Committee had been appointed by
President McKinley on the Canadian Committee. One of them,
however, said he had accepted the appointment without due
reflection, and he was quite satisfied that the practice was
wrong. The Committee disliked exceedingly to make a report
which might be construed as a censure of their associates.
So I was instructed to call upon President McKinley and say
to him in behalf of the Committee, that they hoped the practice
would not be continued. That task I discharged. President
McKinley said he was aware of the objections; that he had
come to feel the evil very strongly; and while he did not
say in terms that he would not make another appointment of
the kind, he conveyed to me, as I am very sure he intended
to do, the assurance that it would not occur again. He said,
however, that it was not in general understood how few people
there were in this country, out of the Senate and House of
Representatives, qualified for important diplomatic service
of that kind, especially when we had to contend with the trained
diplomatists of Europe, who had studied such subjects all
their lives. He told me some of the difficulties he had encountered
in making selections of Ministers abroad, where important
matters were to be dealt with, our diplomatic representatives
having, as a rule, to be taken from entirely different pursuits
and employments.

That Congress in the past has thought it best to extend rather
than restrict this prohibition is shown by the statute which
forbids, under a severe penalty, members of either House of
Congress from representing the Government as counsel.

CHAPTER VI
LEADERS OF THE SENATE IN 1877

As I just said, there was no man in the Senate when I entered
it who equalled in renown either Webster, Clay or Calhoun,
or wielded in the Senate an influence like that of Oliver
Ellsworth. With at most but two or three exceptions, no one
of them would be counted among the great men of the century
in which he lived, or will be remembered long after his death.
But the average excellence was high. It was a company of
very wise men, fairly representing the best sentiment and
aspiration of the Republic. The angers and influences of
the Civil War had gradually cooled under the healing influence
of Grant. The American people was ready to address itself
bravely to the new conditions and new problems, or to old
problems under new conditions.

I shall speak briefly here of some