The weekly register. [volume] (Point Pleasant, Va. [W. Va.]) 1862-1909, 1882-01-11
WASHINGTON LETTER.
The Reassembling Of Congress-
MIR. Ortll Protests Mr.. Springer
Breakers Ahead.
From our Regular Correspondent.

LGiphh Vtlt iseShiitt NoiitrpUnutnt.i ~
WAsHryeToN, D. G., Jan. I, 1882.
The holidaysare over. The nation
al bunting has again been run up at
both ends Of the Capitol, announcing
the presence ofthe House and Sem
ate in Congress assembled. POST
master General James has formally
resigned, and the new Postmaster
General, Howe, has been duly'install-
ed at the head Of the largest postal
department on the planet. The most
noted, and, owing to its cause and its
episodes, the most repulsive trial in
modern judicial history is rapidly
nearing its close. The social world
at the Capitol is abroad on the boule-
ward, or at home in the drawing room,
alert, irrepressable, diabolically gay
and aesthetically wicked. Until
within the last FIVE days, we have
had the balmy winter climate Of
South Carolina; but the new year
brings q temperature and snowfall
that has set the oldest inhabitant
talking.
The House met on Thursday and,
after q brief session, adjourned till
Monday, but the session, brief as it
was, was sufficiently long for Mr..
Orth, Of Indiana, to express his pro.
test and his indignation at being
ignored in the formation of impor-
tant committees. This is the be-
ginning, the forty.seventh Congress
will not hear the end of the very
general dissatisfaction with Speaker
Keifer's committee mechanism. For
the last ten or fifteen years, there
has been a feeling among legislators
that the system of naming the per-
sonel of committees by the Speaker
concentrated too much power in the
hands Of one man. Solong, however,
as the Speaker followed the rule of
recognizing, as far as possible, the
leaders of the House, and placing
them on important committees, there
had been no emphatic protest; but
now comes Speaker Keller, ignoring
all presidents, and nearly all the
recognized leaders, causing great
dissatisfaction in both rank and file,
and in both parties. Mr.. Springer,
Of Illinois, will, in few days, offer a
resolution, setting forth that I'M
known and inexperienced men have
been assigned to important com.
mittees, while older members, and
those familiar with legislation and
the rules Of the House, have not only
been gagged by being placed on I'm,
important committees, but that they
have been removed from important
committees where they have long
served, and that their efficiency as
Legislators has been conspicuously
and wantonly impaired; that the &C
ton of the Speaker is not so much a
personal affront as it is a wrong to
their constituents and to the country,
whose interests demand the best
ability and most mature experience,
or, in other words, that tools shall
not be given to bunglers, but to those
who can use them. The feeling Of
dissatisfaction among members is, by
no means, confined to Mr.. Orth, or to
Democrats. 1t is shared by the
friends of Mr. orth and of Mr.. Kas.
son, and is prevalent among the
Western, the Eastern, the Southern,
the New England, and the New
York delegations. 1t needs no pro.
phet to predict that, with this ill.,
tense feeling existing, the forty
seventh Congress will not be a dove
cote, or the Speakers chair q bed Of
roses. C. A. S.