Mr. be ER. I cannot admit, as the Gentfrom Ohio [Mr. Seusxcu] seems to think, that I have been unfortunate in my illustrations. The cases of Generals Grant and Sherman were cited by me for the purpose of illustrating the fact that even under our present system of promotion by seniority, great and shining meritcould findits way to the surface. In time of war the regular system of promotion by seniority is to a great extent disregarded as it. has been throu bout the whole course of the late war and was willing to admit, too, that if we were always to be at war, then the system proposed by this bill is the very one which ought to lie adopted. Amid the storm of war military merit makes itself evident, and enables us to distinguish truly when the junior should command the senior. But we are now preparing an army for a peace establishment, and I say that it is not a good general rule in time of peace to select for promotion otherwise than by seniority and I do not think there is much weight, with all due deference to the argument of the Gentleman, in the suggestion that we are likely to be overburdened with inefficient and incompe tent officers; for you have your examinin and retiring boards to enable you to rid the may of all that sort of material under the operation of the existing system. Then again the section which the Gentfrom Ohio [Mr. scanner] points out as the remedy of the evils which are complained of as likely to result under the system which he would introduce, namely, section 34, does not provide at all, as he asserts it does, for a board of examiners composed of Army Officers to make selections for promotions, but it provides in these words: That no otheer of the Army below the rank of coloncl shall hereafter be promoted to a higher grade before havini: passed o sutisfuctoryexamination as to his fitness for promotion and record of past servicos before a board of 3 General officers o. fficersol his corps or armof servicesenior to hiiii in rank. It will be perceived that this board is to de cide upon the fitness of officers for promotion. But they do not decide as to the respective merits of the different officers who may appear before the board, but only in general terms as to the fitness or unfitness for promotion. Having received the certificate of such an examining board, a young officer may grow fiay before he receives the promotion for which they certify he is fitted. Now, one of the great evils which will pervade this system thus sought to be introduced into the Army, will be that whenever a vacancy occurs there will be a strife among the various officers as to who is entitled by merit to promotion to fill the vacancy. In aregiment, for example, where a coloneleyis to be filled. every captain in the regiment will consider himself entitled by merit to supersede not only the other captains but the major and the lieutenant colonel; and thus, in every regiment where a vacancy occurs, and as often as it occurs, there will be a scene of jealousy, strife, and intrigue calculated to lead eventually to the demoralization of the Army, and to the destruction of that espritducorps which it is absolutely necessary should be pre served if we desire that our Army shall continue to be in the future what it. has been in the past.