senator has passed entirely out of control of his State, and entirely within the control of the Senate. Thus, when the people of a State have been defrauded, say by the purchase of a senatorial election, they are, with all their sovereignty, bound hand and foot, and not the State, but only the Senate, can furnish the necessary relief.

Now if the Senate, by virtue of its Constitutional powers, does declare a fraudulent election invalid, does that constitute what was called here an encroachment upon the rights of the State? Let us see. In what would such encroachment consist? Not in this, that the Senate in declaring such an election invalid arrogates a power to itself which belongs to the State, for no such power ever belonged to the State, and certainly you cannot encroach upon a power which does not exist. You might just as well say that I arrogate to myself your right to draw upon my deposit in a bank, or that I encroach upon your right to educate my children. Nor can that pretended encroachment consist in this, that the State is thereby deprived of its elected representative, for, in the case I have assumed, first, that representative is not legally elected; secondly, it must be presumed, in common-sense and decency, that the State would rather desire to be relieved of a representative who has defrauded it, (and I include in the term representative Senators also), and that it would itself annul its own act if it had the power to do so, which it has not; and, thirdly, the State is not deprived of its representation nor of its choice, for upon the unseating of a member for such a cause a new election will be ordered in the State at once; the whole matter is turned over to the State legislature for its action, and it may elect the same person turned out by the Senate if it so sees fit.

The whole pretense, therefore, of an encroachment on the sovereign and rightful powers of the State vanishes into utter nothingness. The State retains unimpaired the full scope of its Constitutional powers and rights. The Senate by annulling an election carried by fraud or bribery only does by virtue of its Constitutional powers what the State would be glad to do, but cannot; and when that is done the whole matter is turned over to the State once more for a new election, and the State after all is the final arbiter. The exercise of this power by the Senate does, therefore, not impair, but, looking at it without prejudice, you will find that it virtually protects the rights of the States.

I have now endeavored to show, in a way at least satisfactory to myself, if to nobody else, that the power to act as the judge of the election of its members means the same thing for both houses of Congress; secondly, that it covers for both houses of Congress alike the power to vacate a seat filled by an election carried by fraud or bribery; third, that by the exercise of that power by the Senate, no Constitutional rights of the States are impaired.

But, sir, we are reminded that the resolution now before us for our action has no precedent in the history of the Senate. I admit that; but Senators will be obliged to admit also that the disclosures here made have no precedent in the history of this body; and for the honor of the American people I will suppose that were there a precedent for the one, there would be precedent for the other; that if such a case had ever been disclosed to the American Senate, then the American Senate would have found a remedy and would not have hesitated to apply it.

But if there is no precedent in our past history, is it not time to make one? All precedents are once made for the first time, and I hope, if such a duty devolves upon us, we shall not shrink from it.

It is said, also, that the acceptance of the doctrine upon which this resolution is based would arm a bare majority with dangerous powers. Sir, there is certainly the possibility of an abuse of the power. I feel it keenly. There is no power on earth ever so carefully guarded but is liable to abuse. It is the nature of power. But I invite Senators to consider whether the danger on the other side is not more to be dreaded than the danger on this. What will be the consequence if, under circumstances such as are now surrounding us, we do reject that doctrine which gives us the power to declare a seat vacated upon the ground of bribery? Look around you. It is not from Kansas alone, it is from different States, that rumors reach us of the election of Senators by bribery, undoubtedly groundless in some cases, utterly so, I hope; but, in other cases, bearing a very serious appearance. Do we not all know that after two senatorial elections within a few months, those who had presented themselves as senatorial candidates were arrested upon charges of bribery and are now under indictment? I am very far from desiring to prejudge any of those cases; but the testimony here before us discloses a tendency of a most alarming nature, which I am afraid is not confined to one State nor confined to one portion of the country.

Here I come to the question of fact. We have been advised by the Senator from Wisconsin [Mr. Carpenter] to read this testimony, and then to form our own conclusions. I have followed that advice, or rather I acted upon my own impulses in doing so before the advice was given. I have read this testimony, every line of it, as carefully and conscientiously as it was possible for me to do; and now, sir, what do I find here? I find a man unknown to the political world. After the learned definition of the phrase "political status," which was given us yesterday by the Senator from Illinois [Mr. Logan], I will not apply that term; I will simply say that he had not signalized himself by conspicuous public service, that he was unknown to political fame, that he had given no evidence of uncommon ability in a public career; that, in other words, he had not shown those qualities which usually are apt to draw upon a man the eyes of the people with reference to high political office. That may be nothing to the dishonor of the Senator from Kansas, for not all men have had the same opportunities. But it appears as a fact that he was mainly distinguished by one thing, and that was, an uncommon abundance of money. He appeared as a candidate for the Senatorship surrounded by a horde of those political managers, whose whole political wisdom consists in a knowledge of the low tricks of the trade, in the handling of the appliances of corruption. And behind that group there loomed up one of those great moneyed corporations which now so frequently thrust their hands into the legislation of this country, who have already acquired so dangerous a power, and are threatening to extend it in a still more dangerous degree. He first buys off one competing candidate for $15,000, cash down, who did engage to transfer to him his following in the legislature, as so many head of cattle. So surrounded he steps upon the scene. The cry goes forth that there is money in that election, much money, money for all who are willing to aid. The presence of the temptation stimulates at once every vicious appetite within its reach; one man who has a vote obtains money for casting it; another learns of it and asks himself why should he cast his vote for nothing. The frequency of the practice blunts the individual conscience, and that legislature is transformed into a market where votes are bought and sold. It is thus, as I read this testimony, that Mr. Caldwell was elected a Senator of the United States.

Now, sir, I find here not a mere isolated instance of the indiscretion of an over-zealous friend, but I find here bribery systematically organized; I find here a bacchanalian feast and riot of corruption. And when you read the testimony your imagination will fairly recoil from the spectacle of baseness and depravity that presents itself.

Well, sir, from the testimony as I find it, one thing has become clear to my mind; it is that this is not one of those cases of bribery in a single instance which we have heard spoken of as tainting an election, and, therefore, I do not discuss the question whether by a single case of bribery the election would be invalidated. But what has become clear to my mind is, that Mr. Caldwell could never have been elected Senator of the United States but for the corrupt use of money all around him.

In other words, it was the corrupt use of money and nothing else that effected and carried that election. Sir, I ask nobody to believe my mere statement and assertion; I invite every Senator to take this testimony into his own hands, to read it word for word and line after line, and if they do not come to the same conclusion, let them not vote as I shall. If I were a juryman, acting under the oath of a juryman, called upon to give my verdict, my verdict would be as I have stated; and let me say to Senators who have discussed the question of the facts that that discussion has strengthened rather than weakened my conviction.

Sir, it is to be feared that cases like this are not entirely isolated, and I beg you to consider that they certainly will not stand alone if you permit a case like this to pass with impunity. Let me ask you what can we do, what shall we do, under such circumstances? What is the duty of those who have arrived, from their study of the case, at the same convictions that I entertain, and I know there are many upon this floor? Shall we say that although the testimony convinces us that here a seat in the Senate has been purchased with money, yet that seat shall be held by the purchaser as if it had been acquired by an honest and fair election? Shall we declare, are you, Senators of the United States, prepared to declare that when a man buys a seat upon this floor, buys the high quality of a Senator of the United States, and pays for it, it belongs to him as his property, and that, according to the fifth article of amendment to the Constitution, no private property shall be taken for public use without just compensation? Is that the light in which you look at a transaction like this? Shall we increase the temptation already working to so fearful a degree by assuring to the purchaser of a seat in the Senate of the United States full security of enjoyment? Have you considered the consequences of such indulgence? Let me ask your attention to one of them. To-day, Senators, we may still be able, when we know that a seat has been acquired by purchase, to vacate it by a majority vote; but if you encourage this practice by the promise of impunity, do you know how long it will be before so many of these seats are filled by purchasers, that the struggle will become utterly hopeless? This is not a mere dark fancy, not a mere offspring of a morbid imagination.

The country at this very moment is ringing with the cry of corruption. Is it without reason? Never before have the agencies been so powerful which seek to serve private interests by a corrupt use of money, and never before has the field of political life been so well prepared for their work. The same causes will always and every where bring forth similar effects. We have had a great civil war. That civil war, with its fluctuations of values and its tempting opportunities for the rapid acquisition of wealth, has left behind it a spirit of speculation and greed stimulated to most inordinate activity. There is prevalent a morbid desire to get rich and to indulge in extravagant enjoyments; and the more it grows the greater will grow also the unscrupulousness of men in the employment of means to attain that end. But more than that. More than ever before has the Government of the United States extended its functions beyond its legitimate sphere; more than ever has the public Treasury been pressed into the service of private interests. Do we not all know it? Do we not see and understand what is going on around us? I ask you, sir, what is it that attracts to this National capital the horde of speculators and monopolists and their agents who so assiduously lay siege to the judgment and also the conscience of those who are to give the country its laws? What is it that fills the lobbies behind these green doors with an atmosphere of temptation so seductive that many a man has fallen a victim to it who was worthy of a better fate? What is it that has brought forth such melancholy, such deplorable exhibitions as the country witnessed last winter -- exhibitions which we should have been but too glad to hide from the eyes of the world abroad? It is that policy which seeks to use the power of this great Republic for the advantage and benefit of private interests; it is that policy which takes money out of the pockets of the people to put it into the pockets of a favored few; it is that policy which, wherever it has prevailed, in every age and every country, has poisoned the very fountains of legislation. Do you think, sir, that the consequences now and here will be different from what they have been at other times and elsewhere? Are not your great railroad kings and monopolists boasting to-day that they own whole legislatures and State governments and courts to do their bidding? Have we not seen some of them stalking around in this very Capitol like the sovereign lords of creation?

Are not some of them vaunting themselves now that they have made and can make profitable investments in members of Congress and in Senators of the United States? Have we not had occasion to admire the charming catholicity, the delicious cosmopolitan spirit with which these gentlemen distribute their favors, as was shown before the Credit Mobilier Committee of the House, when Mr. Durant testified that when he gave money for an election, it was entirely indifferent to him whether the man was a Democrat or a Republican provided he was "a good man"? And now let them know that a man who has purchased his seat here, or for whom it has been purchased with money, will be secure in the enjoyment of the property so bought, and, I ask you, will not their enterprise be limited only by their desires, and will not the rapacity of their desires be limited only by their opportunities? As long as such evils are permitted to exercise their influence, they will spread with the power of contagion, and nothing but the most unflinching resistance can check the evil.

Such, Mr. President, is our condition. Everybody sees it; everybody feels it; everybody knows it is so; and if we do not, the people of the United States do. And we must not be surprised if now and then the voice of some organ of public opinion comes to us with a loud complaint of the pusillanimity of Congress in dealing with such things. The Senator from Wisconsin [Mr. Carpenter] the other day spoke of it with a somewhat lofty contempt as the clamor of the mob. It may be such sometimes, but let us see what mob it is we have to deal with now. I will read a few newspaper extracts about the Credit Mobilier investigation of the House:

The House of Representatives --

This was written while the proceedings were still going on --

The House of Representatives is presenting just such an opportunity in its treatment of the Credit Mobilier question. It is acting as if it lacked the courage to follow the men who have thrown the first stone. The evidence against Brooks and Ames is overwhelming. It is their own evidence. The only possible ground for excusing them is that what they have done is not bad for Congressmen to do. The case of all Congressmen who have held Credit Mobilier stock is also plain. The stock was an improper one to hold. It created an interest in defrauding the Government. To refuse to censure the holders of that stock is to say that the Congressional standard of morals is not high enough to condemn it.

Now, gentlemen, do you know what paper published this article? Not the New York Tribune, or the World, but the New York Times.

Here is another, written after the Credit Mobilier proceedings had closed:

The action of the House of Representatives on Judge Poland's Credit Mobilier report, in substituting a vote of censure and condemnation for the resolution expelling Ames and Brooks, and passing over the other inculpated members without notice, fell far short of the just expectations of the country. It was a clear case of moral cowardice, an unmanly shirking of responsibility. After rejecting a resolution which involved a denial of its right to expel Ames and Brooks for the offense with which they were charged, after finding them guilty by a more than two-thirds vote, the House adopted a resolution which virtually declares that a member may offer or accept a bribe and yet not be disqualified from retaining his seat in Congress.

Absolute condemnation must be the verdict of the country on such a lamentable exhibition of moral pusillanimity.

Who was the man who wrote that article? It appeared in Harper's Weekly, and I presume was written by our friend the Hon. George William Curtis.

Now, sir, such words are not those of papers which are in the habit of finding fault with the Administration and the majority. The party service rendered by these papers justifies us in supposing that such words were extorted from them by facts which they could and would neither deny nor gloss over; and certainly, when they speak of public sentiment, they will not make that public sentiment appear in a darker color than it really bears.

I do not quote this language as having the least possible direct or indirect bearing upon the merits of the question now before us, but I quote it to show you a fact which to us as to every citizen is of the highest possible public importance. That fact it is useless to disguise, and we had better fully understand and appreciate it; it is that the confidence of the American people in the integrity of their public men is fearfully shaken. That is the truth, and nobody who knows the country will deny it. Whatever you may think of the causes which have brought forth this result, whatever of the justice of this sentiment, one thing is certain; the fact itself is a public calamity; for, as has often been said in these days, and as can never be repeated too often, what is to become of the respect of the people for the laws if they lose their confidence in the law-makers? I say this not in order to cast a slur upon any one, but to admonish the Senate not to forfeit or jeopardize or weaken that confidence which it may still enjoy. But the Senate will weaken that confidence if, with such evidence before its eyes as confronts us here, it refuses to employ that power which it wields for the protection of its integrity; for the people would be justified in thinking that, if we permit seats here to be bought, we cannot, if we were willing, prevent legislation from being sold.

I would listen to the clamor of the mob just as little as any man on this floor; neither would I, in order to gain the confidence of the mob, descend to do a thing which my conviction of duty did not clearly command. I would face the mob without flinching to prevent a wrong. But I would not treat with contempt, I would treat with respect, that popular voice which calls upon me for nothing else but that I should fearlessly do my duty.

I am far from asking anybody who, upon a conscientious examination of the evidence before us, has not arrived at the same conclusions that have grown up in my mind, to vote as I shall vote; but to those who have formed the same convictions let me say, there is something higher at stake here than the fate of one individual, whom we might regard with sympathy and compassion; something higher also than the danger that might possibly grow from an abuse of power by the majority in vacating seats or annulling elections; and that something is the purity, nay, the very existence of the representative character of our institutions. You speak of partisan recklessness that might unscrupulously employ such a power for its own selfish ends. I know that danger as well as any one knows it; I fear it just as much as any one; I am certainly not inclined to underestimate it; but I entreat you to consider that, by assuring impunity to such offenses as we are here dealing with, by securing the full fruits of their iniquity to those who purchase seats in this body, you will invite to the Senate of the United States an element which, in its very nature corrupt, will be the readiest, the most servile, the most dangerous tool in the hands of reckless partisanship. For you must know that those who feel themselves most vulnerable, those who have to shun the searching light of inquiry, will never have that courage of independence which defies attack, but are apt to be the first to earn, by the most abject and slavish service, refuge and security under the protecting wing of a powerful party. Secure the exclusion from our legislative halls of that class of men who, accustomed to the use of ignoble means, must, in the very nature of things, serve ignoble ends, and you will have secured a much better safeguard against the transgressions of a reckless partisan spirit than by confiding our power within narrower limits than those by which the Constitution has circumscribed it.

I repeat, it is the purity, it is the very existence of the representative character of our institutions that is at stake; for when it is known that seats in this body can be bought and held by right of purchase, sellers and purchasers will multiply in the same measure as the wealth of this country grows to be plundered, as the interests vary to be subserved, as the rapacity of greed increases to be glutted, and the day will come when this body will represent the blood-suckers and the oppressors of the people, and no longer the people themselves.

Sir, it is at last time that we should look the dangers which threaten this Republic in the face. This Republic has no monarchical traditions; it has no pretenders of historic right to disturb its repose or to plot its overthrow. It is not likely to succumb to the shock of force. But there have been republics before this just as sound and healthy in their original constitution as ours, but which have died from the slower but no less fatal disease of corruption and demoralization, and of that decay of constitutional principles and that anarchy of power which always accompany corruption and demoralization. It is time for us to keep in mind that it takes more to make and to preserve a republic than the mere absence of a king, and that when a republic decays, its soul is apt to die first, while the outward form is still lasting to beguile and deceive the eyes of the unthinking. I hope and trust that we are still far from that point; but I think no candid observer will deny that there have been symptoms of a movement in that direction; and I say it with gladness, there are also symptoms justifying the hope that the downward movement may soon be checked if the checking has not already commenced.

I ask you, what is our office under such circumstances? This is the Senate of the United States. No parliamentary body in the world, not even the House of Lords of Great Britain, possesses such exalted attributes, enjoys such a plenitude of power, is loaded with such vast responsibilities. No parliamentary assembly has in its past history been more adorned with genius and public virtue. Let no man say that of all parliamentary bodies in the world this is the only one -- yes, the Senate of the United States, with all its exalted attributes, with all the plenitude of its power, with all its vast responsibilities -- is the only one that has no power to judge whether its members are honestly elected, and to declare an election illegal and void on the ground of bribery, fraud and crime; that this is the only parliamentary assembly on earth which, doubting its own authority, is helplessly to surrender to the invasion of men who purchase with money their way to the highest legislative dignity of the greatest of republics, and, having bought their seats, will sell our laws. When the American people struggle against the power of corruption, their Senate at least should march in the front rank of the advancing column; their Senate at least should hold high its own standard of honor and purity, which is to restore the waning confidence of the masses in the integrity of the law-makers.

Sir, whatever personal disagreements, whatever partisan quarrels, may divide us, upon this, at least, all American Senators should be unanimous. For I entreat you not to forget and no man who has read the history of the world with profit will or can forget that when, in a republic circumstanced like this, the power of corruption has grown great, and threatens to become overwhelming, and a movement of the popular mind has sprung up to resist and check it, one of two results will follow: either that movement of healthy reaction will succeed, the social and political atmosphere will be purified and all will go well, or the movement will fail; a feeling of discouragement, and then of torpid indifference, will settle upon the popular mind; further effort will be deadened by hopelessness, and corruption will riot, not as it did before, but far worse than ever before; and nobody knows where it will end. I need not say to which of these two results the American Senate should use its powers to contribute.

I, for my part, shall vote for this resolution to declare the election of Mr. Caldwell illegal and void. I shall vote for it, clearly convinced, as I am, from my careful reading of this testimony, that Mr. Caldwell's election was effected by the corrupt use of money. I shall so vote, firmly convinced that the Senate of the United States, under the Constitution, does possess the power to declare void an election so carried and effected. If this resolution should fail, and I hope and trust it will not, then I shall vote for the resolution offered by the Senator from Mississippi [Mr. Alcorn] to expel Mr. Caldwell, firmly believing, as I do, that the corruption shown in this case touches his character as well as his election, and clearly unfits him for a seat in the Senate of the United States.

It was with profound regret when I heard the Senator from Illinois [Mr. Logan] say that there was here evident an ungenerous and even vindictive desire to persecute Mr. Caldwell, and to sacrifice him as an innocent victim to popular clamor, something like a wide-spread conspiracy to ruin the reputation and the social and political future of that one man. I cannot refrain from repelling this as a most reckless imputation. The Senators whom I know to entertain, with regard to the merits of this case, views similar to my own, are certainly not among the least generous, the least conscientious, and the least honorable of this body. As to myself, I know my own motives. I feel that they need no vindication. Mr. Caldwell has never offended me. I bear him the same kindly feelings that I bear to any fellow-man. Nothing is further from my nature than to harm any human being, without justice and necessity. Did I believe him innocent, I should not only refrain from everything that might do him harm, but I should be among the first to stand between him and the sacrifice; and even now I assure him it is with the profoundest pain that I see him in his deplorable situation. But, sir, no consideration of personal kindness and sympathy, no emotion of compassionate friendship, can I permit to seduce me, nor should it seduce anybody here, to sacrifice to one individual what is higher than he and higher than all of us the dignity and the honor of the American Senate, the moral authority of the laws we make, the purity of our representative government, and the best interests of the American people. Whatever sacrifice we may be willing to offer, these things at least should not constitute the victim.

U. S. Senate Speeches and Remarks of Carl Schurz