The Wenatchee daily world. [volume] (Wenatchee, Wash.) 1905-1971, 1910-09-17
BIG QUESTION MAY COME
UP To THE CABINET
Secretary Balinger Will Leave His Fate to Associates
Annoyed by Delays of the Committee = There Are
Rumors That He Would Have Resigned if Committee
Had Met and INDICATED Him. But Not Under Fire.

washington, Sept. lf.-W netneT
Richard A Ballinger's resignation
as secretary of the interior will fol-
low Immediately on the cabinet meet
ing, September 20, to attend which
he is now en- route from Seattle; or
whether he will retain his position
indefinitely-at least until after the
delivery to congress of the reports
of the committee that investigated
his stewardship of the public domain
depends now upon the attitude of
his cabinet associates.
May Resign.
Mr.. Ballinger is coming to Wash
ington, his friends say, wholly un-
conscious of any act on his part of
which he should be condemned, and
has determined to force his chief and
his official colleagues to be in effect
his judges. If they concur in the
view at present attributed to Mr..
Taft, that the accused secretary shall
be sustained as an innocent and per-
secuted man, he will retain his posi-
ton: if they fail to back him up, he
will resign. That this is Mr.. Balm
gers position was learned here today
upon authority hardly to be ques-
toned.
Dickinson Absent.
At the first meeting of the cabinet
a rU
Dickinson, the democratic member,
will not have returned from the Phil
ippines and will therefore be saved
the embarrassment of participation
in what is regarded as largely a prob
lem of republican policy.
The meeting is expected to last
three days 1t will surprise nobody
here if the Ballinger case occupies
a large part of the time.
Refuse to Credit Rumors.
Rumors have been constant and
decidedly definite here during the
last few days that Mr.. Ballinger's re-
signation would be one of the first
developments of the cabinet meet
ing; but his friends, including his
associates in the interior department,
have refused to believe that he would
retire under fire." and have pointed
to his oft-repeated declaration to the
contrary and to the recent statement
attributed to him that he would re-
sign only at the specified request OF
the president.
Turmoil Bad.
Some of these, however, today ad-
mitted that they themselves, and the
secretary, are alive to the fact that
the turmoil and uncertainty into
which the protracted controversy has
plunged the department must be
abated soon unless this important
branch of the service is to become
hopelessly demoralized.
Nobody here doubts that a major
ity-all but one of the republican
members-of the Investigating COM
mittee will sustain Secretary Balm
ger. But Secretary Ballinger and his
partisans here were greatly disap-
pointed that the absence of Senator'S
Root and Flint from the Minneapolis
meeting left the pro-Ballinger por-
ton of the committee in the minority
and permitted the democrats and the
insurgent republican members to put
forth reports condemning him. These
reports for many weeks will stand
before the country as the only find
ings of the committee to take final
action, which, it is said, has deter
mined Secretary Ballinger's course.
1t was said here today by close
friend of the secretary that the ma
jority of the committee had been
ready to report at the Minneapolis
ed his resignation to the president
and urged its acceptance on the
ground that the discussions to which
he has been a party were detrimental
to the public interest. When the
committee failed at Minneapolis to
take action as whole, and when
there was no quorum at the subse-
quent meeting in Chicago, it became
apparent that no decision could be
expected for several months.
Position Untenable.
This situation is said to have con-
vinced Mr. Ballinger that his posi-
ton, in spite of the continued sup
port of the president, has become un-
tenable. Unable, as he sees it, to re-
sign as neither indicated or con-
demned by the committee, he has de-
cided, it is said, to demand of his
superior and his cabinet associates
either vindication or condemnation