Mr. HOWE. I listened to a declaration of my colleaguejust now that interested me very deepl an rejoiced me considerably. I hope it will turn out to be entirely correct. Iunder stood him to say that the POTUS is peculiarly tolerant of political opposition; that in point of fact we never have had a President more tolerant than he; that he tolerates opposition even in the members of his own Cabinet, and that he makes no removal from office for opinions sake. Now, Mr. President, if this turns out to be so, I shall be very glad, I shall be exceeding lad, for I am bound to say that of all the Presidents we have ever had in office, I think there is no one of them under such heavy obligation to be tol erant of Opinions opposed to his own as the present President. Sir, the relations between the present POTUS and the party which made him President are of a very peculiar character. That party, you must remember, air, is made up in the main of a body of men ainst whom the President had been at war alhis life until the great body of those men with whom he had acted all his life turned their backs upon the Government and became trai tors to it; and when that happened, the POTUS declined to o with them any longer, stood by the flag as e had always stood, remained true when 1,000s about him were false. That was the single fact which commended him to the confidence of that party which made him VEEP I say he was commended to their judments and to their confidence by the simple act that he did not prove a traitor when 1,000s about him did. For that act of simple fidelity, that is what it is, simply fidelity to his duty as a citizen, we were grate ful, profoundly grateful; and having proved in the very mornin of the struggle ighathe was disposed to stun by the old flag and to uphold the authority of the nation, we were led to believe that he would stand there and thus to the end of the struggle; and so in its very morning we clothed him with the authority and with the emoluments of a brigadier general in l the Army, and we sent him to Nashville to [ assist in defending one of the strategic points in the great controversy that was going on. The POTUS alludes to i that, I see, occasionallyas an actwhich placed. him at a point of imminent peril. Ay, Mr. President, Nashville was a point of imminent eril; in that day there was no point in the U.S. which was not a point of immi nent peril; but when we sent the present president to Nashville we sent security with him; we planted our armies between him and the enemy, a wall of adamant, and gave to Nash ville the same security we gave to Washington and to every other point within the national lines. It was a place of peril because wide spread defection and treason had covered the country with peril. That was all. But it was not peculiarly perilous. We made that not we i who fill these seats, but this nation made Nash ville as secure as any oint. He staid there; he did his duty; an grateful for that duty done, we said to him because he had been. faithful over a few things we would make him ruler over many, and we did make him the VEEP, commended to us asI said before by the single fact that he had been loyal in the beginning of the struggle, and he had been faithful to the one trust we had imposed in him as a general in the Army. It happened that when he had been made by our votes VEEP a terrible disaster overtook the country and he became the president; and it. happened that soon after he became the POTUS the fact was developed that there was a difference ofo llllIOIl upon some points of policy between the resident and the great body of that party which had been instrumental in making him President, upon questions which we thought, and which we think, and which I for one know, are vital and fundamental, if there are any vital and fundamental questions in American pol itics. We found that he was in harmony with those who had opposed his election, and at variance with those who had given him his election. I am not here to discuss the right or the wrong of that difference, for this is not the occasion; I have spoken upon it once and others have spoken upon it freely. I am not here to arrai n the sincerity of these opinions of the Presideat; this is not the occasion for that, ifthat sincerity is open to attack at all, which I do not say. But. conceding him to be sincere in his convictions of duty, this is the thing, I say: that the President was bound to concede sincerity to those who dillered with him, for they had shown that they were disposed to have no personal controversy with iim; they had shown that they were grateful for every political merit he had discovered, and I think they had shown as much magna nimity as ever was exhibited in the conduct of one part toward one who had been a leading and a li e long opponent of theirs. He was bound, I as, to concede sincerity to his oppo nents. I db not say that the President was bound to surrender his own convictions of duty because the party which made him president took another view; but I do say he, of all the Presidents who ever lived, was bound to be tolerant of this difference that existed and was develoed in the body of the party which made him President. That is why I say that he of all men that have ever been put in the presidential office was bound to exercise that very toleration which my colleague tells us now he is going to exercise and is exercising. But, air, as to the fact whether he has exercised that spirit of toleration or not, as to whether he will exercise it hereafter, lhave an event or 2 to refer to. My colleague says that he has made a few removals, not for opinions sake, but to reward gallantry and fidelity exhibited in the soldiers of our Army. I am told my colleague knows whether my information is correct that among the removals which he has been asked to make is me of u gentleman who has for several years filled the office of sub Indian agent for the Indians in the northeastern part of Wisconsin. I am told that he has been asked to remove him from that Office, and to place in it a gentleman who has been connected with the Army it is true, because he has filled since 1861 or 1862the office of paymaster in the Army. paying troops at different points the city of Washington being one, the city of Madison. in our own State, being another, and, I believe, the city of StLouis, bein the 3rd a faithful officer, no doubt, but I take it not coming within the description of those Officers to which our resolutions and our laws referred when they called for discrimination in their favor in the distribution of atronage. But, sir, I am told fur v ther that the Representative from the district in which this office is located, recognizing the propriety of discriminating in favor of soldiers, did think that this payinaster, or expaymaster, was not the most. deserving soldier, and ug gested that instead of his being appointed in place, of that agent whose removal was decided upon, one General Swett should be a pointed, who had been in the Arm and ha been in the line and on the field, iad been shot, not to pieces but had been crippled for life, had displayed great gallantry, had been placed in command of Camp Douglas, near Chicago, and in the discharge of his duty as such command ant, by his energy and by his activity, had really saved the city of Chico o from that which was developed conspiracg there in 1864. I am tol that it was proposed by the representative of that district that this individua should be the recipient of this Office instead of the expaymaster, and I am told that that proposition is absolutely and eremptorily decline, and that my colleague eclines it; and I am told that he has obtained from the President I recite this as rumor; I do not vouch for the truth of any of these statements; I speak of them here because here they can be contradicted a peremptory order on the SecyInterior that the former agent be removed and that the expaymaster be appointed. low, if that is so I am afraid, whatever may be the motive of the President, it will be understood as being intended to favor political Opinion and not military service. I ear that the more because I have been told that this expaymaster was a member of the convention in our State last fall ahd presided over the deliberations of that body, to whose action my colleague has referred several times here as having had very important influence upon the action of the State and upon his action here. That fact being known in Wisconsin, if it be true that the President peremptorily orders his appointment instead of the appointment of this wounded and eripled soldier, I am afraid it will he understoo as a removal for opinions sake, or if not a removal for opinious sake, an appointment for opinions sake. That is one fact which leads me to fear that there is great danger, in spite of what my colleague says, that this power of removal, if conceded to the President, will be exercised for political and partisan purposes. There is another fact to which I wish to call the attention of my colleague. I have my eye upon it now, and I will read it. I read it from a newspaper, it is true, and perhaps as such it is not entitled to any consequence.