the Senate. "The Nation" on March 11, 1886, in a powerful article
reviewing the controversy observed: "There is not the smallest
reason for believing that, if the Senate won, it would use its
victory in any way for the maintenance or promotion of reform. In
truth, in the very midst of the controversy, it confirmed the
nomination of one of Baltimore's political scamps." It is
certainly true that the advising power of the Senate has never
exerted a corrective influence upon appointments to office; its
constant tendency is towards a system of apportionment which
concedes the right of the President to certain personal
appointments and asserts the reciprocal right of Congressmen to
their individual quotas.

As a result of these various influences, the position assumed by
the Republicans under the lead of Senator Edmunds was seriously
weakened. When the resolutions of censure were put to the vote on
the 26th of March, that condemning the refusal of the
Attorney-General to produce the papers was adopted by thirty-two
ayes to twenty-six nays--a strict party vote; but the resolution
declaring it to be the duty of the Senate in all such cases to
refuse its consent to removals of suspended officials was adopted
by a majority of only one vote, and two Republican Senators voted
with the Democrats. The result was, in effect, a defeat for the
Republican leaders, and they wisely decided to withdraw from the
position which they had been holding. Shortly after the passage
of the resolutions, the Senate confirmed the nomination over
which the contest started, and thereafter the right of the
President to make removals at his own discretion was not
questioned.