Ottumwa tri-weekly courier., 1908-03-26
NUMEROUS BILLS
CONGRESS-
ALTHOUGH LEGISLATION HAS
BEEN LIGHT THIS SESSION
MUCH is PENDING.
Washington Bureau Of
The Ottumwa Courier

Washington, D. c., March 81.
Th1s session of congress will be a
record breaker in respect to the num-
Der of bills introduced 1t may be a
do nothing" congress so far as get
ting anything in the way of legislation
enacted is concerned Everyone says
1t is and that it will continue to be.
But representatives and senators are
pouring in bills for the relief of the
country at an amazing rate.
In the house, what Speaker Cannon
calls the chopper" is full of unground
legislation most of the time. 1t is fed
with bills on every conceivable SUB
ject. In the senate, the number Of
bills is more moderate but it is never
theless unusually large.
Since the Sixtieth congress opened
last December up to March 1s, there
have been no less than 1852 bills in
troduced in the house, together with
enough house joint resolutions, house
simple resolutions, house concurren:
resolutions, house reports and house
documents to bring the total up 10
22,136.
In the same time, 6191 senate bills
have been introduced and enough
joint resolutions, simple resolutions,
concurrent resolutions, reports and
documents to bring the total up to
1915.
That is, there have been 2e,352 bills,
resolutions, reports and documents
since the session opened. What this
means in a comparative way as to the
growth of the business of introducing
bills is shown by comparison with the
noted Billion Dollar Congress- the
Fifty-first.
In the 'Billion Dollar Congress-" in
both sessions, there were introduced
In the house 1854 bills, documents,
reports and resolutions, making a to-
tai of 1924 and in the senate total
of 1851, giving grand total in both
house and senate of 2S,115. In other
words, in the two sessions Of the
"Billion Dollar Congress" there were
fewer bills, documents, resolutions
and reports put in than there have
been in little over half of
the first session of the Sixtieth
congress. The figures make the
boasted Billion Dollar Congress"
look pale in comparison with the pres
ent one. Compared with more recent
congresses, it is plain this one is set
ting a swifter pace than any of its
predecessors so far as the initiation
of measures is concerned. When it
comes to passing them, that is another
question.
OF course, the bills that are being
poured into the mill of legislation this
session are of every conceivable kind
and character. Private bills and spe-
cial pension bills are plentiful. Never
before were there so many bills for
the government regulation of this and
that. The administrators activities
IN behalf of the idea of government
regulation of railroads and corpora
tions have borne fruit in a great array
Of bills pertaining to these matters.
Public building bills are unusually
plentiful. Moreover, nearly every
community that can catch sight of
salt water with a telescope or that has
river in hailing distance, wants a
boon in the shape of harbor or river
Improvement. Currency bills are more
numerous than usual and SO are those
dealing with the liquor question in
some phase. These are but a few of
the subjects covered by the thousands
of bills which have been introduced
and which for the most part will find
their way by the end of the session,
not to the statute books but to the
pigeon holes.
j. G. Welliver,