The substance of the original Act was gone, but the Senate sought shelter from its record of inconsistency under the small shadow of this distant and hypothetical restoration of the suspended officer.
But the House would not consent that even the small shadow should remain.

Representatives well knew that it was not agreeable to President Grant that any authority should be retained by the Senate whereby an obnoxious officer could in any event be kept in place against his wishes, and they were in hearty accord with him.

The House had always been jealous of the power of the Senate over appointments to office, and but for the desire to punish President Johnson the representatives would never have consented to the Tenure-of-office Act.

They were now determined, if possible, to strip the Senate of its great aggrandizement of power.

The feeling of many members of the House was to sustain an amendment offered by General Logan directing that "all civil offices, except those of judges of the United-States courts, filled by appointment before the 4th of March, 1869, shall become vacant on the 30th of June, 1869." This would have been a wholesale removal beyond any scheme attempted since the organization of the Government; but it was not deemed wise even to bring it to a test, and the House contented itself with the rejection of the Senate amendments by a decisive vote.
The subject was then referred to a Conference Committee, consisting of Messrs.