The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1886-04-30
TELEPHONE TALK.

Stand and Tells How He Became 1neoge
ested In the Pan Electric Company.
WASHINGTON, April 2o.-The announces.
ment that Attorney General Garland was to
appear before the Telephone Investigation
Committee caused larger attendance than
usual yesterday morning. The Attorney
General appeared. looking pale and rather
feeble. With Q courteous salute to the COM
mittce he Immediately took the stand and
on invitation of the chairman began to
make q statement Of his connection with
tho Pan-Electric Company. He wished. he
said. to lay before the committee and 10
affirm the matter contained in his state.
n.ent to the President on October 8 last In
addition he wished TO explain two or three
points Of that statement. In February.
1888. Mr.. Garland said. General Atkins had
said that he believed the Rogers inventions
were of great utility il properly handled;
that money could be made out of them.
Being poor man like himself General At
kins desired the witness to enter into this.
II told him." said the witness, Il had
never undertaken to make any money ex-
cept by law and poker. / had always lost
at poker and generally won at law, but
was willing to go into this il he thought it
offered any inducements"
Continuing, the witness said that Senator
Harris had made substantially the same
statement about the inventions, and two or
three days afterward he (witness) had been
introduced to Rogers and his son at their
home. He then briefly told of the Organi-
zation of the Pan-Electric Company and
then turned his attention to tho applica-
tons to him to bring suit against the Bell
Company.
It was an inference and not a fact,
Garland said, that the Pan-Electric Com
pany made that application. The inference
was founded on two reasons. first: That
Colonel Young came with another gentle
man in the latter part of July, and wit
ness knew him to be secretary and treasurer
OF the Pan-Electric, and second, because
the witness had OF May 25 received letter
from Rogers, requesting that suit be brought
as sfOckh0lder of the company. Coup
ling these facts together, witness took it
for granted that the Pan-Electric had made
the application. 1t was simply an infer-
ence.
In July Van Benthuysen had presented
his application for a suit, basing it on a
law which, he stated, had been passed at
the last session of Congress. The applica-
ton had been referred by the witness to
the Interior Department, where it should
have gone in the first instance, and the wit
ness had heard no more of 1t until it had
been returned last January with other
papers.
After receiving Van Benthuysen's letter
the witnesses had set to work to examine
into tho matter, for, though he had no init.
nation to that effect, he was satisfied that
other applications would be made Look.
ing over the authorities, he had concluded
that he could not order suit. and he had
determined that he would not touch it at all
under any circumstances.
When the witness was still In the Senate
Senator Plat had come to him one day with
a bill to authorize Government suits and
had asked his opinion of it. Witness had
looked it over and said he regarded it as
unnecessary and that it would do no
good. That was all lie ever had said
or heard about the bill until it had
been brought to his attention through the
application. The only opinion he had ever
given was to the effect that the Pan-E Electric
inventions were not infringements; that
they were improvements upon telephones;
that they were different by patentable and
well recognized principle.
Turning his attention to the ordering of
the Memphis suit, the witness said that he
had arranged to leave Washington on Au-
gust % and spend the entire month of Sep
TENDER at his home in Arkansas. lie had
chosen that time because he had found
September to be the best month to be out
of Washington and because he could shoot
deer in Arkansas in that month under the |
game law. The deer did not become ripe
until September. Mr.. GOOde had returned |
about the middle of August but the |
witness had said nothing to him about the !
application lie had received because he did |
not know what to say. lie supposed the |
gentlemen who had made the application |
would find remedy if they supposed they
had one.
Mr.. Garland had returned to Washington
about October l. and when he called at the |
White House the President had told him
the papers were speaking of the case, where
upon he had made the explanation that had
been published, and witness had never
opened his mouth to Mr.. GoOde about it, be-
cause the Solicitor General, under the Stat.
ute, was perfectly free and independent
and witness had no more control over him
in his (witness) absence or disability than
he had over gentlemen in Congress. He
had never to this day spoken to Mr. GOOde
about the first suit or one alleged to be
pending. MI. GOOde had spoken something
about the counsel and the practice of the
Government in dealing with the counsel,
MIR. Garland did not know what was in
The bill, had never seen the papers on which
The suit was predicated and had never
talked with Secretary Lamar or the gentle
nan who had sat with him. He had even
declined to talk with the President about
he suit
The chairman inquired if the witness re-
yarded the stock as a gift. He replied in
lie negative. Five or six persons had come
together for the organization Of a company
md they lad made assessments, the first
move being to give note for 81, 900, which
was followed by assessments of $50 or 500
ZACH. He did not regard the inventions as
having any marketable value. The COM
)any was to establish their utility and put
KEN on the market
Chairman Boyle asked: ibid you con-
enplate using your official position for the
advantage of the enterprises'
mot at all. If l had been a private cit
zen could have done much better than
when in office" He added that he had no
more idea OF using his official influence
han OF jumping into the Potomac river
With milestone around his neck.
In further examination tue witness said:
1 can not call to mind any thought, action
r word Of mine since nave become Attor.
ey General that Is calculated in the ren,ot-
st degree to increase the value of that
'Ock or enhance its value in any way. I
ave not been at a meeting and have had
. conference with the gentleman connected
18th it at all"
Great rivalry as to speed exists
mOng the sailing ships that annually
AXE Grain and flour To ENGLAND from