The Donaldsonville chief. [volume] (Donaldsonville, La.) 1871-current, 1874-05-16
OUR WASHINGTON LETTER.
WASHINGTON, d. c., May 9th, Il

Ihls is peculiar C0ngress-ln many
respects. Some call it the transit
tional Congress, some the regulating
Congress, some the investigating
Congress, some the cropping Congress,
some the economic Congress and so
on. 1t has now been in session five
months and passed two measures of
Importance; one surrendering the
salary grab, and the other a measure
designed to initiate the currency, but
whether it would or would not do
that, neither its friends or enemies
exactly knew. Morton and Conkling,
one for and the other against, thought
it would infate-Box and Cox-we
beg pardon, Cox and Knox, thought it
would contract, but it makes no diff
ference now, for Grant came the APP
pomatox on it, and that ends it.
But though measures of Importance
do not rush through with any celeri-
ty, the intention to regulate things
generally is not dormant. The cur
reney is to be regulated, transporta-
ton, the public printing, the moiety
system, the contract system, the
District of Columbia, the National
Bank system, the Board of Public
works, the civil service, the hours of
labor in the departments, affairs in
Louisiana; affairs in Arkansas, the
Centennial, the Indians, the civil
rights bill, the mode of electing Pres
ident and Vice President, besides all
the Investigations into Sanborn,
Jayne, pavement contracts, city mar
ket company, Jay Cooks bank, Gen.
Howard, Pension Commissioner Ba-
ker, the Indian frauds, Seneca Sand
stone, the Attorney General and
various incidentals of no great ac-
count. Where OF when it will all
end, no mortal knows.
A powerful article in the Nation on
the misnlanagement of the Pension
Office came down upon us last week,
and had the effect OF a bOmbshell in
the Interior Department. That De-
partment has been making prodigious
efforts to stave off investigation into
Bakers proceedings, and it's influence
over the newspapers here, and over
newspaper row 5" has kept discussion
down. The charges against Baker
having been made by a woman, he
thought it an easy matter to turn
them into -ridicule, and was begin
ming to think he had succeeded, but
the Nation has dispelled that dream,
and tho little dapper quill drivers,
who have been representing the ale
cations to be frivolous, suddenly find
their bodies are entirely too small to |
hide the sunlight, which is destined
TO pour in. Baker can't be sustained
any longer, and must go where the
wood-bine twineth.
Mr.. A. B. Kirkland, who knows
something about wood payements in
tried to Hevade the COM
mittee of Ways and Means, but came
here and registered at the Ebbitt
House under the name of Hoyle. He
betrayed himself by his games, which
are much superior to any of HoyIe's.
one of these little games was played
on the Arlington Hotel, where he
boarded first class and paid in drafts
that We're dishonored.
The Civil Service Rules have met
with another disaster. A Mr.. Par
sons has been appointed Chief Clerk
Of Mullett's Bureau, over the heads of
all the clerks in the office, without a
examination. Parsons is
near relative OF the Parsons who got
$4,000 for obtaining the De Collier
pavement contract from the Board of
Public Works, and Mullett is con-
lected with the Board.
An earnest debate on the centennial
prang up in the House on Tuesday, I
nd was continued on Wednesday {
nd Thursday. II
Mr.. Hale of Maine took the lead in
pposition to the three million appro- i
ration in speech which produced
marked effect, and caused consider !
BILE fiuttering in the ranks of the /,
dvocates OF that measure, and de-
idedly increased the firmness of the i
who began to rally again h