The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1909-01-04

ILL members of congress and other officers of the government. If we examine the debate in detail it appears that most of what was urged in favor of the amendment took the form of the sim pie statement that the committee held that there had been a violation of law'' by the use of the secret service for other purposes than suppressing counterfeiting (and one or two other matters which can be disregarded) and that such language was now to be used as would effectually prevent all such violation of law'' hereafter. MT. Tawney, for instance, says, Ut was for the purpose of stopping the use of this service in every possible way by the departments of the government that this provision was inserted" and MT. Smith says, "Now, that was the only way in which any limitation could be put upon the activities of the secret service" MT. Fitzgerald followed in the same vein, and by far the largest part of the argument against the en- ployment of the secret service was con- fined to the statement that 1t was in violation of law" Of course such a statement is not in any way an argu- ment in favor of the justice of the provision. It is not an argument for the provision at all. It is simply a statement of what the gentlemen mak There was both by implication and direct statement the assertion that 1t was the law and ought to be the law, that the secret service should only be used to suppress counterfeiting and that the law should be made more rigid than ever in this respect.
 No Restrictions on Service.
 Incidentally I may say that in my judgment there is ample legal author ity for the statement that this appro- priation law to which reference was made imposes no restrictions whatever upon the use of the secret service men, but relates solely to the expenditure of the money appropriated. MT. Tawney in the debate stated that he had in his possession "a letter from the secretary of the, treasury received a few days ago. in which the secretary of the treasury himself admits that the pro- visions under which the appropriation has been made have been violated year after year for number of years in his own department" I append here with as Appendix A the letter re- ferred to. Appendix A is letter from Secretary of the Treasury Cortelyou to the chairman of the committee on ap- propriations of the house of represent atives, dated April %, 1908, protest ing against the proposed law abridg ing the right of the secretary of the treasury to detail secret service men to work in other divisions of his de partment- Such abridgement, he de clared, would be distinctly to the ad- vantage of violators of criminal stat utes of the United States."l It makes no such admission as that which Mir. Tawney alleges. It contains, on the contrary, as you will see by reading it, an emphatic protest against any such abr1dgement of the rights delegated to the secretary of the treasury by ex- fsting law" and concludes by assert ing that he 'is quite within his rights in thus employing the service of these agents" and that the proposed modif- cation which MT. Tawney succeeded in carrying through would be distinctly to the advantage of violators of crimi- nal statutes of the United States" I call attention to the fact that in this letter of Secretary Cortelyou to MT. Tawney, as in my letter to the speaker quoted below, the explicit statement is made that the proposed change will be for the benefit of the criminals, a statement which simply reiterated in public form in my message to the con- gross this year and which is also con tained in effect in the report of the secretary of the treasury to the con- gress.
 ~Private Conduct" of Members.
 al Record will also show that practical ly the only arguments advanced in fa- vor of the limitation proposed by MT. Tawney's committee beyond what may be supposed to be contained by impli- cation in certain sentences as to abuses which were not specified were those contained in the repeated statements of MT. Sherley. Mr. Sher- ley stated that there had been ''pro- nounced abuses growing out of the use of the secret service for purposes other than those intended" putting his statement in the form of q question, and in the same form further stated that the private conduct" of "mem- bers of congress, senator's and others ought not to be investigated by the secret service and that they should not investigate a member of con- gress" who had been accused of "con- duct unbecoming gentleman and a member of congress-" Tn addition to these assertions, couched as questions, he made one positive declaration that "this secret service at one time was used for the purpose of looking into the personal conduct of a member of congress" This argument of MT. Sher- ley, the only real argument as to the merits of the question made on behalf of the committee on appropriations, will be found in columns l and of page 5556 and column 1 of page 5557 of the Congressional Record. In col umn 1 of page 5556 MT. Sherley refers