The Houston daily post. [volume] (Houston, Tex.) 1886-1903, 1899-03-25

before the board OF inquiry has done the
work for Miles and his gang. II has been
proven absolutely that the beef was all
right because the maggots In 1t were all
dead. Think how much worse 1t might
have been II they had been alive? Now,
everybody knows that dead maggots are
good food for soldiers. This ought to end
the whole business and Miles should be in
continently fired from the army and the
incident closed permanently.
49,
One William Mckinley and one Thomas
Bracket Reed have met on Jekyl island
and the island is still there. The dispatches
do say that there was paucity of gush
and a woful lack OF empressment when
these two political battleships spoke to
each other. and that Tom simply turned
| and walked away with pretty girl.
have always maintained that Tom was
smart man and the fact that he walked
away with pretty girl proves It, Now, IL
he had walled away alone with his hands
behind him, as Is his wont, there would
have been just ground for severe criticism.
| but. no, he stuck to the congressional
habit to the last and went with the girl
The dispatches also say that the meet
ing down there was purely accidental,
which is regarded here as all tommyrot.
Accidents like that don't just happen.
They got there by design and Mckinley is
going to do his level best to rid his adj
minIstraton of the hardest nut it has to
crack, AS | think have said before, he Is
not going to do It,. Reed and Mckinley
have never liked one another. They were
rival aspirants for the speakership in the
Fiftynrst congress. Reed won easily, but
he generously appointed Mckinley to the
craftsmanship of the committee on ways
and means, which made him floor leader
and gave him an opportunity to win
National reputation as the author of the
Mckinley bill. However. the Mckinley bill
defeated the republican party and brought
about Mckinloy's retirement from con-
gress.
According to the established rules Mr..
McKinleys political career should have
closed then, but, as subsequent events
proved, it had only just begun. He was
taken up and elected governor of Ohio and
six years later he landed In the White
House--the ultimate goal of every ambitl-
Gus statesman. Reed resented McKinley's
being preferred over himself by the re-
publican party. He felt that he was an
ADLER man than Mckinley, and so does
everybody else for that matter, and was
entitled to the nomination at the ST. Louis
convention. What made Reed particularly
raw and quininely bitter was the knowl-
edge that Mark Hanna had tempered with
good many of his dusky delegates from
the South. His caustic comments upon
this subject would make powerful inter-
esting reading If some one would col
lect them and give them to the printer
From the very beginning OF Mckinley s
administration Reed has occupied an at
titude OF hostility to the president.
1t has apparently been his purpose to
thwart every pet project of the admins
tration. After the defeat of the Nicaragua
canal bill toward the close OF the last
session, the friends OF Mr.. Mckinley made
up their minds that something must be
done; that If Reed would not promise to
mend his ways and cease antagonzng the
. administration that his election rs speak
err of the next house must be prevented at
all hazards Steps have actually been
taken by members OF the administration
circle to keep Reed out of the speaker 9
chair 1t was made plain, however, very
soon after the movement started that the
doing UP OF Reed was a pretty big con-
tract, and that even II successful 1t would
be likely to make a serious break In the
ranks of the republican party. 1t was de-
cided TO make final effort to bring about
4 a better understanding between the presl-
dent and Reed in the interest of harmony.
Colonel John G. Moore, the man who took
= Reed to Jekyl island, is Wall street
magnate, and occupies the closest kind
OF relations with Mckinley Probably no
better man to act as peacomaker could
have been selected,
~
Politicians in Washington. however are
inclined to be skeptcal over the prospect
of bringing about complete reconciliation
between Reed and Mckinley. A friend of
Tom Reed said to me last night that Mr..
: Reed will make no deal with Mckinley as
long as Mark Hanna stands at Mckinley 8
elbow. Reed hates and desplses Mark
Hanna and does not trust him in any sense
of the word. He said that IL Mckinley
!, could find some way TO shake off Hanna
, and get away from his baleful influence
l there would be some show of Reed and
, Mckinley getting together, l predict. how
q ever, that Mckinley is not smart enough.
He won't know how to get away from Mark
Hanna. lie can't get away. He is tied too
, hard and fast to him. And since that is the
case Tom Reed knows too much to tie
himself up to Agerism, shafterism, Eag-
anism, Sampsonism and Hannaism, which
is exactly what an alliance between Reed
and Mckinley would amount to under
, present conditions Reed has very little to
gain now by joining the administration
, circle and can never hope to reach the
presidency by that route No man knows
this better than one Thomas Bracket