The most conspicuous, and what was at one time deemed the most important feature of the Senate, is that it represents the several States of the Union as separate commonwealths, and is thus an essential part of the Federal scheme. Every State, be it as great as New York or as small as Delaware, sends two senators, no more and no less. This arrangement was long resisted by the delegates of the larger States in the Convention of 1787, and ultimately adopted because nothing less would reassure the smaller States, who feared to be overborne by the larger. It is now the provision of the Constitution most difficult to change, for "no State can be deprived of its equal suffrage in the Senate without its consent," a consent most unlikely to be given. There has never, in point of fact, been any division of interests or consequent contests between the great States and the small ones.

The Senate also constitutes, as Hamilton anticipated, a link between the State Governments and the National Government. It is a part of the latter, but its members derive their title to sit in it from their choice by State legislatures. In one respect this connection is no unmixed benefit, for it has helped to make the national parties powerful, and their strife intense, in these last-named bodies. Every vote in the Senate is so important to the great parties that they are forced to struggle for ascendancy in each of the State legislatures by whom the senators are elected. The method of choice in these bodies was formerly left to be fixed by the laws of each State, but as this gave rise to much uncertainty and intrigue, a Federal statute was passed in 1866 providing that each House of a State legislature shall first vote separately for the election of a Federal senator, and that if the choice of both Houses shall not fall on the same person, both Houses in joint meeting shall proceed to a joint vote, a majority of each House being present. Even under this arrangement, a senatorial election often leads to long and bitter struggles; the minority endeavoring to prevent a choice, and so keep the seat vacant.

The method of choosing the Senate by indirect election has excited the admiration of some foreign critics, who have found in it a sole and sufficient cause of the excellence of the Senate

as a legislative and executive authority. But the election of senators has in substance almost ceased to be indirect. They are still nominally chosen, as under the letter of the Constitution they must be chosen, by the State legislatures. The State legislature means, of course, the party for the time dominant, which holds a party meeting (caucus) and decides on the candidate, who is thereupon elected, the party going solid for whomsoever the majority has approved. Now, the determination of the caucus has almost always been arranged beforehand by the party managers. Sometimes when a vacancy in a senatorship approaches, the aspirants for it put themselves before the people of the State. Their names are discussed at the state party convention held for the nomination of party candidates for State offices, and a vote in that convention decides who shall be the party nominee for the senatorship. This vote binds the party within and without the State legislature, and at the election of members for the State legislature, which immediately precedes the occurrence of the senatorial vacancy, candidates for seats in that legislature are generally expected to declare for which aspirant to the senatorship they will, if elected, give their votes.

Members of the Senate vote as individuals, that is to say, the vote a senator gives is his own and not that of his State. It was otherwise in the Congress of the old Confederation before 1789. At present the two senators from a State may belong to opposite parties; and this often happens in the case of senators from States in which the two great parties are pretty equally balanced, and the majority oscillates between them. This fact has largely contributed to render the senators independent of the State legislatures, for as these latter bodies sit for short terms (the larger of the two houses usually for two years only), a senator has during the greater part of his six years' term to look for reëlection not to the present but to a future State legislature.

The length of the senatorial term was one of the provisions of the Constitution which were most warmly attacked and defended in 1788. A six years' tenure, it was urged, would turn the senators into dangerous aristocrats, forgetful of the legisla

ture which had appointed them; and some went so far as to demand that the legislature of a State should have the right to recall its senators. Experience has shown that the term is by no means too long; and its length is one among the causes which have made it easier for senators than for members of the House to procure reëlection, a result which has worked well for the country.

The Senate resembles the Upper Houses of Europe, and differs from those of the British colonies, and of most of the States of the Union, in being a permanent body. It does not change all at once, as do bodies created by a single popular election, but undergoes an unceasing process of gradual change and renewal, like a lake into which streams bring fresh water to replace that which the issuing river carries out. This provision was designed to give the Senate that permanency of composition which might qualify it to conduct or control the foreign policy of the nation. An incidental and more valuable result has been the creation of a set of traditions and a corporate spirit which have tended to form habits of dignity and self-respect. Though the balance of power shifts from one party to another according to the predominance in the State legislatures of one or other party, it shifts more slowly than in bodies directly chosen all at once, and a policy is therefore less apt to be suddenly reversed.

The legislative powers of the Senate are, except in one point, the same as those of the House of Representatives. That one point is a restriction as regards money bills. On the ground that it is only by the direct representatives of the people that taxes ought to be levied, and in obvious imitation of the venerable English doctrine, which had already found a place in several State constitutions, the Constitution provides that "All bills for raising revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives, but the Senate may propose or concur with amendments, as on other bills." In practice, while the House strictly guards its right of origination, the Senate largely exerts its power of amendment, and wrangles with the House over taxes, and still more keenly over appropriations. Almost every session ends with a dispute, a conference, a compromise. Among

the rules of the Senate there is none providing for a closure of debate, or limiting the length either of a debate or of a speech. The Senate is proud of having conducted its business without the aid of such regulations, and this has been due, not merely to the small size of the assembly, but to the sense of its dignity which has usually pervaded its members, and to the power which the opinion of the whole body has exercised on each. Formerly systematic obstruction, or, as it is called in America, "filibustering," familiar to the House, was almost unknown in the calmer air of the Senate.

Divisions are taken, not by separating the senators into lobbies and counting them, as in the British Parliament, but by calling the names of senators alphabetically. The Constitution provides that one fifth of those present may demand that the Yeas and Nays be entered in the journal. Every senator answers to his name with Aye or No. He may, however, ask the leave of the Senate to abstain from voting; and if he is paired, he states, when his name is called, that he has paired with such and such another senator, and is then excused.

When the Senate goes into executive session, the galleries are cleared and the doors closed, and the obligation of secrecy is supposed to be enforced by the penalty of expulsion to which a senator, disclosing confidential proceedings, makes himself liable. Practically, however, newspaper men find little difficulty in ascertaining what passes in secret session. The threatened punishment has never been inflicted, and occasions often arise when senators feel it to be desirable that the public should know what their colleagues have been doing.

CHAPTER VIII

THE SENATE AS AN EXECUTIVE AND JUDICIAL BODY

The Senate is not only a legislative but also an executive chamber; in fact, in its early days the executive functions seem to have been thought the more important; and Hamilton went so far as to speak of the national executive authority as divided between two branches, the President and the Senate. These executive functions are two, the power of approving treaties and that of confirming nominations to office submitted by the President.

The Senate through its right of confirming or rejecting engagements with foreign powers, secures a general control over foreign policy. It is in the discretion of the President whether he will communicate current negotiations to it and take its advice upon them, or will say nothing till he lays a completed treaty before it. One or other course is from time to time followed, according to the nature of the case, or the degree of friendliness existing between the President and the majority of the Senate. But in general, the President's best policy is to keep the leaders of the senatorial majority, and in particular the Committee on Foreign Relations, informed of the progress of any pending negotiation. He thus feels the pulse of the Senate, and foresees what kind of arrangement he can. induce it to sanction, while at the same time a good understanding between himself and his coadjutors is promoted.

This control of foreign policy by the Senate goes far to meet that terrible difficulty which a democracy, or indeed any free government, finds in dealing with foreign Powers. If every step to be taken must be previously submitted to the governing assembly, the nation is forced to show its whole. hand, and precious opportunities of winning an ally or striking a bargain may be lost. If on the other hand the Executive is permitted to conduct negotiations in secret, there is always the risk, either that the governing assembly may disavow what has