The Worcester spy. [volume] (Worcester, Mass.) 1898-1904, 1901-12-20
TWENTY YEARS STUDY OF
FINANCIAL QUESTIONS

when Aldrich first came to Wash
ington as a member of the House he
was a wholesale grocer III Providence
That was in 1879, and he had served
his apprenticeship in politics as presl-
dent of the Providence Common CCun-
ell. and speaker for one year OF tne
House of Representatives of the Rhode
Island General Assembly. His reputa-
ton was that Of a good business man
who had shown political aptitude, ana
he did very little in the House to IN
crease it one way or the other. he
was recognized as a leVel-headed mem
Der who would make very sensible
representative as representatives go.
1t was a Democratic House, with sam
Randall as speaker, and they put Alu-
rich at the foot of the committee on
the District of Columbia. He was re-
elected to the Forty seventh Congress,
but before he took his seat again he
had been chosen to the Senate s the
successor to- General Burnside; his leg
islative experience has been acquired
almost exclusively in the body of which
he is now the most influential member
THE Senate, when Aldrich entered
it, was evenly divided politically and
David Davis was president pro tenn.
The leader of the Republican side was
George F. Edmunds of Vermont, man
everything that goes to make up leg
islative leader. Edmunds was a great
lawyer, a keen debater, a master OF
inCisive English, with a mind like a
surgeons scalpel OF politics in the
ordinary sense he knew nothing. He
could no more have railroaded a com
plicated tariff bill through the Senate
than he could have handled Tam
many district in New York. He knew
a, OIL 60
bining interests. And yet, by sheer
acuteness of intellect and mastery of
legislative problems Edmunds domi-
mated the Senate for many years. His
leadership was unchallenged until
there came a new order of things with
the forcing of the tariff question to
the front when Grover Cleveland sent
in his famous message. Edmunds was
chairman of the committee on Ju-
dietary and the leading member of the
committee on foreign relationship
two committees Of the Senate in which
Aldrich would probably find himself
least a home.
when Aldrich entered the Senate
the tariff question was beginning to
assume an important place in legisla-
ton. The tariff commission which
framed the tariff of 1888 was at work
and members of Congress were talking
dDOul SCLtuultS anu uullCSs <Alll III
as a business man representing an i'm
poTtant manufacturing state, was ap-
pointed to a place on the committee
on finance, with which he has remained
ever since, and of which he is now
chairman. He had already begun to
study financial questions, and before
long it was clear that the new senator
was going to devote himself to that
side Of legislation. and to that alone.
1t probably never occurred to him at
that time that through that means he
was destined to grow into the position
Of leadership. He was interested
chiefly in looking out for the indus
tries of his own state, and in order to
do that effectively he found it neces-
sary to study closely all the conditions
which would affect them. There are
not many men in public life who are
willing TO give themselves up to that
kind of work but Aldrich was not only
willing to do it-he was enamored of
the task. He kept al it until he knew
TO a nicely just how any one of the
industries In which he was especially
interested would be affected by an in
crease CT reduction in duties, just what
proportion Of profit rested in ad va
loren or specific, just what relation
one industry bore to another Then he
went further. He read all the books
he could find on political economy and
the theories of finance. There is prob
ably no man IN Congress who has read
more thoroughly or understandingly
than he. His library on financial top
les is one OF the most complete in the
United States. Il. A. Coolidge, in
Ainslce's.