Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1893-10-20
The Senate and Silver Repeal.


Senator Lodge Shows that the Real
Trouble Lies in the Half-Heorted At
tItude of the Democratic Majority.
Senator Henry Cabot Lodge had strik-
ing article in the Boston Journal of last
Sunday on the silver deadlock in the Unit
ed States Senate, its cause and its remedy.
The primary reason why the Senate is
poweress to act, Mr.. Lodge said is not in
the constitutional structure of that body,
as some have argued, but in the rules
which govern its action.
"These rules were adopted when the
Senate was organized, and have continued
in force ever since, practically unchanged.
They provide no method for compelling a
vote and they secure the right of unlimit-
ed debate, which can easily be converted
into the right or wrong of unlimited OBJ
struction. A very simple amendment to
the rules, providing that the majority by a
non-debatable motion may fix time for
taking a vote, would cure the entire
trouble. In other words, the adoption of
some form of closure would make indeh-
mite obstruction impossible, and this, of
course, is what ought to be done"
But we cannot adopt closure because
there is strong majority of the Senate
against it. Moreover, the movement for
it is greatly hampered by the fact that
many of the newspapers, which are now
most loudly demanding closure, only two
years ago commended obstruction of the
federal elections bill as in the highest de-
a. 4 ..,l Ill
to amend the rules. Such a position as
this is an impossible one. We must have
closure for everything or nothing. We
cannot have closure for one measure and
obstruction for another.
"For a century the Senate rules have
been in successful operation, and, under
them, the work of the Senate has gone on,
and countless measures, great and small,
have been enacted into law. The reason
of this is to be found in the fact that gen
uine majority of the Senate has, in prac-
tice, always been able to reach a vote.
With closure we should certainly have
reached a vote on unconditional repeal and
passed it, but we should have reached the
same result without closure if there had
been a genuine working majority for re-
peal in the Senate"
The Root of the Trouble.
The real trouble at the present time is
that the nominal or political majority in
the Senate and the majority for repeal are
not the same. "The repealers, made up
of both parties, can vote for repeal, but
they have no control over the conduct of
business. The conduct of business, the
machinery of legislation, are in the hands
] .I. 10 .itx,
of the Democratic party were in favor of
repeal and against silver they could shape
the conduct of business so as to reach a
vote, and then they could carry their vote
with the aid of the Republican minority.
"If the situation were reversed and the
Republicans, who are more than two to
one in favor of repeal, were in control of
the Senate, all this would have come to
pass and the purchasing clauses of the Sher-
man act would have been disposed of be-
fore this. But a majority of the Demo
cratic party is against repeal and in favor
of silver, and so they paralyze the conduct
of business, which is wholly in theil
hands, and unconditional repeal is as re-
mote today as it was on the 7th of August
"The truth is, parties rule in the United
States. Many persons voted for Mr.. Cleve
land with the apparent idea that he could
do every thing, that he could legisate a:
well as execute. 1t was a miserable mis-
take. When the country elected Mr.
Cleveland they put the Democratic part!
in power Mr.. Cleveland is thoroughly
sound on the financial question, and he hal
made gallant fight to sustain his princi
pies, but the Democratic party is unsound
and the Democratic party controls legisla
ton and is not controlled by its own Pres
ident.
"The purchasing clauses of the Sher
man act stand unrepealed, not because tn
the silver men are obstructionists, and tn
, Senate has no closure rule as it ought T.
have, but because the Democratic party il
; control of the government, and controlle
by the South is a silver party. Panic an
! disaster have reigned in the country be
! cause the future is dark and uncertain
, That darkness and uncertainty exist bC
cause no man can say what the Democrat
J c party will do on the tariff, on the cul
1 rency, or on any other question. ObstruC
! tion prevails in the Senate because tn
s Democratic party which is a silver party
q controls that chamber.
EVERY day that passes over the countr
{ is a bitter proof of the soundness of I'll
Il well-grounded principles and policies upo
q which the Republican party has governe
i the country during the lifetime of a gene
alton. Every day which passes over I'll
Senate is a splendid vindication of the r.
;, publican doctrine of majority rule, and
= the great reform established in the Hou
:, of Representatives by the Republican pa
t. ty under the fearless and brilliant leade
~ ship of Mr.. Reed"
e A 38O-foot smoker.