The Harvard Union.

The fortnightly meeting of the Harvard Union was held in Sever 11 last evening. After the reading and accepting of the minutes of the previous meeting the election of new members was in order, and A. B. Webber, '92, and D. T. Dickinson, L. S. were elected to membership. Of the three questions proposed for the next debate the following was selected: Resolved that a republican form of government is the best for Brazil. Mr. Dodge as a member of the executive committee then brought forward the following amendment to the constitution: The debate from the floor shall close at 10 o'clock unless a motion to the contrary is carried by 2-3 of the members present. This amendment is open to consideration and will be voted upon at the next meeting. The regular debate of the evening was then taken up on the question, Resolved, That President Harrison has broken the pledges of the republican party.

The debate was opened for the affirmative by C. Macy '92. He began his argument by stating the platform adopted by the republicans at Chicago, many points of which he said President Harrison had disregarded. In regard to civil service he said that many removals from office had been made without cause. Mr. Macy closed his argument with an explanation of the Tanner question.

Mr. C. M. Thayer, L. S., in opening the debate for the negative, said that the condition of affairs could be summed up in the one expression, "put yourself in his place." He said he would agree with his opponents that the republican party was lazy but the question to be proved was whether or not President Harrison had violated his pledges. The president has been surrounded by incompetent heads of departments who wish to turn out men; in addition he is oppressed by poor service. The platform of the republican party he said, favors the extension of the civil service reform in so far as to give the sole power of removal from office to an investigation committee. Had President Harrison vetoed any of these measures in the platform when brought before the senate then he might be said to have broken his pledge, but this is not the case. Mr. F. B. Williams, L. S., closed the debate for the affirmative. He said that in seven months President Harrison had turned out more men than Cleveland during the whole administration. He confined himself to civil service and in conclusion said that he had given general proofs and statistics from which it was evident that removals had been made on purely partisan principles.

Mr. H. Hudson, '90, closed the negative side of the question, affirming the arguments of his colleague.

The votes on the question were as follows: On merits of question, affirmative 11, negative 15; on merits of principal disputants, affirmative 7, negative 21; on debate as a whole, affirmative 4, negative 9.