New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1893-08-23
THE COMMITTEES.

of course the South is on the quarterback.
less than third of the populaton less than a
quarter of the business, commerce or wealth,
receives at the hands of Speaker Crisp control
Of thirty-one committees, while two-thirds of
the people. and more than three quarters of the
business. commerce and wealth. have charge OF
only twenty three committees. But there Is
nothing strange in this. The South is the
master of the Democratic party Eastern and
Western Democrats are mere undcrings, whose
business is to do what their Overseers d.
rect. West Virginia directs the Committee of
WAYS and Means, which is the one of most
Importance to Northern manufactures and
mining and commerce. Texas directs the
Committee on Appropriations and on Judiciary
and Missouri the Coinage and Virginia the
decision of election cases. Virginia also d.
reefs foreign and internal commerce, of which
it has a trihe more than Delaware and less tnan
New-Jersey Louisiana controls rivers and
barbors, Missouri controls agriculture, and
Kentucky controls foreign affairs. Alabama,
through an exceptionally good man, it is proper
10 say. controls the Navy, in which that State
has as little interest as any other, and a New
York member is made chairman of the com
mittee North Carolina takes charge OF the
postal service Arkansas of the public lands,
Alabama of the Territories. and Mississippi OF
the railroads. having less railroad mileage than
almost any Northern State. Alabama also dl-
reefs about public buildings and Tennessee
about education The government OF the cohn-
try is turned over to the South, so far as the
House is concerned
The exceptions increase the significance of
the selections Speaker Crisp has made. Mr.
Springer. of Illinois, is deprived OF all voice
on the tariff and sent to control banking and
currency. committee which never gets
chance because either the Ways and Means
or the Coinage Committee practically decides
what should be done. Mr.. Fithian, of Illinois
is set to look after merchant marine and fish
cries. subject of which members from sea
board States are supposed to know something.
Mr.. Cultivate, of Ohio, directs military affairs,
as there Are none. Mr.. Holman, of Indiana
long in charge of appropriations is set aside
to look after Indian affairs, place where he
is expected to be pOwerless The committees
on Manufactures. Mines, Pacific Railroads and
Labor. which exist for no practical purpose and
have no real power, are kindly bestowed on
Northern men, who will see all legislation re-
latifig to those interests controlled by the South
through the committees on Ways and Means,
Coinage. Agriculture and Postal Traffic
But it is right The party in power is a
Southern party with Northern tail. Men at
the North who consent to be Democrats there
bv consent to let the South do their thinking
and willing, and to sneeze when the south
| takes snuff. 1t is the old arrangement and
after irving to break I'D the | Mon and beng
| beaten, the Southern masters return to control
things just as they did in the sos and lind
| Northern Democrats as AFFECT servants as ever.
| Nor is it any disgrace to Northern men that
| they are thus sent to the rear. They cannot
have any comprehension Of the Southern the
DRY of government, because they know some
| thing of the business and industries and com
/ merce of the Nation. If Democratic ideas are
to goverlt it is only proper that they should be
worked out by Southern men.
| There has never been "A more extensively
sectional allotment of committees than this,
not even in the cid days Of rampant Southern
sectionalism. But that was to be expected.
In giving to the North a candidate for Prcsl-
dent, the States which furnished him all the
certain votes required for his election did not
intend to part with the power which their
domination in the Democratic party entities
them to claim. They have asked and taken
only what is their right. \ sectional party
governs except as It's conduct may be modl-
fed by the need of some Northern votes. in
the House the clock has been put back to 1858,
and forty years have been expunged from
| history.