The Portland daily press., 1870-01-25

| additional session of Congress- aud ore to i'm
prove the Penobscot, Union and Narraguaga
rivers in Maine, and one for incorporating the
Washington & Boston Steamship Company.
A bill was presented by Mr.. Washburne, o
Wisconsin, to establish postal telegraph lines
He moved to refer it to special committee o
seven.
Mr.. Farnsworth, of Illinois, called for a di.
vision, and remarked that the matter was al.
ready before the Post Office Committee.
Mr.. Perry moved to refer the bill to the Post
Office Committee Negatived, 67 to 76.
The bill was then referred without discussion
to select committee of seven.
A resolution was adopted declaring the Com
mlttee on elections judicial body, and that
including contested election cases members
should act according to the rules Of law. The
vote stood 1873 to %.
A large number of petitions for the abolition
OF the ranking privilege &C., were presented
and referred; among them by Mr. Calkins, a
petition from 5000 merchants, mechanics and
citizens of New York city against allowing
American registers to foreign built ships, and
in favor of reduction of the existing taxes on
ship building and commerce.
Mr.. Mungen, of Ohio, presented petition of
ID. ii. Blgelow and 154 Others, citizens of Wor-
cester, Mass, for the reputation OF the nationr
al war debt.
A number of bills were presented and refer
red. by MIR. Palmer, of Ohio, to establish a
postal telegraph system and TO incorporate
United States Postal Telegraph Company.
MIR. Dawes, OF Massachusetts,, from the Com
mlttee on Appropriations, reported the legisla-
tive, executive and judicial appropriation bill,
which was ordered to be printed and made the
special order for Wednesday next Mr.. Dawes
stated to the House the figures composing the
bill as compared with the estimates, and that
there were several legislative provisions in the
Dill rendered necessary in order to cut off
abuses, and he moved to suspend the rules so
tnat an order should be made that the usual
hn pndn inst f1pcc
PROVISIONS IN committee of the whole After
considerable discussion the motion was agreed
to.
The House then proceeded to the business
ON the Speakers table as follOws:-The reply
OF the General of the army to the call for in
formation on the Brooks resolution, as to the
authority for certain military officers acting as
committee of elections in the Georgia Legis-
lature, stating that they are not acting as such
committee, but as a board outside of leyisla-
tors to assist Gen. Terry in the execution of
his most unpleasant Office and the duties i'm.
posed on him by act of Congress. A sharp de-
bate followed, principally between Mr.. Brooks,
of New York, and Gen. Butler, and the papers
were referred to the Reconstruction Commit
tee.
Mr.. Farnsworth, OF Illinois, moved to pass
over all the intervening business on the speak
er's table in order to take up the Virginia bill
with the Senate amendments.
MIR. Eldridge, of Wisconsin, inquired wheth-
IL.
but Mr.. Farnsworth declined to make any
promise on the subject. The motion was
agreed to, the Democrats voting in the mega
tive. The bill was then taken up and the
Senate substitute was read.
Mr. Farnsworth moved to concur in the SEN
ate substitute, not, however, because of its
provisions, for if they were presented as origi-
nally he would have supported them. Some
OF them. he thought, were very bunglipgly
drawn up and they would do more harm than
good, but he made the motion because he
thought that to throw the question again to a
sea of discussion and to keep Virginia longer
out of representation would be greater evil
than to adopt the Senate bill.
Mr.. Cox, of New York, asked whether the
passage of the Senate bill would not be yield
ing up the position of the House without even
a chance of committee of conference.
Mr.. Farnsworth replied that that was ques-
ton for the House.
Mr.. Bingham, of Ohio, said it would be
borne on the journal of the House that more
than three to one of the members had declared
TOR the admission of Virginia without cond-
ton. That vote would commend itself to the
approval of posterity. He had no apology to
make here or elsewhere Tor the position he
hen assumed and which he now reiterated;
that 1T was not in the power of Congress by
exacting fundamental conditions in the admis-
sion of State to enforce what could not be le-
enforced in all other States That
being SO, he asked that the State of Virginia
b @ d a.ieted ~s50s tho o. bftt.
gzed the Constitution of the State of Virginia
as being more liberal than the Constitution of
any State west of the Alleghanies If he
thought that under this bill Virginia could be
subjected to conditions which might not be i'm
posed in New York or Ohio he never woulds
vote for the bill.
MIR. Cox, of New York, suggested that the
Senate bill was as obnoxious as the bill report
ed by the Reconstruction Committee, and
which was voted down by the House.
ntarsN lad hot oh 10
obnoxious. He hoped the House would con-
cur in the Senate's amendment. His chief
purpose was to state to the gentlemen on his
own side of the House.
Mr.. Butler, of Observation-Disclosures side
of the House is that? Laughter)
Mr.. Bingham, pdignantly-The gentleman
is WISE wise beyond his years. He cannot
read me out of the party with which 1 am as
ISOLATED, nor can he blot out my record. Vul-
garity is not wit; assumption is not power.
There was no occasion for inquirng.
A wit is feather and foo is a sod:
An honest man s the noblest work of God.
[ Laughter and much excitement on the f1oor.]
Mr.. Butler of Massachusetts took the floor
and the interest in the discussion seemed to be
on the increase. He said he would begin
where the gentleman from Ohio left off; not
with a misquotation, but simply to say that he
had never threatened to read the gentleman
out of the Republican party. Nobody could
do that but himself Whether he had done
that in hurrying the Virginia bill through the
House by snap judgment and with the aid of
his Democratic allies, the country would judge
Whether the gentleman was to have an ova-
ton when he went to Virginia, he did not
know, but had seen something of that kind in
the papers. He should like to be present in
spirit where he could look on, not embodied,
and see Virginians toasting the man whom all
their papers announced as the murderer of
Mrs. Surratt. Excitement What sight;
the lion and-no, not the lamb, but another
animal. Laughter.] He referred to the eu-
logy passed bv the gentleman from Ohio on
the Virginia Constitution, and said that it was
not the work of Virginia statesmen, but of
carpet baggers and scallawags and negroes
from the field He regarded the conditions in
the bills as a notice to Virginia and all the
country that if she did not maintain in spirit
and in truth the spirit of the reconstruction
acts, Congress held and claimed, and with the
help of God and the loyal people of the coun-
try, would exercise the power to place her back
where she had been. He did not know what
new light the gentleman from Ohio had got,
which induced him to support the Senate bill,
which was substantially the bill reported by
the Reconstruction Committee.
Mr.. Farnworth of Illinois said he under
stood very well the allusion made by Mr.. But
Ter to the acting chairman of the Reconstruc-
ton Committee, and he had a word to say on
that subject. He would not allow himself to
be instructed in Republicanism by the gentle
man from Massachusetts. He had been Re-
publican for twenty-five years, when that gen.
tleman was chasing fugitive slaves all over
that State Laughter and clapping of hands
on the Democratic side.1 He had been doing
all he conld at the Chicago Convention for the
nomination of Republican President, when
the gentleman from Massachusetts was at the
Charleston Convention voting for jeff Davis.
He had voted for the Republican party in 1860
when the gentleman from Massachusetts was
voting for Mr. Breckenridge of Kentucky.
He knew that gentleman's faculty Tor getting
on the other side when his allies deserted him
and went over, and he knew his conviction
and conversion was so Sudden that it shamed
that of st. Paul. Laughter. The lightning
that blazed around him, the focal blaze that
illuminated his understanding shamed into
darkness the light that came from st. Paul;
but he knew that the gentleman was somewhat
like Peter when he deserted his master. ID is
desertion was SO recent that he was obliged to
curse and swear to make people believe that
his desertion was genuine Qaughter); so the
gentleman from Massachusetts was obliged 10
be exceedingly radical in order to make people
believe that his conversion was genuine
| Laughter. He understood that the gentle
mans attack was on the gentleman from ONO
| (Mr. Bngham); but he would probably have
named him too, only he knew that he (Earns
| WORTHY had chance to reply.
Mr.. Butler said that his reason was that be
had held the floor by the genteman's courtesy
and therefore did not think it well to arralgI
| him at that time for his sins. (Laughter).
Mr.. Farnsworth, continuing his remarks, re
| minded the House that Mr.. Butler had oppos
ed him every time that be tried to introduce
| bill for the admission of Virginia, and had stat
| ed two days before the recess that the commit