Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1870-07-13
MILEAGE.

We commend to the consideration of
Hunker Democracy the following, rela-
tive to the past and present mileage oil
members of Congress. A responsible wri-
ter says:
al cannot stop to enumerate the thousand
and one queer things which meets one on ev-
cry hand in looking over these old books OF
the Senate, but there is one portion, very
funny part of the record, which cannot pass
without mentioning. / discovered what |
had either forgotten or never known before,
that our good old economical friends used to
nav themselves forty cents for every mile
they travelled in going to and from the capital.
/ suppose it ordinarily costs about as mnch
for Republican 10 travel as Democrat;
but however that may be, no sooner had the
Republican party come into power than they
deliberately cut down the mileage just one
half In 1889 there was paid to Senators
s.59ll as mileage. In 1859, with six more
Senators, there was paid s2e, 10, differ
snee Of s4s, 5s7 50 Taking like ratio for
the House and she total amount paid to men,
hers Of Congress in 1859 As mileage, WAS in
rvgrd numbers S56ss. 900 while the amount
pad in 1855 Was sl09. 600, yearly difference
and saviRg Of Sz54 GO. But SAYS one
How can rkrs De = 1t the mileage in 1889
NJ 40 cents WAS 5.i6-s 900. il certainly az 20
caHsx shosAa De lass halt thar sum, or Sl6l,-
gen Hewis IL then tnaf these Republicans
draw $1,000 less than bait much, Is was
formerly paid the simple hearted and IN
selfish peaocracys
I mast confess that / WIS ligtIe pnxZied
ever this myself. bat after while dsseoTer-
ed wsere the Jake came in Here IL is then.
Msnhsrs OF Congress certify the number Of
4u4 ~hsi- r1-f ry3
honor has usually been deemed sufficient. Ac
eeording to their certificates, then, these old
fathers Of Israel travelled a good many more
miles than their Republican successors. and
my heart finally blcd for the virtuous old gen
tlemen when / noted their long and weary
searches for the historic spot on the banks of
the placid Potomac. Paul was an imposter
The pilgrimage Of Japhet in search of his
father, was pleasure excursion. Weston's
trip to Chicago sinks into nothngness. The
only difference between them and the wan
dering Jew is the fact that they sometimes
came to halt, while he, like Tennyson's
brook, went for ever; and he got no forty
cents mile for it either. There was John
son of Arkansas, when he was a Senator it
was 1000 miles from Little Rock to Wash
ington and back Now it is not so much by a
thousand miles, at least, so says Rice his Re-
publican successor. Think of poor Green of
Missouri, tramping $500 miles to reach the
Capitol, while Drake meanly cuts across lots
and saves over 500 miles, the former COM
ing up at a cost 10 the people of 81 400, the
latter for less than $500. We used to pay
that eminent diplomat, Gwin of California,
nearly $4,000 to come to Washington. We
get Cole, a Republican, here for $1,000. 1t
cost us 81, 900 every time tina tshining Demo-
crat. Jessie ID. Bright turned his face to the
81 k,.< lnvrp fNr
Graham N. Fitch of Indiana, had a very
weary time Of it, for he travelled 1855 miles
and finally reached Washington after much
suffering at a national expense of 81 ,546.
Pratt, though living in the same town, discov-
cred some wonderful route some twelve hun
dred miles shorter, and so we get him here
and back again, heavy as he is, for 1888, 02.
That great and good man, David Tupie.
when he had the misfortune to be Senator
for a few days, wandered about like a lost
sheep, until finally gladdened at the sight of
the dome, after havi"g travelled 1856 miles.
Everybody knows that David had an eye
single to the glory of his country; that he
is boiling over with economy that so far as
national interests are at stake, if a single i'm
provement could be made in his mental or
ganization, it would be by plucking feather
from the wings of his integrity and sticking it
into the tail of his generosity; and yet Col
fax, Packard, and others make the distance
from North Indiana TO the Capitol from eight
to nine hundred miles shorter than did Tupie.
The trouble was doubtless with the arithmetic
and not with David, but from one cause or
another the calculation was wrong.
Davis, the great and costly Jefferson, trav-
eled four thousand miles every time he came
up to the Capitol, and charged us one thous-
and six hundred dollars for the trip. Revels
blacker, but more modest, lining one hundred
and fifty miles further away, cuts across the
country thousand miles nearer, and charges
a thousand dollars less for the job. These
figures are from the official records and chal-
lenge contradiction"