San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1893-07-28
WASHINGTON LETTER.
From Our Regular Correspondent.
WASHINGTON, July "a, 1898.

istration. The announcement was
made, months ago, that the admin
istration, in conjunction with sew
eral eminent free traders, intended
to prepare tariff bill, and that
Secretary Carlisle's supposed
knowledge on the subject was the
principal reason for his having
been made Secretary of the Treas
ury. His best friends never claimed
that he was selected for his finan-
cial knowledge. They couldn't, be
cause he had none. This was
printed in all the administration
papers and was never denied until
now, when Secretary Carlisle says
that no tariff bill is being pre-
pared. and that neither he nor
President Cleveland ever Thought
of doing anything which might be
interpreted as an attempt to die
tate to the House what it should
do in regard to the tariff" He for
gets however, to tell why this
statement was not made long ago,
which makes the inference clear
that the free trade idea has been,
for the time anyway, suspended.
Democratic Congressman have
already begun to do some very
plain talking to Commissioner
Lochren about the wholesale sus-
pension of pensions he has been
making, and unless they are quiet
ed in some way number of them
representing districts having a
large number of old soldier voters
will join the Republicans in bring
ing this matter before Congress.
There seems to be hitch some
where in regard to the House COM
mittee chairmanships. In as much
as Mr.. Crisp's reelection to be
speaker has been certainty for
months past, it is difficult to I'M
derstand why there should be any
delay in announcing the commit
tees and it was not supposed there
would be. Mr.. Crisp's friends
have been saying ever since he
was here several weeks ago that
he would arrange the committees
before he returned and expected to
announce them just as soon as he
took his seat as speaker; but, as |
said, there seems to be hitch
somewhere, for these same
men now say that he hopes to COM
plete the committees within a
week or ten days after COngr ess
meets. This sort of thing is mere
child's play, and this announce
ment is now made, not because
Mr.. Crisp does not expect to have
the committee assignments all
made when he comes to Washing
ton, next week, but because he
fears that the rows which will fol-
low his having obeyed Mr.. Cleve-
lands orders in making those as
signments will necessitate making
some changes after he gets here,
before they are made public.
Comptroller Eckels wants to be
Secretary of the Treasury. That
young man has gall-and he is
charged with having started the
last rumor about the intended re-
tirement of Secretary Carlisle be-
cause of a disagreement with Mr..
| Cleveland.
Secretary Carlisle denies very
emphatically the rumOr which
came from New York, that he had
been rendered the vacancy. in
the Supreme Court caused
by the death of Justice
Blatchford. But when asked
whether he would accept it if it
were rendered to him he was dis
creetly silent, as becomes a man
who would be very glad to let some
other fellow hold up the financial
end of the administration, if
he could only read his title
clear to membership in the
supreme court. His anxiety on
the subject has not been lessened
by the statement made several
days ago by a friend of Secretary
Gresham, and not up to this time
contradicted, that Mr.. Cleveland
had promised that the influence OF
the administration should be ex-
erted to make Gresham the Demo-
cratic presidential nominee in '96.
Mr.. Carlisle had been encouraging
the bee to do little buzzing around
his head, but he knows there can
not be two administration candi-
dates.
There is one set of Democrats in
Washington who are not slow in
expressing their dislike of the
cheese-paring in the last Congress,
on at least one of the appropriation
bills. 1t is made up of officials of