New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1872-03-16
ABaOGATIoN OF COMMERCIAL TREATY
AMNESTY ON ST. PATRICK'S DAY
The California Wool Product
CoNGREss.

Combination of Railroad Interests
Substitute for St. Croix Railroad Bill
sherman On the Tariff. NJ. &. Park
er's Nomination Referred-Persenal
Explanation by MIR. Trumbull-Spirited
Debate.
WASHINGTON, March l5.-Colonel J. H.
Baxter was to-day confirmed as chief medi-
cal purveyor of the army.
House.-The Committee on Commerce
was instructed to inquire particularly into
the nature, extent and objects OF an alleged
combination of Ia lrOad interests known as
the Southern Improvement Company, and
designed to control all the avenues of trans
portation from the oil region IN Pennsylva-
MIA to the seabOard to the oppression and
injury of the producing classes.
After several votes upon the st. CrOix
Railroad the following substitute was
adopted by ninety-fOur to eighty-five. 1t is
telesraphed as having an important bear
ing upon land subsidies: The next vote
was on the substitute offered by Mr.. Ketch-
um. providing that all the lands granted by
Congress in 1856 and 1864 for the construc-
ton of the St. Croix and Lake Superior
Railroad. such grants having expired by
limitation, are declared forfeited to the
United States, and shall henceforward be
subject to homestead entry and settlement
under the homestead act of the
twentieth of May 1862, and that no part of
such lands shall be selected by or inure to
the benefit of any railroad under any as
sumed grant of the United States, and that
no land embraced in the grant to the ST.
Croix Railroad Company shall in any case
revert to the North Pacific Railroad Com
panv, and repeating all acts or parts of acts
Inconsistent with this provision. The last
clause about the North IN Pacific railroad
was added to the substitute, on motion of
Mr.. Banks.
S,3,ate.-NIr Sherman occupied the time
to adjournment upon the tali.t
J. NJ G. Parkers nominate Il as Surveyor
Of Customs at New Orleans has been re-
ferred to the appropriate committee. His
Confirmation is expected Monday.
The following is report OF the debate
arising out of Mr.. Trumbulls personal ex-
plauation to-day: q.
Mr.. Trumbull rose and sent to the desk
10 ne read an extract from Washington
letter, in a paper published at Hastings
Michigan, ehargi ing that Senator tor Irambuil
had Illegally pOcketed $4,000 fee in the
McCardle case in the Supreme Court, hav
ing been employed to represent the Unltel
States bv President johnson, and charges
further that his vote in the impeachment
trial was Influenced by this fee, and calling
for an investigation into the matter by the
Senate MI. Trumbull then said, that dur
ing seventeen years service in the Senate,
he had not heretofore risen to personal ex-
PLANTATION, although he had often been mis-
represented and calumniated. q.
He only noticed this now because he un-
derstocd that the author of this letter was
an officer Of the government, and had been
instigated to make this attack by a member
of this body. Some time since the Senator
from Michigan Mr.. Chandler) had offered
a resolution instructing the committee on
retrenchment to inquire whether any Sen
ator had, under cover OF counsel fees or
otherwise, Illegally received money from
the treasury of the United States. He now
asked the Senator whether the information
upon which this newspaper article was
based was not furnished by him.
Mr.. Chandler said he certainly had the
Senator in his minds eye when he offered
the resolution referred to. He had seen "a
bill made out by the Senator from Illinois,
charging $4,000 for his services m the
McCardle case; $4,000 of it had been paid by
MIR. Stanton. and $l0U by his successor
General Rawllns. He desired to know
whether this money had been improperly
received, but as to any letter having been
written at his request, it was not SO.
Mr. Trumbull-I do not mean at your re-
quest, but whether by any conversation
you may have had.
Mr.. Chandler-Could not answer as to
that; he could not say whether he had any
conversation with correspondents or not.
Mr. Trumbull-If it should turn out on a
statement that Andrew johnson, who was
opposed to reconstruction, did not employ
me; that the consttutionality OF the recon
structon acts was involved in the
decision in the McCardle and Geor-
gia cases; that his Attorney General,
Mr.. Stansberry refused to argue the
McCardle case, that he (Mr. Trumbull) was
in consequence employed not by Andrew
johnson. but by General Grant and Mr..
Stanton: that in the McCardle case and
the Georgia case were involved the greatest
questions involving the very peace of the
country, cases that were argued for several
days; that Mr.. Stanton himself, in oppo-
sition to to the wishes of President johnson,
employed counsel to represent the govern
ment what would he have thought of the
malice that could invent and publish such
statement as this! That the Senate might
know and the country might kno"
why he appeared i'll the case, ne
would ask for the reading OF the following
letter. He then sent to the desk to De read
letter dated War Department, January ..
1868. addressed to Senator Irumbuil, and
signed by General Grant, as Secretary OF
War I'D interim, stating that the department.
desired to engage his services to appear IN
the SUPREME Court in the McCardie case. LII
behalf of the government.
Mr. Trumbull continued at some length
+oexnlain his connection with the case. He
said the fee had been fixed by Mr.. Stanton;
that it had been the custom ever since the
existence of the government for members of
Congress TO appear in the courts either for
or against the government. and that such
practice was in violation of no statute He
asked whether these parties who clamored
for investigation would now want it, after
- ros fnund ont that Grant had amDlore6