PREFACE It is inevitable that one writing the Life of Thomas B. Reed should be drawn into a discussion of the most important questions before Congress during his long period of service; yet I have made the consideration of them entirely secondary to the recording of his course upon them, and have endeavored to permit him to present his own view in his speeches, letters, and other writings. The great questions before the country while he was in Congress were the Southern and race issues, the Greenback and silver questions, the procedure of the House (and especially obstruction), and civilservice reform and the settlement of the monetary standard. Through perhaps half of the Congresses there was a dead level of routine legislation, hardly relieved, although accompanied by the perennial discussion of the tariff. This routine, while not appealing to the imagination, presents much of importance in the development of the country and the shaping of its practical processes of government, and it cannot be neglected. Reed was the most powerful figure in either House of Congress during his time, or at least after he had opportunity to establish himself as he did in the first few years of his service; and his contribution to the settlement of every great issue before the country was in 873771 fluential in a high degree. He firmly believed in protection as necessary to the prosperity of the country in peace and its independence in war. He favored reform in the civil service and was opposed to inflation, to the free coinage of silver, and to the settled policy of obstruction which for more than a century had been carried on under the rules of the House. He himself in his first Speakership overthrew that obstruction by his famous ruling; and when he had been retired to the minority and the ancient system had been restored, he himself put it in practice so aggressively as to prevent the transaction of all business and to compel his adversaries to abandon it. Ever since that time the principle of his ruling has been accepted by all parties as the law of the House. He was an unyielding advocate of equality of rights for all citizens, and steadily maintained the principles of the Declaration of Independence. The chief reason for his retirement from the Speakership and from public life was the annexation, against his protest, of oversea territory, imposing as it did upon ourselves the necessity of violating that principle of self-government which he believed to be the foundation principle of the American Commonwealth. In my quotations from the official reports of debates I have as a rule preserved the expressions of approval or disapproval on the part of the House, believing that they possess a real historical value. Reed, it need hardly be said, was altogether above the petty practice, which I regret to say has found some currency in the House of Representatives, of editing the reports of his speeches by inserting "Applause" and "Laughter" in the printed version, a practice which has made the House appear to be a very stupid sort of body, going wild with enthusiasm over eloquence the cheapest and most fustian, and convulsed with "laughter" over jokes the point of which years of subsequent study have failed to disclose. Indeed Reed had the reputation of not even revising the reporter's notes in order to correct the little slips and errors that will inevitably creep into reports of speeches made in a body like the House. Mrs. Reed and her daughter Katherine Reed Balentine have placed me under very great obligation by giving me free access to the family papers, and in other ways. I am also much indebted to Reed's son-in-law, Captain Arthur T. Balentine. Honorable Asher C. Hinds, who was Reed's close friend, and his parliamentary clerk, and who now represents the Portland district in Congress, has given me much help in many ways, especially by advice and by putting his wide and valuable collection of material at my disposal. SAMUEL W. McCALL. WINCHESTER, MASS., |