The Harrison times. (Harrison, Boone Co., Ark) 1876-1938, 1906-04-07
enEks
WASHINGTON D. ! Aar. 81. 1eO6.

ON the rate bill and that it will then
be passed with a rather broad court
review provision that will be accept
able to the House. Senator Aldrieh
is very good judge spending legis-
lation and he may be right. There
is a rumor, however, that the SEN
ate is going to put the rate bill into
form that will be acceptable to the
House for the purpose of holding it
up at the last moment till ii can get
consideration for a ship subsidy bill.
This is of course a Senate provision.
for the House is not in the frame of
mind to consider subsidy at this ses-
sion. Also the Speaker has declared
himself against it on several ocea-
sions, almost as much against it as
he is against tariff revision, But it
is said that the friends of subsidy
have won the Speaker over to their
way of thinking and that his influ-
ences will be used to get favorable
consideration for the measure.
Though tits a question whether even
the almost all powerful influence Of
the Speaker could force bill of that
sort through just at this juneture,
/ However, there is back of that still
another story, that is that Uncle
oe figures on posing as the dark
horse of the next nominating con-
vention and while he is not particu-
larly keen about the fate of the rate
bill he wants to make friends unto
himself of all the White House influ-
enee he can muster before the fateful
day arrives.
The Keep Commission are eanny
lot of boys. They are all of them
young, as seasoned politicians go,
and all of them are close personal
friends of the President He az
pointed them on this pet commission
simply because he knew that they
were honest young men and he
thinks that any man who is honest
and willing can do as many different
things and do them as well as he
can himself. Now Keep, Hitchcock,
Pinchot, ct al are by no means as
versatile as the President, though
they are all of them honest. well
intentioned young men. Hat they
have shown themselves to be crafty
to a degree. EVERYONE has heard Of
the famous Keep Commission, but
not everyone has heard of the sub
comp,ittees that are doing the work
IT, Commission goes into depart.
ment that it wants to investigate
and select a subcommittee from
among the bureau chiefs and heads
of divisions who already have as
much as they can conveniently do,
| n Ia II ha j.
of investigating. This sub-commit-
tee then reports to the Commission
after it has spent a month or two
working after Office hours getting
up the data, and the Commission
puts out the gist of the 'sub-commit-
tees report as its findings. Yes, it
is a beautiful scheme and it makes
the Keep Commission look mighty
erudite when one reads its reports.
But the funniest thing the commits
sion has done yet was its report on
the Government Printing Office
Now this office is about as much in
need of reform as could be well mag
ined. But the interesting thing was
the Keep Commission printed its re-
port on the need of economy in the
most wastelul volume that ever
came off the government presses. 1t
selected folio page with quarter
wide margin, which as any printer
will testify is about as wasteful a
form decomposition as could be de-
vised. The report was on the most
expensive brand of government pa
per, bar only that on which gold
certificates are printed, and the
binding was in keeping with the rest
of the report. There was an edition
of 10000 copies, not six of which
will be read, run off And altogeth-
er the report on economy was itself
about the most striking object lesson
in the need of economy that has ever
come out of the Government Print
ing Office.
1t is said that a compromise has
been reached on the statehood bill.
OF course it will not be known Just
how nearly correct this is till the
bill comes out of conference. But it
is said that the conferees will report
a bill providing for joint statehood