Richmond dispatch. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1884-1903, 1885-03-28
CHEEKY, TO SAY THE LEAST.
Ex-senator I'M. OF Colorado. Does an I'm
senatorial Act.

Ex-senator I'M. OF Colorado, Does an I'm
senatorial Act.
[By telegraph TO the Dispatch.l
WASHINGTON, ID. G., March 81
The Senate Committee on Post-0fiices
and Post-Roads has to-day been investi-
eating the publication at the Govern
ment Printing Office Of an alleged re-
port of the committee and its circula-
ton through channels provided for pub
lie documents. The document, which
made its first appearance yesterday,
bears the usual formal Senate heading,
and is numbered Report 577; part
g." The members Of the committee
were at a loss to understand how this
document, Of which none of them had
ever heard before. could have worked
its way through the Sccretary's office,
where alone the formal headings are af-
fixed. The clerk whose duty it is to
record and to put heads upon documents
Of this character as they are received
from the Senate, being called upon to
explain, said that the paper had never
passed through his hands. The manu-
script, having been sent for, was found
to have been received from another
clerk in the Secretary's Office, whose
duty it is TO order such extra work as
may be required by the committees and
senator's at the Government Printing
Office, and it was also found that an
order for two hundred extra copies for
the use Of the committee accompanied
it. This clerk explained that the paper
was brought to his desk on March 10th
Of this year by the late clerk Of the
Committee on Post-0ffices and Post
Roads, bearing the usual Senate head
ings in due form, with an order for two
hundred extra copies to be printed for
the use Of the committee. The Print
ing Clerk, supposing the document to
have passed through the regular
channels, and the order in itself
being proper one, sent the
manuscript to the Printing Office,
where il was set up and printed. The
document is entitled, Report on Pos
tai Telegraph-ln the Senate of the
United States" The first five pages
consist of Questions pr0pounded to the
president of the Western-Union Tele-
graph Company" and the remaining
thirty-onc pages are devoted to "press
comments on the action Of the Asso-
ciated Press in furnishing reports ofthe
presidential election" 1t is not init
mated that any of the questions to the
president Of the Western Union were
answered; nor does the document state
any reason for the republications of at
tacks upon the Associated Press, which
are in large part from the columns of
papers which have never been able to
secure the facilities Of the Associated
Press. A line of the printed heading
indicates that the document is printed
under authority received May p. 1854,
six months before the publication of the
press comments, which form its chief
parts.
The ex-clerk of the committee, who
also acted as private secretary to its late
chairman, Senator Hill, Of Colorado,
was sent for to-day by the members of
the committee, and in reply to their in
quiries said he had acted in the matter
at the instance Of Senator Hill.
A motion will be made in the Senate
in behalf of the committee to have this
alleged report suppressed. The MEN,
bers of the committee chartably as
sumo that Hill was ignorant of the fact
that he had no right to make report
as from the Senate committee twelve
days after he ceased to be a member of
the Senate.