If he has committed any gross crime, shocking alike and indiscriminately the entire public mind, then condemn him; but he has rendered services to the country that entitle him to kind and respectful consideration. He has precedents for everything he has done, and what excellent precedents! The voices of the great dead come to us from the grave sanctioning his course. All our past history approves it. How can you single out this man, now in this condition of things, and brand him before the world, put your brand of infamy upon him because he made an ad interim appointment for a day, and possible may have made a mistake in attempting to remove Stanton? I can at a glance put my eye on Senators here who would not endure the position he occupied. You do not think it is right yourselves. You framed this civil tenure law to give each President his own Cabinet, and yet his whole crime is that he wants harmony and peace in his.
Senators, I will not go on. There is a great deal that is crowding on my tongue for utterance, but it is not from my head;it is rather from my heart; and it would be but a repetition of the vain things 1 have been saying the past half hour But I do hope you will not drive the President out and take possession of his office. I hope this, not merely as counsel for Andrew Johnson, for Andrew Johnson's administration is to me but as a moment, and himself as nothing in comparison with the possible consequences of such an act. No good can come of it, Senators, and how much will the heart of the nation be refreshed if at last the Senate of the United States can, in its judgment upon this case, maintain its ancient dignity and high character in the midst of storms, and passion, and strife.
A somewhat startling incident, which for the moment threatened unpleasant results, occurred in the course of the trial. In his opening speech for the prosecution, Mr. Manager Boutwell used this language, speaking of the President:
The President is a man of strong will, of violent passions, of unlimited ambition, with capacity to employ and use timid men, adhesive, subservient men, and corrupt men, as the instruments of his designs. It is the truth of history that he has injured every person with whom he has had confidential relations, and many have escaped ruin only by withdrawing from his society altogether. He has one rule of his life: he attempts to use every man of power, capacity, or influence within his reach. Succeeding in his attempts, they are in time, and usually in a short time, utterly ruined. If the considerate flee from him, if the brave and patriotic resist his schemes or expose his plans, he attacks them with all the energy and patronage of his office, and pursues them with all the violence of his personal hatred. He attacks to destroy all who will not become his instruments, and all who become his instruments are destroyed in the use. He spares no one. * * * Already this purpose of his life is illustrated in the treatment of a gentleman who was of counsel for the respondent, but who has never appeared in his behalf.
The last paragraph of the above quotation manifestly referred to a disagrement between the President and Judge Black, which led to the retirement of that gentleman from the Management of the Defense of the President, a few days prior to the beginning of the trial.
To this criticism of the President, Judge Nelson, of Counsel for Defense, responded a few days later, with the following statement:
It is to me, Senators, a source of much embarassment how to speak in reply to the accusation which has thus been preferred against the President of the United States. * * *In order that you may understand what I have to say about it Idesire to refer the Senate to a brief statement which I have prepared on account of the delicacy of the subject; and, although I have not had time to write it out as I would have desired to do, it will be sufficient to enable you to comprehend the facts which I am about to state. You will understand, Senators, that Ido not purport to give a full history of what I may call the Alta Vela case, as to which a report was made to the Senate by the Secretary of State upon your call. A mere outline of the case will be sufficient to explain what I have to say in reference to Judge Black:
Under the guano act of 1856, William T. Kendal on the one side, and Patterson and Marguiendo on the other, filed claims in the Secretary of State's office to the island which is claimed by the government of St. Domingo.
