The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1910-06-06
BULKELEY HAS NO INFLUENCE IN
 SENATE FOR AFTER FIVE YEARS HE'S SAME AS WHEN HE TOOK SEAT
Washington Correspondent Calls Him Negligible FactorOny on One Occasion, in Brownsville Affair Did He
 SHOW Any Independence

The Washington correspondent of the Springfield Republican writes of Senator Morgan G. Bulkeley and his career in the United States senate as follows:
 What will become of New Eng lands predominating influence in the senate when in the next congress Senator Aldrich of Rhode Island and seen in the places which have known them for so many years? The ques- ton is not merely academic-at least it would not seem to be so for the people of the New England states. Senator Frye, it is true, will still re- main, but the years of his active ser vice are past. Senator Crane and Senator Lodge will then be the un- questioned leaders, and the main re- liance of the New England group. Yet unless they have the support of colleagues who are at least capable and industrious, the interests of New England are certain to receive far less attention from the upper house of congress than in the recent past, when that section has given to the senate so many men of remarkable force and ability-men such as Or vile H. Platt of Connecticut, Hoar of Massa chuSettS and others whose names readily suggest themselves. Influence such as these men wielded cannot be built up in day. Yet in the altered membership of the sen- ate in the next congress, when, for various reasons, there are likely to be seen more new faces than have appeared at any one time in the past, or than may perhaps appear at any one time in the future, there will individual force to assert itself more rapidly than has usually been the case. It therefore seems peculiarly a time when the New England states should individually see to it that they send to the senate men who, even though they may not be of com manding brilliance in all instances, are at least capable, industrious and efficient. It will be a time when the handicap of such senators as Bulke- fairly be described as anything more than a mere cipher in the senate's af- fairs, will weigh particularly heavily.
 Senator Bulkeley is now reaching the end of his fifth year of service in the senate as successor to the late Gen. Joseph R. Hawley. He has to- day little, if any, more influence than on the day on which he took his seat. Controversies of one sort and an- other may play about Senator Bulke- ley's head in Connecticut, such as over his alleged promise not to be
 
 these the Washington observer has nothing to do. The interest here is in studying Senator Bulkeleys posi- ton exactly as it is in the senate without reference to, or prejudice from, outside affairs.
 There is an unwritten role of courtesy or party harmony among senators that they shall not openly interfere with the campaigns which their colleagues may be carrying on ie ,~111n tom, which Senator La Toilette has made conspicuous by his violation of it in going into various states and speaking in opposition to senators of the reactionary type. But Senator Bulkeley is not worth the waste of any possession of the right to cast single vote, he is practically a neg ligible factor, and since La Toilette is doubtless shrewd enough to realize that from his radical point of view Connecticut is a thoroughly conserva- tive state and would only replace Bulkeley by a conservative of great CT efficiency. But aside from La Fol lette, although other members of the senate would discreetly decline to be drawn into any controversy in regard to Senator Bulkeley, it is not difficult to learn the value or utter lack of value which is placed upon Bulke- leys services by conservative Repub- licans who have been more or less closely associated with him, either on committees or in other capacities It is striking fact that in conversation with a number of such Republicans the one and only thing urged in Bulkeley's favor, or as palliating his he generally votes right" That is to say, he~ can be generally depend ed upon without any independent thought of his own to automatically ever the organization leaders may have decided upon. This, it must be admitted, is not a wholly unimport- ant performance, although, it is one which could equally we'll be accom- plished by a puppet figure operated with the necessary strings.
 There was one occasion. to be en-