Ohio History Journal

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THE LONG MEMORY

OF THE UNITED STATES SENATE

 

 

by DONALD WALTER CURL

 

Shortly after his inauguration in March 1889, President Benjamin Har-

rison sent to the Republican-controlled Senate a list of nominees for first

class diplomatic appointments. Among those named were Robert Todd

Lincoln, the former president's son, to London; Frederick D. Grant, an-

other former president's son, to Vienna; Allen T. Rice, the publisher, to

St. Petersburg; Whitelaw Reid, of the New York Tribune, to Paris; and

Murat Halstead, editor of the Cincinnati Commercial Gazette, to Berlin.

The list, according to the New York Times, was rather dull, "but... re-

spectable."1 All of these nominees were confirmed for their posts by the

Senate, with the exception of Murat Halstead.

In a rare departure from precedent, members of the President's own

party refused to give their advice and consent to one of Harrison's nomi-

nees for a major diplomatic post. It was rarer still since Halstead was the

editor of an outstanding Republican newspaper, a friend and adviser of

the President, a confidant of former president Rutherford B. Hayes, an

intimate of James G. Blaine, the newly appointed Secretary of State, and

a man considered in his own right as a power within the party. Finally, the

appointment was thought by some to be one of the best that the President

had made. Halstead spoke German, had numerous friendships among

German-Americans, and knew the German nation well. He had been in

 

NOTES ARE ON PAGES 172-173