When a senator or
member of Congress discovers in some newspaper a statement which he considers
offensive to himself, he rises to a question of privilege, and makes his
statement of facts. Now when an outsider finds himself misrepresented in the
Congressional Record, I suppose he may rise and make his statement of facts.
In the Congressional
Record, Saturday, February 25th, the Hon. James B. Beck is reported as having
said that General Sheridan had come to Washington at an expense to the United
States of a thousand dollars, to assist in having his father-in-law, General
Rucker, made a brigadier-general and quartermaster-general for the purpose of
being retired with increased pay. I know that General Sheridan was ordered to
come to Washington by Secretary of War Lincoln, for an entirely different
matter, at an expense of not to exceed $200, viz. eight cents a mile, coming
and going by the shortest possible mail route, according to a law made by the
Congress of which Mr. Beck was a member.
Mr. Beck is further
reported to have said that General Sherman was in the habit of travelling, with
his large staff, in palace cars at the expense of the United States, nominally
to inspect posts, but really for pleasure. Now this is so totally untrue, and
so diametrically opposed to my usage, that I am simply amazed. Not a cent can
be drawn from the Treasury of the United States without the warrant of law. I
never hired a palace car in my life, surely not at the expense of the United
States, for no quarter-master would pay the voucher, and if such voucher exist,
it can be had on demand of any senator.
General Sherman,
like every army officer, is entitled by law, and receives eight cents a mile
when travelling on duty. My duty and inclination carry me to the remotest parts
of our country, where travel usually costs from ten to twenty-five cents a
mile.
*
* * * * * * * * *
I think the law
ought to provide me a palace car, and I think Mr. Beck agrees with me, and
supposes such to be the fact. I have not a particle of doubt he supposed such
to be the fact, else he would not have asserted it on the floor of the Senate;
but I beg you will on some opportune occasion tell him it is not true, but on
the contrary, that the Government expects me to make tours of the Indian
frontier chiefly at my own cost. The general or lieutenant-general draws the
same travelling allowance as a second lieutenant. No more and no less.
The general of a
department has the right to inspect every post of his command, so the General
of a division is expected to be familiar with the condition of every post
within his sphere of command; and, of course, the commanding general has a
similar right. Without this right an intelligent commander would be impossible.
By this system I am kept informed of everything pertaining to the military
establishment in peace as well as war, and the constant inquiries by Committees
of Congress can thus alone be answered, and I will not alter or change my plans
to suit Senator Beck.
I believe it is
construed as discourteous to refer to a senator in debate by name,—thus you are
addressed as the Honorable Senator from Ohio,—but I infer the rules of the
Senate are not so punctilious about the names of outsiders. Thus Senator Beck
spoke of Generals Sheridan and Sherman by name, and not by office.
We are not ashamed
of our names, and have no objection to their free use on the floor of the
Senate. We fear nothing, not even a positive misstatement, but it surely adds
nothing to the dignity or manliness of a senator to attempt to misrepresent an
absent officer of the common Government, sworn to obey its laws, and to submit
to such measures as it, in its wisdom, may prescribe. . . .
SOURCE: Rachel
Sherman Thorndike, Editor, The Sherman Letters: Correspondence Between
General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, p. 353-5
