The weekly true Democrat. (Tallahassee, Fla.) 1905-1912, 1907-08-23

1911 ayalp 4N4tE - ttlINaa0ou1. IA
prosecuting the report Of DE commit
tee, recommending IT, payment 10 fan,
Nj. BlOunt delivered q speech two
hours IL length, going into every aspect
Of the case, h which he said that IN his
thirty years' experience &c lawyer he
had never seen q ease more completely
proved, and that any court in any civil
Ized,country would order Judgment en-
tered upon its presentation as Il had
been presented to the committee.
The then Governor, WIS. jennings,
had appeared before the COMMITTEES and
endeavored to secure from Il report
for the payment Of small gum, con-
tending that Col. WALES had received q
great deal Of State land When Mr..
BIount asked him IL he did not know
that the land Col WALES bad received
was conveyed to him under entirely diff
ferent contracts for services in select
ing and securing patents for lands, on
behslf Of the Internal Improvement
Fund, he (Jennings), was compelled to
admit that such was the fact. When
these land contracts were entered into,
in 1873, all Of the lands then belonging
to the Fund had been for years tied up
in the litigation which resulted in the
Vose judgments, and il was the work
Of Col WALES in Washington, under
these contracts land in spite Of the ac-
tive and vindietive opposition of Sena-
tor Wilkerson Call and the ex-carpet-
bag Governor, Harrison Reedl, which
resulted in the patenting to the State Of
large bodies of land, including the four
million acres sold by Governor Blox-
hams administration to Hamilton Diss-
ton, the proceeds of which were used to
clear off the Vose claim and others,
thus releasing the lands for sale and
settlement, and for the building Of the
railway lines which now traverse every
section of the State.
When the WALES claim came to
vote in the senate, on the report Of the
Blount committee, Mr.. Jennings had
got in some of his work. and that body
voted to scale the claim down to $79,-
O0O-less than half the amount due UNI
der the contract, and not much more
than enough to reimburse Col. Wales
for the money he had spent in the pre-
paratiOn and prosecution Of the Indian
War Claim. Then, not yet satisfied,
jennings began to work among the
members of the House. With the aid
of his Secretary, Dickinson, now de-
parted from Florida, he hired the opera
house and organized a secret caucus,
securing the attendance Of some part
of the members, who, yielding to his en-
treaties, pledged themselves to vote
for an appropriation of $25, only
one half to 90 to Col. Wales, and one
half to the heirs of the late Col. W. X.
Beard, who had been Col. Wales as
sistant [Col. Wales paying all his ex-
penses1 during several months labor at
Washington spent in the preparation OF
the evidence. Can anyone wonder that
neither Col Wales nor the Boards have
ever had the slightest intention OF. ac-
cepting the sums as appropriated y
In his message to the Legislature
Governor Jennings recited the fact of
the receipt of the Indian War Claim,
stating that the State had, in cold
cash and the return Of its own bonds
with cupons, the sum Of 81 ,089, 800, and
that the whole credit of securing this
magnificent result belonged to the then
Florida Senators and Representatives
in Congress; but later, when he thought
he was a candidate for the U. S, SEN
ate, he claimed in his first speech, all
of the credit for himself |! And this.
when he knew that the United States
never pays any claims without the pre-
sentation of vouchers and other indis-
putable evidence of its validity, and
that Col. Wailes had been working for
tIOenty-three years under the Drew con-
tract and at an expense aggrigating more
than 1000, to search for, arrange,
verify and present to the proper au-
thorities the evidence upon which this
Indian War Claim was based; finally so
satisfying Hon. VIM. Window, then
Secretary Of the Treasury, that he re-
ported the claim to Congress for pay