Aberdeen herald. [volume] (Aberdeen, Chehalis County, W.T.) 1886-1917, 1908-06-01
The Closing Days Of Congress.

cnleI.
The Closing Days Of Congress.
With an overwhelming majority in
the senate and the house and with
continued and noisy protestations of
devotion to the presidents programme.
congress has thus far passed through
the house only two of the multitude of
bills which he has urged. The second
one. that involving child labor in the
District of Columbia. passed only with
the aid of Democratic votes. Nothing
yet has come of the recommendation
for free wood pulp and print paper,
for the amendment to the antitrust
law, for publicity of campaign con-
tributions or any of half dozen neces-
sary laws for the government of the
District of Columbia.
The editor of Il weekly newspaper of
national reputation sitting i'll the press
gallery with me the other day and
watching the perfect discipline with
which Speaker Cannon. Leader Payne,
Dalzcll, Hepburn and Tawney worked
together TO prevent anything of really
national Importance from being brought
to a vote on HE floor said:
81 can't understand the theory on
which these men are working. Here
the entire Associated Press and the
American Newspaper Publishers assoc
citation have united in a demand that
wood pulp and print paper be put on
the free list. yet all they can get out of
this congress is the appointment of
commission obviously intended to carry
the subject over until next winter and
which is conducting the investigation
in such a way as to make it perfectly
apparent to all who attend the hearings
that the cards are stacked against the
publishers. The newspaper owners
are threatening reprisals. In this pres
ent house there are thirty-fve Repub-
leans sitting whose districts are so
close that a change of thousand votes
from the Republican to the Democratic
side would retire each one of them.
"The Democratic minority has put it.
self on record as a unit for free pulp.
A petition asking that the bill be called
up has been signed by every Democrat
in the house. Only one Republican
position. What will the press of the
country do? The moral sentiment of
| the country is a unit in favor of the
national publicity law. yet the speak
err and his cabal will not allow it to
be voted on in the house. If the Re
publican party is to so before the ma
ton on the record of Roosevelt, the
| m in tn iS hat 20
| lican congress has repudiated him by
refusing to accept his recommends
lions. If the record of congress is to
be the issue. it is one of impotence and
dereliction of duty. One almost thinks
that that gang down there whom we
all know at heart are hostile to the
president and to Taft are systematical-
| ly plotting treachery for the overthrow
of both"
The Singular Senator From Arkansas.
If Senator Jeff Davis desired to at
tract attention irrespective of what
sort of attention it might he. he could
! have hardly done better than he uld
with his speech week ago in the SEN
ate This paragraph. addressed to
Rockefeller and Morgan, affords fair
example of its general tone:
Let the scavengers of plutocracy howl
Miserable travestes upon noble manhood.
| postgraduates in all arts of SANDER or
| defamation, L challenge the subsidized
press. Go, damnablc imps of pelf and
greed! l defy your taunts. Tear to frag-
ments my political career if it comport
with your execrable will. Stihe and dis
tort my every utterance. Not satisfied, if
| such be your brutal frenzy. lash my poor
form into insensibility. Then, if it be
your further pleasure. gnaw from my
stiffening bones every vcstige of CULVER
| ing flesh Howl in wrctchcd bestiality
! through my own innocent blood as 1t
| drops from your fendish visages.
This is, of course, balderdash. Yet,
however foolish may be his ranting in
the senate, there is shrewd side to
Davis character which has enabled
him to hold his own in his state. |
heard a story of a clever trick he
played on an opponent for the nominal
ton for governor. His rival was
member of an old Arkansas family,
tall, stately. digntied man. In the
joint debates which they conducted
throughout the state he was carrying
| every dutlcHCe WIFI ullll. DdNlS saw
that something must be done. Just
before one of his biggest meetings he
let the rumor be circulated that if
Judge attacked him on the stage
again as he had been doing he Davis
would take physical vengeance upon
him. The judges friends became per-
turbed. They went to him and told
him that he must go to the next meet
ing armed. But ! never carried
weapons" protested the Judge Still
they insisted and finally persuaded
him to slip pistol into his hip pocket.
In the midst of his speech Davis. who
was then governor, turned dramatical-
ly to his rival and, declaring himself
to be an officer of the law and one
who reverenced and obeyed the law.
demanded to know whether even then
the gentleman confronting him was not
violating the law by carrying a dead
ly weapon. The judge could not lie.
could not defend himself, and. with
passionate appeal to all his hearers
| 30 41;, o., ~.