Arizona republican., 1905-07-13
Publication of His Letter
 to the President
CHARGES OF VFNALlTY
Made Against the Department of Ag- ricUlture and Incidents Related on Which They Were Exam inatAOn Of Correspondence.

Washington, July 12.-A new and investigation was developed today through the publication of the letter of Walter c. Hubbard, president of the New York Cotton exchange. addressed to President Roosevelt, in which the writer declared that the members of the exchange had been greatly shocked by recent disclosures of ve- nality in the department of agricuI- ture," and requesting full investigation of the methods which led to the cor ruption, with a view of preventing the possibility of a recurrence. That letter is believed here to be the outcome of recent correspondence between Secre- tary Wilson and MT. Hubbard, in which the latter called upon the secre- tary to make him a public apology be- cause he had some years ago called the secretary's attention to alleged leaks and that no notice had been given tEe suggestion. The secretary wrote a tart reply, in which he in formed MT. Hubbard that he owed no one an apology in the light of having done his duty to the best of his ability, and that when he got an inkling that
 
 to the secret service officers to hunt down.
 The case to which MT. Hubbard re- ferred in his recent letter to the sec retary occurred in 1900. On December 20 of that year MT. Hubbard sent the secretary certain papers showing that a MT. Sternberger wanted to sell in- formation to a New York cotton brok- craze firm, claiming that he could get it in advance from the department Secretary Wilson immediately turned the matter over to secret service off, cers. but in about a week Chief WiIkie reported that "it looks like an attempt of Sternberger to buncO the New York firm" After allowing two months to elapse and not hearing further the sec retary. on MarcR 26 1901 called upon the secret service for information as to whether they had made any discov- cries. On the following day, Secretary Gage of the treasury replied as fol- lows:
 ''The action of this man who wanted to sell information was done with the hope of being able to sell information, but as a matter of fact his efforts to obtain the advance information failed, as he received no assistance from the persons in Washington upon whom he depended fer information"
 This report of Mr. Gage was trans mitted to Mir. Hubbard by Secretary , Wilson the next day and the matter was allowed to drop. But in January, ! 1902. MT. Hubbard complained of hay i ing been advised that southern ginners were sending to the department re- ] ports of their gining operations bear l ing date of December 22 or 23, and" i said Mr. Hubbard, "I am able to un- l derstand why reliable returns from ginners should be obtained, since the ! result is to be published" It seems, ! however, that the department of az riculture had not called for ginners' i statistics ct that time, but circulars ! had been issued from the census bu- ! reau.
 Tn the same month Mr. Hubbard ! wrote the department of agriculture , asking for certain information on cot | ton, but the seer etary, in the course of 1 sharp letter denying the request, ! written under date of January II, 1902, 1 said:
 We take the ground here that noth- ing goes out unless it goes to the whole !, people. We have no favorites."
 Secretary Wilson today permitted the examination of the correspondence in order to show that as far back as five years ago he had taken prompt action to discover any leaks in his of fee.