Mr. TRUMBULL. Mr. President, I shall not enter into the personal controversy which has arisen here between the Senators from Maine and Massachusetts, nor shall I attempt to follow the Senators from Maine and Maryland in their high eulogiums upon the SecyTreasury, or the Senators from Wisconsin and Massachusetts in what they have said that might be construed in any way as reflecting upon that officer. What I have to say relates, as I conceive, to the public interest. I think it is an evil and a very great evil that we are vesting in the heads of Depts the extraordinary discretion which of late years we are conferring upon them; and I am glad to see upon the Present occasion that even the chairman of the ComFinance is aban doning in some respects that vast discretion which he a few years ago advocated here with such ability ocarried through the Senate. In 1865 we appropriated $250,000 to be placed in the hands of the SecyTreasury, to be disbursed by him among the clerks in his Dept without any check whatever. I opposed that measure as strenuously as I could upon the ground that it was demoralizing, that no SecyTreasury ought to want to have placed in his hands such a fund, that it must be embarrassing to him and would create heart burning and ill feeling among the clerks in his Dept, for those who did not receive a portion of it would think that they were unjustly treated. But, sir, all that I could say and all that those who agreed with me could say was overborne by the statement of the Senfrom Maine that this was necessary, that a quarter of a million of money was to be placed in the hands of the SecyTreasury to be disbursed as he thought proper. ow, sir, we see the results of it. I see that Senators are under some misapprehension as to the disbursements of the $160,000 which we appropriated last year. We learned something in 1866 which we did not know in 1865; for instead of leaving $250,000 to be disbursed entirely at the discretion of the SecyTreasury, as was done in 1865, in 1866 the law defined who shoukd receive a good portion of this money. It provided: “That, so much of the appropriation of $250,000 granted by act approved March 2, 1865, for compensation of temporaryclerks in the Treasury Dept, and for additional compensation to. in the same Dept as remainsunexpended shall be divided as follows, namely: $100each shall be paid to the clerks in said Dept of the 1st and 2nd classes, who have not received any additional com:. " out of aveserved said appropriation, and who shall in said capacity for oneyear previous to July 1, 1863. And $100 shall be paid to eachperson employed intary, said Deptappointed by the Secre at an annual salary amounting to less than $1, 200, and who shall have served under such appointment for oneyear previous to July 1, 1865.” So that the law itself took away from the Secretary a great portion of that discretion which had, unwisely as Congress thought, been conferred upon him the year previous, because if it had not been unwisely done Congress would not have thought it expedient to limit the distribution a year ago. Now, we find the ComFinance striking out entirely this appropriation of 150 or 200,000 dollars, to be disbursed at the pleasure of the SecyTreasury among the clerks in his Dept, whether his favorites or not. It is all stricken out.