MR. PRESIDENT,--It is evident that this debate has opened a broader question than was imagined at first. Doctors disagree. The learned Senator from Illinois differs from the learned Senator from Maine. One expounds the caucus obligations in one way, and the other in another. Now I am clear that this debate ought not to be closed without some defined code of caucus, and it seems to me that the learned Senators, so swift in judgment, ought to supply this code. It should be reduced to a text. We should know to what extent one is bound, and to what extent not bound: whether the Senator from Illinois, who refuses to be bound by the caucus in one point, which was fully discussed, is a man of honor; whether another Senator, who refuses to be bound on other points, is a man of honor. That question could be settled by some explicit code: for we have been admonished that we cannot differ from the caucus without a departure from propriety, if not from duty; and I do not know that stronger language has not been employed. If it has, I will not quote it. It seems to me that this should lead to a practical conclusion, and it is this: to have nothing to do with a proposition which can be discussed only through such avenues, which requires such refinement of detail, with regard to which the Senator from Illinois makes one exception, and other Senators other exceptions, and to which still other Senators entirely object. Now I am not going to complain of the Senator from Illinois. In following his convictions he is doing right; but then I wish him to understand that others on this floor may have the privilege he claims for himself,--justly claims; it is his title. I recognize the Senator as a man of honor, though he does refuse to carry out the decrees of the caucus. I believe that every Senator here has responsibilities as a Senator which are above any he can have to a caucus, which is only a meeting of friends for consultation and for harmony, where each gives up something with a view to a common result, but no man gives up a principle, no man gives up anything vital. No Senator can expect another Senator to give up anything vital; no Senator can expect another Senator to sacrifice a principle. I will not imagine that any Senator would sacrifice a principle. If a Senator expects another to accord with him in the conclusions of a caucus, I know well it is because he does not see it in the light of principle; but if another Senator does see it in the light of principle, how can he be expected to act otherwise than according to his light? It is not given to all to see with the clearness of the caucus-defenders. Theirs is the pathway of light; they see the obligation as complete. Others cannot see it so. I am in that list. I cannot see it as a final obligation. I have been present in many caucuses, and I believe, looking over the past, I have harmonized reasonably with my associates. Sometimes I have been