, 1888-09-04

Carolina willing to vote for a bill which
would in his Judgment c%ontravene the
provisions of an existing treaty?
Butler-Yes, under the leadership of
my distinguished friend from Ohio (Mr.
Sherman) who would not hesitate a mo-
ment to abrogate a treaty and violate its
provisions so far as the Chinese are CON
cerned.
Mitchell-Is it the opinion of the sena-
tor from South Carolina that the pending
bill does contravene any of the provisions
of the existing treaty?
Butler-I have no opinion on the sub
iect, because | am not informed upon it.
Therefore | appealed to the senator from
Ohio and he tells me that it does.
Mltchell-Then the senator from South
to vote for a bill about which he has no
opinion at all.
Butler-You ought not to complain of
that.
MITCHELL am not complaining of it.
L want to know where the senator stands.
Butler-Right behind the senator from
Oregon.
Mitchell-A good place to stand.
Butler-lt gives me great pleasure to
follow him. If he leads me astray he
will be held responsible. The bill is an
open, fragrant violation of the treaty be-
tween this government and the govern
ment with which it is on terms of peace
and good will.
Mitchell-Does the senator think that
the repeal OF N existing law is a violation
of that law?
Butler-I think there is q good deal of
politics in this whole business, and it is
not q very seemly thing either. But for
thet fact that we are on the eve of a presi-
dental election, and that each party
wants to get the vote of the Pacific slope,
this scene would not be enacted in the
senate.
Mitchell-The senator is speaking
about his own party.
Teller-How about the house of repre-
sentatives passing this bill?
Butler-The Republican senate pro-
poses to see the house play and 90 one
better. That is the plain English of it.
You may call it contravention, repeal, an
abrogation of an existing treaty, but the
plain English of it is that it is a violation
of the treaty,
Mitchell argued that congress has as
much power to repeal a treaty as it has to
repeal a law. That had been decided by
the supreme court. 1t occurred to him
that if the Democratic house thought it
necessary to present a bill which repealed
a condition of a treaty, it should have
gone a little further and made the bill
more effective by covering the whole
ground. He was thankful for so much OF
the bill, however, and he could not delay
its passage by offering any amendment.
The debate was continued at much
length by Senator Gray, who deprecated
the action of the senate In putting unnec-
essary amendments on the treaty which
would have fully accomplished the pur-
pose of the pending bill, and by Senators
Stewart, Vest, Dolph, Mitchell and
George. The latter made a long argu-
ment to prove that the Republicans were
responsible for the Burlingame treaty and
for the rejection of various measures to
restrict Chinese immigration.
This argument was traversed by Mitch
ell. He declared that George in asserting
that the Republican party was response
bic for opening the door to Chinese i'm
migration was asserting his own Ignorance
of what he was talking about, and that
the door had been opened by the Demo
cratic party of California.
AS Morgan desired to speak on the bill
it went over until tomorrow and the SEN
ate adjourned.