The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1909-07-27
congressman in Scramble Over
Annual JunketS.
Never Before Have So Many
Been Organized.
UNCLE SAM PAYS BILLS
Trip to the Isthmus Is the
Most Common.
Conservation Commission May
Yield Trip or Two to Europe.

Washington, D. c., July 27.-There
| is great figeting among the congress
sional junketeers, as congress nears
! it's close of the special session. Strange
as it may seem, there is authority for
the statement that never before have
so many junI1ets been organized un-
der one guise or another, and never
before were so many senators and
representatives getting things ready
for d trip hither or thither at the
government expense as this summer.
They have to arrange those things
more carefully nowadays, when pub
lie sentiment is decidedly hostile to
junkets by congress; but, all the
same. the congressman gets the trips,
by hook or crook. and these latter
days they have become very ingenious
in working out schemes by which the
dear people pay for their summers
travel.
During the last two years visit to
the Panama canal, in fact. several
visits, have become favorite con-
gressional- junket. The statesman at
Washington; who wants sea trip at
the expense of Uncle Sam, suddenly
becomes greatly concerned about
the progress of the Panama canal.
He gets something sent out to the
newSpa perSe in his district about his
intention of going down there to see
just how things are going, anyway
He has to pay his railroad fare from
Washington to New York and return.
which costs only about S15, and
apart from that the junketeer is in
clover for three to four weeks. He
can easily get a pass over the gov
ernment steamship lines to the 18th
mus-in fact. is about the only
American citizen who can-and once
on the isthmus he is taken care of in
fine fashion and at a very little cost
to himself. He returns after fine
vacation, bristling with ideas, which
nobody in Washington cares a plea
yune for. He imposes an interview
or two upon his constituents about
the canal, and then settles down to
the same old routine.
The conservation commission and
the internal waterways com mmission
promise to yield a junket or two be-
fore the summer is over Always
when commission is launched
new idea, the commissioners simply
yearn to see how it is done abroad,
and they are not satisfied till they
have galloped up and down Europe
a the expense of your Uncle Samuel.
Undoubtedly the government vouch-
ers which have been turned in for
these sightseeing trips OF commits
sioners in Europe have cost this gov
ernment, first and last. millions OF
dollars And the new commissions
are still heading for Europe as ener-
Eetically as ever. A party interested
in the conservation and Improvement
OI Waterways eApeClS " sail soon al
ter congress adjourns.
The incest, fattest junket of all is
the one proposed to Honolulu. But
it is a little different than the other
junkets of the season. The territory
of Hawaii votes the money to take a |
party of thirty-five or forty congress-
men and their wives out there to see |
what the islands are like, and what
the needs of the territory are in the |
matter of legislation. OF course, it is |
just as jolly for the junket-loving |
congressman, but he cannot go unless |
he is invited, and the personnel is de- |
termined by the territorial authori- |
ties.
For several years it was quite the
thing for the congressional junket- |
Ger to take a trip around the world |
at government expense, incidentally |
visiting the Philippines. But it is |
becoming increasingly difficult to get !
passage on the army transports. Ac-
cordingly the statesmanliI1e interest |
in the Philippines has been on the |
wane. for passage by the commercial
steamers cost real money.
Former Senator and Mrs. Chester I.
Long have disposed of their Washing
ton residence property, situated at the
corner of Massachusetts avenue and l.
street The property was pre-