The Birmingham age-herald., 1908-01-31
HOUSE COMMITTEE HEARING
Perry Belmont, Samuel Gompers and Others Appear With Mir. Bryan To Discuss Election Matters
 and contribu' s.

lcly ana all me GS iployeu to secure the election of 0!S lefeat a candidate should be megfa C ich the one using them would nf .shamed to have the world know
 This epitomizes the views of William J. Bryan on the subject of publicity of campaign contributions as expressed today before the House committee on election of President and Vice Presi- dent The meeting was called for the special purpose of hearing MT. Bryan. In addition to the full membership, there were present Perry Belmont and Sam uel Gompers and other labor leaders.
 MT. Bryan declared that reforms only come when abuses are recognized. Not until there is an evil to be remedied, ' he declared, ''does one think of a rem edy." The thing to be remedied in Amer ican politics. he continued, was the use of money to secure control of the gov ernment. "the money being advanced by those antagonistic to the public purpose. ," When a man resorted to secrecy, he said. it must be because he has something to gain that he did not want the world to know, or that he distrusts the intelli- gence or patriotism of the people.
 Mr. Bryan insisted that the most inn portant thing to be done was to make the campaign contribution known before the election. He recognized that there was an advantage in finding out after the horse is stolen how the door was un- locked, but" he said, T think it much better to find out before the horse is stolen that a theft is contemplated.
 Knowledge Too Late.
 The trouble about the. publication of expenditures after elections was that the knowledge came too late to be of any advantage to the people in that campaign. It was very easy to change the commit tee and the personnel of the organiza- ton, he said, and then make scapegoats of those who had been in charge of the elections MT. Bryan declared there could be no objection to anyone making a campaign contribution If that con tribution represents his patriotic interest in a public cause" He said it was the duty of the people to contribute to the expense of disseminating campaign material by way of education.
 .It had been charged he said, that Chairman Cortelyou had received contrf- buttons from 5000 contributors, as if, he said. ''it was a matter to deserve recogni- ton that so many people had contribu- ted" Even if this were true, he argued. that they were a very slim fraction or the 100000 voters for President Roose- welt.
 As for the democratic party MT. Bryan said that in 1897 1t had more contributors than In any other previous campaign. Many men who would bet $500 on the re- suit of an election would not contribute So to a campaign fund.
 MT. Bryan, however, voiced his opposi- ton to the principle of allowing only a few men to provide campaign funds IL follows almost as a matter of necessity. he said, that these men will have an influence after the election entirely out of proportion to their numbers or to the influence they ought to have In other words" MT. Bryan said, without any in- tention of yielding to the entreaties or these men, without any conscious sacrince of the public interest to the private claim, these men who contribute large sums naturally and almost necessarily have this influence. because of the contribution. :"
 No Ground For Suspicion.
 MT. Bryain said he was glad President Roosevelt had taken the matter up. He has spoken so plainly on the subject or public campaign contributions, said MT. Bryan, "that I am sure that the fact that I am a democrat will not place sus- picion upon my argument, for l think | have the same interest in this matter that the President has expressed He declared he had far greater interest in government and in public questions than in personal concern about the success of an individual" and, he added, DnnGaNalt those who, like him, have spoken out in the republican party have the same broad, general interest that have democrats who have spoken out"
 Chairman Gaines interrupted with the remark that the difficulty of the commit tee had been in agreeing upon plan to accomplish the desired purposes
 Mr. Bryan replied that he recognized the difficulty of getting law sufficiently comprehensive in it's material purpose which would not invade the sphere of the states, but he believed one could be en- acted along the lines indicated.
 Laws Adopted.
 The hearing was arranged by the Pub licity Bill association, and Perry Belmont. its president, presented to the committee an abstract of the laws of several states relating to the publicity of election con tributions and expenditures. Such laws, he said, had been enacted in 16 states. as follows: Alabama, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Montana New York, Pennsyl- vania, South Carolina, Texas, Virginia and Wisconsin. Three states, Florida, Kentucky and Tennessee, had laws forbid ding corporations to contribute in any manner for political purposes, while in five states, Maryland, New Jersey Ohio, Oregon and West Virginia, publicity laws had been recommended.
 The bill under consideration was the one drawn by MT. Belmont and introduced by Mir Mccall of Massachusetts. If enacted into law MT. Belmont said it could not be supposed that anyone at the coming election would try to evade it.
 Postal Changes.