Mr. HENDRICKS. Mr. President, it is well enough to understand exactly what it is that we are proposing to do. The State dept has been called upon to give the senate information in regard to a correspondence between the SecyState and our minister at Vienna. That correspondence has been given. I suppose the Senfrom Massachu; setts is satisfied that the minister has vindicated his position sufficiently. The letter is of suf. ficient length for that purpose in reply to so short a note as was addressed to him by the SecyState. The question that is made by the Senfrom Massachusetts is, whether the man who communicated the information to the President, upon which the SecyState thought it his duty to address the minister at Vienna, was a distinguished man or an obscure man. That is the inquiry that he asks the Senate today to make. Who can question that the SecyState ought to have addressed this note to the minister at Vienna if the information was in fact communicated to the President as stated? Let me call the attention of the Senate to the statement that is made by the SecyState in his note to Mr. Motley. Here it is: “SIR: A citizen of the U.S. hasaddressed a letter to the President from Paris, in which he representsthat he had traveled extensively in Europe during the last year, in the course of which he had had occasion to see something of our ministers, and consuls in various, countries;, that most of those whom he met were bitterly hostile to the President and his Administration, and exPressedthat hostility in so open a manner as to astonish Americans, and to leave a very bad imPression on Europeans. He adds that you do not pretend to gust, ” conceal “your disas he saysyou style it, at Sonduct, the president'swhole loudly prtohcalat iymou despiseAmerican democracy, and that an English gentleman is the model of human perfection: that the President has desertedhis pledges and principles in Mr. Seward, who, you say, commonwith is hopelessly degraded.” Now, Mr. President, if any minister abroad, if any rePresentative of the Government of the U.S. . at any country, used language such as this, was it not the duty of the SecyState to make inquiry about it? If he used language depreciating the Chief Magis trate of this nation in the Presence of foreign Powers; that the President had conducted himself so as to produce a “ disgust” on the part of his minister abroad; that this minister despised “American democracy, ” a term not used in regard to political differences, but a comprehensive term, referring rather to the character of our institutions, and that that minister loudly proclaimed that “an English gentleman is the model of human perfection;” that the President had “deserted his pledges and principles in common with Mr. Seward, who is hopelessly degraded” ought not information coming to the State Dept or to the President of such language used by a foreign minister to be inquired into on the part of the State Dept? No man will question it. Has any minister I do not care how eminent he is a right to go abroad and proclaim that our institutions are a failure; that the principles that underlie those institutions are despised by him; that the President is an object of disgust to him; and that the SecyState is hopelessly degraded? Has any minister a right to use such language to European hearers? I deny it, sir. Whatever may be our misfortunes, it is not the business of the rePresentatives of our Government abroad to proclaim those misfortunes or anything that goes to the dishonor of the Government. Then, sir, this ought to be inquired of by the SecyState; and the distinguished Senfrom Massachusetts cannot, in his place, say that it is the right of a minister abroad to use such language in regard to the high officers of the Government whom he rePresents abroad, and whose opinions he must reflect there in regard to our foreign intercourse, especially in regard to the American democracy. Then, sir, it comes down simply to the question whether the person who wrote this letter is a distinguished person or a very obscure person. The Senator says he is so obscure that he cannot now recollect his name. I suppose, then, it comes to this: that information communicated to the Government is not to be acted upon unless it comes through some highly respectable source, as the Senfrom Massachusetts would esteem it. I say that such information as this coming from abroad required the attention of the Government, and no man is sufficiently eminent that he can shield himself from a responsibility in regard to an accusation of this sort. I suppose the Senfrom Massachusetts wishes to know whether the man who wrote this letter is eminent in the world of letters; whether he is a distinguished man; in other words, whether the POTUS has opened his ear to an American citizen of obscure position. If he be not an eminent man the President must not hear when he speaks in behalf of the honor of the nation; but if he be an eminent man it is all right. “Eminent” by birth? Is that what is meant? Or “eminent” because of position attained? That is the inquiry we are now to make. The Senator wants to know who wrote the letter, whether he is an eminent man or whether he is an obscure man. Did the President, who ought to rePresent all the people of this country not the eminent men alone, but the obscure allow his ear to be opened to information communicated by some citizen of obscure position? If he did he is to be very mueh cen sured here, I suppose. I do not understand that the truth can come to men in high position only from men of eminent position. It is the duty of the President to allow his ears to be open to If information from every source. the Senator wishes to establish the fact that this person was not entitled to credit, and therefore to censure the SecyState because he placed any reliance upon the information, that is another inquiry; but his statement is, that he is rather an obscure man, because he does not know him; he does not recollect his name; and he wants the Senate to inquire who it is that should dare to write to the President in regard to a o foreign minister, of such obscure position as that the distinished Senfrom Massachusetts does not know him. I expect there are 300,000 citizens in Indiana whom the Senator does not know; and if one of those citizens whom the Senator does not know should write to the President in regard to a matter that touches the honor of the country, and the President should allow himself to be influenced by that information, the Senator would say, “Why, here is an eminent man that is attacked by an obscure man, and the President has allowed his ears to be open to this information coming from an obscure citizen of the State of Indiana.” Is that an argument that we are to hear here in the Senate? Sir, in this land the President is to hear all, and not the eminent alone, but the obscure. The rich, the learned, and the eminent can take care of themselves: it is the obscure and the men who have no power in and of themselves, and because of their political association, that the President ought to hear and defend in all their rights. But now, in the American Senate the position is assumed that the SecyState has listened to information from an obscure source, and the Senate is asked to inquire into the degree of the obscurity of this man shall he not inquire when he is informed that a representative abroad has said that the President is an object of “disgust?” shall he not inquire when a rePresentative abroad has said in European ears that the SecyState, representing the dignity and honor of this nation in her foreign relations, has “hopelessly degraded” himself? shall he not inquire when he is in formed that an American minister has denounced “American democracy?” He must inquire; he dare not refuse to inquire, however eminent that minister may be; the more eminent the greater the fault. Then, as I said, it comes down simply to the question whether the Senate shall inquire whether the person who communicated from Paris this information was a person of obscure birth or obscure position in life. If he is not eminent, the SecyState is to be cen sured. If he be eminent and known to the distinguished Senfrom Massachusetts, then it is all right on the part of the Secretary.