The Washington union., 1858-03-28
HoUR-spEAKINe IN the HOUSE.

sentatives in the Kansas dispute. Of course they
win be harangues of precisely an hour's tcugth
chopped off by the Speakers gammel, that modern
clepsydra, with the accuracy Of machine
and MANNED and snangled as sadly in the logic and
argument as the victims of Procrustes are said to
have been under the operation OF that curious and
bloody bed of his, which acted on tall customers
like double guillotine, shortening both exremities
of the frame at the same time
We suppose it admits of equal doubt whether the
modern hourmeasure for speeches in the American
House of Representatives suggested by tho
Roman clepsydra whether the modern guillotine
very ingenious Frenchnan who invented it, was bor-
rowed from the contrivance of Procrustes
Forty set speeches in the House--forty hours of
essay reading in deliberatve body-forty lay SER
mons politics in Congress Why, it is worse
than forty years in the desert forty days of fast
ing in Lent, tho horrors endured by the forty
thieves in their forty jars when the hot oil
poured in upon their frying bodies and souls.
Hour-speeches in debate What contradiction in
terms What sorry field for quick repartee, and the
sharp encounter of mind with mind, does this hour
speaking debate afford AS well might you expect
to detect agility in the gambollng of elephants or in
agymnastic school of Falstafs. Hour speaking The
very idea of the hour murders the patience of an
audience. What clearness and brilliancy in the ex-
ordium what eloquence and passion in the perora-
ton, can compensate for the irksome certainty Of
the inevitable hour! An hour of Milton, an hour of
Shakespeare, hour of Cicero, or of Homer or of
Byron, taken by premeditaton as Dose and not be-
guilcd of you uaawares would be unpleasant
enough bolus but an hour of Smith, or Jones' or
Black, or White or Brown, bored into you in the
middle of the day, in business hours is murder by
inches; Is worse than the crust, ditch-water and
duress of the old common law the pe,s forte ct duye
Mr.. Black, from the Commonwealth of Erebus,
rises in his place in the House. and regales his
uscrpt and desk with passionate sooquy, con-
tnued through period which nothing but the
Speakers inevitable hammer seems capable of ter
minating. His harangue the next day finds fitting
receptacle in that mausoleum of prose- the Congress
sonai Globe Two weeks afterwards, Mr.. Brown,
from the adjoining district of the same Common
wealth, replies in like sooquy of another inter
minable hour and his speech is in turn likewise de-
posted in the capacious cemetery of eloquence
Such is modern debate such is discussion an prac-
tised in the American House of Representatives
Mighty abuses have grown up in our land of IL
cense and abuses; but, among them all, there are
none to compare, in huge proportions and evil inu
ences, with this one of the "hour rule" and of
printed reporting at public expense. Jonahs gourd
vine Jacks mammoth bean stalk are proverbal for
the rapid growth they had but the evils engender-
ed by this modern rule and practice have outgrown
them all. Orator fit, the old motto; but it meant
that men became orators by dnt of aborious study
effort, and practice by the ripe scholarship and the
consummate skill in speech, achieved by assiduous
application. Orator it, is still true in the sense that
under our practice of allowing essays on subjects
at large to be rected read the House. and print
ed at public expense in the congressional reports
the feebest legislative mind may now become an
orator IN print. If he cannot speak he can at least
read If he cannot compose a speech for himself
he get it done to hand. Thus can he figure as an
orator in the congressional reports, and transmit him
self to posterity in that proud character though in
capable Of accomplishing a fve-mnutes effort in
real debate.
Thus are modern orators manuiactured--by
the hour rule and by the official reporter. 1t is one
of the most splendid triumphs of modern machinery
that clever orators may be made out of downright
blockheads. 90 The hour rule and the printed re-
port are magicians more cunning than the old al
chymists-for they can in fact compound orators at
will without reference to the quality of the
terial. John Randolph thought he had discovered
the philosophers stone in finance but here is
philosophers stone in rhetoric that can convert
every man it touches into an orator. Under this
magical talisman all who enter the halls of Congress
become incontinently the equals of Henry and
Adams, Webster and Calhoun.
Somebody has said truly that the reporter was
the great leveller of ntellects The hour rule cuts
all off at the length the reporter moulds all in
the same mould. The printed debates containing the
speeches of congressman, of all intellectual grades
are like the Egyptian catacombs, where the mum
mics, packed away like herrings in cask are all
grinning the grin, and you unable to know
in any particular instance whether you behold the
CHASTITY vsage of king or of a cobbler.
Until the rule is restored in the House which re-
quires all debate to be addressed to the subiectmat
ter under discussion and until the system of full
aud ndiscriminate reporting at public expense be
shall have no more congressional elo
qucnce of the oden sort If reporting at public ex-