than
once. He was then fearful that a President might use his office,
his appointing power, to further his own ends instead of for the
good of the people. He started, undoubtedly, with that idea in
his mind. He was going to carry out the civil service doctrine to
the utmost. But when he had been President a few months he was
exceedingly unpopular with his party. The Democrats who elected
him had been out of office for twenty-five years. During all those
years they had watched the Republicans sitting at the national
banquet. Their appetites had grown keener and keener, and they
expected when the 4th of March, 1885, came that the Republicans
would be sent from the table and that they would be allowed to tuck
the napkins under their chins. The moment Cleveland got at the
head of the table he told his hungry followers that there was
nothing for them, and he allowed the Republicans to go on as usual.

In a little while he began to hope for a second term, and gradually
the civil service notion faded from his mind. He stuck to it long
enough to get the principal mugwump papers committed to him and to
his policy; long enough to draw their fire and to put them in a
place where they could not honorably retreat without making themselves
liable to the charge of having fought only for the loaves and
fishes. As a matter of fact, no men were hungrier for office than
the gentlemen who had done so much for civil service reform. They
were so earnest in the advocacy of that principle that they insisted
that only their followers should have place; but the real rank and
file, the men who had been Democrats through all the disastrous
years, and who had prayed and fasted, became utterly disgusted with
Mr. Cleveland's administration and they were not slow to express
their feelings. Mr. Cleveland saw that he was in danger of being
left with no supporters, except a few who thought themselves too
respectable really to join the Democratic party. So for the last
two years, and especially the last year, he turned his attention
to pacifying the real Democrats. He is not the choice of the
Democratic party. Although unanimously nominated, I doubt if he
was the unanimous choice of a single delegate.

Another very great mistake, I think, has been made by Mr. Cleveland.
He seems to have taken the greatest delight in vetoing pension
bills, and they seem to be about the only bills he has examined,
and he has examined them as a lawyer woul