many States the people composing either of the great parties now select their own representative delegates to National Conventions, and where their selections are not respected, grave party danger is sure to follow. There is nothing wrong in this, since it points to, and is but paving the way for a more popular selection of Presidents and Vice Presidents-to an eventual selection of Presidential electors probably by Congressional districts. Yet those to be selected at large must through practical voluntary forms be nominated in that way, and the partisan State Convention is the best method yet devised for this work, and its instructions should be as binding as those of the people upon their representatives. In this government of ours there is voluntary and legal work delegated to the people directly; there is legal work delegated to appointing powers, and an intelligent discrimination should ever be exercised between the two. "Render unto Cæsar those things which are Caesar's," unless there be a plain desire, backed by a good reason, to promote popular reforms as enduring as the practices and principles which they are intended to support.

Fredrick W. Whitridge, in an able review of the caucus system published * in Lalor's Encyclopædia of Political Science, says:

there was secured the previous concurrence of two-thirds, and this principle was extended to the 56 who supported Mr. Bayne. Then when the joint committee of 24 was agreed upon, it was bound by a rule requiring three-fourths to recommend a candidate. All of these were plain departures from a great principle, and the deeper the contest became, the greater the departure. True, these were but voluntary forms, but they were indefensible, and are only referred to now to show the danger of mad assaults upon great principles when personal and factious aims are at stake. Opposition to the early Congressional caucus was plainly right, since one department of the Government was by voluntary agencies actually controlling another, while the law gave legal forms which could be more properly initiated through voluntary action. The writer believes, and past contests all confirm the view that the voluntary action can only be safely employed by the power by the law with the right of selection. Thus the people elect township, county and State officers, and it is their right and duty by the best attainable voluntary action to indicate their choice. This is done through the caucus or convention, the latter not differing from the former save in extent and possibly breadth of representation. The same rule applies to all offices elective by the people. It cannot properly apply "A caucus, in the political vocabulary to appointive offices, and while the attempt of the United States, is primarily a private to apply it to the election of U. S. Senators meeting of voters holding similar views, shows a strong desire on the part, frequently held prior to an election for the purpose of of the more public-spirited citizens, to ex- furthering such views at the election. ercise a greater share in the selection of With the development of parties, and the these officers than the law directly gives rule of majorities, the caucus or some them, yet their representatives can very equivalent has become an indispensable properly be called upon to act as they would adjunct to party government, and it may act if they had direct power in the pre- now be defined as a meeting of the majority mises, and such action leads them into a of the electors belonging to the same party party caucus, where the will of the majority in any political or legislative body held of their respective parties can be fairly preliminary to a meeting thereof, for the ascertained, and when ascertained re- purpose of selecting candidates to be spected. The State Legislatures appoint voted for, or for the purpose of deU. S. Senators, and the Representatives termining the course of the party at and Senators of the States are bound to the meeting of the whole body. The consider in their selection the good of the candidates of each party are univerentire State. If this comports with the sally selected by caucus, either directly or wish of their respective districts, very indirectly through delegates to convenwell; if it does not, their duty is not less tions chosen in caucuses. In legislative plain. Probably the time will never come bodies the course of each party is often when the people will elect United States predetermined with certainty in caucus, Senators; to do that is to radically change and often discussion between parties has the Federal system, and to practically de- been, in consequence, in some degree stroy one of the most important branches superseded. The caucus system is, in of the Government; yet he is not a careful short, the basis of a complete electoral observer who does not note a growing dis- system which has grown up within each position on the part of the people, and party, side by side with that which is alone largely the people of certain localities, and contemplated by the laws. This condition imaginary political sub-divisions, to control has in recent years attracted much attenthese selections. The same is true of tion, and has been bitterly announced as Presidential nominations, where masses of an evil. It was, however, early foreseen. people deny the right of State Conventions John Adams, in 1814, wrote in the "Tenth to instruct their delegates-at-large. In * By Rand & McNally, Chicago, Ill., 1882.

Letter on Government:" "They have themselves with ballots, including the invented a balance to all balance in their names of the parties fixed upon, which caucuses. We have congressional caucuses, they distributed on the days of election. state caucuses, county caucuses, city cau- By acting in concert, together with a carecuses, district caucuses, town caucuses, ful and extensive distribution of ballots, parish caucuses, and Sunday caucuses at they generally carried their elections to church doors, and in these aristocratical their own mind. In like manner it was caucuses elections have been decided." The that Mr. Samuel Adams first became a caucus is a necessary consequence of representative for Boston." (History of majority rule. If the majority is to define the American Revolution, vol. i., p. 365.) the policy of a party, there must be some February, 1763, Adams writes in his method within each party of ascertaining diary: "This day I learned that the cauthe mind of the majority, and settling the cus club meets at certain times in the garparty programme, before it meets the op- ret of Tom Dawes, the adjutant of the Bosposing party at the polls. The Carlton ton regiment. He has a large house and and Reform clubs discharge for the Tories he has a movable partition in his garret and Liberals many of the functions of a which he takes down and the whole club congressional caucus. Meetings of the meets in his room. There they smoke members of the parties in the reichstag, tobacco until they cannot see one end of the corps legislatif and the chamber of the room from another. There they drink deputies are not unusual, although they flip, I suppose, and there they choose a have generally merely been for consulta- moderator who puts questions to the vote tion, and neither in England, France, regularly; and selectmen, assessors, colGermany or Italy, has any such authority been conceded to the wish of the majority of a party as we have rested in the decision of a caucus. What has been called a caucus has been established by the Liberals of Birmingham, England, as to which, see a paper by W. Fraser Rae, in the "International Review" for August, 1880. The origin of the term caucus is obscure. It has been derived from the Algonquin word Kaw-kaw-wus-to consult, to speak-but the more probable derivation makes it a corruption of caulkers. In the early politics of Boston, and particularly during the early difficulties between the townsmen and the British troops, the seafaring men and those employed about the ship yards were prominent among the town-people, and there were numerous gatherings which may have very easily come to be called by way of reproach a meeting of caulkers, after the least influential class who attended them, or from the caulking house or caulk house in which they were held. What was at first a derisive description, came to be an appellation, and the gatherings of so-called caulkers became a cau

cus.

John Pickering, in a vocabulary of words and phrases peculiar to the United States (Boston, 1816), gives this derivation of the word, and says several gentlemen mentioned to him that they had heard this derivation. Gordon, writing in 1774, says: "More than fifty years ago Mr. Samuel Adams' father and twenty others, one or two from the north end of the town where all the shi business is carried on, used to meet, make a caucus and lay their plan for introducing certain persons into places of trust and power. When they had settled it they separated, and each used their particular influence within his own circle. He and his friends would furnish

lectors, wardens, fire wards and representatives are regularly chosen in the town. Uncle Fairfield, Story, Ruddock, Adams, Cooper, and a rudis indigestaques moles of others, are members. They send committees to wait on the merchants' club, and to propose in the choice of men and measures. Captain Cunningham says, they have often solicited him to go to the caucuses; they have assured him their benefit in his business, etc." (Adams' Works, vol. ii., p. 144.) Under the title caucus should be considered the congressional nominating caucus; the caucuses of legislative assemblies; primary elections, still known outside the larger cities as caucuses; the evils which have been attributed to the latter, and the remedies which have been proposed. These will accordingly be mentioned in the order given.

"The democratic system is the result of the reorganization of the various antiTammany democratic factions, brought about, in 1881, by a practically self-appointed committee of 100. Under this system primary elections are to be held annually in each of 678 election districts, at which all democratic electors resident in the respective districts may participate, provided they were registered at the last general election. The persons voting at any primary shall be members of the election district association for the ensuing year, which is to be organized in January of each year. The associations may admit democratic residents in their respective districts, who are not members, to membership, and they have general supervision of the interests of the party within their districts. Primaries are held on not less than four days' public notice, through the newspapers, of the time and place, and at the ap pointed time the meeting is called to order by the chairman of the election district as

sociation, provided twenty persons be present; if that number shall not be present, the meeting may be called to order with a less number, at the end of fifteen minutes. The first business of the meeting is to select a chairman, and all elections of delegates or committeemen shall take place in open meeting. Each person, as he offers to vote, states his name and residence, which may be compared with the registration list at the last election, and each person shall state for whom he votes, or he may hand to the judges an open ballot, having designated thereon the persons for whom he votes, and for what positions. Nominations are all made by conventions of delegates from the districts within which the candidate to be chosen is to be voted for. There is an assembly district committee in each assembly district, composed of one delegate for each 100 votes or fraction thereof, from each election district within the assembly district. There is also a county committee composed of delegates from each of the assembly district committees. The function of these committees is generally to look after the interests of the parties within their respective spheres. This system is too new for its workings to be as yet fairly criticised. It may prove a really popular system, or it may prove only an inchoate form of the other systems. At present it can only be said that the first primaries under it were participated in by 27,000 electors.

You caucus for no other possible purpose than under the implied argument that the opinion and wishes of the minority shall be yielded to the opinions of the majority, and the sole object of caucusing is to ascertain what is the will of the majority. I repeat that unless you intend to carry into effect the wishes of the majority, however contrary to your own, you have no business at a caucus.' (Political History of New York, vol. i., p. 192).-In accordance with this theory, the will of the majority becomes obligatory as soon as it is made known, and one cannot assist at a caucus in order to ascertain the will of the majority, without thereby being bound to follow it; and the theory is so deeply rooted that, under the caucus and primary election system, it has been extended to cases in which the majorities are such only in form.

"The remedies as well as the evils of the caucus and nominating system have been made the subject of general discussion in connection with civil service reform. It is claimed that that reform, by giving to public officers the same tenure of their positions which is enjoyed by the employes of a corporation or a private business house, or during the continuance of efficiency or good behaviour, would abolish or greatly diminish the evils of the caucus system by depriving public officers of the illegitimate incentive to maintain it under which they now act. Other more speculative remedies "The evils of the caucus and primary have been suggested. It is proposed, on election systems lie in the stringent obliga- the one hand, to very greatly diminish the tion which is attached to the will of a for- number of elective officers, and, in order to mal majority; in the fact that the process do away with the pre-determination of elecof ascertaining what the will of the major- tions, to restrict the political action of the ity is, has been surrounded with so many people in their own persons to districts so restrictions that the actual majority of votes small that they can meet together and act are disfranchised, and take no part in that as one body, and that in all other affairs process, so that the formal majority is in than those of these small districts the consequence no longer the majority in fact, people should act by delegates. The thealthough it continues to demand recogni-ory here seems to be to get rid of the netion of its decisions as such.

cessity for election and nominating ma"The separation between the organiza- chinery. (See A True Republic,' by Altion and the party, between those who no- bert Strickney, New York, 1879; and a seminate and those who elect, is the sum of ries of articles in Scribner's Monthly for the evils of the too highly organized cau- 1881, by the same writer). On the other cus system. It has its roots in the notion hand, it is proposed to greatly increase the that the majority is right, because it is the number of elections, by taking the whole majority, which is the popular view thus primary system under the protection of the expressed by Hammond: 'I think that law.* This plan proposes: 1. The direct when political friends consent to go into nomination of candidates by the members caucus for the nomination of officers, every of the respective political parties in place member of such caucus is bound in honor of nominations by delegates in conventions. to support and carry into effect its deter- 2. To apply the election laws to primary mination. If you suspect that determina- elections. 3. To provide that both politition will be so preposterous that you can-cal parties shall participate in the same not in conscience support it, then you ought primary election instead of having a differon no account to become one of its mem- ent caucus for each party. 4. To provide bers. To try your chance in a caucus, and for a final election to be held between two then, because your wishes are not gratified, candidates, each representative of a party to attempt to defeat the result of the deliberation of your friends, strikes me as a *This was partially done by the Legislature of palpable violation of honor and good faith. | Pennsylvania in 1881.

time previously entered through the main door, advanced to the centre of the room, and having reached within a few feet of his victim, fired two shots, one of which took fatal effect. The bullet was of fortyfour calibre, and striking the President about four inches to the right of the spinal column, struck the tenth and badly shattered the eleventh rib. The President sank to the floor, and was conveyed to a room where temporary conveniences were attainable, and a couch was improvised. Dr. Bliss made an unsuccessful effort to find the ball. The shock to the President's system was very severe, and at first apprehensions were felt that death would ensue speedily. Two hours after the shooting, the physicians decided to remove him to the Executive Mansion. An army ambulance was procured, and the removal effected. Soon after, vomiting set in, and the patient exhibited a dangerous degree of prostration, which threatened to end speedily in dissolution. This hopeless condition of affairs continued until past midnight, when more favorable symptoms were exhibited. Dr. Bliss was on this Sunday morning designated to take charge of the case, and he called Surgeon - General Barnes, Assistant Surgeon-General Woodward, and Dr. Reyburn as consulting physician. To satisfy the demand of the country, Drs. Agnew, of Philadelphia, and Hamilton, of New York, were also summoned by telegraph, and arrived on a special train over the Pennsylvania Railroad, Sunday afternoon. For several days immediately succeeding the shooting, the patient suffered great inconvenience and pain in the lower limbs. This created an

who have been selected by means of the primary election. This plan would undoubtedly do away with the evils of the present caucus system, but it contains no guarantee that a new caucus system would not be erected for the purpose of influencing the primary election' in the same manner in which the present primary system now influences the final election. (See however The Elective Franchise in the United States,' New York, 1880, by D. C. McClellan.)The effective remedy for the evils of the caucus system will probably be found in the sanction of primary elections by law. Bills for this purpose were introduced by the Hon. Erastus Brooks in the New York Legislature in 1881, which provided substantially for the system proposed by Mr. McClellan, but they were left unacted upon, and no legislative attempt to regulate primaries, except by providing for their being called, and for their procedeure, has been made elsewhere. In Ohio what is known as the Baber law provides that where any voluntary political association orders a primary, it must be by a majority vote of the central or controlling committee of such party or association; that the call must be published for at least five days in the newspapers, and state the time and place of the meeting, the authority by which it was called, and the name of the person who is to represent that authority at each poll. The law also provides for challenging voters, for punishment of illegal voting, and for the bribery or intervention of electors or judges. (Rev. Stat. Ohio, secs. 2916-2921.) A similar law in Missouri is made applicable to counties only of over 100,000 inhabitants, but by this law it is made optional with the volun-apprehension that the spinal nerves had tary political association whether it will or not hold its primaries under the law, and if it does, it is provided that the county shall incur no expense in the conduct of such elections. (Laws of Missouri 1815, p. 54.) A similar law also exists in California. (Laws of California, 1865-1866, p. 438.) These laws comprise all the existing legislation on the subject, except what is known as the Landis Bill of 1881, which requires primary officers to take an oath, and which punishes fraud."

Assassination of President Garfield.

At 9 o'clock on the morning of Saturday, July 24, 1881, President Garfield, accompanied by Secretary Blaine, left the Executive Mansion to take a special train from the Baltimore and Potomac depot for New England, where he intended to visit the college from which he had graduated. Arriving at the depot, he was walking arm-in-arm through the main waitingroom, when Charles J. Guiteau, a persistent applicant for an office, who had some

been injured, and death was momentarily expected. On the night of July 4th a favorable turn was observed, and the morning of the 5th brought with it a vague but undefined hope that a favorable issue might ensue. Under this comforting conviction, Drs. Agnew and Hamilton, after consultation with the resident medical attendants, returned to their homes; first having published to the country an indorsement of the treatment inaugurated. During July 5th and 6th the patient continued to improve, the pulse and respiration showing a marked approach to the condition of healthfulness, the former being reported on the morning of the 6th at 98, and in the evening it only increased to 104. On the 7th Dr. Bliss became very confident of ultimate triumph over the malady. In previous bulletins meagre hope was given, and the chances for reco very estimated at one in a hundred.

From July 7th to the 16th there was a slight but uninterrupted improvement, and the country began to entertain a confident hope that the patient would recover.

hope rose and fell alternately, and though the patient's spirits fluctuated to justify this change of feeling, the improvement failed to bring with it the strength necessary to meet the strain.

Hope and fear alternated from day to improvement was not enduring, however, day, amid the most painful excitement. and on Saturday, September 17th, the On the 8th of August Drs. Agnew and rigor returned. During the nights and Hamilton had to perform their second days succeeding, until the final moment, operation to allow a free flow of pus from the wound. This resulted in an important discovery. It was ascertained that the track of the bullet had turned from its downward deflection to a forward course. The operation lasted an hour, and ether! President Garfield died at 10.35 on the was administered, the effect of which was night of Sept. 19th, 1881, and our nation very unfortunate. Nausea succeeded, and mourned, as it had only done once before, vomiting followed every effort to adminis- when Abraham Lincoln also fell by the ter nourishment for some time. However, band of an assassin. The assassin Guiteau he soon rallied, and the operation was pro-was tried and convicted, the jury rejecting nounced successful, and, on the following his plea of insanity.

day, the President, for the first time, wrote his name. On the 10th he signed an important extradition paper, and on the 11th wrote a letter of hopefulness to his aged mother. On the 12th Dr. Hamilton expressed the opinion that the further attendance of himself and Dr. Agnew was The stomach continued weak, however, and on the 15th nausea returned, and the most menacing physical prostration followed the frequent vomiting, and the evening bulletin announced that "the President's condition, on the whole, is less satisfactory."

unnecessary.

Next a new complication forced itself upon the attention of the physicians. This was described as "inflammation of the right parotid gland." On August 24th it was decided to make an incision below and forward of the right ear, in order to prevent suppuration. Though this operation was pronounced satisfactory, the tient gradually sank, until August 25th, when all hope seemed to have left those in attendance.

pa

President Arthur.

Vice-President Arthur, during the long illness of the President, and at the time of his death, deported himself so well that he won the good opinion of nearly all classes of the people, and happily for weeks and months all factious or partisan spirit was hushed by the nation's great calamity. At midnight on the 19th of September the Cabinet telegraphed him from Long Branch to take the oath of office, and this he very properly did before a local judge. The Government cannot wisely be left without a head for a single day. He was soon afterwards again sworn in at Washington, with the usual ceremonies, and took occasion to make a speech which improved the growing better feeling. The new President requested the Cabinet to hold on until Congress met, and it would have remained intact had Secretary Windom not found it necessary to resume his place in the Senate. The vacancy was offered to ex-Governor Morgan, of New York, who was actually nominated and confirmed before he made up his mind to decline it. Judge Folger now fills the place. The several changes since made will be found in the Tabulated History, Book VII.

It has thus far been the effort of Presi

dent Arthur to allay whatever of factious bitterness remains in the Republican party. In his own State of New York the terms "Half-Breed" and "Stalwart" are passing into comparative disuse, as are the terms "Regulars" and "Independents"

Two days of a dreary watch ensued; on the 27th an improvement inspired new hope. This continued throughout the week, but failed to build up the system. Then it was determined to remove the patient to a more favorable atmosphere. On the 6th of September this design was executed, he having been conveyed in a car arranged for the purpose to Long Branch, where, in a cottage at Elberon, it was hoped vigor would return. At first, indications justified the most sanguine expectations. On the 9th, however, fever returned, and a cough came to harass the wasted sufferer. It was attended with in Pennsylvania. purulent expectoration, and became so troublesome as to entitle it to be regarded as the leading feature of the case. The surgeons attributed it to the septic condition of the blood. The trouble increased until Saturday, September 10th, when it was thought the end was reached. He rallied, however, and improved rapidly, during the succeeding few days, and on Tuesday, the 13th, was lifted from the bed and placed in a chair at the window. The

"Boss Rule."

The complaint of "Boss Rule" in these States-by which is meant the control of certain leaders-still obtains to some extent. Wayne MacVeagh was the author of this very telling political epithet, and he used it with rare force in his street speeches at Chicago when opposing the nomination of Grant. It was still further cultivated