Page:Life and Select Literary Remains of Sam Houston of Texas (1884).djvu/195

Rh genius of American institutions apply to other than white men, and is it the soldier or the teacher that is to civilize the red races? Houston believed, because he had means of judging, that the Indian, as well as the white man, was to be trusted in civil service. Yet more. Civil Service Reform was urged in precisely the same form, and on the same grounds as now. The venerated Macon, in February, 1823, as chairman of a committee of the Senate on Constitutional Reforms, proposed measures for diminishing and regulating the patronage of the Executive. Though the system of filling subordinate offices with partisan political aspirants, irrespective of fitness, was not then, as under a later administration, inaugurated, the whole history of the Government, observed by himself personally, led Macon to see that only fixed tenure in office could secure the service of men devoted, not to a party, but to the interests of the people. No man in Congress was more firm and faithful than Houston in uncovering, irrespective of party, malfeasance in office, as appeared in the next, the Nineteenth Congress, to which he was elected.

The Presidential election, which was held in the autumn of 1824, and reported to Congress in December, created divisions unknown before. Besides the candidates of the two great parties, two other candidates were in the field. General Jackson, put forward by the Democrats, received 97 electoral votes, having supporters in all sections of the country; Adams, the Whig candidate, received 84 votes, chiefly in New York; Crawford, an Independent, received 41 votes, chiefly from Whigs, especially in Virginia; while Clay received 37 votes, mainly from the West, and, as was supposed, as a Democratic candidate. The election being thus thrown into Congress, as neither candidate had a majority of the votes cast, a union of the friends of Mr. Adams and Clay was formed; Mr. Adams was elected to the Presidency, while Mr. Clay became Secretary of State. As this implied in Mr. Clay a virtual change in political principles, charges of corruption were of course naturally suggested, and Mr. Clay, late in the session, asked an investigation. This Houston opposed. His reasons were given in a circular to his constituents, dated March 3, 1825. The substance of this circular, afterward published in Niles' Register, at Baltimore, May 28th, is worthy of reproduction, as it gives the balanced judgment of Houston on matters of civil and constitutional law. It is as follows:

"At a late day of the present session an appeal was made by the Speaker of the