from Maine, New York, Vermont, Wisconsin, Kansas, and Oregon, left unrepresented no important commercial interest in the nation.

The Committee on Manufactures was headed by William Sprague, Senator from Rhode Island, a State having the largest capital invested, and most persons employed in manufactures, in proportion to population, of any in the Union. Senator Sprague himself having been educated in the counting-room of a manufacturing establishment, and having control of one of the largest manufacturing interests in the country, was the appropriate person for such a position.

The agricultural States of Ohio, Kansas, Maryland, Pennsylvania, and
Kentucky furnished the members of the Committee on Agriculture, with
Senator Sherman at its head.

Of the Committee on the Judiciary, a Senator has given a description. In a speech delivered in the Senate, December 12, 1865, Mr. Doolittle, of Wisconsin, said: "From its very organization the Senate designs to make that committee its constitutional adviser—not that its opinions are to be conclusive or controlling on the vote of any member of this body, like the opinion of the bench of Judges in the House of Lords; but its members are chosen in consideration of their high professional ability, their long experience, and well-known standing as jurists, in order that their report upon constitutional questions may be entitled to the highest consideration. And, sir, if you look into the organization of the Judiciary Committee appointed by the Senate at the present session, what is it? There is the Senator from Illinois, [Mr. Trumbull], for years Judge of the Supreme Court of that State before he entered this body, who, for ten years and more, has been a faithful, laborious, distinguished member of that committee, and for the last four years its chairman. And there sits my honorable friend from New York [Mr. Harris], for twenty years before he came here known and distinguished among the able jurists and judges of that great State. And there is the honorable Senator from Vermont [Mr. Poland]. He has, it is true, just entered this body, but his reputation as a jurist preceded his coming, and he comes here to fill the place in this chamber, and is put upon this Judiciary Committee to fill the place of him of whom I will say, without disparagement to any, that he was the ablest jurist of us all—the late distinguished Senator from Vermont [Mr. Collamer]. And there is the Senator from New Hampshire [Mr. Clark], from the far East, and the Senator from Nevada [Mr. Stewart], from the Pacific coast, and the Senator from Indiana [Mr. Hendricks], from the central region, each of whom stands eminent in the profession in the State which he represents, and all of whom are recognized here among the ablest jurists of this body."

Some of the great political questions destined to engage the attention of the Thirty-ninth Congress invested the Committee on the District of Columbia with a national interest, although its duties pertained chiefly to the local concerns of the immediate neighborhood of the capital. Its chairman, Mr. Morrill, of Maine, as well as its members, among whom were Wade, Sumner, and Yates, gave it character and ability, and afforded assurance that the great questions involved would be calmly met and honestly answered.