The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1894-04-28
TIE JOURNAL SATURDAY EVENING. APRIL g.

Joses un Lae street csaoezs, standing
erect and motionless sometimes for an
hour at time and threatening with de-
struction any who laugh at him or even
stop long to gaze. Another local cur1os-
ity, though a man of average sense, Is
Big Headed Parker He Is a small man,
but has the largest head in the world
and enjoys fairly good health withal.
The fact that he has sold this head to
scientific association adds not little to
the interest he excites-
There is one man who made bet
against CleveEand's election in 1892 the
terms of which were that if he lost he
was to play the cornet for one year on
the streets and live on what he received
for it. He seldom played over an hour
day and was SO generously rewarded
that he lived like prince. There is a
Frenchman with a scheme for laying
out the Potomac fats in immense flow
er beds of red, white and blue, repre-
senting the American flag. He also has
a scheme for a new system of sewerage,
the pipes to be above ground and paint
ed gorgeously in the national colors- OF
course he has a bill which he wants
congress to pass and has hammered
away for years making the lives of new
congressman a burden. He is really
something of an engineer and on other
subjects quite intelligent
A Favorite Subject.
The committee ON education and Ia
Dor suffers most from these fellows, and
its chief business is to prevent them
from annoying other members. Hun
dreds of bills are brought TO this COM
mittee almost every session, and it is
worth noting that the most gorgeous
schemes are generally sent in by the sor-
REST looking specimens of humanity,
and the bills calling for largest expendi-
lures and promising most wonderful re-
turns are mostly by men who dwell in
Is cent lodging houses and get their
meals by chance. Even here, however,
there is cheering evidence that Wash
ington is no longer the crank heaven it
was from 1865 to 1875 or little later.
In those days the committees were sim
ply overwhelmed, and as it was time
of general unsettlement of old ideas and
rash experiments a hearing was given
to everybody. The great army of the
queer and crazy descended upon Wash
ington, and every valid attempt at re-
form was made ridiculous by their ex-
treme views. Woman suffrage, for in
stance, became a phrase of contempt
among congressman because of the wild
eyed creatures who used it as starting
point to advocate polygamy, polyan-
dry, the agapemone, the phalanstery and
other systems of SO called free love.
In view Of her subsequent history it is
curious to recall the address of Victoria
Woodruff before the senate judiciary
committee, the respect with which she
was listened to and the high praise be-
slowed upon her production. It ought
m ho0 al, for 4 11xy
Theodore Ti1ton. The experience of that
time put an end to such hearings before
the committees
Insane ON One Subject.
Labor reform was another victim of
the excessive zeal of the cranks. Finan-
cial reform was simply laughed out of
court. The movement to put God in the
constitution and recognize Christianity
by national law was SO completely
crushed that it is only of late that any
congressman could be found willing to
listen to an argument on it Temperance
reform was simply run in the ground
But of all the subjects on which there
was discussion at that time none fur
nished the cranks with SO varied and at
tractive a field as the negro The future
historian will probably say that the
American people then went insane on
that subject, as the English did at one
time ON ''popish plots -
A Blight to Legitimate Reform.
The panic of 1873 knocked the nom
sense out of most Of these people, and
the fearful scandals of that year and
the three following purified the moral
atmosphere and gave a new form to
Washington crankism. Since then near
ly all the great schemes have been pro-
jected in aid of labor, and here again
the curse of crankism comes to blight
legitimate reform What ought to be
done and might easily be done to appease
the discontinued to some extent is pre-
vented by the moral cowardice of MEM
bers who are afraid of being classed
with wild eyed Missionaries, and let a
man make ever so modest a suggestion
about silver or incomes or reduced tax
vs. Ss& a. %;.:.
n ~ -