The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1882-09-29
A Sample Roorback.

The Argus copies from the New York Sun
the letter of its Washington correspondent
in which it is charged, or rather intimated,
that certain members of the forty-first Con-
gress were corruptly Influenced to vote for
the pas sage of the Texas Pacific Railroad
bill and that Mr.. Reed as chairman of the Ju-
dietary committee of the House of Represen-
tatives prevented an investigation of this mat
ter and thus saved to that road the land grant
which it had forfeited. The letter charges
that Mr.. Newhall one of the corporators
named in the Texas Pacific bill, secured its
passage through the U. S. Senate by the use
of acorruption fund of one hundred and ten
thousand dollars in cash and two hundred
thousand dollars in land grant bonds, and
that Marshall 0. Roberts of New York had
placed in the hands of Richard G. Parsons,
Marshal of the Supreme Court of the United
States, one million dollars in land grant
bonds with which to secure the passage of
the measure through the House; that after
prolonged struggle the bill was finally passed
in March 1871. The letter refers to the
Congressional Globe to show that certain
Members of Congress who voted against the
bill at first in the House, finally voted for
its passage; and draws tberefrom the infer
ence, that this change was brought about
by corrupt means.
As this letter gives dates and refers to
pages of the Congressional Globe, we have
had the curiosity to examine the matter, and
have failed to find in the record anything
that could warrant a suspicion in the mind
of the most prejudiced partizan that any
corrupt means were used in either branch
of Congress to secure the passage of the
Texas Pacific Railroad BILL 1t may seem a
waste of time to attempt to follow and cor
rect the yagaries of imaginative Washington
correspondents, but as this is a characters
tic sample of the sort of stuff with which
they crafty the taste for scandal of their
INSCRIPTIONS employers, it is perhaps well
enough, for once in way, to show its ut
ter, baseless and fragrant mendacity.
As stated in the letter, the bill passed the
Senate June 81, 1870, at an evening session
to which it was especially assigned, and its
NChoAASAobiOd OStupiC0 bnC ClUiiO bCcbiOns
the time being taken up in discussing
amendments offered by Senators who parti-
cipated in the debate. Bayard and
Edmunds, representative men of their
respective parties who never let any
measure pass without the severest scrutiny,
took an active part in the discussion. The
debate on the measure covers fifteen pages
of the Globe 1890 to 1915 inclusive) and not
one word Of opposition to the bill can be
found in the whole debate. 1t finally passed
unanimously without a division being
called. Only Washington correspondent
imagination could conceive that a measure
to which there was no opposition whatever
should require a corruption fund of
one hundred and ten thousand dollars
in cash and two hundred thousand
dollars in bonds-and it puzzles the COM
mon mind to understand how company,
not incorporated 1.-THE bill was to incorporate
the company, which had no lands and not
even a corporate existence could issue two
hundred thousand dollars in land grant
bonds and use them to corrupt those already
willing Senators. If the bill was bribed
through the Senate, it was certainly the
most remarkable case of legislative corrup-
ton in history or romance. 1t is quite pos
sible that this man Newhal may have re-
ceived money from somebody to engineer
the measure through Congress, but that any
of it ever got beyond him seems most unlike
ly.
Following the bill into the House of Repre-
sentatiyes we find that on July ID, one of the
very last days of the session, (Globe, page
1924 Mr.. Schenck moved to suspend the
rules and take this bill out of its order from
the Speakers table for consideration. Mr..
Butler of Massachusetts asked the Speaker
whether, If the bill were taken up for consid-
Grafton, it would not be in order to move
an amendment 20 attach any other railroad
bill which anyone might choose to move.
The Speaker replied that any bill which had
not been considered or referred in the House
might be appended to it. Mr.. Bingham APP
pealed to his colleague, Mr.. Schenck, to in
clude in his motion the apportionment bill.
The vote was finally taken, not on the pas
sage of the bill, but on suspending the rules
to take it from the Speakers table out of its
order for consideration at that time, and
this motion of Mr.. Schenck was negatived
by the decided vote of 101 to IA. Every
member who voted against suspending the
rules on the motion of Mr.. Schenck might
have been an honest and consistent friend of
the bill, and have voted for it when finally
reported to the House by the Railroad Com
mittee, even if it had not been amended.
But the bill as reported back to the House
was amended SO materially that the chair
man Of the Committee, in reporting it to
the House, designated it as substitute for
the Senate bill. After its passage by the
House, it went to the Senate and that body
disagreed to the amendments of the House,
and the differences between the two houses
were reconciled in conference committee.
The charge that Mr.. Reed suppressed an
investigation into the means used to secure
the passage of the bill is as ridiculously abb
surd as the other charges and insinuations
in regard to the passage of the bill. The
fact is that the Judiciary Committee of the
present House was unanimous in agreeing
that the land grant had been forfeited by the
company. Not dollar of money and not
an acre of land has been given by the United
States to this company, and no member Of
Congress proposes to give either money or
land So it cannot be very fragrant case
of corruption. 'The earth hath bub-
bles as the water hath, and this is OF Them"
THERE is one thing that the "respecta-
ble'' and ''oid line'' Democrats who voted
for Andrew Jackson are requested to remem-
Der, and that is that Mr.. John Kelly has
brought the Democratic party of New York
to terms, and by leaving Mr.. Corning and
going over to Mr. Cleveland secured the
nomination of the present Democratic can
didate for governor of the Empire State.
This is the same Mr.. John Kelly who was
4 1.