Boston Public Library - Electric Scotland

WILLIAM B. ALLISON, OF DUBUQUE, IOWA. 133
It is one of his excellent traits that he never deals with the
public business in a partisan spirit. As a legislator he is pre-
eminently a man of affairs. He manages the subjects entrusted
to him with the view of doing the best that is ijossible
for the government. It is because he is determined to do
the best that is in his power that he confines himself so close-
He is not brilliant. He does not
ly to one class of subjects.
address the galleries nor the country, and while his speeches
are not works of art, they are very earnest, and very interest-
ing and informing to those who desire to obtain a thorough
knowledge of the question under discussion. Perhaps the
most popular speech that he ever made in congress was that
on the tariff, from which excerpts have been given. His
argument on the silver question was full of learning. The
pa'rt he has taken in the political debates which have been
made in the senate, especially those of the special session in
1879, when both houses of congress were controlled by the
Democrats, and when there was a bitter conflict between
them and President Hayes, has been that of a questioner and
suggester; and in that way he has had more influence upon
legislation than many a senator whose appearance upon the
fxoor has furnished entertainment for the idlers of the capitol.
While he has not filled any executive office, his Republican
colleagues regard him as a man of exceptional executive
capacfty. When Mr. Garfield was elected president, Mr.
Allison might have been secretary of the treasury. There
was then a general consensus of opinion that, next to Mr.
Sherman, he was the best equipped of his party for that office.
The relations between the president and himself were very
close. They had served together in the house, and they had
acted together on almost every question of public policy,
with the exception, perhaps, of that involved in the silver
bill. Mr. Garfield was desirous that the Iowa senator should
be his finance minister, but the latter was unwilling to quit
the senate, and Mr. Windom was appointed.
In the interesting and exciting times that followed the inauguration
of his friend, he never permicted himself to turn
from the duties with which he was charged to take part in
the factional strife. He was consulted by both sides in the
confident belief, which was never disappointed, that he would
not betray the councils of either. He is too thoroughly
devoted to the public business to permit party politics to interfere
with it, and too strongly devoted to his party to do
to divide it into factions.
He is as quiet in his social life as he is in the senate, and
anything