THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 MEMORIAL ADDRESSES 
 
 LIFE AND CHARACTER 
 
 OF 
 
 FRANK WELCH, 
 
 (A REPRESENTATIVE FROM NEBRASKA), 
 
 DELIVERED IN THE 
 
 HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES AND IN THE SENATE, 
 FORTY-FIFTH CONGRESS, THIRD SESSION. 
 
 PUBLISHED BV ORDER OF CONGRESS. 
 
 WASHINGTON: 
 
 GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE. 
 1879.
 
 FORTY-FIFTH CONGRESS, THIRD SESSION. 
 
 CONGRESS OF THE UNITED STATES, 
 IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, February 27, 1879. 
 Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate concurring), That there be 
 printed twelve thousand copies of the memorial addresses delivered in the Senate 
 and House of Representatives upon the life and character of the late FRANK 
 WELCH, late a Representative from the State of Nebraska; of which nine thou- 
 sand shall be for the use of the House and three thousand for the use of the 
 Senate. 
 Attest : 
 
 GEO. M. ADAMS, Clerk. 
 
 AN ACT providing for the engraving and printing of portraits to accompany memorial 
 addresses on the late Representatives Leonard, Quinn, Welch, Williams, Douglas, Hart- 
 ridge, and Schleicher. 
 
 Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of 
 America in Congress assembled, That the Secretary of the Treasury be, and he is 
 hereby, authorized and directed to cause to be engraved and printed portraits of the 
 late Representatives Leonard, Quinn, Welch, Williams, Douglas, Hartridge, and 
 Schleicher, to accompany memorial addresses delivered in the Senate and House of 
 Representatives in honor of the said deceased Representatives, and to defray the 
 expenses thereof the necessary sum is hereby appropriated out of any money in the 
 Treasury not otherwise appropriated, such sum to be immediately available. 
 
 Approved, March 3, 1879.
 
 fcfcif 
 
 ADDRESSES 
 
 ON THE 
 
 DEATH OF FRANK WELCH 
 
 PROCEEDINGS IN THE HOUSE. 
 
 FEBRUARY 19, 1879. 
 
 < 
 On motion of Mr. SAPP, by unanimous consent, 
 
 Ordered, That the memorial services in honor of the late FRANK 
 WELCH, late a Representative from the State of Nebraska, be held 
 to-morrow evening, at the session heretofore ordered by the House. 
 
 FEBRUARY 21, 1879. 
 
 Mr. MAJORS. I offer the resolutions which I send to the desk. 
 
 The Clerk read as follows : 
 
 Resolved, That this House has heard with profound regret of the 
 death of Hon. FKANK WELCH, late a Representative from the State 
 of Nebraska. 
 
 Resolved, That the House do now suspend the consideration of 
 public business, in order to pay proper respect to the memory of the 
 lamented deceased. 
 
 Resolved, That in token of regard for the memory of the lamented 
 deceased, the members of this House do wear the usual badge of 
 mourning for thirty days. 
 
 Resolved, That the Chief Clerk of the House do communicate these 
 resolutions to the Senate of the United States. 
 
 Resolved, That out of further respect to the memory of the deceased 
 this House do now adjourn.
 
 ADDRESS OF MR. MAJORS ON THE 
 
 ADDRESS OF yVlR. yVlAJORS, OF J^EBRASKA. 
 
 Mr. SPEAKER : At nine o'clock in the evening of September 4, 
 1878, at Neligh, Nebraska, Hon. FRANK WELCH departed this life, 
 the victim of a paralytic stroke. He died in his chair, away from 
 home and family. He was surrounded by warm and dear friends, 
 but no wife, no relative was near to utter words of cheer as he passed 
 into the dark valley. More than a year ago the warning stroke came, 
 which, while it did not blast, yet so affected his stalwart frame that 
 he never fully recovered his wonted health and vigor. 
 
 Possessing a sanguine disposition, and trusting to the recuperative 
 energies of his nature, he refused to spare himself, and entered upon 
 and continued his labors in this body with characteristic 'ardor and 
 energy. When he returned home last July his changed appearance 
 was marked by his acquaintances, and caused his friends no little 
 anxiety. It was thought that the pure and bracing air of his west- 
 ern home, together with needed rest and recreation, would bring back 
 the luster to his cheek and restore vigor to his frame. But when hope 
 ran highest, when least expected, the lightning again descended and 
 consumed the life that was left, remembering that 
 
 'Tis the twink of an eye, 'tis the draught of a breath, 
 From the blossom of health to the paleness of death, 
 From the gilded saloon to the bier and the shroud, 
 O, why should the spirit of mortal be proud ! 
 
 Mr. WELCH died in the meridian of life, at the period of his great 
 usefulness as a citizen and public servant. With large capacity for 
 usefulness; with wide, varied experience in public affairs, and great 
 responsibilities on his shoulders, at a time when his influence was 
 sweeping into a broader arena, when the fervor of youth was still 
 in his blood, the shadowy hand beckoned him to his journey across 
 the dark continent to the land beyond the sun.
 
 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF FRANK WELCH. 
 
 In the beautiful and expressive language of a former member of 
 this body : 
 
 We complain that the divine sickle could not wait for its human harvest until the 
 whitened and bending heads should incline with the weight of years toward the 
 earth which was destined to receive them. 
 
 As Mr. WELCH'S successor it becomes my duty, as his friend it is 
 my privilege, to hold up to public view the record of a life which has 
 in it much that is praiseworthy and little that can be censured. Mr. 
 WELCH was born in Massachusetts in 1835. In childhood his fam- 
 ily removed to Boston, where Mr. WELCH received his education. 
 Adopting the profession of engineering, he came West in 1857 to 
 assist in running the line of a projected railway across Iowa, the ter- 
 minus of which was to be on the east bank of the Missouri. In 1863 
 he married, in Boston, Miss Elizabeth Butts, of Hudson, New York. 
 In the mean time he engaged in the mercantile business, which re- 
 sulted disastrously. At various times he represented his section of 
 country in the Territorial and State legislatures, and in 1865 was 
 president of the upper house. In 1871 he was appointed register of 
 the land office at West Point, Nebraska, which position he held until 
 1876. In the fall of 1876 his claims were pressed with such enthu- 
 siasm by his friends that he received at the hands of the Republican 
 State convention the nomination for member of Congress, and after 
 a spirited contest was elected by an overwhelming majority. 
 
 Mr. WELCH entered Congress in the prime of manhood, when the 
 play of his pulse was still healthful, representing as large an expanse 
 of country as all New England, and a population of over three hun- 
 dred thousand. The demands upon his time and strength were in- 
 cessant. The extension of the postal service and keeping up the 
 efficiency of the Federal Government to a level with the needs and 
 wants of a growing State required his constant attention. Nebraska 
 may have had in this body in other days men of greater talent, men 
 of broader culture, yet it is doubtful whether any of her Representa-
 
 ADDRESS OF MR. MAJORS ON THE 
 
 lives ever served her with such fidelity and tireless industry as Mr. 
 WELCH. 
 
 Mr. WELCH was, indeed, a representative man. Though educated 
 in the Athens of America, yet he had lived so long in the West, 
 almost a quarter of a century, that he might be called a child of the 
 prairies. He had stood by the cradle when the young State was 
 born ; he had grown with its growth ; his name was in some measure 
 identified with its greatness. He knew the needs and wants of his 
 people, and was in warm sympathy with their life and purposes. He 
 took a pride in the State of his adoption, occupying the midway 
 position between the far East and the far West, along which the life 
 currents of immigration daily flow. He expected to see the dream 
 of one of America's most gifted poets realized, " She is the prairie 
 dame, that sitteth in the middle and looketh east and looketh west." 
 Hence Mr. WELCH was peculiarly fitted to represent the people of 
 my State in the national councils. Had he lived, it was the hope of 
 his friends, and perhaps his own ambition, that his influence in pub- 
 lic affairs, which had hitherto been confined to the limits of his own 
 State, might sweep out into broader fields of usefulness; but "death's 
 untimely frost" nipped the blossoming hopes of his friends and his 
 own budding aspirations. 
 
 Mr. WELCH in public life was an eminently useful man. His in- 
 fluence was a positive force for good. He reached and controlled 
 men in the most practical way. He was no orator. He possessed 
 none of the graces of oratory which captivate and conquer public 
 assemblies, yet when the occasion was imperative he could put his 
 thoughts into the traces of compact expression and utter his ideas 
 with force and clearness. "Many are the friends of the golden 
 tongue," says the Welsh proverb. FRANK WELCH, however, had 
 many friends though he did not possess the golden tongue in the 
 sense used. Without marked ability for public speaking, without 
 great knowledge of that seasoned life of men stored up in books,
 
 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF FRANK WELCH. 
 
 and little of that ripe culture which comes from meditation in the 
 closet, yet Mr. WELCH was an influential man. 
 
 He had mingled with and been jostled by men upon the dust-swept 
 highway of business life; he had been in close contact with those 
 extreme types of character indigenous to frontier life. He had in 
 his earlier life known men at the other extreme who had been under 
 the intellectual sand-paper too long, and he had thereby acquired that 
 practical talent, that ready adaptation of means to ends which reaches 
 and controls men and often achieves success when a higher talent 
 fails. 
 
 Mr. WELCH in private life was an exemplary man. He enjoyed 
 life with the keenest zest. While he lived laborious days, yet he did 
 not scorn delights of life. Mr. WELCH was a man of fine social 
 powers; there was a genial magnetism in his presence, a certain 
 heartiness in his greeting, a frankness and openness of manner that 
 attracted men. 
 
 It was said of the late Lord Holland that he always came down to 
 breakfast with the air of a man who had just met with some signal 
 good fortune. Mr. WELCH possessed a like sunny disposition over 
 which the clouds of gloom rarely if ever settled. 
 
 But it was in the sacred precincts of the home circle that his social 
 nature shone with the pure luster. It was there that he gave utter- 
 ance to the best thoughts of his best soul, and gave full play to the 
 kindly emotions of the heart. Upon his hearth-stone the fires of do- 
 mestic happiness always burned brightly. In his home, where peace, 
 love, and happiness were enthroned, he found both an incentive to 
 his ambition and rest from his exciting public labors. 
 
 But the seal of death has been placed upon his life before it had 
 attained the ripeness of age. The reed has been broken by an un- 
 timely wind. A useful man, an active and vigilant public servant, 
 an ornament to society has retreated from the din and turmoil of life 
 to the realms beyond.
 
 8 ADDRESS OF MR. SAPP ON THE 
 
 It remains for us to move upon the stream of being as if 
 
 'Tis not all of life to live, 
 
 so that when the inevitable hour comes we shall find that 
 'Tis not all of death to die. 
 
 ADDRESS OF yVlR. J3APP, OF JoWA. 
 
 Mr. SPEAKER : In the death of Hon. FRANK WELCH, to whose 
 memory I would to-day pay a brief tribute, we are called upon to 
 mourn the loss of a truly good man. When we met in this Hall at 
 the beginning of this session of Congress I am sure the thought was 
 present to each of us that one of our number was not here, that one 
 seat had been made vacant, and it was then as now hard to realize 
 that one so young, so full of hope and honorable ambition when we 
 separated a few short months before, had crossed that narrow line 
 that divides time from eternity, and that his youthful form and face 
 would be seen by us no more forever. It is proper that this House 
 suspend its deliberations upon public affairs at this time that we may 
 offer fitting and appropriate tribute to the memory of one so recently 
 associated with us. 
 
 It was my privilege, Mr. Speaker, to know Mr. WELCH long and 
 well. I met him first in the year 1860, when, a wanderer from my 
 old Ohio home in search of health, I found the home of my adoption 
 on the green prairies of the West. In the intervening years a kind 
 Providence has permitted me to form many warm friendships, but 
 there are none I recall more fondly than his. It is not my purpose 
 now to speak in detail of the life and character of our lamented friend, 
 though his short career furnishes much for a lengthy eulogy. His 
 most prominent characteristics were, I think, sound discretion, clear 
 discernment, good common-sense, great honesty of purpose, and
 
 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF FRANK WELCH. 
 
 indomitable energy, and I believe had he been permitted to pass 
 through the vicissitudes of a long life he would have met and man- 
 fully fulfilled all the duties allotted to him. He inspired all who 
 knew him with confidence in his honesty, integrity, and honor, and 
 compelled the concession that he was both just and generous. 
 Guided by his high sense of justice, his reasoning faculties rarely 
 failed him in the attainment of truth, which was with him the con- 
 trolling principle in both public and private life. He was, doubtless, 
 not without a commendable desire for worldly distinction ; but that 
 desire was always subordinate to his convictions of right. With these 
 admirable endowments were happily blended the kindlier affections 
 of the heart that endeared him to his friends, and made him in pri- 
 vate life the valuable citizen, the affectionate husband and father, 
 and the devoted friend. 
 
 Mr. WELCH was a native of Massachusetts, and was born on the 
 historic ground of Bunker Hill, February 10, 1835, and was there- 
 fore at the time of his death in the forty-fourth year of his age. By 
 the death of his father in the tender years of his infancy he was left 
 to the care of his remaining parent, who happily for him was one of 
 New England's most capable and devoted mothers. She survives 
 her lamented son and is doubtless comforted in her great bereave- 
 ment that many of her fondest hopes for him were realized before 
 his early summons came. He received his education in the public 
 schools of his native State, graduating at the high school of Boston. 
 He chose the profession of civil engineering, and in this capacity 
 was intrusted with several important surveys in the West, after which 
 he settled in Nebraska, making it his home from 1857 until his death. 
 In his new home he held many places of trust, among which were 
 register of the United States land office and member of the legisla- 
 tive council, and by which body he was elected as its presiding offi- 
 cer. In every station he was called upon to fill he was distinguished 
 for his devotion to the cause of truth and justice. 
 
 2 w
 
 ADDRESS OF MR. WIGGINTON ON THE 
 
 Those who sat with him in the committee-room here will long re- 
 member the care with which he gave his counsels and the clearness 
 with which he explained them. His fidelity and accuracy were no- 
 where more manifest. 
 
 But, sir, he has fallen almost at the threshold of his career, and 
 while lamenting that the years of one so full of promise could not 
 have been prolonged, yet as he never faltered by the way, and has 
 left us so much of good example in the work of his short life so well 
 and faithfully performed, we can scarce find it in our hearts to repine 
 that he has gone to his rest. We would not again revive the busy 
 brain nor again renew the throbbing of that large and generous heart; 
 we would not disturb the repose in which he sleeps; but if in the 
 solemnity of this call of one whom many of us knew so well we can 
 rightly appreciate what such a dispensation is calculated to impart, 
 if it shall teach us to realize the comparative insignificance of earthly 
 things, if it shall enable us to feel that this transitory life, this brief 
 sojourn here is but a step in the series of infinite existences, a mere 
 harbor where we furl our sails before we launch upon the great ocean 
 of eternity; if we can more justly estimate ourselves and appreciate 
 the duties which each day devolve upon us, then we shall have 
 learned from this melancholy event the beneficent lesson which in 
 the goodness of Divine Providence it was designed to impart. 
 
 For him, time and earth have passed away ; he has departed in 
 the meridian of his manhood, in the midst of the glowing hopes of a 
 successful life, like a vigorous tree cut down in the wealth of its sum- 
 mer bloom ere the bright green of a single leaf had been seared by 
 the blight of autumn. 
 
 ADDRESS OF yV\R. WIGGINTON, OP CALIFORNIA. 
 
 Mr. SPEAKER : There is a maxim which had struck its roots deep 
 into the hearts and consciences of men before Jesus Christ uttered
 
 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF FRANK WELCH. II 
 
 the divine charities on the mountains ; before the founders of the 
 Academy taught the Athenians the precepts of noble living ; before 
 Confucius, far remote in the denser obscurities of antiquity, illustrated 
 the civilization of his time by the doctrines of peace on earth and 
 good-will to men : 
 
 Of the dead speak nothing but good. 
 
 Eulogy of the dead is the consecrated privilege and duty of the 
 living. This venerated custom of the House of Representatives 
 these appointed tributes to the memory of our associates who go out 
 from among us forever to join the innumerable and eternal proces- 
 sion, are not so shallow and artificial as to belong merely to the dull 
 and spiritless dignities of a deliberative assembly. They are not 
 rendered in obedience to the cold and stately aphorisms of philoso- 
 phy. They have their source where is the richest and most exquisite 
 nourishment of the virtues of human character in the deeper sym- 
 pathies of the human heart. 
 
 But, Mr. Speaker, standing in the presence of the dead, were the 
 sentiment " De nwrtuis nil nisi bonum " not an imperative intuition; 
 were it not the common instinct of our common nature ; or were this 
 the occasion for just and exact or critical estimate of character and 
 conduct, I would still be able to speak of our deceased coworker and 
 fellow-member, FRANK WELCH, nothing but good. 
 
 Circumstances did not permit my acquaintance with Mr. WELCH 
 to be that of intimate personal and social relationship. Amid the 
 very large membership on this floor, and in the responsible and en- 
 grossing duties of his constituents which press upon each of us when- 
 ever this House is not in immediate session on affairs of public serv- 
 ice, it is possible for one member to cultivate with few of his fellows 
 the appreciation of many admirable personal traits, and to acquire 
 with very few of them that closer insight into qualities of mind and 
 heart which are developed in the habitual intercourse of friend with 
 friend.
 
 12 ADDRESS OF MR. WIGGINTON ON THE 
 
 But, sir, in the division of labor which the organization of this body 
 requires for the accomplishment of its work, in the special division of 
 duty to which our brother, so startlingly stricken from our midst, 
 was assigned, I knew him well. We of the Committee of Public 
 Lands all knew him with the most unhesitating confidence in and 
 respect for his character and abilities as a man, and with a most cor- 
 dial regard inspired by his genial and gracious temper as an associate. 
 In the brief course of his parliamentary career, if he did not belong 
 to the conspicuous few who compel our admiration for the brilliant 
 intrepidity and force, alertness and power of intellect which achieve 
 the leadership of tumultuous debate, he had yet taken his assured 
 place among those who are marked for sturdy independence and 
 self-reliance of thought, conscientious inquiry for truth, and a high 
 standard of determination and action, qualities scarcely less valuable, 
 though less resplendent, in him who serves the people in this Hall. 
 
 FRANK WELCH came from one of the farther Western States, and 
 in him was exemplified that strong type of manhood, courageous 
 without display, inflexible but kindly, which belongs to the people 
 who have prepared that vast territory lying midway of the continent 
 to be the seat of political empire in this great Union of States. It is 
 there where exists the most powerful identity of interest between the 
 different sections of the Republic ; it is there where is the greatest 
 homogeneity, the closest amalgamation of the varying classes of 
 American character; and there the American people find themselves 
 most kindred. Within that great region the Pacific coast holds its 
 fraternal clasp with the Atlantic borders; through its coalescing 
 power the South roust be made one with the East; in the broad sweep 
 of that hardy and prolific interior are founded the mightiest and most 
 enduring columns which support the Federal Union. Our deceased 
 friend and brother was the representative of a people among whom 
 the love of country is a plant of native and luxuriant growth ; a free 
 and patriotic people of commanding physical and intellectual strength
 
 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF FRANK WELCH. 
 
 I have spoken his warmest praise when I have said he was fit to 
 represent such a people, and that he well and faithfully discharged 
 his service to them. 
 
 Mr. Speaker, the bolt which struck him down was a calamity to 
 his household; of all bereavements the most terrible, because so swift 
 and instantaneous. Within that sacred shrine of grief I do not enter 
 but for a moment with bowed head and with sympathy for the sor- 
 row thus denied the sad consolation of such holy memories as sur- 
 round the death-bed of husband and father. Upon us of this Cham- 
 ber this death fell with the shock which for an instant stills the pulses 
 of the living whenever death comes unheralded and unannounced. 
 An hour ago, erect and vigorous manhood, warm life, sanguine 
 health ! Now, the prostrate form rigid in the embrace of death ! 
 Suddenly, in one moment, the grim monster stalks within this Cham- 
 ber has come, has passed, has gone ! Who next ? 
 
 Why do I allude to these things ? Why in pronouncing some brief 
 words of tribute to the honorable memory of our departed friend and 
 brother to be engrafted on the records of this body of which he was 
 an able and earnest member, do I suggest these reflections on the 
 manner of his death ? Because, sir, I wish to be understood as ap- 
 proaching the following thought with that awe and reverence which 
 it befits mortals to feel when they contemplate that which lies be- 
 yond this life. This so swift taking-off this so sudden plunge even 
 into the solemn mysteries which lie within the veil that hides eternity 
 from mortal vision is it to him for whom the message conies the 
 least acceptable of all forms of death? I venture to think not. The 
 ordeal must once be passed. A painless death is most to be desired. 
 To die even while the senses are yet keen and the physical and 
 mental powers able to participate with energy in the active duties 
 and engagements of life is not a thought so repulsive that men should 
 shrink from it with dread. 
 
 Intense suffering may break down the will and repress the courage
 
 ADDRESS OF MR. PATTERSON ON THE 
 
 of brave men, but the certain prospect of death often inspires with 
 fortitude, something of that fortitude and constant purpose of mind 
 which distinguished a chieftain known to fame wherever Scottish 
 annals are read. Dying, the Bruce willed that his heart should be 
 borne on a pilgrimage to the holy sepulcher, and to Douglas he in- 
 trusted the execution of this religious command. In a southern 
 defile that Scottish chieftain, accompanied by a small band of retain- 
 ers of his own household, encountered a dense mass of hostile spears. 
 To cut through that deep array not even Douglas might hope. But 
 flight or retreat he scorned. Halting for the charge, he unslung from 
 his neck the golden casket which contained the relic of his dead sov- 
 ereign, and hurling it far over the outermost ranks of the enemy, his 
 mighty voice rang out as with the slogan of bloody Bannockbawn 
 
 Go ! heart of Bruce, as was thy wont, into the very center of thy foes, and 
 Douglas follow ! 
 
 Our deceased brother possessed the noble characteristics of that 
 chieftain who courted death in the performance of his promises and 
 duty, as our brother met it. Could I say more ? His memory must 
 ever be cherished by those who knew him most by those who knew 
 him best. He lived so that he could meet death with all its conse- 
 quences, as he did meet it, without notice. Would that all of us 
 may so live. 
 
 ADDRESS OF yVi.R. PATTERSON, OF 
 
 Mr. SPEAKER : I cannot but feel sad when I realize that death has 
 stricken down in the vigor of manhood a steadfast friend. Between 
 the departed and myself there were ties that could not well exist be- 
 tween others. We stood upon this floor representing States whose 
 borders joined, and each was without a colleague from his common-
 
 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF FRANK WELCH. 15 
 
 wealth to whom he could look for aid or sympathy in hours of trial. 
 The history of our two States was almost a common one. Beyond 
 the Missouri, within the mauhood of the youngest member of this 
 body, they have been seized from countless ages of silence and 
 vacancy, and by the same class of people, exercising like courage, 
 enduring like hardships, meeting and conquering like dangers, have 
 been placed in the group of State republics that make up the model 
 government of the world. 
 
 Upon several occasions we had conversed upon the phenomena pre- 
 sented in the representation of our States in the American Congress. 
 In the less numerous body, representing the autonomy and equality 
 of the States, these two younger sisters of the Republic were upon an 
 equality with the oldest and greatest in the family; while in the 
 greater body, representing the people, where greater difficulties are in 
 the way of the individual member, they were accorded but one Rep- 
 resentative. Many times, after we had been struggling before the 
 committee or upon the floor for recognition of our needs and a con- 
 cession of our rights, have we deplored to each other the small re- 
 turns for our efforts so largely owing to the lack of strength which a 
 numerous delegation gives to each member of it. 
 
 I never met Mr. WELCH to know him until the second session of 
 this Congress. It was after I was assigned to the Committee on 
 Public Lands that our association commenced; and in the intimacy 
 which committee duties beget I learned to admire the plain and strong 
 manhood of the Representative from Nebraska. He was one of the 
 few men of sterling merit, with sturdy and sensible views upon every 
 public subject, with a vigorous individuality, who are content to allow 
 an entire Congress to pass without claiming the attention of the 
 House beyond the few minutes necessary for the explanation of some 
 particular measure vital to their constituency. 
 
 In the committee-room his store of knowledge and clear views upon 
 every phase of every question pertaining to our public lands made
 
 1 6 ADDRESS OF MR. PATTERSON ON THE 
 
 him an oracle to us all. Educated as a civil engineer, serving for 
 several years as a register of a land district in Nebraska, having trav- 
 ersed the plains, the mountains, the parks and valleys of the vast 
 interior of our continent, none was more qualified to advise upon any 
 question pertaining to them. This fact every member of our com- 
 mittee recognized; and if the measures which have passed into laws 
 through the portals of our committee-room could speak, they would 
 tell of his skillful workmanship upon every line. 
 
 I met him last at the city of Omaha, on his way to his home at the 
 close of the last session. He had preceded me by several days, and 
 when I joined him he was buoyant with the anticipations of the 
 future. His desire had been to be returned to the next Congress. 
 Aspirants for his place had arisen during his absence, and before 
 reaching Omaha he feared some one of them might be successful; 
 but when we met that fear had vanished. In recognition of his val- 
 ued services all competition had retired, and he felt assured of the 
 coveted renomination without opposition. After we separated, the 
 heat and absorption of the political campaign stopped communica- 
 tion. During it he passed from earth, called by a voice that must be 
 heeded, and that will reach the ears of us all only too soon. 
 
 Mr. Speaker, I can truly say that I loved FRANK WELCH as sin- 
 cerely as I ever loved one whom I had known for so short a time. 
 He was a true type of the moral and heroic man. Without brill- 
 iancy; laying no claim to forensic power; with nothing but his worth, 
 his pluck, his energy, his moral uprightness, and recognized devotion 
 to the welfare of the people of his State, he was chosen by them as 
 their Representative in the American Congress, and he was in truth 
 the representative of all the manly virtues that have made his con- 
 stituency men among men the wide world over. The commonwealth 
 of Nebraska may send men of greater talent to this Hall; such may 
 in the future give to her the fame that Clay has given to Kentucky 
 or Webster to Massachusetts, but she will never send a Representa-
 
 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF FRANK WELCH. 17 
 
 tive with more sincere convictions, a higher standard of manhood, 
 or a greater devotion to his public duties than were possessed by 
 FRANK WELCH, the man to whose memory this House to-night pays 
 tribute. 
 
 ADDRESS OF M.R. TlPTON, OF ILLINOIS. 
 
 Mr. SPEAKER: I desire to add my tribute of respect to the memory 
 of FRANK WELCH, and to unite my sympathy with that of the people 
 of Nebraska, who moura the loss of a true citizen and Representative. 
 At the meeting of the extra session of this Congress Mr. WELCH was 
 to me a stranger. I soon, however, formed his acquaintance, and 
 from that time until his death we were true friends. Mr. WELCH was 
 modest and unassuming in his manners, and I apprehend that he 
 formed but few acquaintances during his service in this House. By 
 reference to the Congressional Record of the first session of this Con- 
 gress we find that he was elected to the Forty-fifth Congress from the 
 State of Nebraska as a Republican, and I have no doubt that he 
 would have been re-elected to the Forty-sixth Congress had he not 
 been stricken down in death. Mr. WELCH was comparatively a 
 young man; he was full of promise and full of hope. 
 
 Born in the State of Massachusetts, in early life he took the advice 
 of a great statesman and went West, settling in the Territory of Ne- 
 braska. He loved his people, and the great aim of his political life 
 seemed to be how best to advance the interests of the people of the 
 State that he had the honor to represent. He was liberal in his views, 
 yet firm for the right as he understood the right. His many virtues 
 and acts endeared him to all who became thoroughly acquainted with 
 him. Just at the close of the last session I had a long talk with him 
 about his State and the labor of representing and looking after the 
 interests of an entire State embracing such a vast territory and such 
 varied interests, and it is to the constant strain upon his mind and
 
 1 8 ADDRESS OF MR. TIPTON ON THE 
 
 the constant fear that something would be left undone which ought 
 to be done that I attribute, at least in part, his death. 
 
 Mr. Speaker, I think I may truly say that Mr. WELCH was a model 
 man in many respects. In his motives and purposes in political life 
 we read the advanced interests of a common country, and in his pri- 
 vate life a kind husband, father, and neighbor. To some extent I 
 was familiar with his purposes and hopes, and to say that he was not 
 ambitious would be untrue; but, on the contrary, his great ambition 
 was to represent his State with honor to the State and credit to him- 
 self. He loved liberty, and believed that it could be best maintained 
 by sound and wholesome laws judiciously enacted. 
 
 Mr. WELCH was not a man to become excited; he was careful, calm, 
 and deliberate in all his purposes. 
 
 Mr. Speaker, I shall ever cherish with pride my recollections of and 
 acquaintance with Mr. WELCH, and shall ever remember him as a 
 true friend; and by a true friend I mean a man who is willing and 
 in fact anxious to assist his friends at all times and under all circum- 
 stances. FRANK WELCH loved liberty and hated oppression in all 
 its forms, and in this he was the fit representative of the pioneer 
 people who in behalf of freedom settled the Territory of Nebraska. 
 
 I believe had he lived that his services would have been of great 
 value to the people of his State. But FRANK WELCH is no more 
 stricken down in death in the very prime of life and the early morn- 
 ing of his usefulness. It is well known by members upon this floor 
 that a new member of this House quiet and unassuming as was Mr. 
 WELCH can make but little public demonstration at the first session 
 or in fact in the first Congress, and that during the first session at 
 least he would form but few acquaintances, and for this reason I feel 
 that many members upon this floor did not form an intimate acquaint- 
 ance with him during his service as a member of this House; yet I 
 think I may safely say that those who did form his acquaintance 
 regarded him as a high-minded and an accomplished gentleman.
 
 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF FRANK WELCH. 19 
 
 Mr. Speaker, the number of deaths in this Congress has been the 
 subject of comment and newspaper articles all over the land, yet we 
 heed it not. Members come and go from this Capitol with the same 
 unconcern that they would if death was unknown in the Republic. 
 The world simply notes the fact. The death of Mr. Morton and of 
 Mr. Bogy, two distinguished members of the Senate, and seven 
 members of this House Quinn, WELCH, Leonard, Williams, Douglas, 
 Hartridge, and Schleicher at the close of this Congress will have 
 passed into history. Their public services, however, have made an 
 impress upon the country that will not be forgotten. The death-roll 
 of the Forty-fifth Congress will ever be remembered by us as one 
 remarkable in the world's history. It is but the repetition of the 
 lesson that death is no respecter of persons or position in life. 
 
 The great harvester comes and reaps withersoever he will. One 
 generation passes away and in quick succession another follows. One 
 man dies and another is ready to take his place. Thus in quick suc- 
 cession does generation follow generation, so that it is impossible to 
 discern the dividing line between the present and the past or the 
 present and the future. 
 
 Mr. Speaker, I regard as the most wonderful fact in all nature that 
 it is not vouchsafed to man to know when, how, or under what cir- 
 cumstances he will meet death. There is not a man in all this Re- 
 public who, if he knew that within a certain number of years from 
 this time he must meet death, would not, to some extent at least, 
 determine to change his habits of life. Yet we know the fact that 
 all men must die, and that many like Mr. WELCH will be stricken 
 down in the prime of their manhood almost without warning. 
 
 On coming to this Capitol we behold, on Pennsylvania avenue, a 
 funeral procession. We stop a moment and inquire, " Who is dead ? " 
 We are told by a passer-by ; we again pause a moment and wonder 
 at its magnificence and grandeur, and pass on. And before we reach 
 this Capitol the fact is blotted from our memories, only to be recalled
 
 ADDRESS OF MR. TIPTON ON THE 
 
 by the recollection of the magnificence of the procession. Again 
 and again are we reminded that death is in the land, but we heed 
 it not. 
 
 That terrible scourge known as yellow fever during the past sum- 
 mer converted great commercial cities into cities of mourning. Mov- 
 ing commerce upon the streets gave way to the funeral procession. 
 Almost one-half of this the fairest land on earth was dressed in 
 mourning. But a few months have passed away, yet I fear this ter- 
 rible lesson is fast fading in our memories. And when this generation 
 shall have passed away, the fact will be read and known only by the 
 student of medicine or the historian. 
 
 The death-roll of this Congress is confined to no locality in the 
 Republic, but on the contrary it reaches from the Hudson to the Rio 
 Grande. Nine States of this Republic are in mourning for the loss 
 of distinguished men, and the nation mourns the loss of "the combined 
 efforts for good of these men who have passed away. The great reaper, 
 in the selection of his own, seems to have selected the noble ones of 
 the assembled Representatives of the people. It is fitting that we, 
 the members of this Congress, shall ever cherish in our memories the 
 kindest feelings for those who have died since its organization. 
 
 Mr. Speaker, it is in this spirit that the Constitution throws its pro- 
 tecting shield around the home of every man in the land. It is in this 
 spirit that the Constitution binds the graves of these fallen Repre- 
 sentatives under one flag and one government. It is this spirit that 
 it is hoped will bind together the people of the Republic by a tie 
 stronger than acts of Congress or constitutions. It is in this spirit 
 that we hope to conform legislation of the country to the deliberate 
 judgment of the people. It was this that FRANK WELCH hoped for. 
 While it is true that he did not live to see all accomplished that he 
 desired, yet I believe he did live to see the commencement of the 
 new era, the adjustment of all legislation to the demands and neces- 
 sities of the people. It is my belief, as it was that of Mr. WELCH,
 
 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF FRANK WELCH. 
 
 that we have reached a period in human progress when just and hu- 
 mane laws, honestly and fairly enforced, will meet the approval of the 
 people in every part of the country. 
 
 Mr. Speaker, I am one of those who believe that neither states nor 
 republics are, in the long run, ungrateful. I believe that in this coun- 
 try, sooner or later, in all cases, merit will receive its reward. In the 
 case of FRANK WELCH it has been prompt. To-day Nebraska 
 awards to him the honor of approval of his official acts, and the 
 nation to-day tenders to his widow and children by these memorial 
 services the heart-felt sympathy of the nation. 
 
 I desire to place upon record to go down to history my judgment 
 that he was one of the good men of this land; that every purpose, 
 every object of his life was for the good of the people; that he had 
 no motive, no purpose which in his judgment would injure any man 
 on the face of this earth, but on the contrary his life was devoted to 
 the good of all. 
 
 While, as I said a moment ago, the Congressional Directory gives 
 us no information as to any official positions that he held prior to his 
 election to this House, yet I am advised that he had held important 
 official positions in the Territory of Nebraska. I apprehend that the 
 judgment of all who knew FRANK WELCH is that he was the noblest 
 work of God an honest man. 
 
 ADDRESS OF y&R. p<DNGER, OF ^MICHIGAN. 
 
 Mr. SPEAKER : It is with great pleasure that I find I have the op- 
 portunity, although unexpected, to join on this occasion with my 
 colleagues in paying a brief tribute of respect to the memory of one 
 of our members who came among us for a short time and made him- 
 self known to us in these halls during that brief period as a sterling, 
 energetic, and faithful member of this House.
 
 22 ADDRESS OF MR. CONGER ON THE 
 
 It was my fortune during most of the time that he was a member 
 here to occupy a seat in the Hall so near him that I could observe 
 the whole course of his Congressional life upon this floor. He was a 
 constant attendant upon the sessions of this body. He was faith- 
 ful in season and out of season in the performance of all the duties 
 which might be required of a member of this House. 
 
 When I parted with him at the close of the session prior to his 
 death I little thought that he, so young, apparently so vigorous, so 
 full of life and hope and ambition, moderated as it was by his innate 
 modesty, would be the first to be called from our number to go down 
 to the silent halls of death. 
 
 I knew little of our friend's history. He was not communicative 
 of his own personal history and of his own personal desires or ambi- 
 tion. I learned that he was born in New England, and passed his 
 youthful days in that city of our Union which claims for itself the 
 highest rank in literary and scientific culture; that while young, just 
 entering upon the active duties of life, pursuing, as I understand, his 
 occupation of engineering, he passed from that Athens of America 
 out westward and westward, crossing rivers, crossing States, going far 
 on, seeking his home and a place for the development of his genius. 
 The scene of his labors was in a new State, twenty years ago, per- 
 haps then a Territory, in which there were few comforts or luxuries 
 or refinements of life; a country then traversed in part by savage 
 tribes; a territory over which roamed the buffalo in immense herds, 
 as yet unscared by the presence of man. To such a region our young 
 friend, in his ambition and his hope, went to find a home for himself. 
 In a new land, amid scenes stretching out upon the broad plains of 
 Nebraska, beyond the Mississippi, beyond the Missouri, he sought 
 his home. 
 
 Sir, if there be anything that is grateful to my mind in looking over 
 the institutions of my beloved land, it is, that whatever may be the 
 rank or sphere of life in which one is born, under whatever circum-
 
 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF FRANK WELCH. 23 
 
 stances his early life may have begun, the goddess of these institu- 
 tions takes every youth by the hand, gives him education, gives him 
 hope, gives him courage, gives him emulation, and, above all, gives 
 him the example of a long and splendid line of illustrious men, from 
 the very beginning of our government down to the present time, who 
 like himself enjoyed no advantages of birth or education, no assist- 
 ance of powerful and influential friends, but who have had solely the 
 surrounding influences of these free institutions of our land, which 
 extend to the humblest and the poorest the same help that they ex- 
 tend to the wealthiest and the mightiest among us. These institu- 
 tions bid the youth enter on that royal highway which education, 
 which industry, which patient seeking may find out that royal road 
 to the hearts of his fellow-men, to distinction among them to office 
 if office be his desire, to wealth if wealth be his ambition, to the 
 means of doing good to his fellow-men if to do good to his fellow- 
 men be within his heart. It is these institutions of our country that 
 enable every child of the land to rise, if he will, to usefulness, to emi- 
 nence, to high positions of trust, to the confidence and esteem of his 
 fellow-men, as by far the larger number of our most distinguished 
 statesmen, civilians, and lawyers have risen by the aid of these insti- 
 tutions from poverty and obscurity to fill the most honored places 
 within the gift of the nation. 
 
 Mr. WELCH was an example of the beneficial effects of such insti- 
 tutions and such training. To him it mattered not whether he 
 remained in the State of his birth, surrounded with luxuries, sur- 
 rounded with culture, surrounded with all that could excite emulation 
 and ambition in his heart, or whether he went off to the broad prairie 
 as the field of his labor, or to the great forest as the scene of his toil. 
 It is enough for us to know that going off into a far-off land, and as 
 I have learned going there a stranger with no one to uphold him, to 
 introduce him, to push on his fortunes, he gained so far the good-will, 
 the kindly feeling, the confidence of all the people of that Territory
 
 24 ADDRESS OF MR. CONGER ON THE 
 
 that they promoted him to places of honor and of trust, that they 
 reposed in this young man a confidence which is rarely reposed in 
 older, wiser, and more experienced men. 
 
 I have met many people of that State ; I have seen them here and 
 met them elsewhere, and I never have heard any other expression of 
 sentiment from any with whom I have been acquainted than that 
 FRANK WELCH, their Representative in Congress, had the high es- 
 teem, the absolute confidence, and the kindest regards of all the 
 people of that State. 
 
 Sir, Mr. WELCH did not occupy in this House a position which 
 some covet ; a position of strife, and antagonism, and ambition to 
 lead or to oppose. But his position was that of a patient, earnest, 
 pains-taking worker laborious, as I have been informed, in commit 
 tee, in the examination of all questions submitted to him; earnest, 
 as we all know, in every matter affecting the interests of the constit- 
 uency he so ably represented. I think, sir, that amid all the disputes 
 and wranglings within this Hall there is no member of this House 
 that ever did or ever could entertain for a moment one unkind 
 thought, ever did or ever could speak one unkind word, of our de- 
 parted friend for anything and all things which he did or neglected 
 to do in these halls. How few of us can say that of ourselves ! How 
 few of us deserve that it should be said of us by others! 
 
 Mr. Speaker, our friend Mr. WELCH, whatever he may have failed 
 to do, however his ambition may not have reached its height, what- 
 ever feelings he may have had in his spiritual experiences, could say 
 of himself as Abou Ben Adhem said : " Then write me down as one 
 who loved his fellow-men." Genial, warm-hearted, gentle, kindly, 
 inoffensive, pleasant, and agreeable in all the relations'of life, those 
 who knew him were won to him by that loving, kindly, generous na- 
 ture of his. He loved his fellow-men, and his fellow-men loved him; 
 and many hearts were grieved, almost startled, when the news first 
 reached them that our quiet friend had passed from among the liv-
 
 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF FRANK WELCH. 25 
 
 ing and was numbered with those who had gone from these halls 
 forever. 
 
 I had not expected to have the opportunity to express my views 
 and my sincere regard for our departed friend. Those who have 
 known him through this life, those who are more intimately acquainted 
 with his inner nature than myself, all describe him in language I 
 would like to describe him in. All speak of him in such terms of 
 regret and kindness and affection as I have felt for him, and as I 
 should like to describe my feelings in regard to hinTto-night. I have 
 said these things because toward our friend I had all these kindly 
 feelings and I would pay this passing tribute to his memory as that 
 of a friend to a friend. 
 
 ADDRESS OF yVlR. BRIGHT, OF ^ENNSYLYANIA. 
 
 We know that moons shall wane 
 And summer birds from far shall cross the sea ; 
 But who shall tell us when to meet with death ? 
 
 Our deceased friend was a stranger to me until I met him in this 
 Chamber. I never knew him until I knew him in my relations with 
 him on the Committee on Public Lands. As has already been said 
 of him, he was faithful to the discharge of the duties which were in- 
 cident to the work which was necessary to be done on that commit- 
 tee. I supposed him a man of excellent health ; I believed that he 
 was, and in my intercourse with him I never heard of any complaint 
 with regard to any physical disability. But in his youth he was cut 
 down ; and why it is, sir, that men of the physical strength and power 
 and youth and manhood of our departed friend should be called 
 hence, when men like myself, who have reached their three score 
 and ten, are permitted to live and move on, is one of the inscrutable 
 things which the providence of God alone can reveal. 
 
 4 w
 
 26 ADDRESS OF MR. WRIGHT ON THE 
 
 I attended, Mr. Speaker, the memorial services of Henry Clay. 
 They were conducted in the Senate Chamber. It was long ago. I 
 was present at the memorial services that occurred on the death of 
 John Quincy Adams. It was long ago. But these men of whom I 
 speak had reached the period that revelation says is the limit of men's 
 life. They were rich golden sheaves that the reaper gathered up. 
 Their time had come, and he had a right to exult in the bounty of 
 the harvest that he had gathered. 
 
 I was in this H*ouse, sir, when the memorial services were bestowed 
 on that eminent and great man, Stephen A. Douglas. He, too, ac- 
 cording to our mode and method of estimation of human life, went 
 before his time ; but when he left this earth a great man had stepped 
 out of the legislative and social relations of life, but not so prema- 
 turely as our friend whose funeral cortege we are conducting now. 
 
 I would like, Mr. Speaker, to have learned more with regard to 
 the character of Mr. WELCH than I know, because in my intercourse 
 with him I found him a man possessing those traits of character 
 which dignify and exalt human nature qualities of the heart, sir, 
 that after all is said are the standard by which we are to estimate 
 not only human greatness but human perfection. 
 
 I stood in the Thirty-seventh Congress at the same desk that I am 
 speaking from now. A colleague of ours had died. He was a 
 stranger to me. I knew but little of him, merely a speaking, casual 
 acquaintance. My associates requested me to take part in the pro- 
 ceedings which were to be had on that memorial occasion. I replied 
 to them that I knew so little of the man I should not know what to 
 state if I rose to speak on the occasion. It was remarked, however, 
 that I was the senior member of the delegation from the State, and 
 they expected me to say something with regard to the deceased. I 
 sat in my seat, reserving the privilege of concluding what had to be 
 said, and during the remarks which were made one of my associates, 
 who had attended his funeral and burial, made use of the remark
 
 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF FRANK WELCH. 27 
 
 that the town in which he lived in Pennsylvania had literally turned 
 out to his funeral. The concourse was immense ; men, women, and 
 children were about the bier of the dead man, and not only that, 
 but there seemed to be a general feeling of woe throughout the little 
 community in which he lived. They had all come to pay the last 
 token of regard to Dr. Cooper, their Representative in Congress, 
 who lay in the coffin before them. Upon that hint I rose and spoke. 
 That furnished me with a theme, and it gave rise, sir, to this train of 
 thought : that after all we must judge of a man's character and the 
 excellency of his heart from the estimation in which he is held by 
 the people who are about him and with whom he moves daily. If 
 he has endeared himself to the people who were in close proximity 
 to him ; if he has their praise and their regards and esteem, that is 
 the standard by which we are to measure the qualities of the human 
 heart, and esteem the human character. -~" 
 
 My friend, the eloquent John J. Crittenden, of Kentucky, occupied 
 the third seat from where I stand now upon that memorable occa- 
 sion. After the adjournment of the House, and in a conversation 
 with me, he said : " My friend, you have taught me an important 
 matter to-night." "Ah, sir; what is that?" "You have fixed a 
 standard by which you measure human perfection, new to me, but 
 which I shall remember to the end of my days." 
 
 Now, sir, Mr. WELCH was a man who had these amiable qualities 
 which were calculated not to repel but to bring men to him. He 
 sympathized with his big heart in the troubles and disasters and the 
 strange state of things that exist in the country at this moment. 
 
 Sir, in talking with him upon the subject of the distress of this land 
 I have seen tears roll from his eyes, but they were gems always from 
 what you may call the great ebullition that comes from a full heart, 
 and from a noble, generous mind, and from an exalted manhood. 
 
 As has been said of him, he was not a man who took a prominent 
 place in conducting the affairs of this House and the legislation that
 
 28 ADDRESS OF MR. WRIGHT ON THE 
 
 was intrusted to him not a prominent part ; but, sir, he had judg- 
 ment ; he had discretion ; and he generally came to a correct con- 
 clusion, as has been already remarked by the gentlemen who have 
 preceded me, with regard to the nature of the business that he had 
 in hand. 
 
 He was not great, but, sir, he was good. Greatness without good- 
 ness is a myth. 
 
 A man may be a great statesman ; he may be a distinguished gen- 
 eral ; he may have commanded armies, and may have won triumph- 
 ant victories ; he may be great as a philosopher ; he may be great 
 in the various and multiplied pursuits and occupations of life ; but if 
 he does not unite goodness with it he does not come up to my stand- 
 ard of greatness. It is the heart that heals the woes of others that 
 makes a great man in my estimation, in forming my opinion. 
 
 If men could be great and good as were the two distinguished 
 men whose images grace the walls of this Chamber, who are daily 
 before you great and good like them, then you may talk about 
 human perfection, about greatness that only embodies the idea of 
 self-elevation, or to occupy positions that shall command the admi- 
 ration of the world. That greatness, sir, dwindles into insignificance 
 and nothing compared with the man of charitable emotions and of a 
 noble heart, that can reach and take in the whole woes of others. 
 
 Sir, it affords me great satisfaction to speak in the manner in which 
 I do and apply these great principles to the modest, retiring man 
 who but yesterday was among us and with us, but who now has left 
 us forever. It elates me to talk in this way of one of my associates. 
 I know that his heart was in the right channel; I know that his sym- 
 pathies reached the great human family ; I know that no man felt 
 more keenly the wants and necessities which exist through this land 
 than the man whose memorial services we have met on this occasion 
 to conduct. So much I learned with regard to our colleague here 
 from an acquaintance of some four or five months, but having talked
 
 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF FRANK WELCH. 29 
 
 with him familiarly, and having learned the bent of his mind, and 
 the noble, generous heart that he possessed having learned these 
 things, you do not know how much I really regarded and respected 
 that man while living; you do not know how much I feel this loss 
 now that he is dead. 
 
 He was not great in the sense of the word that we consider great- 
 ness. He was good to a fault, and I hold him up his exalted char- 
 acter I hold him up with regard to those kind qualities of heart, as 
 a man whose course among us is to be followed as a model for imi- 
 tation. 
 
 We do not know men, sir, until we come in close contact with 
 them. There may be many other men who are members in this Hall 
 who come up to the standard that I have described. We do not 
 know them. We come here as party men, and there is a space of 
 some four or five feet between us that separates us. Will it always 
 be so ? Is there no millenium no political millenium? We come 
 here identified with party. We form our associates too often with 
 our own party men, unless accident brings us in close contact with 
 those of the opposite party, as accident in the line of my official duty 
 here brought me in contact with Mr. WELCH. 
 
 I only wish I could be brought more often in contact with men 
 differing from me in political affinities, if they could be the kind of 
 men that this man who has left us proved himself to be. 
 
 Now, sir, I have in this desultory way thrown out some few gen- 
 eral ideas of my estimate of human character which was eminently 
 possessed by our departed friend. If his life could have been spared 
 it might have been for the benefit of mankind. But who is to say 
 that the decree of God is not right ? Who is to take exceptions to 
 it ? Who is to quibble at it ? 
 
 These things occur around us daily, and we think of them, per- 
 haps, but not so much as we ought. It is not within the scope of 
 human intellect to answer the inquiries I have made. It is well that
 
 30 ADDRESS OF MR. CAIN ON THE 
 
 it is not so, because otherwise it might produce effects that would be 
 detrimental not only to the men who live but to the friends who sur- 
 round them. 
 
 I bade adieu in this Chamber to a friend who in life was very near 
 to me. I hope that in the future these Halls may be filled with men 
 who possess the heart, who have the ability, who have the judgment 
 that he had who has gone hence forever. Peace to his ashes. 
 
 ADDRESS OF yVLR. PAIN, OF JSOUTH 
 
 Mr. SPEAKER: Four years have passed since I first entered this 
 Hall. During that time I have listened with deep feeling to the 
 tributes paid here to the many eminent men that the insidious reaper, 
 Death, has taken from our midst. It has never been my privilege 
 until now to utter a sentence or a word in connection with the de- 
 parture of any member of this House. 
 
 At this time, however, I feel prompted to utter a sentiment in har- 
 mony I hope with the sentiments which have been uttered by the 
 distinguished gentlemen who have preceded me. I come to pay a 
 tribute of respect to the departed dead. I come to mingle my sym- 
 pathies and, if I may be allowed to say so, the sympathies of my race 
 with your sympathies for the bereavements which this House of Con- 
 gress has suffered, and which have befallen the States from whence 
 came these departed Representatives. 
 
 Men are known by their lives, and their labors furnish the best 
 evidence of their worth to the communities from which they came, 
 and the States they represented, and the nation whose citizens they 
 were. The deeds, the labors of the distinguished departed, are to us 
 the best evidence of their worth and their value. 
 
 The gentlemen who have preceded me in these eulogies have aptly 
 described the character and the services of him who has gone. It
 
 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF FRANK WELCH. 31 
 
 was not my pleasure to be familiarly associated with him on commit- 
 tees of this House, or to have any intimate social relation with him 
 other than as a fellow-member on this floor. But I regard it as but 
 right, when death comes into this Hall, that each member should 
 necessarily feel the bereavement. Each of us is reminded then there 
 will come a time when we, like our fallen comrades, must take our 
 departure. 
 
 The fact that the State of Nebraska had trusted Mr. WELCH with 
 the care of her interests in this Hall is indeed one of the evidences of 
 his value to that State and his worth to the people he represented. 
 The labors which he performed upon the committees of this House, 
 his deportment among his fellow-members, are the highest encomi- 
 ums that can be paid to him and his worth as a Representative and 
 a citizen. 
 
 The confidence which the State of Nebraska reposed in Mr. WELCH 
 must indeed be to us the best evidence of the regard in which he was 
 held at home, and of his value to the community in which he lived, 
 of his moral and social worth to the State which he had the honor to 
 represent here. The best evidence of his high value comes to us from 
 the arduous labors in which he was engaged and the honorable man- 
 ner in which he discharged all his duties. 
 
 Mr. Speaker, in this Hall we all meet upon one common level. I 
 therefore come, and I may be pardoned for the allusion, to present on 
 this occasion the sympathy of a race of men who hitherto have, had 
 but little representation on this floor. I want the nation to know 
 that those with whom I am identified, the constituency whom I rep- 
 resent on this floor, feel a common sympathy with all that affects the 
 interests of this great country. No member of this House can be 
 smitten down by the hand of death but we partake of the sorrow 
 which his loss causes the nation. 
 
 When any one State loses an honorable representative, the constit- 
 uency that I represent feel a common sympathy with that State in its
 
 32 ADDRESS OF MR. CAIN. 
 
 bereavement. When the nation suffers the loss of one of its great 
 and good men, we as a part of that nation claim the privilege of pay- 
 ing our tribute of respect and honor at the shrine of his memory. 
 
 Sir, death is the common lot of all men; none too high, none too 
 low but must pass in the same solemn train. It is ours as statesmen, 
 as citizens, to recognize the importance of this great truth ; that what- 
 ever may be the aspirations of men, whatever may be their attain- 
 ments here on earth, there must come a time when their earthly career 
 shall be cut short and they shall be carried to that bourne from 
 whence none may return. 
 
 Upon the altar of sorrow I come now to pour out my sympathy 
 and the sympathy of those whom I represent. I come to tender to 
 this nation the sympathy of a heart that feels whatever loss this na- 
 tion may suffer, whatever loss a State may sustain. We join in 
 common with our fellow-citizens in paying our tribute of respect to 
 the memory of bim who has gone, and of expressing our sympathy 
 with the State and the nation in its loss, and to implore the blessings 
 of Heaven upon all our common country. 
 
 The resolutions offered by Mr. MAJORS were then agreed to unan- 
 imously ; and in accordance therewith (at nine o'clock and ten min- 
 utes p. m.) the House adjourned.
 
 PROCEEDINGS IN THE SENATE. 
 
 FEBRUARY 22, 1879. 
 
 A message from the House of Representatives by Mr. GEORGE M. 
 ADAMS, its Clerk, communicated to the Senate the intelligence of 
 the death of Mr. FRANK WELCH, late a member of the House from 
 the State of Nebraska, and transmitted the resolutions of the House 
 thereon. 
 
 FEBRUARY 25, 1879. 
 
 Mr. PADDOCK. Mr. President, I call up the resolutions of the House 
 of Representatives of respect to the memory of the late Hon. FRANK 
 WELCH, member of the House of Representatives. 
 
 The PRESIDING OFFICER. The resolutions will be read. 
 
 The Secretary read as follows: 
 
 IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 
 
 February 21, 1879. 
 
 Resolved, That this House has heard with profound regret of the 
 death of Hon. FRANK WELCH, late a Representative from the State 
 of Nebraska. 
 
 Resolved, That the House do now suspend the consideration of 
 public business, in order to pay proper respect to the memory of the 
 lamented deceased. 
 
 Resolved, That in token of regard for the memory of the lamented 
 deceased the members of this House do wear the usual badge of 
 mourning for thirty days. 
 
 33
 
 34 ADDRESS OF MR. PADDOCK ON THE 
 
 Resolved, That the Clerk of the House do communicate these 
 resolutions to the Senate of the United States. 
 
 Resolved, That out of further respect to the memory of the de- 
 ceased this House do now adjourn. 
 
 Mr. PADDOCK. I send resolutions to the desk to be read. 
 
 The PRESIDING OFFICER. The resolutions will be read. 
 
 The Secretary read as follows : 
 
 Resolved, That the Senate receives with sorrow the announcement 
 of the death of Hon. FRANK WELCH, late a member of the House of 
 Representatives from the State of Nebraska, and tenders to the family 
 and kindred of the deceased the assurance of sympathy under their 
 sad bereavement. . 
 
 Resolved, That the Secretary of the Senate be directed to transmit 
 to the family of Mr. WELCH a certified copy of these resolutions. 
 
 ADDRESS OF y\&R. J^ADDOCK, OF J^EBRASKA. 
 
 Mr. PRESIDENT : I little thought when my late colleague of 
 the House sat near me here listening to the eulogies pronounced 
 in the memorial service for the lamented Morton that only a few 
 months would pass until I should be summoned to speak in his 
 funeral. Verily it hath been truly written, " In the midst of life 
 we are in death." How often during the past year has this solemn 
 admonition come to us. True, our own immediate brotherhood has 
 been spared during these later months, but the shafts of death have 
 fallen thick and fast among our brethren in the other House. One 
 bereavement has followed another there in quick succession, until in 
 very truth it hath become a House of mourning. 
 
 Mr. President, I shall not delay the Senate by an extended memo- 
 rabilia of our lamented colleague, Representative WELCH. He was 
 born on Bunker Hill, Charlestown, Massachusetts, February 10, 1835; 
 was graduated at the Boston High School, and afterward specially
 
 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF FRANK WELCH. 35 
 
 educated and trained as a civil engineer. Soon after embarking in 
 his profession the duties thereof called him into the West, and finally, 
 while yet a very young man, in the year 1857, he established his 
 home at Decatur, Nebraska. Mr. WELCH was a gentleman in the 
 highest and broadest sense of the term kind, gentle, generous, manly. 
 As might naturally have been expected for a young man possessing 
 such qualities of mind and heart, he rapidly advanced to the front 
 in society, and in affairs in his county and section. He was very 
 soon chosen to represent his district in the council or senate of the 
 Territorial Legislature, and a little later was elected to the senate of 
 the first Legislature chosen under the State organization, of which body 
 he was made the presiding officer. He held other positions of honor 
 and of trust under both the Federal and State Governments, and in 
 1876 was elected a member of the Forty-fifth Congress. He repre- 
 sented the largest Congressional district in the Union, both as respects 
 territorial extent and population. He was alone in the other House 
 from Nebraska a State embracing an area of seventy-five thousand 
 square miles, with a population of nearly four hundred thousand a 
 comparatively new State, having innumerable and varied interests 
 in process of development, dependent largely upon Federal legisla- 
 tion and Federal executive administration for encouragement and 
 protection. 
 
 There was put upon him the labor of three men, and by day and 
 by night unceasingly he struggled through the protracted and excit- 
 ing session of last year to do it all. Mr. WELCH was a man of great 
 energy, industry, and pertinacity of purpose. He would do all re- 
 quired of him although he should know the effort would cost him his 
 life ; he did all, and as many another before him in like circum- 
 stances had done, he went prematurely to his grave. When the ses- 
 sion closed, Mr. WELCH returned to his constituency very much worn 
 and broken in health. He needed rest, but he took it not. At once 
 he entered upon an active and an exceedingly laborious political
 
 36 ADDRESS OF MR. PADDOCK ON THE 
 
 canvass. His physical machinery could not endure the additional 
 strain thus put upon it, and then the end came, soon and swift but 
 pangless. In the evening of the 4th day of September, 1878, in a 
 public meeting, in the midst of a numerous audience, composed 
 largely of his political friends and admirers whom he was about to 
 address, he was suddenly stricken and fell in instant death. His 
 family a fortd mother, a devoted wife, and three loving children 
 were absent in a distant Eastern State, and no other of his kindred 
 was present to close the eyes of him who thus in the prime of his 
 manhood went down under a weight of life's burdens too heavy to 
 be longer borne. 
 
 Mr. WELCH'S re-election was assured, and but for the failure of 
 health resulting in his premature death, a career of continually in- 
 creasing honor and usefulness would surely have been his. As a 
 Representative he was honest, sagacious, and faithful to his convic- 
 tions. In his relations with his constituency he was just, fair, and 
 impartial toward all parties, factions, interests, and sections. As a 
 colleague he was kind, generous, and considerate. I had known 
 Mr. WELCH intimately during all his Nebraska life nearly a quarter 
 of a century and I have the warrant that genuine friendship gives 
 to speak of him. Standing before the bier upon which reposed his 
 mortal remains, surrounded by his grief-stricken neighbors and friends, 
 I declared in the sad ceremonial whence his body was born to its 
 final resting-place, that during all these years of our intimacy FRANK 
 WELCH had never to my knowledge, been guilty of an unkind, an 
 ungenerous, an unmanly act. That declaration, sir, I here repeat. 
 He scorned the low pursuits of malice. The ignoble sentiments of 
 hatred and revenge found no lodgment in his breast, and moved him 
 not even to retaliation for injuries, real or imaginary; while on the 
 other hand every service, however difficult, every sacrifice, however 
 painful, was cheerfully endured by him for the advancement, the 
 protection of the interests of his friends.
 
 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF FRANK WELCH. 37 
 
 Such a man was FRANK WELCH, and such, sir, is the measure ot 
 our loss. 
 
 Mr. President, it was with no " hollow circumstance of woes," but 
 as one sorrows for a brother lost, as a family in sackcloth mourns 
 when the insatiate archer entering its charmed circle selects for his 
 victim the favorite of the flock, that we, each and all, in the State he 
 had loved so well and served so faithfully, did say peace and farewell 
 to his ashes. At length they bore him from us, and now his ashes 
 mingle with the soil of Massachusetts. To us, sir, who loved FRANK 
 WELCH, and we all did love him; to us who labored with him from 
 the smallest beginnings in the territorial time to the days of stalwart 
 statehood for Nebraska, there is indeed left the bright record of his 
 honorable citizenship, the proud monuments of his public service, 
 the sweet memory of his personal graces, and of his frank and gen- 
 erous nature, the valued example of his earnest life ; and these, sir, 
 shall be ours evermore. Remembering this, sir, with such cheerful- 
 ness and resignation as we could command, we responded to the 
 appeal of maternal affection and returned to Massachusetts the mor- 
 tal casket broken and useless to be sure which once had held this 
 priceless jewel. On behalf of the young State whose institutions 
 FRANK WELCH helped to mould, I send greetings and grateful ac- 
 knowledgments to Massachusetts for the valued services of this her 
 son in our upbuilding. But remember, Senators of that grand old 
 commonwealth, his ashes are ours as well as yours. You received 
 them from us with our love and orrr tears ; you gave them honored 
 sepulture. Now guard them well, we pray you ; for when the last 
 trump shall sound, and they who died for liberty on Bunker Hill and 
 the other patriots buried there shall then in glad obedience, come 
 forth, no nobler spirit will appear than his whose life, commencing 
 in that historic place, was mainly given to the work of development 
 and civilization which resulted in the establishment of a free and 
 prosperous commonwealth in the distant West, where only a little
 
 38 ADDRESS OF MR. SAUNDERS ON THE 
 
 time before the Indian, undisturbed, " pursued the panting deer," and 
 "the wild fox dug his hole unscared," in a land where no white man 
 had ever dwelt and the arts of peace were unknown. 
 
 ADDRESS OF yV5.R. ^AUNDERS, OF J^EBRASKA. 
 
 Mr. PRESIDENT : My colleague has left but little, if anything, for 
 me to say in reference to the life and death of our late associate, 
 Hon. FRANK WELCH. His personal acquaintance with the deceased 
 was longer and perhaps more intimate than mine, and especially 
 prior to his entering upon his official duties as a Representative in 
 Congress; I therefore left it to my colleague to give, as he has so 
 tully and well done more ably than 1 could do more of the par- 
 ticulars of the early business life and of the early trials and triumphs 
 of our late friend. I had known Mr. WELCH about seventeen years; 
 and from the time of his election to the House to the time of his 
 death I was on intimate terms with him, an'd was strongly impressed 
 with his uniformly amiable disposition, kindness of heart, courteous 
 demeanor, and his unfaltering fidelity to his public trusts. 
 
 He was possessed of a warm, genial nature and an unrestricted 
 flow of friendship for his fellow-man, which secured for him in life a 
 popularity truly enviable. And now that an early grave has closed 
 over him, the people of our entire commonwealth mourn over his 
 departure as though it were that^t some near and dear relative. 
 
 The good and generous qualities of our human nature were blended 
 in his character. He was resolute, courageous, and ardent in all of 
 his pursuits. Unaided and alone he obtained place, and indeed was 
 the architect of his own fortune. He came to Nebraska long before 
 it was admitted into the Union as a State, and at once took part in 
 giving shape to her public institutions and in preparing the Territory 
 for the responsible position she was soon to occupy as one of the inde-
 
 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF FRANK WELCH. 39 
 
 pendent States of the Union. He represented his district for several 
 sessions in the Territorial and State legislatures, and afterward held 
 the arduous and responsible position of register of one of the United 
 States land offices in Nebraska. Elected to Congress in the fall of 
 1876 and dying before his term of service had expired, he was thus 
 prematurely prevented from filling the measure of his own aspirations 
 and the hopes of the people who had confided in him their trusts. 
 
 There was much in the active life of Mr. WELCH that might well 
 be emulated by the youth of our country, and which illustrates the 
 adaptability of our republican institutions to the development of 
 genius and the noble ambitions and high aspirations of men when 
 directed in the interests and for the benefit of his fellow-men. At 
 the early age of twenty-two he left his New England home and, fol- 
 lowing " the star of empire " with the compass and chain of the en- 
 gineer, settled in Nebraska. And with an indomitable physical and 
 intellectual energy, directed by great good sense and tempered with 
 justice to all men, we have seen him rise from place to position until 
 he stood an honored and useful member of Congress at large from 
 the State of his adoption. To what higher eminence he might have 
 attained in his brilliant career had he not been cut down in the bloom 
 of manhood we can well imagine by the strong personal force with 
 which he conquered success and the high esteem in which he was 
 held by the people of his State. 
 
 He was strong in his convictions of right, and a decided party man, 
 but there was a kindness and beritgnity about him that like polished 
 armor turned aside all feelings of ill-will or animosity, and tended to 
 disarm his opponents and turn them into friends. 
 
 It is a phase in our political character a phase to be lamented and 
 deprecated for party antagonism to assail the private character and 
 misrepresent the public acts of an official, and especially is this def- 
 amation unguarded and severe in the excitement and heat of a polit- 
 ical campaign. .There are but few men in public position, however
 
 40 ADDRESS OF MR. SAUNDERS ON THE 
 
 chaste their lives, however pure their intentions, however disinter- 
 ested their acts, who have not had hurled at them the poisoned arrows 
 of partisan rancor. But the manly and generous qualities of our 
 deceased friend were a shield to his character, and whatever may 
 have been said against him in the heat of partisan anger was never 
 cherished in the hearts of those who may have thus hastily spoken. 
 
 His political course was short and successful ; labor and not words 
 was what he relied upon for success; and no person, of whatever party, 
 or hovrever much they may have differed with him in opinion, ever 
 doubted his intentions or failed to admire his fidelity to his party and 
 his friends. His zeal in the performance of his duty kept him steadily 
 at his post; and no movement, either of order or business, failed to 
 attract his attention. 
 
 He was the first and only one of those who have been honored 
 with a seat in the national council from the State of Nebraska who 
 has departed hence for a world of peace; and yet he was the young- 
 est of them all. He was cut down in the bloom and prime of his 
 manhood, in the full possession of his intellectual powers, and has 
 passed to that shadowy land from whence there is no return. 
 
 Mr. President, the record of the tomb is fast filling up with illustri- 
 ous names. In the providence of an all-wise God a number of victims 
 greater than is usual have been snatched by the hand of the dread 
 destroyer from the councils of the nation during the present Congress. 
 In the course of a very short service in this Chamber it has been my 
 sad experience to witness with sympathizing sorrow an unusual num- 
 ber of occasions of this character, in memory of the departure of re- 
 spected members of one or the other of the two Houses of Congress. 
 
 How impressively sad this warning, reminding us of the mutability 
 of human life, of how powerless the earthly hands of love to save, 
 and verifying in this case the saying that " in the midst of life we are 
 in death"! Let these frequent admonitions, so solemn and awful, 
 find a deep place in our hearts who yet remain behind.
 
 LIFE AND CHARACTER OF FRANK WELCH. 41 
 
 Our late associate has gone hence, sir, but his memory will survive, 
 embalmed in the hearts of those who knew him and appreciated his 
 manly qualities. He died, as he lived, deserving and possessing the 
 warm-hearted esteem of many and the ill-will, I trust, of none. In 
 private life in the State in which he lived he was respected, confided 
 in, and beloved to a very remarkable degree; and I have never wit- 
 nessed a community apparently more deeply impressed by the death 
 of one of its number than in the exhibition of sorrow over the death 
 of our deceased associate. 
 
 The integrity of his character, the soundness of his judgment, and 
 the kindness of his heart were well attested by the confidence and 
 affection bestowed upon him in his life and the intense sorrow with 
 which his untimely death was deplored. 
 
 Let us commend the heart-stricken widow, the fatherless children, 
 and the bereaved relatives and friends to the tender mercies and 
 teachings of Him who doeth all things well, and who alone can heal 
 the bruised heart and calm the whirlwind of grief in the afflicted 
 soul. 
 
 The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the res- 
 olutions proposed by the Senator from Nebraska [Mr. PADDOCK], 
 
 The resolutions were agreed to unanimously. 
 
 Mr. SAUNDERS. As a further mark of respect to the deceased I 
 move that the Senate do now adjourn. 
 
 The motion was agreed to; and (at five o'clock and thirty-eight 
 minutes p. m.) the Senate adjourned. 
 
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 Cong. 
 
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 1879 - 
 
 Memorial addresses on 
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