The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1888-02-25
THE FIPTIETH CONGRESS.


The Nicaragua Canal aud Dependent PEN
sions Under Discussion In tho senate.
WAsHINGroS, Feb 24-M-. Cullom offered
resolution, which was adopted, requesting the
President to inform the Senate whether the
French government has prohibited the importa-
tion into France OF American products; what
steps, IL any, have been taken by the govern
ment or the United States to procure the re-
scinding of such prohibition, and whether any
correspondence between the two governments
bad taken place prior to the Presidents message
OF Jan. IL last, recommending the acceptance OF
the invitation OF the French government to par
ticipate in the international exposition In PARIS
In 1889. and. If so. the substance OF such CORE
spondence
On motion Of Mr.. Edmunds the Senate bill to
incorporate the Maritime Canal Company, OF
Nicaragua. was taken from the calendar for
consideration. A long discussion ensued upon
the point that this bill does not contain the re-
Btrictions and safeguards inserted In like bill
and other bills last session.
Mr.. Hoar thought il better that the bill should
Tail altogether than that these safeguards should
DO removed.
Mr. sherman hoped the bill. which simply Ia.
eorporates certain well gentlemen who
proposed to build one OF the greatest improve
nnents or modern times. should be passed with
out unnecessary delay. IL there was still de-
sire to 20 with the Eads project. he should
be willing to take the pending bill as model.
For himself, he would. be willing TO have the
Nicaragua canal undertaken by the government
itself. He would vote from the treasury Of the
United States enough money to commence work
and to complete IL, but that WAS so evidently
against the general popular voice that the idea
had. Of course TO be abandoned. He hoped that
this bill would DO passed without any contro-
versy.
Mr.. Vest said that he had no desire to revive
the old controversy, but no asked why the pro-
visions and restrictions which were deemed nee
essary in the Eads bill and in the Nicaragua
bill OF last session We're omitted in the present
bill. The Senator from Vermont had then in
sisted that it would be unsafe and unwise to
pass any q. arter that did not contain provis-
ION that o. = government of the United States
should lot be liable in any event.
Mr.. Amunds replied TO the remarks of Mr..
Vest, and then Mr.. Morgan took the floor in ad-
vocacy of the bill, and was speaking when the
unfinished business was taken up, being the bill
granting pensions to ex.soldiers and sailors who
are incapacitated from the performance of man
ual labor and providing Cor pensions TO the de-
pendent relatives of deceased soldiers and
sailors.
Mr. Henderson addressed the Senate in ad vocacy
of the bill. He gave the history of the bill that
passed in the last Congress and was vetoed by
the President. He spoke of the veto 'de-
stroying Veto" ana as being ''couched in
words OF condemnation and much verbosity."
There had been question OF constitutional
right involved in the vetoed bill; it had involved
simply the question of wisdom and expediency.
He expressed his belief that the majority of the
ex-soldiers of the Union thought the time had
not yet come for service pension law. They
simply demanded that their disabled and en-.
feebled comrades should be taken from pauper
homes and almshouses and should be
furnished with pensions. And they had
high authority for snch demand, il not in the
action OF President Cleveland, Mt least in his
words In his annual message Of 1886 the Presi-
dent had said: Every patriotic heart responds
TO tender consideration for those who, having
Served their country long and we'll. reduced
to restitution and dependency, not AN Incl
dent OF their service, but with advancing age.
or through sickness or misfortune. cannot
rid myself OF the conviction that if these ex-
Bodiers are to be relieved, the benefits of enact
menr may be claimed as a right, and relief
should be granted under sanction of law, not
evasion of it.D Could it be possible. he asked,
that the hand which had written those lines
could have also written the cruel veto
message of Feb. ii, 1887! What marvellous
change must have come over the spirit
of the Presidents dream in the few mon tbs that
elapsed between the penning of the annual mes
sage and the writing of the veto message
Quoting the words in the veto message put a
premium upon dishonesty and rascality. and
that there was widespread disregard of truth
and good faith in the matter of procuring pen,
the Republic, deny it The charge is baseless,
cruel, hoelous, and is so gross in its conception
that il does not need refutation the part of
the American people," He quoted Mr.. Cleve-
lands Endorsement: in 1854, OF petition for a
pension Of So month to all
mated that at that time there was an
election pending. In this connection, he
NAKED that when the devil was sick the devil
a monk would be; when the devil was well, the
devil a monk was he." 1t had been claimed by
mugwump papers, he said, that the President
was better than his party, but he thought that,
so far as approaching the services of those who
fought for the Union concerned, the party
was much better than its President. Perhaps
the President would have had better appre-
citation of the sacrifices of the soldiers if he had
fought on the one side or the other. 1t was i'm
possi bic. he said, to calculate the cost of the
pending bill; but il matter what it cost,
provided the measure was Just and right He
believed that it would pass both horses of Con-
gress without change, and that ''in the present
exigency'i Il would not receive the veto Of the
chief executive. If the President should feel an
tnclination to fater in the performance OF his
plain duty IT this matter he would commend to
him the words of the great martyr of liberty
the man who knew the soldiers sacrifices and
approved the result of their labors-"With NAL
ice toward none. with charity for all, with firm-
ness in the right" believing that, in reading
him, he would find strength given him 10 do the
like.
Mr. Turpie made an eloquent appeal in favor
of the bill, a measure calculated to put tho
INDECENT ex-soldiers in position TO enjoy the
calm which had followed the storm and the
peace which had succeeded the war
Without coming to n vote the bill, the Sem
ate proceeded to executive business, and soon
adjourned till Monday.
Proceedings of the House.