The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1910-05-27
Travelling Expense Fund Is
Exhausted and House viii
Not Advance Money
|EXPENSE FUND STRICKEN
| OUT OF BILL IN HOUSE
Acrimonious Rebate Occurs Over ne
Matter and Democratic Members
Say Things About Taft and
His Travelling Expenses

Washington. May 26-President Tafts
travelling expenses and the fact that al
| ready he had overdrawn his allowance of
| $4,000 a year voted by Congress, led to
acrimonious debate in the House today
and to a refusal to permit him to use the
next years allowance to meet the deficit.
| AS reported from the House committee
| on appropriations, one item of $4,000 for
the fiscal year beginning July next
| would have become Immediately avail
| able" except for the protests of demo-
| cratic members. The words Immediate
! ly available finally We're stricken out
by the action of Mr.. Mann of illinois.
| the occupant of the chair, in sustaining
| a point of order made by Mr.. Macon of
Arkansas. a democrat.
| 1t was the western and southern trip
made by Mr.. Taft last fall that exhaust
ed the White House travelling fund. Dur
| ing the debate Chairman Tawney, in
charge of the bill. criticised southern
democrats for their attitude in objecting
| to an appropriation to defray the ex-
pense of trip on which they had been
the Presidents guests.
| Representative Hardwick of Georgia
drew from Mr.. Tawney the admission
that Secretary Carpenter had furnished
! him a list of names of democrats who
had accepted the Presidents hospitality.
In connection with the use of the names
| of such democrats Mr.. Bartlett of Geor-
gia charged that "the President has vio-
Hated both the rules of hospitality and
of decent conduct
Speaker Cannon, in a speech from the
floor, defended the necessity of the Pres
ident meeting the whole people. and said
his long trips to various sections of the
country were necessary.
President Taft. Mr.. Tawney explained.
had made his extended trip through the
west and south at the invitation of SEN
! ators, governors of states and civic or
| ganizations.
Plea of Tawney
| 'rrhis trip" said Mr. Tawney, was not
made for his own pleasure. Congress
| was in session when delegation after del
| egation from this House, from the SEN
ate and from the different states visited
him, urging him to make such a trip"
At that time, Mr.. Tawney said, there
was no appropriation to meet travelling
| expenses. 81
'The President informed the chairman
of the committee on appropriations" ex-
| planned Mr.. Tawney, that personally he
| would rather remain at his summer home
| after adjournment than to make the
| trip and that the only way he would bs
able to make it would be through Con-
| rr;,, hi -ia
| we failed to make at the close of the
| Sixtieth Congress. Now. after the Pres
ident has accepted the invitation of mem
bers of this House and has visited their
states, after senators and governors in
vited him, and while on that trip he
| accepted their hospitality, they criticse
him."
This statement greatly excited the DEM
| ocrats, several of whom vainly attempted
to interrupt.
| Mr.. Tawney said nine democratic gov
ernors invited the President to visit their
states. the states being Texas, Colorado,
Indiana, Mississippi, Louisiana. Montana.
| South Carolina, North Carolina and
| Arkansas. He added that democratic
senators from Louisiana, Mississippi, Ten
nessee, Georgia. Missouri. North Carolina.
Florida, Colorado and South Carolina. to-
gether with % democratic representatives,
| had extended to the President the hos
| pitality of their states and districts.
''Is this southern hospitality" shouted
Mr.. Tawney, looking toward the demo-
Gratis. Can there be meaner man than
| he who invites another to accept his
hospitality and then kicks him because
| he accepted?"
| Bartlett Demands Names
| Mr.. Bartlett of Georgia demanded to
know what representatives had accepted
| the hospitality of the President on that
trip. as stated by Mr.. Tawney
| Mr.. Tawney promptly named Mr.. Bart
| lett and his colleague Mr.. Hardwick OF
| Georgia.
''That is not true; that is false ex-
claimed Mr.. Bartlett. The Georgian ad-
| ded that he did ride in the Presidents
car but he paid his own fare.
Mr.. Tawney said three democratic sem
| ators had been guests of the President
on his western trip.
| Mr. Fitzgerald declared that when the
President exhausted his appropriation
| for travelling expenses he should have
had strength of character enough to re-
fuse some of the invitations. or to pay
his own travelling expenses. He dismissed
the Presidents speeches on his trip as
more harmful to the republicans than
to the democrats, and criticised as a re-
markable proceeding Mr.. Tawney's OBJ
tanning from the White House the list
Of democrats who urged the President
to visit them.
II am inclined to believe Mr. Fitz-
gerald said that after August s. last, no
republican governor desired the President
| to make such speeches as those in which
he declared the present tariff law to be
the best ever passed
! Fitxgerald's Argument
The country could not desire to have
the President away from Washington
while Congress was in session, according
to Mr. Fitzgerald. He deprecated what
he declared to be the practice of cabinet
officers to leave Washington in hot
weather and set up their official quar-
ters in other places. There had been
fCnNrrNurHn mn VDAGn ~