The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1894-08-30
WHAT CONGRESS HAS DONE.
Ex-Speaker Reed Comments on Demo-
cratic Leadership.

Some Dead Humbugs-Mr. Cleveland
Confronted by His Recent Acts.
Copyright, 1894 by New York Press.
And now they have gone. this Senate
and House of Representatives: gone,
W 18th only three months more of unhap-
py life left III them. What are we to
say? One year of almost continuous ses-
sion, aud what have they done? and how
have they done it? The Republicans can
not use the language of reproaeh of in
vective or abuse. The whole vocabulary
has been exhausted by themselves speak
ing of themselves We cannot hope to
equal, in commenting on the Senate
the tremendous and effective words of
the President Of their own choice. If we
were to search the VIII lie dictionary of
diatribe. we could not equal the charge
of party pertidy and party dishonor,
made by the President against the Sem
ate and received by the House of Repre-
sentatives with its 100 Democratic ma
Jority, with cheers and applause.
II we were to comment upon the Presi-
dent and his action we could not use
language half SO damaging as Democrat
ic Senators used in open Senate with up
lifted hands, as severating the truth of
personal betrayal and personal bad faith
II we were. to comment upon the
House of Representatives and it's lead
ers, We should be deemed, guilty of gross
no cI,i 4 4, oi.,
words in describing their own actions.
What a condition for partisan critic to
lie in to be obliged. in common decency.
to use softer words about his enemies
than they use about themselves. And
the enemies are not saints in embryo,
beating their breasts and blackening
their stransgressions to reach the heights
of sainthood through the depths of sin.
Oh, no. they are simply earnest men
standing by the broken business of a
whole country. and trying to tell who de-
stroyed it, and having great success.
No, we7obviously cannot use therein any
language of reproach or of harshness
Earlier and .(for that purpose) worthier
hands have gathered all these laurels.
All we can say is that all three sides
are. probably right. The President and
Senate have told the truth about each
other, and the House about itself.
NOW LET Us REVIEW.
With this simple expression of faith in
their veracitys let US turn to a slight re-
view of what they have DONE There is
no doubt that this review will be as dis
tasteful and unsatisfactory to the ma
jority of honest Democrats as to Repub-
licans themselves. Whatever good thing
has been done has been spoiled
in the doing. If the House has yielded
to the dictates of long denounced
common sense and adopted proper rules,
been violated in the attempt to avoid
tine necessity. If Congress has re-
peaied the purchasing clause of the Sher-
man act, it was only done after such
long delay as has deprived the country
of any advantage the repeal might have
given it. Nor has the mystery of the
collapse of the compromise and the con-
nection OF the President Herewith ever
been cleared up. Whether he consented
to that compromise or Eot is not for me
to say. That is family secret, but it
is no family secret that that compromise
was not repudiated until after the Re
publican members were sounded, and it
was clear they would have no part or
lot in it.
Two such misunderstanding as these
between the President and the Senate,
if Republican would have caused SEN
sation as of burnt WOODEN among the peo-
pie. But the Democracy has limitations
as to morality very much enlarged. That
party seems to realize thar General But
Ter said in jest, that nobody was truly
unassaila BILE until his character was
gone. Thestarifsbill of perfidysand dis
honorn has become law, and an inter
esting law it is. How Democratic Sen
ate, believing in the platform of it's par
Jy, could have passed it, how Demo-
cratic House could have passed it, hav-
ing hundred majority, is simply in
comprehensive.
How the President could have permit
ted it to become law is simply an i'm
possible study in human nature. How
can the country reconcile his action with
It's former estimate of him? He was
deemed by very large part of the pea
pie as a man of sound common sense
and of great will power. His reputation
lOF BUOu Seuso CoTGaluly uau SHOCK IN
the case of the Sandwich Islands and is
still more likely to suffer from the con-
trast between the letter to Wilson and
the surrender to German If he consent
ed to the Wilson surrender and was in
the capitalization, he ought to have hand
ed in his side-arms and sigr ed the bill.
If he did not consent, then, by both
House and Senate, he has been pro-
nounced to be not even factor in the
transaction. Hereafter, the President,
instead of standing on Mugwump and
unreal pedestal, must be reckoned with
the rest of them, and the legrets will
not all be on the Democratic side.
THE WILSON BILL.
The truth about the Wilson bill is that
it was foolish bill when it went out Of
the ways and means committee, and was
made still more foolish in the House. 1T
had neither policy nor practice, and yet
has been erected into a golden calf, to
be worshpped by party conventions, and
that, too, with the consent and approval
of their own Moses. Even the Senate
bill does have some regard to the bust