Richmond dispatch. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1884-1903, 1885-01-24
The Couressional Record.

/ Inc COuRTcSSlOlidi feCNoAb'
Mr.. HENDERSON, report Of Thurs
day last in the United States Senate in
favor Of making the Congressional Re
cord an "exact transcript" of the pro-
ceedings Of the two houses Of Congress
will be fully discussed, unanimously
lauded so far as the object Of the bill
is concerned, and will probably then be
consigned to the tomb of the Capulets.
| OF course it is the desire of most con-
gressmen that the Record shall carry
down to future generations 8 true
report of what is said and done in
Congress. The trouble is how to ac-
complsh this object without doing SO
atthe expense of the valuable time ofthat
body, and at the risk of making the Re
cord repository of speeches or re-
marks that ought never to be heard of
after their utterance has disgraced the
one or the other house of Congress.
First, as to saving time, it may be said
that every congressman who shall be
refused permission to publish his unde-
livered speech in the Record will, if
possible, deliver it in the house of
which he is a member. and so secure
its appearance in that journal. Under
existing arrangements, he need only
ask permission to print his speech in the
Record to secure its publication therein.
Thus much valuable time Is saved
especially in the House of Representa-
tives. In last Thursdays issue Of the
Record appears a members speech to
which is attached, as if it had been read
in the House, Though it was not an
entire sermon delivered by some clergy
man upon the occasion of the death of
a congressman. 1t ought not to be
there but perhaps it would better ap-
pear there without having been read in
the House than after having been read
there.
AS rule no congressman is ever con-
WINGED by one of those set speeches.
These are intended for home consump-
ton, and are generally unobjectionable
in character. The running debates, in
which members often convince one an
other, are reported with surprising &C
curacy. The supplementary words
are sometimes scratched out by the
speakers themselves when they revise
the reports of their remarks. And why
not? Why should man be compelled
20 appear before the public in dress
which he was ashamed Of as soon as
he had had time to reflect upon its
character Where shall the line be
drawn? If a man says, as many con-
gressmen no doubt do, - between you
and l." instead of " between you and
me-" is he to be compelled to let his
constituents see his blunder? Every
day in the House of Representatives
there are hundreds, and often thousands,
of grammatical errors made by the
speakers. Under the present system
these mistakes are corrected by
the printers or the reporters. Is
the Record to be " an exact transcript"
Of all these blunders? If not, why
should it be made to contain the dis
agreeable and supplementary and UNI
justifable remarks that are so often
heedlessly made by members? Shall
downright falsehood be perpetuated in
the Record because congressman ut
tered it to his fellow-members?
But the Record does state the fact
when Mr.. SMITH asks permission to
print his speech in that journal. Is
not that an "exact transcript" of
the "original"? 1t says, in effect,
that Mr.. SMITH did not deliver the fol-
lowing speech in Congress but he
nevertheless obtained from that body
permission to print it in the Record.
And these speeches, be it remembered,
are printed not in the body Of the re-
port of the proceedings, but each speech
by itself; and, besides, such speeches
are always, we believe, printed not in
the Congressional Record proper but
in what is called the appendix.
The New York papers have made
mountain out Of a mole-hill. The Re
cord is already so nearly an "exact
transcript" Of what is said and done
in the two houses Of Congress that any
difference which Mr.. MANDERsoN's
bill could effect if it should become
law would not be apprecisble by one
reader in dozen.
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