Prosecution again objected, and the yeas and nays were taken:

Yeas—Anthony, Bayard, Buckalew, Davis, Dixon, Doolittle, Fessenden, Fowler, Grimes, Henderson, Hendricks, Johnson, McCreery, Morrill of Maine, Morton, Norton, Patterson of Tennessee, Ross, Sherman, Sprague, Sumner, Trumbull, Van Winkle. Vickers. and Willey-25—14 Republicans and 11 Democrats.

Nays—Cameron, Cattell, Chandler, Cole, Conkling, Conness, Corbett, Cragin, Drake, Edmunds, Ferry, Frelinghuysen, Harlan, Howard, Howe, Morgan, Morrill of Vermont, Nye, Patterson of New Hampshire, Pomeroy, Ramsey, Stewart, Thayer, Tipton, Williams, Wilson, and Yates—27—all Republicans.

So the proffered evidence was refused.

No. 12.

April 13, 1868—General Sherman's examination continued:

Question: After the restoration of Mr. Stanton to office, did you form an opinion whether the good of the service required a Secretary of War other than Mr. Stanton; and if so, did you communicate that opinion to the President?

Mr. Conness called for the yeas and nays and they were ordered, and resulted:

Yeas—Anthony, Bayard, Buckalew, Dixon, Doolittle. Fowler, Grimes, Hendricks, Johnson, McCreery Patterson, of Tennessee, Ross, Trumbull, Van Winkle and Vickers—15—6 Republicans and 9 Democrats.

Nays—Cameron, Cattell, Chandler, Cole, Conkling, Conness, Corbett, Cragin, Davis, Drake, Edmunds, Fessenden, Frelinghuysen, Harlan, Henderson, Howard, Howe, Morgan, Morrill of Maine, Morrill of Vermont, Morton, Norton, Nye, Patterson of New Hampshire, Pomeroy, Ramsay, Sherman, Stewart, Thayer, Tipton, Willey, Williams, Wilson and Yates—35—33 Republicans and 2 Democrats.

So the proffered testimony was refused.

No. 13.

The next question asked of Gen. Sherman was by Senator Johnson:

Question: Did you at any time, and when, before the President gave the order for the removal of Mr. Stanton as Secretary of War, advise the President to appoint some other person than Mr. Stanton?

Mr. Drake demanded the yeas and nays, which were as following:

Yeas—Anthony, Bayard, Buckalew, Dixon, Doolittle, Edmunds, Fessenden, Fowler, Grimes, Henderson, Hendricks, Johnson, McCreery, Patterson of Tennessee, Ross, Trumbull, Van Winkle, Vickers—18-9—Republicans and 9 Democrats.

Nays—Cameron, Cattell, Chandler, Cole, Conkling, Conness, Corbett, Cragin, Dixon, Drake, Ferry, Frelinghuysen, Harlan, Howard, Howe, Morgan, Morrill of Maine, Morrill of Vermont, Morton, Norton, Nye, Patterson of New Hampshire, Pomeroy, Ramsay, Sherman, Stewart, Thayer, Tipton, Willey Williams, Wilson, Yates—33—30 Republicans and 2 Democrats.

So the proffered testimony was refused.

No. 14.

Counsel for defense offered:

A warrant of arrest of Gen. Thomas, dated February 22, 1868, and the affidavit on which the warrant issued.

(This warrant had been issued on the affidavit of Mr. Stanton.)

The yeas and nays were as follows:

Yeas—Anthony, Bayard, Buckalew, Cattell, Cole, Corbett, Cragin, Davis, Dixon, Doolittle, Fessenden, Fowler, Frelinghuysen, Grimes, Henderson, Hendricks, Johnson, McCreery, Morrill of Maine, Morrill of Vermont, Morton, Norton, Patterson of New Hampshire, Patterson of Tennessee, Pomeroy, Ross, Sherman, Sumner, Trumbull, Van Winkle, Vickers, Willey, Williams, Yates—34—24 Republicans and 10 Democrats.

Nays—Cameron, Conkling, Chandler, Conness, Drake, Edmunds, Ferry, Harlan, Howard, Howe, Morgan, Nye, Ramsay, Stewart, Thayer, Tipton, Wilson—17—all Republicans.

So the warrant was received in evidence.

That warrant was issued by Judge Carter, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the District of Columbia, upon the complaint of Edwin M. Stanton, and charged Thomas with attempting forcibly to seize and take possession of the War Office, in violation of the fifth section of the Tenure-of-Office Act. The warrant was as follows:

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.

To David S. Gooding, United States Marshal for the District of Columbia:

I, David K. Carter, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court for the District of Columbia, hereby command you to arrest Lorenzo Thomas, of said District, forthwith, and that you have the said Lorenzo before me at the chambers of the said Supreme Court in the City of Washington, forthwith, to answer to the charge of a high misdemeanor in this, that on the 21st day of February, 1868, in the District of Columbia, he did unlawfully accept the appointment of the office of Secretary of War ad interim, and did then and there unlawfully hold and exercise and attempt to hold and exercise the said office contrary to the provisions of the act entitled "An Act regulating the tenure of certain civil offices, passed March 2, 1867, and hereof fail not, but make due return.

Given under my hand and seal of said court this 22nd day of February, 1868,

D. K. Carter. Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the District of Columbia.

Attest: R. J. Meigs, Clerk. (Marshal's Return). Washington, D. C., February 22, 1868.

The within writ came to hand at 7 o'clock a.m. and was served by me on the said Lorenzo Thomas at 8 o'clock a.m, and I now return this writ and bring him before Chief Justice Carter at 9 o'clock a. m. of to-day.

David S. Gooding, U. S. Marshal, D. C.

No. 15.

Mr. Johnson, (of the Court,) asked this question of General Sherman, witness on the stand: When the President tendered to you the office of Secretary of War, ad interim, on the 27th of January, 1868, and on the 31st of the same month and year, did he, at the very time of making such tender, state to you what his purpose in so doing was?

Counsel for Prosecution objected, and Mr. Drake called for the yeas and nays, which were taken, as follows:

Yeas—Anthony, Bayard, Buckalew, Cole, Davis, Dixon, Doolittle, Fessenden, Fowler, Frelinghuysen, Grimes, Henderson, Johnson, McCreery, Morrill of Maine, Morrill of Vermont, Morton, Norton, Patterson of Tennessee, Ross, Sherman, Sumner, Trumbull, Van Winkle, Vickers, Willey—16—16 Republicans and 10 Democrats.

Nays-Cattell, Chandler, Conkling, Conness, Corbett, Cragin, Drake, Edmunds, Ferry, Harlan, Howard, Howe, Morgan, Nye, Pomeroy, Ramsay, Stewart, Thayer, Tipton, Williams, Wilson, Yates—22—all Republicans.

The question was decided to be admissible, and the anawer was "yes."

No. 16.

The next question, in immediate connection with the last, was:

If he did, state what he said his purpose was?

The yeas and nays were ordered and the vote was:

Yeas—Anthony, Bayard, Buckalew, Cole, Cobertt, Davis, Dixon, Doolittle, Fessenden, Fowler, Frelinghuysen, Grimes, Henderson, Hendricks, Johnson, McCreery, Morton, Norton, Patterson of Tennessee, Ross, Sherman, Sumner, Trumbull, Van Winkle, Vickers, Willey—26—15 Republicans and 11 Democrats.

Nays—Cameron, Cattell, Chandler, Conkling, Conness, Cragin, Drake, Edmunds, Ferry, Harlan, Howard, Howe, Morgan, Morrill of Maine, Morrill of Vermont, Nye, Patterson of New Hampshire, Pomeroy, Ramsay, Stewart, Thayer, Tipton, Williams, Wilson, Yates—25—all Republicans.

So the question was permitted to be answered, and General Sherman said:

The President told me that the relations between himself and Mr. Stanton, and between Mr. Stanton and the other members of the Cabinet, were such that he could not execute the office which he filled as President of the United States without making provision ad interim for that office; that he had the right under the law; he claimed to have the right, and his purpose was to have the office administered in the interest of the Army and of the Country; and he offered me the office in that view. He did not state to me then that his purpose was to bring it to the Courts directly; but for the purpose of having the office administered properly in the interest of the Army and the whole Country. I asked him why lawyers could not make a case, and not bring me, or any ofcer of the Army, into the controversy. His answer was that it was found impossible, or a case could not be made up; but, said he "if we can bring the case to the Courts, it would not stand half an hour."

Mr. Butler, of the Prosecution, objected, and after debate, General Sherman continued:

The question first asked me seemed to restrict me so close to the purpose that I endeavored to confine myself to that point alone. On the first day, or first interview, in which the President offered me the appointment ad interim, he confined himself to very general terms, and I gave him no definite answer. The second interview, which was on the afternoon of the 30th, was the interview during which he made the points which 1 have testified to. In speaking he referred to the constitutionality of the bill known as the civil tenure-of-office bill, I think, or the tenure of civil office bill; and it was the constitutionality of that bill which he seemed desirous of having tested, and which, he said, if it could be brought before the Supreme Court properly, would not stand half an hour. We also spoke of force. I first stated that if Mr. Stanton would simply retire, although it was against my interest, against my desire, against my personal wishes, and against my official wishes, I might be willing to undertake to administer the office ad interim. Then he supposed the point was yielded; and I made this point? "Suppose Mr. Stanton do not yield?" he answered, "Oh! he will make no objection; you present the order and he will retire." I expressed my doubt, and he remarked. "I know him better than you do: he is cowardly." I then begged to be excused from giving him an answer to give the subject more reflection, and I gave him my final answer in writing. I think that letter, if you insist on knowing my views, should come into evidence, and not parol testimony taken up; but my reasons for declining the office were mostly personal in their nature.

Mr. Henderson (of the Court) asked this question:

Did the President, on either of the occasions alluded to, express to you a fixed purpose or determination to remove Mr. Stanton from his office?

General Sherman answered:

If by removal is meant a removal by force, he never conveyed to my mind such an impression; but he did most unmistakably say that he could have no more intercourse with him in the relation of President and Secretary of War.

Mr. Howard (of the Court) asked the General:

You say the President spoke of force. What did he say about force?

General Sherman answered:

I enquired, "Suppose Mr. Stanton do not yield? What then shall be done?" "Oh," said he, "there is no necessity of considering that question. Upon the presentation of an order he will simply go away, or retire.

Mr. Henderson (of the Court) asked the question:

Did you give any opinion, or advice to the President on either of those occasions in regard to the legality or propriety of an ad interim appointment; and if so, what advice did you give, or what opinion did you express to him?

Mr. Bingham of the prosecution, objected, and the Chair put the question to the Senate whether it should be answered. The Senate, without a division, refused answer to the question, and the examination of Gen. Sherman closed for that day.

No. 17.

Wednesday, April 15th. The defense offered several extracts from records of the Navy Department, to prove the practice of the Government in cases of removal from office by different Presidents prior to Mr. Johnson. of which the following are samples:

NAVY AGENCY AT NEW YORK.

1861. June 20. Isaac Henderson was, by direction of the President, removed from the office of Navy agent at New York, and instructed to transfer to Paymaster John D. Gibson, of United States Navy, all the public funds and other property in his charge. Navy Agency at Philadelphia.

Dec. 26, 1851. James S. Chambers was removed from the office of Navy Agent at Philadelphia and instructed to transfer to Paymaster A. E. Watson, U. S. Navy, all the public funds and other property in his charge.

The prosecution objected and the yeas and nays were ordered.

Yeas—Anthony, Bayard, Buckalew, Cole, Conkling, Corbett, Davis, Dixon, Doolittle, Edmunds, Ferry, Fessenden, Fowler, Frelinghuysen, Grimes, Henderson, Hendricks, Howe, Johnson, McCreery, Morrill of Maine, Morrill of Vermont, Morton, Patterson of New Hampshire, Patterson of Tennessee, Ross, Saulsbery, Sherman, Stewart, Sumner, Trumbull, Van Winkle, Vickers, Willey, Wilson, Yates—36—25 Republicans and 11 Democrats.

Nays—Cameron, Cattell, Chandler, Conness, Cragin, Drake, Harlan, Howard, Morgan, Nye, Pomeroy, Ramsay, Thayer, Tipton, Williams—15—all Republicans.

So the evidence was admitted.

No. 18.

Thursday, April 16, Mr. Walter S. Cox on the stand. The defense offered to prove:

That Mr. Cox was employed professionally by the President. in the presence of General Thomas, to take such legal proceedings in the case that had been commenced against General Thomas as would be effectual to raise judicially the question of Mr. Stanton's legal right to continue to hold the office of Secretary for the Department of War against the authority of the President, and also in reference to obtaining a writ of quo warranto for the same purpose; and we shall expect to follow up this proof by evidence of what was done by the witness in pursuance of the above employment.

Mr. Drake demanded the yeas and nays, and they were ordered:

Yeas—Anthony, Bayard, Buckalew, Corbett, Davis, Dixon, Doolittle, Fessenden, Fowler, Frelinghuysen, Grimes, Hendricks, Howe, Johnson, McCreery, Morrill of Maine, Morton, Norton, Patterson of New Hampshire, Patterson of Tennessee, Ross, Saulsbury, Sherman, Sprague, Sumner, Trumbull, Van Winkle, Vickers, Willey—29—17 Republicans and 12 Democrats.

Nays—Cameron, Cattell, Chandler, Conkling, Cragin, Drake, Edmunds, Ferry, Harlan, Howard, Morgan, Morrill of Vermont, Nye, Pomeroy, Ramsay, Stewart, Thayer, Tipton, Williams, Wilson, Yates—21—all Republicans.

So the testimony was received, and the witness proceeded to detail the steps he had taken by direction of the President to procure a judicial determination of General Thomas' right to the office of Secretary of War and to put him in possession, till the following question was asked.

No. 19.

What did you do toward getting out a writ of habeas corpus under the employment of the President.

Prosecution objected, and the yeas and nays were ordered:

Yeas—Anthony, Bayard, Buckalew, Davis, Dixon, Doolittle, Fessenden, Fowler, Frelinghuysen, Grimes, Hendricks, Johnson, McCreery, Morrill of Maine, Morgan, Norton, Patterson of New Hampshire, Patterson of Tennessee, Ross, Saulsbury, Sherman, Sprague, Sumner, Trumbull, Van Winkle, Vickers, Willey—27—15 Republicans and 12 Democrats.

Nays—Cameron, Cattell, Chandler, Conkling, Conness, Cragin, Drake, Edmunds, Ferry, Harlan, Howard, Howe, Morgan, Morrill of Vermont, Nye, Pomeroy, Ramsay, Stewart, Thayer, Tipton, Williams, Wilson, Yates—23—all Republicans.

The Senate having decided the evidence to be admissible,

Mr. Cox proceeded:

When the Chief Justice announced that he would proceed as an examining Judge to investigate the case of General Thomas, and not as holding Court, our first application to him was to adjourn the investigation into the Criminal Court then in session, in order to have the action of that Court. After some little discussion this request was refused. Our next effort was to have General Thomas committed to prison, in order that we might apply to that Court for a habeas corpus, and upon his being remanded by that Court; if that should be done, we might follow up the application by one to the Supreme Court of the United States. * * * The Chief Justice having indicated an intention to postpone the examination, we directed General Thomas to decline giving any bail for further appearance, and to surrender himself into custody, and announce to the Judge that he was in custody, and then present to the Criminal Court an application for a writ of habeas corpus. The Counsel on the other side objected that General Thomas could not put himself into custody, and they did not desire that he should be detained in custody. The Chief Judge also declared that he would not restrain General Thomas of his liberty, and would not hold him or allow him to be held in custody. Supposing that he must be either committed or finally discharged, we then claimed that he be discharged, not supposing that the Counsel on the other side would consent to it, and supposing that would bring about his commitment, and that we should then have an opportunity of getting a habeas corpus. They made no objection, however, to his final discharge, and accordingly the Chief Justice did discharge him.

No. 20.

The witness, Mr. Cox, was asked by counsel for defense:

After you had reported to the President the result of your efforts to obtain a writ of habeas corpus, did you do any other act in pursuance of the original instructions you had received from the President on Saturday to test the right of Mr. Stanton to continue in the office; and if so, state what the acts were?

The yeas and nays were ordered on the demand of Mr. Howard.

Yeas—Anthony, Bayard, Buckalew, Davis, Dixon, Doolittle, Fessenden, Fowler, Grimes, Hendricks, Howe, Johnson, McCreery, Morrill of Maine, Morton, Norton, Patterson of New Hampshire, Patterson of Tennessee, Ross, Saulsbery, Sherman, Sprague, Sumner, Trumbull, Van Winkle, Vickers, Willey—27—15 Republicans and 12 Democrats.

Nays—Cameron, Cattell, Chandler, Conkling, Conness, Cragin, Drake, Edmunds, Ferry, Frelinghuysen, Harlan, Howard, Morgan, Morrill of Vermont, Nye, Pomeroy, Ramsay, Stewart, Thayer, Tipton, Williams, Wilson, Yates—23—all Republicans.

So the evidence was admitted, and Mr. Cox continued.

On the same day or the next, I prepared an information in the nature of a quo warranto. I think a delay of one day occurred in the effort to procure certified copies of Gen. Thomas' commission as Secretary of War ad interim, and of the order to Mr. Stanton. I then applied to the District Attorney to sign the information in the nature of a quo warranto, and he declined to do so without instructions or a request from the President or the Attorney General. This fact was communicated to the Attorney General and the papers were sent to him. Nothing was done after this time by me.

No. 21.

The defense offered to prove:

That the President then stated that he had issued an order for the removal of Mr. Stanton and the employment of Mr. Thomas to perform the duties ad interim; that thereupon Mr. Perrin said, "Supposing Mr. Stanton should oppose the order." The President replied: "There is no danger of that, for General Thomas is already in the office." He then added: "It is only a temporary arrangement; I shall send in to the Senate at once a good name for the office.

Mr. Butler, for prosecution, objected, and the vote was:

Yeas—Bayard, Buckalew, Davis, Dixon, Doolittle, Hendricks, McCreery, Patterson of Tennessee, and Vickers—9—all Democrats.

Nays—Cameron, Cattell, Chandler, Conkling, Conness, Corbett, Cragin, Drake, Ferry, Fessenden, Fowler, Frelinghuysen, Grimes, Harlan, Howard, Howe, Johnson, Morgan, Morrill of Maine, Morrill of Vermont, Morton, Nye, Patterson of New Hampshire, Pomeroy, Ramsay, Ross, Sherman, Sprague, Stewart, Thayer, Tipton, Trumbull, Van Winkle, Willey, Williams, Wilson, and Yates—-37—36 Republicans and 1 Democrat.

So this testimony was rejected.

No. 22.

Friday, April 17. The defense offered to prove:

That on this occasion (a Cabinet meeting previously mentioned), the President communicated to Mr. Welles, and the other members of his Cabinet, before the meeting broke up, that he had removed Mr. Stanton and appointed General Thomas Secretary of War ad interim; and that, upon the inquiry by Mr. Welles whether General Thomas was in possession of the office, the President replied that he was, and on further question of Welles, whether Mr. Stanton acquiesced, the President replied that he did; all that he required was time to remove his papers.

Mr. Butler objected and the yeas and nays were ordered.

Yeas—Anthony, Bayard, Buckalew, Cole, Conkling, Corbett, Davis, Dixon, Doolittle, Fessenden, Fowler, Grimes, Hendricks, Johnson, McCreery, Morton, Patterson of Tennessee, Ross, Saulsbery, Sherman, Sprague, Sumner, Trumbull, Van Winkle, Vickers, Willey—26—15 Republicans and 11 Democrats.

Nays—Cameron, Cattell, Conness, Cragin, Drake, Edmunds, Ferry, Frelinghuysen, Harlan, Howard, Howe, Morgan, Morrill of Maine, Morrill of Vermont, Patterson of New Hampshire, Pomeroy, Ramsay, Stewart, Thayer, Tipton, Williams, Wilson, Yates—2-3-all Republicans.

So the testimony was received, and the following proceeding was had Mr. Evarts, of Counsel for the President. Mr. Welles on the stand:

Please state, Mr. Welles, what communication was made by the President to the Cabinet on the subject of the removal of Mr. Stanton and the appointment of General Thomas, and what passed at the time?

Mr. Welles: As I remarked, after the Departmental business had been disposed of, the President remarked, as usual when he had anything to communicate himself, that before they separated it would be proper for him to say that he had removed Mr. Stanton and appointed the Adjutant General Lorenzo Thomas, Secretary ad interim. I asked whether General Thomas was in possession. The President said he was; that Mr. Stanton required some little time to remove his writings, his papers; I said, perhaps, or I asked, "Mr. Stanton, then, acquiesces?" He said he did, as he considered it. * * *

Question: Now, sir, one moment to a matter which you spoke of incidentally. You were there the next morning about noon?

Answer: I was.

Question: Did you then see the appointment of Mr. Ewing?

Answer: I did.

Question: Was it made out before you came there, or after, or while you were there?

Answer: While I was there.

Question: And you then saw it?

Answer: I saw it.

Question by Mr. Johnson (of the Court): What time of the day was that?

Answer: It was about twelve.

* * * Question by Mr. Evarts: Did you become aware of the Tenure-of-office bill, as it is called, at or about the time that it passed Congress?

Answer: I was aware of it.

Question: Were you present at any Cabinet meeting at which, after the passage of that Act, it became the subject of consideration?

Answer: Yes, on two occasions. The first occasion when it was brought before the Cabinet was on the 26th of February, 1867.

Question: Who were present?

Answer: All the Cabinet were present.

Question: Was Mr. Stanton there?

Answer: Mr. Stanton was there, I think, on that occasion.

Question: This civil tenure act was the subject of consideration there?

Answer: It was submitted.

Question: As a matter of consideration in the Cabinet?

Answer: For consultation for the advice and opinion of members.

Question: How did he submit the matter to your consideration?

Mr. Butler objected and demanded that the offer be put in writing.

No. 23.

That the President at a meeting of the Cabinet, while the bill was before the President for his approval, laid before the Cabinet the tenure-of-civil-office bill for their consideration and advice to the President respecting his approval of the bill: and thereupon the members of the Cabinet then present gave their advice to the President that the bill was unconstitutional and should be returned to Congress with his objections, and that the duty of preparing a message, setting forth the objections to the constitutionality of the bill, was devolved on Mr. Seward and Mr. Stanton; to be followed by proof as to what was done by the President and Cabinet up to the time of sending in the message.

After argument the yeas and nays were taken:

Yeas—Anthony Bayard, Buckalew, Davis, Dixon, Doolittle, Fessenden, Fowler, Grimes, Henderson, Hendricks, Johnson, McCreery, Patterson of Tennessee, Ross, Saulsbury, Trumbull, Van Winkle, Vickers, and Willey—20—9 Republicans and 11 Democrats.

Nays—Cameron, Cattell, Chandler, Cole, Conkling, Conness, Corbett, Cragin, Drake, Edmunds, Ferry, Frelinghuysen, Harlan, Howard, Howe, Morgan, Morrill of Maine, Morrill of Vermont, Patterson of New Hampshire, Pomeroy, Ramsay Sherman, Sprague, Stewart, Thayer, Tipton, Williams, Wilson, and Yates—29—all Republicans.

So this testimony was rejected.

No. 21.

Counsel for Defense offered to prove:

That at the meetings of the Cabinet at which Mr. Stanton was present, held while the tenure-of-civil-office bill was before the President for approval, the advice of the Cabinet in regard to the same was asked by the President and given by the Cabinet, and thereupon the question whether Mr. Stanton and the other Secretaries who had received their appointment from Mr. Lincoln were within the restrictions upon the President's power of removal from office created by said act was considered, and the opinion expressed that the Secretaries appointed by Mr. Lincoln were not within such restrictions.

The yeas and nays were ordered, and the vote was:

Yeas—Anthony, Bayard, Buckalew, Davis, Dixon, Doolittle, Fessenden, Fowler, Grimes, Henderson, Hendricks, Johnson, McCreery, Patterson of Tennessee, Ross, Saulsbury, Sherman, Sprague, Trumbull, Van Winkle, Vickers, and Willey—22—11 Republicans and 11 Democrats.

Nays—Cameron, Cattell, Chandler, Cole. Conness. Corbett, Cragin, Drake, Edmunds, Ferry, Frelinghusen, Harlan, Howard, Howe, Morgan, Morrill of Maine, Morrill of Vermont, Patterson of New Hampshire, Pomeroy, Ramsay, Stewart, Thayer, Tipton, Williams, Wilson, and Yates—26—all Republicans.

So this testimony was rejected.

No. 25.

Counsel for defense offered to prove:

That at the Cabinet meetings between the passage of the tenure-of-civil office bill and the order of the 21st of February, 1868, for the removal of Mr. Stanton. upon occasions when the condition of the public service, as affected by the operation of that bill, came up for the consideration and advice of the Cabinet, it was considered by the President and Cabinet that a proper regard to the public service made it desirable that upon some proper case a judicial determination of the constitutionality of the law should be obtained.

The question being taken by yeas and nays, resulted:

Yeas—Anthony, Bayard, Buckalew, Davis, Dixon, Doolittle, Fessenden, Fowler, Grimes, Henderson, Hendricks, Johnson, McCreery, Patterson of Tennessee, Ross, Saulsbury Trumbull, Van Winkle, and Vickers—19—8 Republicans and 11 Democrats.

Nays—Cameron, Cattell, Chandler, Cole, Conkling, Conness, Corbett, Cragin, Drake, Edmunds, Ferry, Frelinghuysen, Harlan, Howard, Howe, Morgan, Morrill of Maine, Morrill of Vermont, Patterson of New Hampshire, Pomeroy, Ramsay, Sherman, Sprague, Stewart, Thayer, Tipton, Willey, Williams, Wilson and Yates—30—all Republicans.

So the proffered testimony was rejected.

No. 26.

Counsel for defense put this question to witness, (Mr. Welles, then Secretary of the Navy.)

Was there, within the period embraced in the inquiry in the last question, and at any discussions or deliberations of the Cabinet concerning the operation of the tenure-of-civil-office act and the requirements of the public service in regard to the service, any suggestion or intimation whatever touching or looking to the vacation of any office by force or getting possession of the same by force?

Counsel for prosecution objected, and the vote was:

Yeas—Anthony, Bayard, Buckalew, Davis, Dixon, Edmunds, Fessenden, Fowler, Grimes, Hendricks, Johnson, McCreery, Patterson of Tennessee, Ross, Saulsbury, Trumbull, Van Winkle, and Vickers—18—8 Republicans and 10 Democrats.

Nay-s-Cattell, Chandler, Cole, Conkling, Conness, Corbett, Cragin, Ferry, Frelinghuysen, Harlan, Howard, Howe, Morgan, Morrill of Maine, Morrill of Vermont, Patterson of New Hampshire, Pomeroy, Ramsay, Sherman, Stewart, Thayer, Tipton, Willey, Williams, Wilson, and Yates—26—all Republicans.

So the proffered testimony was rejected.

No. 27.

Defense offered to prove:

That at the meetings of the Cabinet at which Stanton was present, held while the tenure-of-civil-office bill was before the President for approval, the advice of the Cabinet in regard to the same was asked by the President, and given the Cabinet, and thereupon the question whether Mr. Stanton and the other Secretaries who had received their appointments from Mr. Lincoln were within the restrictions upon the President's power of removal from office created by said act, was considered and the opinion expressed that the Secretaries appointed by Mr. Lincoln were not within such restrictions.

Mr. Johnson: I ask that the question propounded by the Senator from Ohio (Mr. Sherman) shall now be read.

The Secretary read the question as follows:

State if, after the 2d of March, 1867, the date of the passage of the tenure-of-office act, the question whether the Secretaries appointed by President Lincoln were included within the provisions of that act came before the Cabinet for discussion; and if so, what opinion was given on this question by members of the Cabinet to the President.

The yeas and nays were ordered; and being taken resulted:

Yeas—Anthony, Bayard, Buckalew, Davis, Dixon, Doolittle, Fessenden, Fowler, Grimes, Hendricks, Johnson, McCreery, Patterson of Tennessee, Ross, Saulsbury, Sherman, Trumbull, Van Winkle, Vickers, and Willey—20—9 Republican and 11 Democrats.

Nays—Cameron, Cattell, Chandler, Cole, Conkling, Conness, Corbett, Cragin, Edmunds, Ferry, Frelinghuysen, Harlan, Howard, Howe, Morgan, Morrill of Maine, Morrill of Vermont, Patterson of New Hampshire, Pomeroy, Ramsay, Stewart, Thayer, Tipton, Williams, Wilson, and Yates—26—all Republicans.

So the proffered testimony was rejected.

No. 28.

The Prosecution proposed to put in evidence the nomination of Lieutenant General Sherman, to be General by brevet, sent to the Senate on the 13th of February, 1868, also the nomination of Major General George H. Thomas to be Lieutenant General by brevet, and to be General by brevet, sent to the Senate on the 21st of February, 1868.

The question being taken by yeas and nays, resulted: Yeas—Anthony, Cole, Fessenden, Fowler, Grimes, Henderson, Morton, Ross, Sumner, Tipton, Trumbull, Van Winkle, Willey, and Yates—14—all Republicans.

Nays—Buckalew, Cameron, Cattell, Chandler, Conkling, Conness, Corbett, Cragin, Davis, Dixon, Doolittle, Drake, Edmunds, Ferry, Frelinghuysen, Harlan, Hendricks, Howard, Howe, Johnson, McCreery, Morgan, Morrill of Maine, Morrill of Vermont, Patterson of New Hampshire, Patterson of Tennessee, Pomeroy, Ramsay, Sherman, Sprague, Stewart, Thayer, Vickers, Williams, and Wilson—35—26 Republicans and 9 Democrats.

So the proffered testimony was refused.

GENERAL EMORY'S TESTIMONY.

The Ninth Article of the Impeachment was based upon alleged military changes in the City of Washington whereby the number of troops on duty there was rumored to have been largely increased, with a view to their use in the controversy between the President and Congress, and more especially for the expulsion of Mr. Stanton from the War Office in case of his resistance to the order of the President for his retirement. The wildest rumors of that character prevailed—that Mr. Johnson proposed to throw off all disguise and assume direct military control and the establishment of practically a military dictatorship. Congress had some months previously enacted that all military orders from the President should be issued through the General of the Army—the Congress thereby assuming to practically abrogate a constitutional function of the Chief Executive.

There was considerable confidence among the supporters of the impeachment that they would be able to prove these allegations by General Emory, then in local command of the troops and Department of Washington. General Emory was called by the prosecution, and the following was his testimony.

Examined by Mr. Butler:

Question: Will you have the kindness to state, as nearly as you can what took place then? (Referring to an interview with the President at the Executive Mansion.)

Answer: I will try and state the substance of it, but the words I can not undertake to state exactly. The President asked me if I recollected a conversation he had had with me when I first took command of the department. I told him that I recollected the facts of the conversation distinctly. He then asked me what changes had been made. I told him no material changes, but such as had been made I could state at once. I went on to state that in the fall six companies of the 29th infantry had been brought to this City to winter; but as an offset to that, four companies of the 12th infantry had been detached to South Carolina on the request of the Commander of that District; that two companies of artillery had been detached by my predecessor, one of them for the purpose of siding in putting down the Fenian difficulties, had been returned to the command, that although the number of companies head been increased, the numerical strength of the command was very much the same, growing out of an order reducing the artillery and infantry companies from the maximum of the war establishment to the minimum of the peace establishment. The President said: "I do not refer to those changes." I replied that if he would state what changes he referred to, or who made the report of the changes, perhaps I could be more, explicit. He said, "I refer to recent changes within a day or two," or something to that effect. I told him I thought I could assure him that no changes had been made; that under a recent order issued for the government of the armies of the United States, founded upon a law of Congress, all orders had to be transmitted through General Grant to the army, and in like manner all orders coming from General Grant to any of his subordinate officers must necessarily come, if in my department, through me; that if by chance an order had been given to any junior officer of mine it was his duty at once to report that fact. The President asked me. "What order do you refer to?" I replied, "To order number 17 of the series of 1867." He said, "I would like to see the order," and a messenger was dispatched for it. At this time a gentleman came in who I supposed had business in no way connected with the business I had in hand, and I withdrew to the farther end of the room, and while there, the messenger came in with the book of orders and handed it to me. As soon as the gentleman had withdrawn, I returned to the President with the book in my hand, and said I would take it as a favor if he would permit me to call his attention to that order; that it had been passed in an appropriation bill, and I thought it not unlikely that it had escaped his attention. He took the order and read it, and observed, "This is not in conformity with the Constitution of the United States, that makes me Commander-in-Chief, or with the terns of your commission." I replied, "That is the order which you approved and issued to the army for our government," or something to that effect. I can not recollect the exact words, nor do I intend to quote the exact words of the President. He said, "Am I to understand that the President of the United States can not give an order except through the General of the Army? Or General Grant?" I said in reply, that that was my impression—that that was the opinion that the Army entertain, and I thought upon that subject they were a unit. I also said, "I think it is fair, Mr. President, to say to you that when this order came out, there was considerable discussion on the subject as to what were the obligations of an officer under that order, and some eminent lawyers were consulted. I myself consulted one—and the opinion was given to me decidedly and unequivocally that we were bound by the order, Constitutional or not Constitutional. The President observed that "the object of the law was evident."

The following is that portion of the act referred to:

"Section 2. Be it further enacted: That the headquarters of the General of the Army of the United States shall be at the City of Washington, and all orders and instructions relating to military operations issued by the President and Secretary of War shall be issued through the General of the Army, and in case of his inability, through the next in rank. The General of the, Army shall not be removed, suspended, or relieved from command or assigned to duty elsewhere than at said headquarters except at his own request WITHOUT THE PREVIOUS APPROVAL OF THE SENATE; and any orders or instructions relating to Military operations issued contrary to the requirements of this section, shall be null and void. And any officer who shall issue orders or instructions, contrary to the provisions of this section, shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor in office; and any officer of the Army who shall transmit, convey or obey any orders or instructions so issued contrary to the provisions of this section, knowing that such orders were so issued shall be liable to imprisonment for not less than two nor more than twenty years upon conviction thereof in any Court of competent jurisdiction."

By turning to the Congressional Record of that day, it will be found that Mr. Johnson was perfectly aware of the existence of the foregoing provision of the Act of Congress in the bill referred to, at the time he returned the bill to the House with his signature. His reasons for so signing it are set out in the following communication to the House accompanying the bill

The act entitled "An act making appropriations for the support of the Army for the year ending June 30, 1868, and for other purposes," contains provisions to which I must call attention. There are propositions contained in the second section which in certain cases deprives the President of his Constitutional functions of Commander in Chief of the Army, and in the sixth section, which denies to ten States of the Union their Constitutional right to protect themselves in any emergency, by means of their own militia. These provisions are out of place in an appropriation act, but I am compelled to defeat these necessary appropriations if I withhold my signature from the act. Pressed by these considerations, I feel constrained to return the bill with my signature, but to accompany it with my earnest protest against the section which I have indicated.

Andrew Johnson. Washington, D. C., March 2, 1868.

That Congress was to expire by limitation at 12 o'clock on the 4th, thirty-six hours later. If Mr. Johnson had vetoed the bill, as under ordinary conditions it would have been his duty to the Constitution and to himself to do, its re-passage through the two Houses in that limited time would have been impossible, and the appropriations carried by the bill for the support of the Army would have been lost. To save them Mr. Johnson submitted to the indignity put upon him by Congress in denying him a guaranteed and manifest Constitutional right and power. In that act Mr. Johnson illustrated a magnanimity and a consciousness of public responsibility that was most creditible to himself, and in marked contrast to the action of Congress toward him.



CHAPTER X. A CONFERENCE HELD AND THE FIRST VOTE TAKEN.

A few days prior to the day set for taking the vote on the several Articles of Impeachment, and after the conclusion of testimony, it was proposed that there be a private session for conference of the Senate on a day named, May 11th, to give Senators an opportunity to declare themselves on the pending impeachment.

Neither the precise object or the utility of a conference were then apparent, but the result was somewhat of a surprise to those who had, up to that time, been undoubtingly confident of the President's conviction. Comparatively few Senators had previously declared their position. Very few, if any of the Republican Senators had indicated a disposition to vote against any of the articles, but the silence of a number of them, and their refusal to commit themselves even to their associates, was a source of uneasiness in Senatorial Impeachment circles. Hence, possibly, the suggestion of a "conference."

It was taken for granted that every Democratic Senator would vote against the impeachment. But the idea was not to be entertained that the "no" votes would extend beyond the Democratic coterie of twelve. There were, however, anxious misgivings as to that. There was too much silence—too much of saying nothing when so little that might be said would go so far to relieve an oppressive anxiety.

So a session for "conference" was ordered and held, much to the surprise of gentlemen whose silence had become somewhat oppressive, and was becoming equally painful to those who wanted a conference." It savored of an attempt to "poll the Senate" in advance of judgment. It was resolved at the session of May 7th, to hold a session for deliberation on the following Monday, May 11th. The most surprising development of that session was the weakness of the bill of indictment at the very point where it was apparently strongest—the first Article. Two conspicuous and influential Senators—Messrs. Sherman of Ohio, and Howe of Wisconsin—declared, and gave convincing reasons therefor, that they would not vote for the impeachment of Mr. Johnson on that Article.

In his remarks on this occasion, after giving a history of the enactment of the Tenure-of-Office law, the first section of which specifically excepts from its operation such members of Mr. Johnson's Cabinet as had been appointed by Mr. Lincoln and still remaining, though not recommissioned by Mr. Johnson, Mr. Sherman said:

I can only say as one of the Senate conferees, under the solemn obligations that now rest upon us in construing this Act, that I did not understand it to include members of the Cabinet not appointed by the President, and that it was with extreme reluctance and only to secure the passage of the bill that, in the face of the votes of the Senate I agreed to the report LIMITING AT ALL the power of the President to remove heads of Departments. * * * I stated explicitly that the Act as reported did not protect from removal the members of the Cabinet appointed by Mr. Lincoln, that President Johnson might remove them at his pleasure; and I named the Secretary of war as one that might be removed. * * * I could not conceive a case where the Senate would require the President to perform his great executive office upon the advice and through heads of Departments personally obnoxious to him, and whom he had not appointed, and, therefore, no such case was provided for. * * * Can I pronounce the President guilty of crime, and by that vote aid to remove him from his high office for doing what I declared and still believe he had a legal right to do. God forbid: * * * What the President did do in the removal of Mr. Stanton he did under a power which you repeatedly refused to take from the office of the President—a power that has been held by that officer since the formation of the Government. and is now limited only by the words of an Act, the literal construction of which does not include Mr. Stanton. * * * It follows, that as Mr. Stanton is not protected by the Tenure-of-Civil-Office Act, his removal rests upon the Act of 1789, and he according to the terms of that Act and of the commission held by him, and in compliance with the numerous precedents cited in this cause, was lawfully removed by the President, and his removal not being contrary to the provisions of the Act of March 2nd 1867, the 1st, 4th, 5th, and 6th Articles, based upon his removal, must fail.

On this point, Mr. Howe said:

If Mr. Stanton had been appointed during the present Presidential term. I should have no doubt he was within the security of the law. But I cannot find that, either in fact or in legal intendment, he was appointed during the present Presidential term. It is urged that he was appointed by Mr. Lincoln, and such is the fact. It is said that Mr. Lincoln's term is not yet expired. Such I believe to be the fact. But the language of the proviso is, that a Secretary shall hold not during the term of MAN by whom he is appointed, but during the TERM of the PRESIDENT by whom he may be appointed. Mr. Stanton was appointed by the President in 1862. The term of that President was limited by the Constitution. It expired on the 4th of March, 1865. That the same incumbent was re-elected for the next term is conceded, but I do not comprehend how that fact extended the former term.

Entertaining these views, and because the first Article of the Impeachment charges the order of removal as a violation of the Tenure-of-Office Act, I am constrained to hold the President not guilty upon that Article.

These declarations, coming from two gentlemen of distinction and influence in the party councils, both of whom Had actively participated in framing the Tenure-of-Office Act, became at once the occasion of genuine and profound surprise, and it is unnecessary to say that they tended largely to strengthen the doubts entertained by others as to the sufficiency of all the other allegations of the indictment. They naturally and logically reasoned that the removal of Mr. Stanton, set out in the first Article, constituted, in effect, the essence of the indictment, and that all that followed, (save the 10th Article was more in the nature of specifications, or a bill of particulars, than otherwise—that if no impeachable offense were set out in the first Article, then none was committed, as that Article constituted the substructure of all the rest—its essence and logic running through and permeating practically all—and that without that Article, there was no coherence or force in any of them, and consequently nothing charged against the President that was impeachable, as he had not violated the Tenure-of-Office law, and was not charged with the violation of any other law.

That conference developed, further, that a large majority of the Articles of Impeachment were objectionable to and would not be supported by a number of Republican Senators.

Mr. Edmunds would not support the 4th, 8th, 9th, and 10th Articles, being "wholly unsustained by proof," but would support the 11th, though apparently doubtful of its efficiency.

Mr. Ferry could not support the 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, 9th, or 10th Articles.

Mr. Howard declared that he would not support the 9th Article.

Mr. Morrill of Vermont, would not support the 4th, 6th, 9th, or 10th Articles, as they were unproven.

Mr. Morrill, of Maine, Mr. Yates, Mr. Harlan, and Mr. Stewart, would vote to convict on the Articles relating to the removal of Mr. Stanton—uncommitted on all others.

Mr. Fessenden, Mr. Fowler, Mr. Grimes, Mr. Henderson, Mr. Trumbull, and Mr. Van Winkle, each declared, at that conference, their opposition to the entire list of the Articles of Impeachment.

But eighteen Republicans committed themselves at that conference, for conviction, out of twenty-four who filed opinions. While it was taken for granted that the six Democrats who had failed to declare their position at that conference would oppose conviction, the position of the eighteen Republicans who had failed to declare themselves became at once a source of very grave concern in impeachment circles. Out of that list of eighteen uncommitted Republicans, but one vote was necessary to defeat the impeachment. This condition was still farther intensified by the fact that eight of the eleven Articles of Impeachment were already beaten in that conference, and practically by Republican committals, and among them the head and front and foundation of the indictment—the First Article—by Messrs. Sherman and Howe, two conspicuous Republican leaders.

A forecast of the vote based on these committals as to the several Articles, would be against the First Article, twelve Democrats and eight Republicans, one more than necessary for its defeat—the eight "not guilty" votes including Messrs. Sherman and Howe.

Against the Fourth Article—twelve Democrats and nine Republicans—including Messrs. Edmunds, Ferry, and Morrill of Vermont.

Against the Fifth Article—twelve Democrats and eight Republicans-including Messrs. Edmunds and Ferry.

Against the Sixth Article—twelve Democrats and nine Republicans-including Messrs. Ferry, Howe, and Morrill of Vermont.

Against the Seventh—Article-twelve Democrats and seven Republicans—including Mr. Ferry.

Against the Eighth Article—twelve Democrats and seven Republicans—including Mr. Edmunds.

Against the Ninth Article—twelve Democrats and twelve Republicans—including Messrs. Sherman, Edmunds, Ferry, Howe, Howard, and Morrill of Vermont.

Against the Tenth Article—twelve Democrats and ten Republicans—including Messrs. Edmunds, Sherman, Ferry, and Morrill of Vermont.

It is somewhat conspicuous that but three gentlemen—Messrs. Sumner, Pomeroy, and Tipton, in their arguments in the Conference, pronounced the President guilty on all the charges—though five others, Messrs. Wilson, Patterson of New Hampshire, Frelinghuysen, Cattell, and Williams, pronounced the President guilty on general principles, without specification; and Messrs. Morrill of Maine, Yates and Stewart, guilty in the removal of Mr. Stanton, without further specification of charges.

As but one vote, in addition to the twelve Democratic and the six Republican votes pledged against conviction at the Conference, was necessary to defeat impeachment on the three remaining Articles—the 2nd, 3rd, and 11th—and as nearly a half of the Republicans of the Senate had failed to commit themselves, at least in any public way, the anxiety of the advocates of Impeachment became at once, and naturally, very grave. How many of the eighteen Republicans who had failed to declare themselves at that Conference might fail to sustain the Impeachment, became, therefore, a matter of active solicitude on all sides, especially in impeachment circles in and out of the Senate. Republican committals in the Conference had rendered absolutely certain the defeat of every Article of the Impeachment except the Second, Third, and Eleventh, and the addition of but a single vote from the eighteen uncommitted Republicans to the "No" side, would defeat them.

It was under this unfavorable condition of the Impeachment cause, that the Senate assembled on May 16th, 1868, for the purpose of taking final action on the indictment brought by the House of Representatives, the trial of which had occupied the most of the time of the Senate for the previous three months, and which had to a large degree engrossed the attention of the general public, to the interruption of legislation pending in the two Houses of Congress, and more or less to the embarrassment of the commercial activities of the country.

For the first time in the history of the government, practically eighty years, the President of the United States was at the bar of the Senate, by virtue of a constitutional warrant, on an accusation of the House of Representatives of high crimes and misdemeanors in office, and his conviction and expulsion from office demanded in the name of all the people. No event in the civil history of the country had ever before occurred to so arouse public antipathies and public indignation against any man-and these conditions found special vent in the City of Washington, as the Capitol of the Nation, as it had become during the trial the focal point of the politically dissatisfied element of the entire country. Its streets and all its places of gathering had swarmed for many weeks with representatives of every State of the Union, demanding in a practically united voice the deposition of the President.

On numbers of occasions during the previous history of the Government there had been heated controversies between the Congress and the Executive, but never before characterized by the intensity, not infrequently malevolence, that had come to mark this and never before had a division between the Executive and the Congress reached a point at which a suggestion of his constitutional ostracism from office had been seriously entertained, much less attempted.

But it had now come. The active, intense interest of the country was aroused, and everywhere the division among the people was sharply defined and keen, though the numerical preponderance, it cannot be denied, was largely against the President and insistent upon his removal.

The dominant party of the country was aroused and active for the deposition of the President. Public meetings were held throughout the North and resolutions adopted and forwarded to Senators demanding that Mr. Johnson be promptly expelled from office by the Senate—and it had become apparent, long before the taking of the vote, that absolute, swift, and ignominious expulsion from office awaited every Republican Senator who should dare to disregard that demand.

Under these conditions it was but natural that during the trial, and especially as the close approached, the streets of Washington and the lobbies of the Capitol were thronged from day to day with interested spectators from every section of the Union, or that Senators were beleaguered day and night, by interested constituents, for some word of encouragement that a change was about to come of that day's proceeding, and with threats of popular vengeance upon the failure of any Republican Senator to second that demand.

In view of this intensity of public interest it was as a matter of course that the coming of the day when the great controversy was expected to be brought to a close by the deposition of Mr. Johnson and the seating of a new incumbent in the Presidential chair, brought to the Capitol an additional throng which long before the hour for the assembling of the Senate filled all the available space in the vast building, to witness the culmination of the great political trial of the age.

Upon the closing of the hearing—even prior thereto, and again during the few days of recess that followed, the Senate had been carefully polled, and the prospective vote of every member from whom it was possible to procure a committal, ascertained and registered in many a private memoranda. There were fifty-four members—all present. According to these memoranda, the vote would stand eighteen for acquittal, thirty-five for conviction—one less than the number required by the Constitution to convict. What that one vote would be, and could it be had, were anxious queries, of one to another, especially among those who had set on foot the impeachment enterprise and staked their future control of the government upon its success. Given for conviction and upon sufficient proofs, the President MUST step down and out of his place, the highest and most honorable and honoring in dignity and sacredness of trust in the constitution of human government, a disgraced man and a political pariah. If so cast upon insufficient proofs or from partisan considerations, the office of President of the United States would be degraded—cease to be a coordinate branch of the Government, and ever after subordinated to the legislative will. It would have practically revolutionized our splendid political fabric into a partisan Congressional autocracy. Apolitical tragedy was imminent.

On the other hand, that vote properly given for acquittal, would at once free the Presidential office from imputed dishonor and strengthen our triple organization and distribution of powers and responsibilities. It would preserve the even tenor and courses of administration, and effectively impress upon the world a conviction of the strength and grandeur of Republican institutions in the hands of a free and enlightened people.

The occasion was sublimely and intensely dramatic. The President of the United States was on trial. The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court was presiding over the deliberations of the Senate sitting for the trial of the great cause. The board of management conducting the prosecution brought by the House of Representatives was a body of able and illustrious politicians and statesmen. The President's counsel, comprising jurists among the most eminent of the country, had summed up for the defense and were awaiting final judgment. The Senate, transformed for the occasion into an extraordinary judicial tribunal, the highest known to our laws, the Senators at once judges and jurors with power to enforce testimony and sworn to hear all the facts bearing upon the case, was about to pronounce that judgment.

The organization of the court had been severely Democratic. There were none of the usual accompaniments of royalty or exclusivism considered essential under aristocratic forms to impress the people with the dignity and gravity of a great occasion. None of these were necessary, for every spectator was an intensely interested witness to the proceeding, who must bear each for himself, the public consequences of the verdict, whatever they might be, equally with every member of the court.

The venerable Chief Justice, who had so ably and impartially presided through the many tedious weeks of the trial now about to close, was in his place and called the Senate to order.

The impressive dignity of the occasion was such that there was little need of the admonition of the Chief Justice to abstention from conversation on the part of the audience during the proceeding. No one there present, whether friend or opponent of the President, could have failed to be impressed with the tremendous consequences of the possible result of the prosecution about to be reached. The balances were apparently at a poise. It was plain that a single vote would be sufficient to turn the scales either way—to evict the President from his great office to go the balance of his life's journey with the brand of infamy upon his brow, or be relieved at once from the obloquy the inquisitors had sought to put upon him—and more than all else, to keep the honorable roll of American Presidents unsmirched before the world, despite the action of the House.

The first vote was on the Eleventh and last Article of the Impeachment. Senators voted in alphabetical order, and each arose and stood at his desk as his name was called by the Chief Clerk. To each the Chief Justice propounded the solemn interrogatory—"Mr. Senator—, how say you—is the respondent, Andrew Johnson, President of the United States, guilty or not guilty of a high misdemeanor as charged in this Article?"

Mr. Fessenden, of Maine, was the first of Republican Senators to vote "Not Guilty." He had long been a safe and trusted leader in the Senate, and had the unquestioning confidence of his partisan colleagues, while his long experience in public life, and his great ability as a legislator, and more especially his exalted personal character, had won for him the admiration of all his associates regardless of political affiliations. Being the first of the dissenting Republicans to vote, the influence of his action was feared by the impeachers, and most strenuous efforts had been made to induce him to retract the position he had taken to vote against conviction. But being moved on this occasion, as he had always been on others, to act upon his own judgment and conviction, though foreseeing that this vote would probably end a long career of conspicuous public usefulness, there was no sign of hesitancy or weakness as he pronounced his verdict.

Mr. Fowler, of Tennessee, was the next Republican to vote "Not Guilty." He had entered the Senate but two years before, and was therefore one of the youngest Senators, with the promise of a life of political usefulness before him. Though from the same State as the President, they were at political variance, and there was but little in common between them in other respects. A radical partisan in all measures where radical action seemed to be called for, he was for the time being sitting in a judicial capacity and under an oath to do justice to the accused according to the law and the evidence. As in his judgment the evidence did not sustain the charge against the President such was his verdict.

Mr. Grimes, of Iowa, was the third anti-impeaching Republican to vote. He had for many years been a conspicuous and deservedly influential member of the Senate. For some days prior to the taking of the vote he had been stricken with what afterwards proved a fatal illness. The scene presented as he rose to his feet supported on the arms of his colleagues, was grandly heroic, and one never before witnessed in a legislative chamber. Though realizing the danger he thus incurred, and conscious of the political doom that would follow his vote, and having little sympathy with the policies pursued by the President, he had permitted himself to be borne to the Senate chamber that he might contribute to save his country from what he deemed the stain of a partisan and unsustained impeachment of its Chief Magistrate. Men often perform, in the excitement and glamour of battle, great deeds of valor and self sacrifice that live after them and link their names with the honorable history of great events, but to deliberately face at once inevitable political as well as physical death in the council hall, and in the absence of charging squadrons; and shot and shell, and of the glamor of military heroism, is to illustrate the grandest phase of human courage and devotion to convictions. That was the part performed by Mr. Grimes on that occasion. His vote of "Not Guilty" was the last, the bravest, the grandest, and the most patriotic public act of his life.

Mr. Henderson of Missouri, was the fourth Republican Senator to vote against the impeachment. A gentleman of rare industry and ability, and a careful, conscientious legislator, he had been identified with the legislation of the time and had reached a position of deserved prominence and influence. But he was learned in the law, and regardful of his position as a just and discriminating judge. Though then a young man with a brilliant future before him, he had sworn to do justice to Andrew Johnson "according to the Constitution and law," and his verdict of "Not Guilty" was given with the same deliberate emphasis that characterized all his utterances on the floor of the Senate.

Mr. Ross, of Kansas, was the fifth Republican Senator to vote "Not Guilty." Representing an intensely Radical constituency—entering the Senate but a few months after the close of a three years enlistment in the Union Army and not unnaturally imbued with the extreme partisan views and prejudices against Mr. Johnson then prevailing—his predilections were sharply against the President, and his vote was counted upon accordingly. But he had sworn to judge the defendant not by his political or personal prejudices, but by the facts elicited in the investigation. In his judgment those facts did not sustain the charge.

Mr. Trumbull, of Illinois, was the sixth Republican Senator to vote against the Impeachment. He had been many years in the Senate. In all ways a safe legislator and counsellor, he had attained a position of conspicuous usefulness. But he did not belong to the legislative autocracy which then assumed to rule the two Houses of Congress. To him the Impeachment was a question of proof of charges brought, and not of party politics or policies. He was one of the great lawyers of the body, and believed that law was the essence of justice and not an engine of wrong, or an instrumentality for the satisfaction of partisan vengeance. He had no especial friendship for Mr. Johnson, but to him the differences between the President and Congress did not comprise an impeachable offense. A profound lawyer and clear headed politician and statesman,, his known opposition naturally tended to strengthen his colleagues in that behalf.

Mr. Van Winkle, of West Virginia, was the seventh and last Republican Senator to vote against the Impeachment. Methodical and deliberate, he was not hasty in reaching the conclusion he did, but after giving the subject and the testimony most careful and thorough investigation, he was forced to the conclusion that the accusation brought by the House of Representatives had not been sustained, and had the courage of an American Senator to vote according to his conclusions.

The responses were as follows:

Guilty—Anthony, Cameron, Cattell, Cole, Chandler, Conkling, Conness, Corbett, Cragin, Drake, Edmunds, Ferry, Frelinghuysen, Harlan, Howard, Howe, Morgan, Morton, Morrill of Maine, Morrill of Vermont, Nye, Patterson of New Hampshire, Pomeroy, Ramsay, Sherman, Sprague, Stewart, Sumner, Tipton, Thayer, Wade, Williams, Wilson, Willey, Yates.

Not Guilty—Bayard, Buckalew, Davis, Dixon, Doolittle, Fessenden, Fowler, Grimes, Henderson, Hendricks, Johnson, McCreery, Norton, Patterson of Tennessee, Ross, Saulsbury, Trumbull, Van Winkle, Vickers.

Not Guilty—19. Guilty—35—one vote less than a Constitutional majority.



CHAPTER XI. THE IMPEACHERS IN A MAZE. A RECESS ORDERED.

THE FINAL VOTE TAKEN.

The defeat of the Eleventh Article was the second official set-back to the Impeachment movement—the first being the practical abandonment of the First Article by the change in the order of voting.

The vote had been taken on what its friends seemed to consider its strongest proposition; the Eleventh Article having been so framed as to group the substance, practically, of all the pending ten Articles. The impeachers had staked their cause upon that Article, and lost. They seemed not to have contemplated the possibility of its defeat. So confident were they of its success, in which event it would be immaterial what became of the other Articles, that they apparently had agreed upon no order of procedure after that should have been defeated. They were in the condition of a flock of game into which the sportsman had fired a shot and broken its ranks. They were dazed, and for a moment seemed not to know what next to do, or which way to turn. They did not dare now go back to the fated First Article, according to the program agreed upon, as Mr. Sherman and Mr. Howe had demonstrated its weakness, and they were fearful of going to the Second or Third, as in the then temper of the anti-impeachers it was manifest there would be little hope for either of them, and the other eight had been already beaten without a vote, at the conference previously held, and by Republican commitals.

The Chief Justice ordered the reading of the First Article, according to the order agreed upon, but before that could begin, apparently to gain time for recovery, Mr. Williams moved that the Senate take a recess of fifteen minutes, but the motion was not agreed to.

The Chief Justice again ordered the reading of the First Article, but again, before the clerk could begin the reading, Mr. Williams intervened to move an adjournment to Tuesday, the 26th day of the month.

After numerous conflicting motions relating to the date of the proposed reassembling, and several roll calls thereon, the anti-impeachers generally insisting on proceeding at once to vote on the other articles of impeachment, the motion of Mr. Williams to adjourn to June 26th, prevailed.

Of course the purpose, and the only purpose then apparent, of that adjournment, was to gain time, apparently in the hope of more favorable developments in the next ten days.

The supposably strongest count of the indictment having been beaten, it was apparent that it would be folly to hazard a vote on any other at that time. There was a possibility that changes might occur in the personnel of the Senate in the interim. As but one article had been put to vote, and as that was beaten by the lack of a single vote, there seemed a further possibility that influences could be brought to bear, through the industry of the House, as was very soon after developed, to secure the support of an anti-impeaching Senator on at least one of the articles of impeachment yet to be voted upon. A vacancy in the ranks of the anti-impeaching Republicans to be filled by an impeaching appointee might happen. Many contingencies were possible during the next ten days for a reversal of the action of the Senate just had. At all events, everything would be hazarded by permitting further immediate action, while the situation could be rendered no worse by delay, and time and other mollifying conditions and influences might bring changes more promising of success.

The anti-impeachment Republicans had not long to wait for the development of the purpose of the recess, at least so far its supporters in the House were concerned. Immediately upon the adjournment of the Senate, the House re-assembled, and the following proceeding was had:

Mr. Bingham: I have been directed by the Managers on the part of the House of Representatives, in the matter of the Impeachment of Andrew Johnson, to report the following preamble and resolutions for consideration at this time:

Whereas, information has come to the Managers which seems to them to furnish probable cause to believe that improper or corrupt means have been used to influence the determination of the Senate upon the Articles of Impeachment submitted to the Senate by the House of Representatives against the President of the United States; therefore.

Be it Resolved, That for the further and more efficient prosecution of the Impeachment of the President, the Managers be directed and instructed to summon and examine witnesses under oath, to send for persons and papers, and employ a stenographer, and appoint sub-committee to take testimony; the expense thereof to be paid from the Contingent Fund of the House.

This resolution was immediately and without debate adopted by a vote of 88 to 14. It would be stating it mildly to say that the House was in a tumult. The Republican leaders were wild with rage. They had selected for the first vote what they deemed the strongest point in their indictment, and lost; and their vengeance now turned upon those Republican Senators who had failed to support them. Hence the adjournment of the Senate for ten days to afford them time to discipline the recusants and force an additional vote for conviction on the next ballot.

The conspicuous indelicacy of this move was two-fold: 1st, in that the House proposed to investigate the action of a co-ordinate branch of Congress: and 2nd, that the trial not being concluded, it had to a pointed degree the appearance of an attempt to intimidate Senators who had voted against conviction into changing their votes at the next ballot in fear of an inquisition for alleged corruption. In that sense it was an act of intimidation—a warning. It was an ill-disguised threat and a most unseemly proceeding—yet there was not one among the supporters of the Impeachment to condemn it, and few who failed openly to justify it. Partisan rancor and personal and political hostility to the President had reached a point that condoned this indelicacy of the House towards the Senate, and justified the public assault upon the dissenting Republican Senators, and the insult to the Senate itself.

The demand for adjournment and delay seemed to have been understood by the impeaching majority of the Senate, and was of course promptly granted and further voting postponed, and the Senate adjourned to May 26th.

The next ten day were days of unrest—of anxiety to all who were involved or in any way interested in the impeachment proceeding. While the result of the 16th gave hope and comfort to the opponents of impeachment, it caused little or no perceptible discouragement to its more radical friends. They were more active and persistent than ever. The footsteps of the anti-impeaching Republicans were dogged from the day's beginning to its end and far into the night, with entreaties, considerations and threats, in the hope of securing a reversal of the result of the 16th. The partisan press of the States represented by the anti-impeaching Republicans came daily filled with vigorous animadversions upon their action, and not a few threats of violence upon their return to their constituents. But it was in vain.

The Senate reassembled on the 26th of May to complete the vote on the articles of impeachment. After the usual preliminary proceedings, Mr. Williams moved to begin the voting on the Second Article, which was had with the same result as on the 11th—and then the Third, and still with the same result. It then became manifest that it was useless to go farther, as all the balance had been rendered certain of defeat, and by still more decisive votes—a considerable number of those so far voting for impeachment having committed themselves in the previous conference against all the balance. So, to save themselves from being forced to vote against impeachment on any of the articles, there was a unanimous vote of the impeachers to abandon the case and adjourn—and with it went glimmering the visions of office, and spoils, and the riotous assaults on the public treasury that had for months been organizing for the day when Mr. Johnson should be put out and Mr. Wade put in, with the political board clear for a NEW DEAL.

An analysis of the Eleventh, Article shows. that it comprised four distinct counts, or accusations.

First—That Mr. Johnson had said that the Thirty-Ninth Congress was not a Congress of the United States, but a Congress of only part of the States, and therefore had no power to propose amendments the Constitution.

The latter clause of this accusation was the only portion of the first count that received any consideration during the trial, and the only testimony brought in its support was the Parsons-Johnson telegraphic correspondence set out in Interrogatory No. 5.

In that dispatch, referring to then pending Constitutional amendment (the 14th) Mr. Johnson referred to Congress as "a set of individuals." Mr. Manager Boutwell declared this expression to be "the gist of the offense of this particular telegraphic dispatch."

Counsel for defense objected to this testimony, but it was received by a vote of yeas twenty-seven, nays seventeen.

As the Fourteenth Amendment was not declared adopted or a part of the Constitution for more than a year after the transmission of that dispatch, and as the Constitution of the United States prohibits any abridgment of the freedom of speech, and as this remark was unaccompanied by any act in violation of law, it is difficult to see how it could be construed into an impeachable offense. Moreover, saying nothing of the good taste or propriety of that dispatch, Mr. Johnson was opposed to the proposed amendment, and had the same right to oppose it, or to characterize it or the members of Congress favoring it, as had any private citizen, or as had the members of Congress to characterize his action in the premises, without being called to account therefor.

The second count of that article was:

Violation of the Tenure-of-Office Act of March 2nd, 1867, in seeking to prevent the resumption by Mr. Stanton of the office of Secretary of War.

This clause had been very effectually disposed of by Messrs. Sherman and Howe several days before the vote was taken on the Eleventh Article, when they pointed out the fact that the language cage of the first section of the Tenure-of-Office Act clearly excepted, and was intended by the Senate, to except Mr. Stanton and all other persons then in Mr. Johnson's Cabinet who had been originally appointed by Mr. Lincoln and were still holding over under Mr. Johnson without having been recommissioned by him; and that Mr. Johnson had therefore the legal right and power to remove them at his pleasure.

And so convincing had been the argument of those gentlemen at that time, that there was unanimous consent on the pro- impeachment side of the Senate, on two different occasions, to set aside the First Article, of which the alleged unlawful attempt to remove Mr. Stanton was practically the principal accusation. Not illogically, that unanimous consent to abandon the First article by thus setting it aside, and afterwards refusing to put it to a vote, may be said to have been equivalent to a vote of its insufficiency.

It is pertinent to suggest here that the President believed the Tenure-of-Office Act to be unconstitutional, as it was clearly an attempted abridgment of his power over his Cabinet which had never before been questioned by Congress. The only method left him for the determination of that question was in the course he took, except by an agreed case, but it is manifest from the record that no such agreement could be had, as an effort thereto was made in the Thomas case in the District Court, but failed, the prosecution withdrawing the case at the point where that purpose of the President became manifest.

The third count was:

Attempting to prevent the execution of the Army appropriation Act of March 2nd, 1867.

The means specified in this alleged attempt was the appointment of Mr. Edward Cooper to be Assistant Secretary of the Treasury, with power to draw warrants on the Treasury without the consent of the Secretary—the purpose being to show that, with General Thomas acting as Secretary of War, and Mr. Cooper as Assistant Secretary of the Treasury to honor General Thomas' drafts, and thus, in control of expenditures for the support of the Army, a conspiracy was sought to be proven whereby the President intended and expected to defeat the Reconstruction Acts of Congress by preventing the use of the Army for its enforcement.

Mr. Johnson, of the Court, asked this question:

The Managers are requested to say whether they propose to show whether Mr. Cooper was appointed by the President in November, 1867, as a means to obtain unlawful possession of the public money, other than by the fact of the appointment itself?

Mr. Manager Butler answered:

We certainly do.

Mr. Butler read the law on this subject, passed March 2nd, 1867, as follows:

That the Secretary of the Treasury shall have power, by appointment under his hand and official seal, to delegate to one of the Assistant Secretaries of the Treasury authority to sign in his stead all warrants for the payment of money into the public Treasury and all warrants for the disbursments from the public Treasury of money certified by the accounting officers of the Treasury to be due upon accounts duly audited and settle by them; and such warrants signed shall be in all cases of the same validity as if they had been signed by the Secretary of the Treasury himself.

Mr. William E. Chandler, who had been Assistant Secretary of the Treasury, was on the witness stand, called by the prosecution. Mr. Butler asked whether it was the practice of the Assistant Secretary to act as Secretary in case of removal of the Secretary.

Answer: I am not certain that it is, without his appointment as Acting Secretary by the President.

Mr. Fessenden, of the Court, propounded this interrogatory?

1st—Has it been the practice, since the passage of the law, for an Assistant Secretary to sign warrants unless especially appointed and authorized by the Secretary of the Treasury?

2nd—Has any Assistant Secretary been authorized to sign any warrants except such as are specified in the Act?

The witness answered as to the first:

It has not been the practice for any Assistant Secretary since the passage of the Act to sign warrants except upon an appointment by the Secretary for that purpose in accordance with the provisions of the Act. Immediately upon the passage of the Act, the Secretary authorized one of his Assistant Secretaries to sign warrants of the character described in the Act, and they have been customarily signed by that Assistant Secretary in all cases since that time.

As to the second question the answer was:

No Assistant Secretary has been authorized to sign warrants except such as are specified in this Act, unless when acting as Secretary.

That disposed of the third count in the Eleventh Article, and the testimony was rejected by a vote of yeas 22, nays 27.

These answers to tire interrogatories seemed to prove the reverse of what the Prosecution had expected. The accusation of the Third count was not sustained.

As to the Fourth count of the Eleventh Article, that Mr. Johnson sought to prevent the execution of the "Act to provide for the more efficient government of the rebel States," passed March 2nd, 1867, by the removal of Mr. Stanton from the War Office, the proceedings of the trial disclose no testimony of a sufficiently direct character for specification, except, possibly, a number of speeches delivered at different points by Mr. Johnson, which are set out in the Tenth Article of the Impeachment. As that Article was by unanimous consent abandoned and never put to vote, all its allegations logically fell as unproven.

There was, therefore, no force and little coherency in the Eleventh Article. It fell of its own weight. Every one of its several averments had been disproven, or at least not proven. It was to a good degree a summing up—an aggregation, of the entire bill of indictment on the several distinct forms of offenses charged—a crystallization of the whole.

The entire impeachment scheme was in reality beaten by the vote on that Article, and the adjournment of ten days then taken could have been only in the hope on the part of the majority that ultimate success on some one of the remaining Articles could be made possible, in some way, legitimate or otherwise, in part by the importunate throng of visitors to the Capitol who were vociferously and vindictively urging Mr. Johnson's removal largely for reasons personal to themselves—but more especially through the efforts of the House of Representatives to discipline one or more of the anti-impeaching Republicans of the Senate.

The allegation of the Second Article, put to vote on the 26th, and beaten by the same vote as was the Eleventh, was a corollary of the First-violation of the Tenure-of-Office Act in the appointment of General Thomas as Secretary of War ad interim, WITHOUT THE ADVICE AND CONSENT OF THE SENATE. This was the first declaration ever made in the Senate that an ad interim or merely temporary appointment to fill a vacancy, required confirmation by that body. The power to make such an appointment is so clearly possessed by the President without consultation of the Senate-had been so uniformly exercised by every preceding President without question, that argument on that point would be superfluous.

In reality the essence of the Second Article, as of the First, was the removal of Mr. Stanton. If the President could remove him without the consent of the Senate, which was clearly established in the debate in the conference by Messrs. Sherman and Howe, the way was clear for the appointment of an act interim Secretary, to the end that the office be filled until such time as the President would be prepared to refill the place with a Secretary on consultation with the Senate. That was the very thing he attempted to do on the 22nd of February, the day after Mr. Stanton's removal, when he sent to the Senate the nomination of Thomas Ewing, Senior, to be Secretary of War, for the action of that body.

The Third Article was so closely analagous to the Second, that an analysis of it would be in the nature of repetition. If there were any distinctions between them, they were so finely drawn that they amounted simply to a distinction without a difference—a characteristic, indeed, of a large part of the eleven Articles of Impeachment—a characteristic so conspicuous that it was not deemed worth while by the majority to go further in their submission to the Court.

These three Articles—the Second, Third and Eleventh—being the only Articles of the entire list of eleven put to a vote, and having been taken up and passed upon out of their numerical but in the order of their supposed availability—must therefore be regarded as confessedly the strongest and most likely of the entire list to command the support of the Senate. They were selected and set out. for the test. That selection was equivalent to saying, "we put the Impeachment cause to test on these three Articles. If they fail, we have nothing more to offer."

They were put to test and failed. They failed because of their innate weakness. Failed because they proved nothing. Failed because not a single allegation of the entire indictment was or could be proven or tortured into all impeachable offense. Not a remark made by the President or an act performed in all the long and bitter controversy that. had subsisted between himself and Congress could be brought nearer to the impeachment mark, in fact, few if any of them so near, as had been the every day rule in the House of Representatives during the previous two years in their treatment of the President. Yet nobody thought of impeaching members of the House for their every day personal vituperations against him.

Bill after bill had been offered in Congress, and law after law enacted, with apparently the sole purpose of hampering the Constitutional authority apparently functions of the President—even the assumption of Executive powers and judicial functions by Congress—the not remote purpose of which seemed to be his entrapment into some measure of resistance upon which could be based an indictment. The House seemed to be literally "lying in wait" for him, with traps set on every side for his ensnarement.

At last, after two years of this sort of scheming and impatient and anxious waiting, the opportunity seemed to have offered in the alleged violation of the Tenure-of-Office Act. The fosterers of the impeachment crusade, weary with their long vigil and growing desperate with every additional day's delay, clutched at the new turn of affairs like a drowning man at a floating straw, and with the avidity of a starved gudgeon at a painted fly.

It was not strange that this sort of diplomacy, developed and exposed as it was in the Senate, in spite of the unfair and partisan maneuvering of the prosecution to prevent it, should have reacted, and contributed to turn against the impeachment movement gentlemen who entered upon the investigation under oath to give Mr. Johnson a fair, non-partisan trial. The only surprise was that, after the exposure of the malignant partisan spirit that sat in judgment upon Mr. Johnson, and the utter and absolute failure to prove any violation of law on his part, but on the contrary, a determination to preserve from infringement the functions of his office and prevent a revolution from fundamental political forms by the absorption of the Executive authority by the legislative branch of the government—that even a majority, and more especially, that nearly two-thirds of the Senate, could have been found at the close in support of the Impeachment.

This record will serve to explain the omission to vote on the First Article—Messrs. Sherman and Howe being precluded from supporting it in consequence of the position taken by them in the controversy between the two Houses of Congress over the first section of the Tenure-of-Office Bill while that bill was pending, and to avoid defeat on the first vote taken, which was inevitable on that Article—and also to explain, so far as any explanation is possible, the zig-zag method of conducting the ballot—skipping all the first ten Articles and going down to the bottom of the list for the first vote, with the promise of then going back to the first Article and continuing to the end. but, instead, skipping that for the second time, and starting in again on the Second and then the Third.

Of course, the natural effect of this battle-dore and shuttle- cock method of treating so grave a matter as an impeachment of the President of the United States, added to the effect of the manifest unfairness of the majority in their treatment of testimony offered in the President's defense—was to disgust some who doubtless entered upon the trial honestly inclined to vote for Andrew Johnson's impeachment, but wanted it done fairly and openly, without any suppression of pertinent testimony or juggling for a verdict—and amusing to others, who viewed it as proof of weakness in the indictment, and of misgiving as to the result on the part of its supporters.

To still others it was more than that. It was not only an indication of weakness, but of a determination to take every possible advantage, fair and unfair, to save votes for conviction. The impeachers not unnaturally feared the effect of the defeat of the First Article by the nay votes of Messrs. Sherman and Howe, and probably other Republicans, which was certain to follow the submission of that Article to a vote. Its only allegation was the unlawful removal of Mr. Stanton from the office of Secretary of War in violation of the Tenure-of-Office Act. That alleged offense was repeated in varied but more or less specific forms, in every succeeding Article of the Impeachment except the Tenth, and constituted the sum and substance—the gravamen—of the entire indictment. It was the basis upon which the impeachment super-structure had been erected. Without that Article there was not only no foundation, but no coherence in the recital of Mr. Johnson's alleged offenses, and when that fell by its abandonment, the entire impeachment scheme fell with it—as, if there were nothing in the First Article on which to hang an impeachment, there could be nothing in those that followed and were but an amplification—a mere exploitation—of the First.

In substantiation of this view of the First Article, the declaration of Mr. Boutwell to that effect is here inserted. Mr. Boutwell was chairman of the committee of the House appointed to prepare the Articles of Impeachment upon which Mr. Johnson was tried. On his report of these Articles to the House he said, after speaking particularly of the Tenth Article:

The other Articles are based upon facts which are of public knowledge, growing out of the attempt of the President to remove Secretary Stanton from the office of Secretary for the Department of War.

That is, that the basis of the entire accusation was the alleged violation of the Tenure-of-Office Act in the removal of Mr. Stanton, as recited in the First Article.

So, after taking the vote on the Second and Third Articles and their defeat by the same vote as that on the Eleventh, it became manifest that further effort to the impeachment of the president on any of the remaining eight Articles would be useless, and Mr. Williams moved that the Senate, sitting as a Court of Impeachment, adjourn sine die, which motion was carried by the following vote:

Yeas—Anthony, Cameron, Cattell, Chandler, Cole, Conkling Corbett, Cragin, Drake, Edmunds, Ferry, Frelinghuysen, Harlan, Howard, Morgan, Morrill of Maine, Morrill of Vermont, Morton, Nye, Patterson of New Hampshire, Pomeroy, Ramsay, Sherman, Sprague, Stewart, Sumner, Thayer, Tipton, Van Winkle, Wade. Willey, Williams, Wilson, Yates—34.

Nays—Bayard, Buckalew, Davis, Dixon, Doolittle, Fowler, Henderson, Hendricks, Johnson, McCreery, Norton, Patterson of Tennessee, Ross, Saulsbury, Trumbull, Vickers—16.

Every Senator present who had voted for conviction voted to abandon the prosecution and end the trial, and every Senator present who had voted against conviction, voted to continue and go through the indictment.

Of course, it was useless to go farther with any hope of success, as, it will be seen by this record, all the remaining Articles were dead, beaten in caucus before the voting commenced, and by the professed friends and leaders of the movement.

Possibly it was the anticipation of this effect of the abandonment of the First Article, that was the "sickness" to which Mr. Edmunds, at the outset of the voting, ten days before, ascribed the peculiar order of taking the vote.

It is not intended to aver that there was any privity or concert in this particular manipulation—yet it is suggestive. The Impeachment had been dragging since the 22nd of February, to May 26th—more than three months,—and had been everywhere the engrossing topic of the time. It was becoming tiresome-not only to the Senate, but to the general public.

Notwithstanding the City of Washington was still filled with people who had been waiting weary weeks and months for the deposition of Mr. Johnson and the accession of Mr. Wade to the Presidency, for the fulfillment of pledges of appointment based thereon, and who were still importunate for impeachment, the business element of the country at large was tiring of it and its depressing effect upon the commercial activities. Even Senators and Congressmen were being moved to a sense of the obstructive and somewhat ridiculous phases the impeachment movement was beginning to take on—and not a few of those who in its earlier stages had honestly favored the movement, inside as well as outside the membership of both Houses of Congress, had begun to realize the actual nature and purposes, as also the shallowness of the impeachment movement that from whatever motives it had originated, it had degenerated very much into a game of personal ambition—of vindictiveness—and office getting and spoils—and practically nothing higher.