WRITINGS OF SAM HOUSTON, 1827
79
were those of Republicanism, and of the country? Did he ever return to such an application a proud and insolent answer? Did he ever say to such a body, I disregard you, the Representatives of the People, and notwithstanding your request, I shall make such appoinment as I, in the plentitude of my authority and vower, shall think proper to choose? Had none under the pres- ent Administration been put in office but honest and patriotic men, whatever might be their party sentiments, I should not have one word to say. But I do say that when an individual whose character and conduct has been without reproach, and who has the voice of the Representatives of the People in favor of his appointment, deserves a share of the public patronage, that, on Jeffersonian principles, he ought not to refuse it. What were the circumstances in this case? Was the editor of the Nashville Whig> on whom the United States printing was bestowed totally unconnected with the Secretary of State? No, Sir, he was his connexion. And if it is Jeffersonian policy to take patronage away from one against whom no charge could be supported, for the purpose of giving it to a relation of the man in power, we may go on step by step in such policy till we get a state of things no better than that which Jefferson sought to overturn. If a man thus connected, and who is "willing to step behind the scenes" and play a double part: a man who for that reason, received, according to his own account, "a miniature martyrdom"- if such a man is to be preferred to. one who has the recommendation of the Representatives of a sovereign State, and if this is correct policy-Jeffersonian policy- I am wholly unacquainted with it, and I trust in God, I ever shall be. This was the man from whom, as we are told, proceeded the "only voice which was heard in behalf of the Administration in a land of political darkness." Sir, all this may be very right; but I confess myself unable to see on what principle it is justified. Nor can this be excused, upon the plea that it was the established usage into office. The prac• tice, heretofore, in the Department, has been to allow an indi- vidual who might l::!e personally opposed to the views and opinions of the head of the Department, if he was honest and capable, as a public officer, to retain his place. Such, I believe, was uniformly the practice under a former 1·eign; I will not vouch that it is under the present. With regard to the distribution of the public printing, the inquiry ought to be, do men who are upright and ·Republican in principles and practice, desire that a particular individual shall be retained as a printer of the laws, and are there
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