The farmer and mechanic. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 18??-19??, 1911-04-11

served thirty-six full years. and seems
to be assured of thirty-eight, the
service any man ever has had
IN the House Of Representatives.
Representative H. Fl. Bingham. Of
pennsylvania, "th father of the
House today begins the duties OF
his seventeenth consecutive term.
"hlle John Dalzell has had already
twenty-four years Of continuous serv-
ice, and Serene f. Payne has had
twenty-six years, broken by one de-
feat
About the Twelfth Congress.
In the Twelfth Congress the ia
ther OF the enate' was Stephen r.
Bradley, of Vermont, whose service
began in 1871, N who therefore had
oeen twenty years a Senator when
that met. In the new Con-
gress assembling today Senator Will
liam p. Frye, Of Maine, has the rec
the Senate on March Is, 1881, just a
little more thar thiHty years ago;
and before that he had served five
terms, or ten years. in he House Of
representatives. He is now, there
fore, in his forty-first year Of Con-
gressional service. His late colleague.
former Senator Hale, came to the SEN
ate just eleven lays earlier. He had
come to the House two years earlier.
but was defeated by a Greenbacker~ in
0hNA "co WV III esq ~
years before he came to the Senate.
He had forty full years of service.
Not reckoning continuous service.
the oldest veteran in Congress now
is Senator Shelby NJ. Cullom, Of II
linois. He has been in the Senate con-
tinuously since 1888 and therefore
ranks next to Senator Frye as the
Oldest man in point of service in that
body. But Senator Cullom has served
two terms in the lower house, the
! fTscI ~ /, 0rrc ~ Ra-@l or
He is the only man now in Congress
who was a membe of that body when
Lincoln was President.
Never SO Many Green Men Before.
One feature or the Congress just
met is unique. Never before
has the majority Of the lower house
had SO few men of experience as ma
jority members. This results from the
fact that the Democrats, coming into
power in the House, have been in the
minority for sixteen years and that
during that time nearly all of their
old-time leaders have been retired.
Indeed, the split in the party tina re
suited in the Republican landslide Of
1894 sent most Of the old-time Demo
cratic leaders into private life from
which they never have returned.
I. Only three Of the Democrats of the
new House ever sat under the gavel OF
a Democratic Speaker. Of these Will
liam A. Jones, Of Virginia, ranks first,
he having had twenty years Of con
tinuous service, two terms Of which
We're under Speaker Crisp. Then
comes Champ Clark, the new Speaker
who has had sixteen years of broker
service, one term of which was under
Crisp. The other is j. f. G. Talbot
of Maryland, who was in the House
away back in the days of Speakers
Randall and Carlisle, and who came
back to Congress in 1908 after man.
!. years of retirene nt.
Disadvantages Democratic Majority
Iabors Under.
But the unique fact is that not 6
single member of the new Demo
cratic majority ever was chairman o
a committee; not q single one ever
whole, Or over the House in lesis
lative session; not a single one evcl
was responsible for the onduc @
any important piece Of legislation fol
the House. This results from th'
twin influences Of sixteen years o
minority and the overthrow Of tn
I old order in the Democratic party
Only once before in the history 70
the country has the Democratic partz
been out Of power SO long, and tina
was from 1859 to 1876, from the be
ginning Of the Republican party
. power until the reaction following tn
Civil War. But after that long perio(
the Democrats sent many men Z
; washington VINO mad mao Wlue eApeT
fence in legislative affairs there in tn
; old days Of Democratic ascendancy.
Even in the stress Of the revolt
I~tionary procedure by which the Demo
t Gratis today organize the House, i
? will be noticed tina long service count
: for more than anything else in tn
distribution of committee places an
2 positions of Importance. The on
: hundred and twenty-eight new Repre-
: %sentatives and the sixteen new Sena
- - o}ix- 4, ,Cnnc
sional careers yesterday may be tn
ablest set Of men that ever came t
: Washington, but they will have very
I. very little opportunity to d~eInonstrat
: that ability until they have adde'
wears to their equipment. Even il
= the face of the fact that all the com
mittees for sixteen years have bee
appointed by Republican Speakers. tn