From that time onward, although there was much condemnation of the evil practice of removing good officers for opinion's sake, each party as it came into power practiced it; and prior to 1860 no movement was made with the distinct purpose of changing this feature off the civil service.
Blaine notes the ongoing practice of removing officials for political reasons despite public condemnation.
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The haste with which the question was brought to a decision can hardly be justified, and is a striking illustration of the intense party-feeling which had been engendered by the war.
It is to the eminent credit of the Republican members of Congress that they stood in a crisis of this magnitude true to principle, firm against all the power and all the patronage of the Administration.
I have long since wished that capital punishment were abolished.
Many Northern Democrats had indeed given the assurance that if any attempt at coercion should be made by the Republican National Administration, they would themselves meet it with force, and that, if war should come, it would be in the…
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