The Salt Lake tribune. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1890-current, 1911-08-22
THE EXTRA SESSION ENDS.

pected to adjourn today, We see some
opinions expressed that it has been an
unimportant session with little done. We
think that opinion mistake Con
gress did fully, exactly, and handsomely
the very thing and the only thing, for
which il was called in session. II
could, and should, have finished its Ia
bors inside Of month, so far as that
was concerned. The House did its part
in passing the Canadian reciprocity
treaty, which was the specific thing
named by the President in his procla-
nation calling the extra session, with
out delay. But the Senate laid itself
out in protracted, deliberate time.
consuming investigation which amount
ed to nothing, and in windy, long
continued debates which shed no light
Oh the question, and which merely
served to air the spites and personal de-
sires for notoriety Of a considerable
number of Senators. Not a fact of any
interest OF importance was developed
in the Senate investigation, not point
of any real interest or value was de-
veloped in the long Senate discussion,
and ut the last, when delay was no longer
possible. the Senate concurred with the
House In passing the reciprocity bill
precisely as it had been received, and
ms the President desired to have it
passed.
So the specific business which the
extra session was called to dc was done,
though at a tiresome cost in delay, for
which the President was in no way
responsible; and the consumption of
time is not in any way to be charged
TO him.
Attempts to legislate on the tariff
question failed, as they ought to have
failed, because the understanding clear
ly was when the Sixtyfirst Congress
adjourned in March, that no tariff leg
islation was TO be taken up until the
Tariff Board reported next December,
and it was directed to report at that
time, The injudiciousness Of any at
tempted tariff legislation in the mean
time was so apparent to all, and the
certainty that President Taft would in
sist upon waiting for the Tariff Board
report was so evident, that it was a
matter of surprise that the House and
Senate should seriously take up the
tariff Legislation with any expectation
of having it enacted. The possibility
of passing some tariff laws through the
House was considered fair until the
test was made. But the possibility of
passing any measures through the Sen
ate over the veto was hopeless from the
first; so that the time passed in the
attempts to make tariff legislation was
time lost so far as that effort was con-
cerned. And it must be remembered
that it was the long delay in the Sen
ate on reciprocity that put the House
to legislating on the tariff. as it had
nothing else to do.
But. in another direction, this time
was by no means lost: on the con
trary it was well employed. The
House has been making series Of in
vestigatiops that were of the highest
interest TO the public, and Of the great
est Importance from the governmental
standpoint. First of all, the big sugar
trust was investigated and startling
testimony was delivered The methods
of the big trust, filthy, odious, arbi-
trary, and indecent in suppressing com
petition. were laid bare The affilia-
ton of the local Utah-Idaho Sugar
Trust with the big sugar trust in the
East WAS fully established, but the
operations of this local trust were not
gone into. The whole trust business,
however. was made odous to the Amer
lean people by the Investigations and
By the unassailed testimony that was
delivered
The investigation Of the steel trust
showed the wicked. unlawful methods Of
those who organized that trust. 1t
showed that President Roosevelt was
made tool Of by Messrs. Frick and
Gary. who held up to him in terrorem
that his speeches were creating dis
astrous panic, and by that means got
him TO agree TO let them take in the
Tennessee Coal & Iron Company, he as
President guaranteeing them immunity
from prosecution under the law. while
at the same time it was admitted on all
hands that what they proposed TO do
was illegal, and that it was the Pres
ident's duty preemptorily to stop it, as
he had sworn to do in his oath of of
flee. He forgot all that, however, in
the terror of the situation. and with
Frick and Gary bringing home to him
the responsibility for the supposed panic
that was TO ensue. The tricky nature
of it all was disclosed when the mis-.
leading interview with Gates was
quoted wherein he turned suspicion
upon the trust companies of New York,
and ruined two of the biggest of them
in order TO protect the interest Of the
combine that was seeking unlawfully
to absorb the Tennessee Coal e. Iron
Company Messrs. Morgan and Car.
negie are vet to be heard in this in