The Providence news. (Providence [R.I.]) 1891-1906, 1893-08-30
Between the Present and Past
Speak or Of tho House.
SHARP CRITICISMS BY Mr.. REED
Lead MT. Crisp Into the Arena Of Debate.
The = 1T Betwe the : wo Much En-
Joyed- What Was Done In the Senate
Yesterday.

Me house proceedings was the debut o.
Mr. Crisp as speaker on the floor. He
was led to leave his chair by some caustis
criticisms made BY Mr.. Reed upon the
proposed code Of rules. and his appear
Ance upon the arena of debate was warmly
Applauded.
Mr.. Reed twitted the Democratic party
upon their partial approval of the rules
Of the Fifty-frst congress, but In q hu
morous vein, and contended that they had
not gone far enough. He then, In more
serious manner argued In favor Of the
rights of the majority. which rights had
been firmly maintained In the Fifty hrst
congress. Now the house was In the
habit Of lodging measures instead Of
meeting them. He criticised the provis
ion OF the rules, which, he claimed.
vested the committee on rules with the
authority which should be vested in the
speaker.
Why not adopt Q system of rules which
would give control to the majority and
take from tho filibusterer his opportunity
10 stop the consideration Of a measure. 1t
was better to have q speaker exercise
power In the full light Of public opinion
than to exercise II IN the seclusiou Of the
committee room.
Crisp's Argument.
Then. for the first time this session. the
speaker took the hoor, having called Mr..
Richardson Dem., Tcnn.) to the chair.
and replied to the criticisms Of the gentle
man from Maine. He said there were pro
visions In this code which were taken sub
stantially from the rules Of the Fifty first
congress Neither himself nor any mem.
bar - ha r,,lo a;t,
from reporting rules simply because they
were part of the rules of the Fifty-6rst
congress- Very much of those rules was
to be commended, very much Of those
rules had beer, by the country. abso-
lutely condemned.
The gentleman from Maine Reed) when
he stood up before the country and spoke
of the rules of the Fifty-irst congress
failed to speak OF the practices adopted
before the rules were adopted which were
so odious to the country. The first action
in the Fifty-frst congress which was
odious to the country was not an action
under any rule. but 1t was the arbitrary
high-handed action on the part OF the
speaker without authority of rules. with
out authority of anyone.
Reed Again.
Mr.. Reed, In reply, said that 1t was un.
usual for the presiding officer Of this body
to leave his exalted position and to par
take In the discussion on the floor. II was
even a question whether he ought to do it
at all. But Of this action. he made no
question. The gentleman from Georgia
alone was the judge OF his action. II the
gentleman did not believe that the other
members Of the committee on rules were
o. La st g..
him to decide when his powerful aid
should be thrown into the balance
He (Reed) regretted that the speaker had
taken the floor, not only ON general princi-
pies, but because he had introduced into
the debate certain amount of PARTISAN
ship, thereby showing that though the
rest of the house here survived the meas
ures of the Fifty-trs congress the present
speaker had not To what had been said
about him, personally, he would not reply,
for he would not allow this debate to de-
generate into personal question.
The debate was continued by Springer
Dem., Ills.), Boatuer Dem., La.) and
Hooker Dem., Miss.), who conteuded that
the membership on the committee on
rules should be increased, Pickler (Rep.,
s. d., who agreed with Hooker on this
point, Cummings Dem., N. W, Hepburn
(Rep, Ia.) and Bryan (Dem., Neb)
Then the subject was dropped, and
Springer Dem., Ills) introduced bill to
provide for the coinage of the seignoirage
silver in the treasury. Referred. The
house then adjourned.
In the Senate.
The chairman Of the finance committee
was (as he had promised to be) every
prompt In reporting to the senate" the
action OF the committee on the house bill
to repeal part of the Sherman law. As
soon as the reading of Mondays journal
was finished, Mr.. Voorhees, rose and re-
ported back that bill with an amendment
in the nature Of substitute. 1t was
placed on the calendar and will be, &C.
cording to the notice given by Mr..
Voorhees,, pressed for consideration to the
exclusion of other business. The sub
stitute, is word for word, the same bill
that was reported by the finance commit
tse two weeks ago.
The first speech against the substitute
was made by Mr.. Gordon Dem., Ga. }, who
argued that 1t would delay indefinitely
the repeal of the Sherman law, which he
wanted to be immediate and unconditional.
Mr.. Teller (Rep., Colo) made long
argument to show that the Sherman law
had not produced the existing financial
stringency.
A resolution which Mr.. Stewart hal
offered last Monday inquiring from the
secretary OF the treasury whether there
would be y deficiency in the revenues of
the government during the current year