Morning journal and courier., 1890-12-12
THE FrFrx-FInsr CONGRESS.

l THE FlFIf"F1hST CONGRESS-. | The Election Bill in the Senate | Passage by the House of the Forti. fcation Appropriation Bin-BllIs Reported from the Public Lands Committee.
 WASHINGTON, D. O.. Dec. 11.-Mr. Mitchell offered resolution (which was agreed to) instructing the postofice com mittee to inquire into the feasibility and advisability of law for postal savings bank in connection with all or certain classes of postofices throughout the country.
 The resolution offered yesterday by MT. Plamb for daily meetings of the senate at 10 a. m. and for recesses from 5:30 to 8 p. m. was taken up.
 The resolution was opposed and advo- cated by several senators until 2 p. m., when consideration of the elections bill was resumed and MT. Wilson of Iowa ad dressed the senate m advocacy Of the meas ure.
 It was always dangerous, he said, to neglect to prevent the practice of injustice. Had the founders of the government be- AA1eO unconscionable curse it had become they would undoubtedly have provided for its the republic * The repub- lie would not abandon the prin- ciple of equality upon which it rested and to which it owed it's phenomenal progress. Fraud, intimidation, force and assassina- tion might for time prevent the free and equal use of the ballot. Such instrument ality might prolong the journey the repub lie must take before it reached the end the country dol It must do right. Let every citizen, be he white or colored. cast his vote as is his right and have it counted as it is cast. If congress obeyed the die tates of duty it would establish peace throughout the republic. If it refused it would but involve the country in the per ills of retributive justice, which was ever the ally of the oppressed.
 At the close of debate the senate went into executive session and at 5:45 adjourn ed.
 In the morning hour MT. E. S. Taylor of Ohio, from the committee on judiciary, called up and the house passed bill amending section 5,515, revised statutes.
 The amendment provides penalty for any person having the custody of ballots and returns after an election has been held who shall alter such returns or erase the name of any candidate for representative or delegate in congress from any of the ballots in his custody or in any way alter or deface the same with the intent to affect the result of such election.
 The house went into committee of the whole on the fertilization appropriation bill.
 The bill was read and agreed to without discussion, and the committee having risen the bill was passed, together with bill appropriating $400, 900 to meet deficiency in the appropriation for public printing and binding.
 A bill was then taken up to amend the anti-polygamy law by providing that the personal property formerly belonging to the Mormon church but which was for feited by congress and placed in the hands of receiv ST shall be placed in the common school funds of the territory of Utah, which was the disposition made of the real estate held by the church.
 MT. Caswell of Wisconsin explained the necessity of the passage of the bill.
 Without completing it's consideration the house laid it aside as unfinished busi- ness and went into the committee of the whole on bills reported from the public lands committee.
 Mir. Payson of Illinois, chairma>, called up the bill to indemnify purchasers of swamp lands and to reimburse the several states for lands due them under the swamp-lands act.
 After the debate without action the committee rose and the house adjourned
 Historian Bancroft Criticized.
 HALIFAX, N. S., Dec. 11.-There will be published here tomorrow posthu- nous article by Hon. Joseph Howe, the Nova Scotia statesman, who died while governor of Nova Scotia. It is criticism of Historian Bancroft's memorial address on Abraham Lincoln delivered at Wash ington in 1866. It severely condemns the manner in which MT. Bancroft compared MT. Lincoln with Lords Palmerston and Russell. The article also deals with social conditions in England to which the historian referred. It is in the form of an open letter to MT. Bancroft, and was written immediately after the latter had delivered his memorial address, but was suppressed at the solicitations of eminent British statesmen.