Mr. HENDRICKS. The clause is that the President shall fill vacancies happening during the recess; and the naked question is whether a vacancy existing at the time of the adjournment is a vacancy happening during the following recess, and the uniform construction of the executive dept has been that that vacancy ought to be filled, and I have given, from Secretary Seward's correspondence with the Senator. Michigan on behalf of the ComJudiciary, an extreme case, a case where Congress devolves upon the President the duty to execute a law and provides an officer to execute it so near the adjournment that there is not time to nominate a person to fill the office before the adjournment. Here may be a period of many months before the Senate shall be again in session, and Congress passes a law so shortly before the adjournment that it is impossible for the President to make a nomination and for the Senate to act upon that nomination before the adjournment. Now, the question is whether the construction given by the executive dept has not become the fixed construction of the Constitution on this subject, such is to control our consciences in legislating upon it. Another instance is suggested: an officer is discharging very important duties at some distant point; it may be in California or it may be at some foreign position; he may die during the session of the Senate, and the President not hear of the death, the President not know of the vacancy until after the adjournment of Congress. Now, you say by this law that during all the following recess that vacancy shall not be filled, and this not because of any evil which has come to the public service by the exercise of this power, but simply because a man may be placed in that position whose political opinions are not agreeable to the majority of Congress. I ask Senators if it is policy to enact such a law, if there may be any injury to the public service by changing the construction which has been uniformly put upon this provision of the Constitution. The case given by Secretary Seward is a strong one; the case which has been suggested to me is another strong one. Are the laws to be executed during the recess? If so, they must be executed through the officers provided by law. If those officers cannot be appointed in particular cases, the laws cannot be executed. Let me suppose another case. The President sends a nomination to the Senate and the Senate bolds that nomination until very nearly the adjournment, and Senators know that that very frequently happens; the nominations are in this body sometimes months before they are acted upon, and on perhaps the very day of the adjournment a nomination may be rejected and it is impossible for the President to fill the place before the adjournment. The public service requires that the duties of that office should be discharged. Now, are Senators willing for partisan purposes to say that that office shall be vacant, and that the public interests and the interests of the people shall suffer for fear that some man may be appointed, tem porarily appointed, whose office cannot continue longer than the close of the next session, whose political views are not agreeable to the majority? That is the question. Because of these considerations I have felt it to be my duty to move to strike that part of the section out, because I believe that under the construction which has been given to the Constitution we cannot enact such a law, and because I believe further that if we have the power it is a very dangerous thing to exercise it as is proposed. The service may suffer.