The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1910-03-04
OUR WASHINGTON LETTER
Latest National Topics of General Interest Discussed by Cur Special Correspondent
 Whats What in Washington.

of the railway rate lava case of tre- mendous inportdnce-each of the three different flash. It took them half an hour to figure out, afterwards, just exactly. what Justice White meant in his opinion, and then they were able to do it 4oniy with the assistance of Solicitor General Hoyt.
 Another insta1ca. A press associa- tion man at the court hears opin- ion on case 454,-the question of wheth- CT the Secretary of War has the au- tnority to make the Olentagy Bridge Company raise it's bridge six inches. He writes out a bulletin embracing what he thinks the court has decided,- that the Secretary has the power. Eff teen minutes later; when he is des- pairingly s-ttemptineg 70 discover what the Chief Justice had been saying about case number Et625'', he is hand ed message from his boss,-*'Opposi- tion says re-Olentagy bridge, that Secretary War has not got the power. How?''
 The correspondent doesn't dare leave the court room until all the decisions have been rendered, for fear of losing an important one. A press association man last year left the room for just from his office, and in that time, Chief Justice Fuller announced that the court had denied the petition of the Government for hearing of the $29.- 900, 900 Standard Oil Case. He didn't get this supremely important news item for at least ten 1ninutes-and then , some lawyers talking about it. (Editors: And the man who got scooped was not the U. P. correspon- dent.)
 From the fact that the opinions as ! rendered by the court contain only a legal history of the case, and seldom present the facts in a way which they could be used by the wspapermen. ! and, also, because very often that justices merely announce Case Num- fber so-and-so; for reasons stated in l iT7in it is necessary for the correspondents I to have a carefully. prepared synopsis of every case on the docket all ready, from which to secure the essential facts on the litigation in question, when decision is rendered The only way to get this information is to di- gest the transcript of the record, which often spreads through half dozen volumes. The Missouri River Rate Cases take up seven large books of 400 odd pages each; the Tobacco Trust Cases fill up two 500 page volumes, there are many others just as bulky 1 One of the press association men
 that work for fifteen years, and every Monday, the regular decision day of | the court. he has the same sort of stage-fright as the youngsters.
 l Representa- tive Mann of Illinois, the | official objector'' for the Republican
 ders he received and has thrown up 1 the job. This is the most important
 piece of gossip going the rounds of the
 House jrst now, and speculation is
 rife to who will be the man to sue
 ceed him in the thankless task. The matter is complicated to some extent
 in the eyes of the Regulars by the fact that Mann insists on still playing the
 role to which he was assigned, and
 several times each day, delivers some stinging blows a t pet projects of ftUn- cle JOe'S crOWd.'' How to persuade
 Mann to quit objecting on his own
 hook is therefore likely to become a l (Continued on Page 9.1