Page:Speeches, correspondence and political papers of Carl Schurz, Volume 5.djvu/184

160 Of the thousands of officers, therefore, in the United States, a very few individuals only, probably not twenty, will be removed, and those only for doing what they ought not to have done. I know that in stopping thus short in the career of removals I shall give great offence to many of my friends. That torrent has been pressing me heavily and will require all my force to bear up against; but my maxim is fiat justitia, ruat cœlum.

And in his letter of July 12, 1801, to the merchants of New Haven, he said:

It would have been a circumstance of great relief had I found a moderate participation of office in the hands of the majority. I would gladly have left to time and accident to raise them to their just share. But their total exclusion calls for prompter corrections. I shall correct the procedure, but that done shall return with joy to that state of things when the only question concerning a candidate shall be, Is he honest? Is he capable? Is he faithful to the Constitution?

I invite the modern Democrat to contemplate in a spirit of candor and soberness, and perhaps with some reverence, the example set by the father of the Democratic party. The Federalists, the first party in possession of the Government, had filled almost all the offices during three Presidential terms. When after a furious contest the Democrats came into power, the provocation for sweeping changes was as great as it has ever been since. What did Jefferson do? He was a warm partisan himself, and a keen politician too. But did he permit himself to be swept off his feet by the greedy clamor of his adherents? Did he resolve upon a clean sweep and, in the sanguinary parlance of to-day, “set up the guillotine” to make the heads of Federal placemen promiscuously fly into the basket? Did he proceed upon the idea that under a Democratic Administration all Government officers must