The citizen. (Honesdale, Pa.) 1908-1914, 1910-04-08
LEGISLATORS HIT.
Thirteen Senators and AS.
SembIymen Accused.
INSURANCE BRIBERY PROBE.
Disclosures Forced by Supt. Hotoh.
kiss Which Make the Aids
Conger Scandal Look Small
by Comparison.
BRIBERY PROBE.

New York, April THE ground
work for a series of disclosures of leg
islative corruption which promise to
make the recent Allds-Conger scandal
look small by comparison was laid
here when State Superintendent of In
surance Hotchkiss resumed his inves-
tigation of the purchase and sale of
laws by rich corporations and corrupt
senators and assemblymen
Before superintendent Hotchkiss
gets through with this phase of the
matter it is expected that thirteen Re
publican senators and assemblymen
who ruled Albany in 1900 the last
year Theodore Roosevelt was govern
or and in the four years Benjamin B.
Odell was governor, will be so ir-
retrievably involved in series of dis
graceful transactions that their elimi-
nation from the Republican state ma
chine and from all public offices and
honOrs will become imperative.
The documents which are expected
to reveal the inside workings of the
old guard and drive them into political
oblivion consist of the books of the
bankrupt Stock Exchange brokerage
house of Ellingwood & Cunningham,
which failed in 1904
These books show that from 1900 to
1904 thirteen Republican senators and
assemblymen, members of the most
important committees in the legisla-
ture, gambled in stocks ON very
heavy scale through that firm.
The books also show that seven of
these men received large sums of mon
ey from G. Tracy Rogers, a special
partner of that firm and the legisla-
tive representative in Albany of the
street railway interests of New York
state.
Mr.. Rogers is president of the street
railway system of Binghamton. n. Y,
his home town. and is also president
of the Street Railway association of
the state of New York and as such is
credited with having seen to it for
years that no laws opposed to the troll
ley companies of the state are enact
ed in Albany and that many laws IA
vorable to them have been enacted.
Mr.. Rogers is said to be in hiding to
escape subpoena issued for him by
Mr.. Hotchkiss. While his testimony
if freely given, would illuminate many
facts in possession of the state super
intendent of insurance. such as the
source of the money used by the spec
ulating legislators, his absence will
not prevent disclosure of the identity
of many of them, together with all the
details of their speculative deals.
One of the thirteen men involved is
now a member of congress, and he is
expected to voluntarily take the wit
ness stand in an effort to clear him
self of the imputation of wrongdoing
while senator of the state of New
York.
James w. Cunningham, a stockbro-
ker in Wall street and formerly a
member of the failed firm of Filing
wood & Cunningham, was a reluctant
witness at the inquiry.
He testified that Assemblyman Louis
Bedell, a member of the railways and
rules committees, owed his firm $7,665
when it failed after dealing extensive
ly in New York Transportation and
other railroad stocks affected by legls-
lation. Bedell received $500 cash
from the firm on May l. 1901; $4,000
cash on May 3. 1901. and $500 cash
on Sept 30, 1904. He had never paid
the $7,665 owing.
Another member of the legislature,
a senator, member of the railways
committee, drew from the firm $4,000
in cash on April %, 1901, after deal
ings in New York Transportation COM
pany stock.