Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1906-11-03
SP OILS OF BATTLE
Tuesdays Anticipations OF
Power, Glory and Gain.
FRESHMEN TO BE SEATED
Civil Service Reform Has Taken All
the Influence.
COMFORTS COMING TO THEM
Few Perquisites Left, but Each to Have
Private Office in the New
Building.
COMFORTS COMING TO THEM

Copyright, 1906. by John Elfreth Watkns)
On Tuesday next. out of the thousand
and more of men now vying for the glory
and gain influence and power alleged to
20 with seat in the national House of
REPRESENTATIVES Just 500 will be elected.
A fourth of these, or less. will receive their
congressional togas for the first time.
These freshmen will not take their seats
beneath the admiring eyes of the House
galleries for thirteen months. unless the
President call an extra session of the
new Congress. They will have that gener-
Gus space in which to grind their parlia-
mentary etiquet Ind departmental rou
tine Nevertheless they will draw their
salaries from the 4th of next March, al
though they will not take their oaths of Of
fec or begin their official labors until nine
months later. This long wait before newly
elected members may get to work has time
and again been criticised by students of
government. who have suggested that
new Congress should convene in March
directly following their election, and when
their salaries commence. The fact that
large majority of members of both
Houses were farmers In the first years of
the republic made this impossible. These
agricultural members insisted upon be-
spring planting and wanted to remain there
until after the crops could be gathered
each fall. But in present days a large
majority of our federal legislators are
lawyers. In the present House there are
249 lawyers to twenty-one farmers in
the present Senate. lawyers fifty and farm
ers only three. Nevertheless many contend
that this long wait of thirteen months
should continue. that partisan feeling may
have a thorough cooling off after cleo
ton. But the other side presents a long
list Of evils resulting from the delay. For
example, the short session of the present
Congress will sit from about this time
next month until March and after the
new Congress shall have been elected. In
that session there will be many disgruntled
members who failed of denomination or re-
election and who will not feel any re-
sponsibility to their constituents-who, in
fact, may feel spite toward them Then
again II a man supposedly elected to the
new Congress and who draws his salary
from March 4 next has his seat success
fully contested by a rival candidate after
the meeting of Congress more than a year
hence Uncle Sam must pay two congress
sional salaries in the one district from
March to December or later. Members dis
placed by contest do not have to return
their wases-so much Is they have drawn
to the treasury. If a Congress convened
on the March after its election there would
be Il saving of considerable each
Congress.
A Cure for Swelled Heads.
We spoke Of the glory and gain. influ-
ence and power for which the congressional
nominees are battling today. The new
member who feels the thrill of glory during
those first thirteen months spent at home
directly following his election becomes dis
Nusnued the moment he takes his seat
among the tried leaders of his party and
beneath the ignoring eye of the Speaker.
He experiences a return OF the pangs suf-
fered on his first day of school, when he
ran the gauntlet of the big boys and stood in
trembling We of the teacher
When the time comes for him to leave
home and start UToa lis triumphal Journey
to t-e national capital a platfornfu Of
political admirers viii shake Hs Gia / hand
and 4 brass band in the background will
discourse mel0G:ous farewell. Even until
the train fades away at the vanishing point
of perspective viii his chesty figure be seen
bowling from the 'ear platform and the
local papers viii come out with a double
header describing the glorious seLG-of of
yh,ir honorable" At Washington with
bated breath he will await his fl:st appear-
ancc in the great chamber Of the House
Their" To take his seat before the posies
which admirers have laid upon his desk
TErn for the rude awakeningi
Here is how a new member of the present
Congress described his first appearances:
II reached the door Of the House and was
about to step in when the doorkeeper took
me by the arm and said:
d" Pardon me, but you can't go in there
You'll have TO go up in the gallery
Why? l inquired.
" Because this door is for members only
But | am member said l. with some
Indignation in my voice.
Well came the reply, after he had
eyed me skeptically, then you will have to
be identified.
House officers Don't Know All M. C.'s.
Indeed. not even the officers of the House
know all members by sight. The sergeant
alarms now demands q photograph of
each member OF Congress and this motley
collection of portraits Is hung up. rogues
gallery style, convenient to the window
where members apply for their pay and
perquisites. The Speaker himself knows
comparatively few new members by sight
in the opening days of a Congress but
this fact deters him little in the routine
OF business, as the members of the fresh
men class are expected to stick close to
their chairs and hold their tongues still
until thoroughly broken in. Until the
Speaker has become acquainted with him
the member finds himself ignored
when he rises for recognition, ana the
party leaders commonly subject him to the
same embarrassment when he calls upon
them to yield few minutes OF their time
and let him put in his oar.
While every new senator-regardless of
his degree of idiocy-is featured in the
press at large. which prints deliberately IL
Illustrated interviews anent his first am
btion, his favorite poet. the turn of his
first law case and the brand of his favor
lite cigar the career OF the new reoresen-
tative is regarded as poor copy outside
his home papers unless he have some SUI
perlative distinction-as, for example, that