he West as an
ardent Whig and an equally ardent Republican.

--Charles Devens of Massachusetts was appointed Attorney-General. His
standing as a lawyer can be inferred from the fact that he had left
the Supreme Bench of his State to accept the position. To eminence in
his profession he added an honorable record as a soldier, having
served with distinction in the civil war and attained the rank of
Brigadier-General. As a private gentleman he was justly and widely
esteemed.

--For Postmaster-General the President selected David M. Key of
Tennessee, who during the previous session had served in the Senate,
by appointment of the Governor of his State, to fill the vacancy caused
by the death of Ex-President Johnson. The selection of Mr. Key was
made to emphasize the change of Southern policy which President Hayes
had foreshadowed in his Inaugural address. Mr. Key was a Democrat,
and personally popular. A Southern Democrat in a Republican Cabinet
presented a novel political combination, and it is evidence of the tact
and good sense of Mr. Key that he administered his Department in such
manner as to secure, not merely the respect of the Republican party,
but the sincere friendship of many of its leading members. He was wise
enough and fortunate enough to induce Hon. James N. Tyner, whom he
succeeded as Postmaster-General, to remain in the Department as First
Assistant, in order that Republican senators and representatives might
freely communicate upon party questions, which Mr. Key delicately
refrained from even hearing. The suggestion was made, however, by men
of sound judgment, that in projecting a new policy towards the South,
which was intended to be characterized by greater leniency in certain
directions, it would have been wiser in a party point of view, and more
enduring in its intrinsic effect, to make the overture through a
Republican statesman of rank and ability.

Among the new senators of the Forty-fifth Congress were some who were
transferred from the House and were already well known to the country.
James B. Beck of Kentucky, George F. Hoar of Massachusetts, Benjamin
H. Hill of Georgia, had each made a brilliant record by his service in
the House. Mr. Blaine of Maine now entered for a full term, but had
come to the Senate several months before as the successor of Honorable
Lot M. Morrill, when that gentleman was called by President Grant to
administer the Treasury Department.--Among those who had not