The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1897-09-29

| over one-fifth or these measures were
reported by the Senate committees,
and something like half of those re-
ported sent TO the House. The Senate
! committees have the unrePorted meas
ures on their calendars and can act
upon them Immediately upon reas-
sembling if they desire.
SPEAKER Reed, by Withholding most
| of the committees until the day of adj
! iournment. and preventing the House
| from engaging in general legislation,
| kent the output of Congress at the ex-
ira. secession down TO IA public acts, II
nubIic Joint resolutions and one private
| Joint resolution, the Dingley tariff act
and the four appropriation bills (Agri-
cultural. Sundry Civil, Indian and Cen
eraI Deficiency which had failed at the
| preceding short session, being the only
| measures Of general Importance in the
| list But the members OF the House
were free TO introduce bills, even II
| they could do nothing else, and they
nut in 1853 bills, 81 joint resolutions,
six concurrent resolutions and 81 House
resolutions, many of these measures
being, of course, duplicates of measures
| offered simultaneously in the Senate,
| and these bills and resolutions, with
those sent over by the Senate, can be
taken up by the House committees on
the very first day OF the session If the
managers want it done.
Speaker Reed, it is believed, would
like TO have Congress do more in the
way OF legislation at the next session
than to pass the appropriation bills,
keeping their amounts as small as pos
sible, and standing on the Dingley tar
if act as all the general law-making
which the country wants at present, or
at least ali that it wants and can get,
for. while Speaker Reed may desire to
see our Treasury and financial laws i'm
proved, if not to suit the currency re-
formers at least to enable the Govern
ment to issue bonds to protect the
Treasury, on better terms than it can
now do, he would not, it is believed,
favor the agitation of financial legls-
lation when in the present condition of
the Senate it is practically impossible
to carry any of it through.
AS to lesser matters, such as the
Bankruptcy act or the improvement OF
the immigration laws, Mr.. Reed might
say that while the country needs them,
it does not want them as much as it
wants Congress to adjourn at an early
day. But, whatever his views may be,
the Speaker is, after ALL as he con-
tends, the organ rather than tie mas
ter of his party in the House, at least
to the extent that he cannot make the
majority do what it really does not
want to do, now that the committees
have been appointed, although he can
prevent it from doing some OF the
things it may want to do, so that it is a
question of compromises and he must
humor his majority somewhat.
Then, too, he must, as the party lead
er in the House and on friendly terms |
with the Administration, not only con- |
suit, but carry out to considerable |
degree the wishes of the President as |
the party leader pre-eminent. Speaker |
Reed will feel proud to put drought the |
House those measures which President |
Mckinley recommends as party meas
ures, or which he thinks the business
interest of the country demand, unless
the Speaker has decided personal OBJ
jections. If Secretary Gage presents
the bill for Improvement of Treasury |
conditions or the national banking sys-
tenn, Speaker Reed will be expected to
put it through the House, even though |
ne knows nothing will come of it in the
Senate, just as he did with the Currency
Commission bill the day Congress adj
journed, although nobody supposed he
personally approved it.
And just so as to measures affecting
our foreign affairs and notably the leg
islation in the interest of the construc
ton of the Nicaragua Canal as an Am
erican project which President McKin-
lev is expected to recommend after he
receives the report of the Walker COM
mission in December or January, and
the legislation which may be necessary
to conSummate the annexation of Ha-
wall with which the Nicaragua Canal
scheme is fitted in by the Administra
ton.
Speaker Reeds greatest service to
TIE Administration in its dealings with
foreign affairs was, of course, rendered |
at the extra session, when he held back
the Cuban belligerency resolution,
which threatened to make it impossible
for the Administration to continue it's
to bring about peace in Cuba
by peaceful negotiations.
A YEAR FOR LOG-ROLLING.
With members of the House looking
forward to the attempts most of them
will make to secure denomination next
spring and reelection next fall, it will |
be difficult for the Speaker to keep the
majority from extravaganza in appro-
priations for new public buildings and |
river and harbor Improvement This
is the year for a River and Harbor bill |
and also for log-rolling scheme of
public buildings projects, and the fact
that the Treasury deficit will continue
in al probability to the end of this fiscal
year will not make it much easier to
prevent the candidates for reelection
in the House from voting for larger ap-
preparations to be expended in their
districts out of the surplus expected for
the next fiscal year through the return
of prosperity.
Doubtless some of the near-sighted
politicians in the House will
follow General Grosvenor in attacking
Civil Service reform, but as even he
had to attack his friend, the President,
in doing so, it will be difficult for them
to maintain agreeable relations at the
White House while they are doing so,
and of course nothing will come of it.
Speaker Reed and all the managers of
the House stand with President Nc
kinley on this question and will dis