Cameron County press. [volume] (Emporium, Cameron County, Pa.) 1866-1922, 1902-01-16
WASHINGTON LETTER.
From an Occasional Correspondent

Editor Press
Session and Soiree, caucus and
levee, negotiations and flirtations
pass and intermingle in the nation
al capital this season with such
kaleidoscope rapidity as to almost
bewilder the on-looker and the pen
of a Balzac or a Thackery would
be needed to adequately portray
the scenes which surround the leg
islation of a nation of over eighty
million people upon which the sun
never sets.
Congress is once more in session.
Refreshed by the holiday recess
seasoned senators and some some
what fresh representatives have
converted the halls of the Capitol
into a human beehive. Astute
lobbyists and alert correspondents
throng the galleries and committee
rooms. Reciprocity and tariff,
canals and civil service, pensions
and irrigation are discussed and
argued with earnestness or nom
chalance as they are demanded or
disregarded by each legislator S
constituents, but out of chaos will
come order and legislation pregant
with beneficial results to great
people will have been enacted,
private feuds will have been re-
pressed and the knowledge of work
well done will afford comfort and
satisfaction to the legislators who,
after having worked or played un-
2easingly for months, will flee from
the summer heat of Washington
next June or July.
In the meantime the record of
the Fifty-Seventh Congress will be
watched with keenest interest by
millions of people. Upon its de-
cisions rests the welfare Of thou
sands of citizens, not alone in this
country but in Porto Rico and the
Philippines, in Hawaii and Samoa
and even in little Guam, while
Cuba, the young sister republic so
lately born into the world, notes
with intense anxiety the delibera-
tions Of that body upon whose
craftsmanship her future prosperity
so largely depends.
Before the holiday recess was over
seven thousand bills had been pre-
sented in the Senate and House,
more than the fifty per cent of the
total number introduced during the
Fifty-Seventh Congress. Hour
after hour Senator Frye and Gen
eral Henderson occupy the chairs
of Senate and House and refer bills
and resolutions to their proper
committees. To the uninitiated
the halls Of Congress frequently
present scenes of singular inactivity
and the question is often asked,
how can Congress accomplish so
much when it's sessions are so short
and so little attention seems to be
paid to the precedings by the mem
bers? But it is not on the open
floor that bills are framed and legis-
lation enacted. There they are
formally passed only after they
have been determined upon Gin
committee. But glance into the
committee rooms after the session
has adjourned. There is no in
activity there. Intense earnestness
characterizes the informal debates
which are to decide the fate of the
faYorite measure of the Western
members, the pet bill of the repre-,
sentatives of the New England
States, the cherished scheme of the
Southern delegation. There red
tape is abandoned, sophistry is
dropped and the member from
Pedunk frankly admits the sense
lessness of the bill he champions
but, he adds, ''My constituents de.
mand it. 1t must pass or | will not
be returned" for, as some wit has
put it, "a Congressman no sooner
gets to Washington than he must
labor to get back"-secure his re
election. 1t is to the committee
rooms that the experienced cor
repondent gets for news.
The days of biting repartee ant
cruel inyective in the Congress O
the United States have passed. Ne
longer will venerable Southern
Senator be heard to characterize
the grafton Of his Northern col