The Dawson news. (Dawson, Ga.) 1889-current, 1912-03-06
RODDENBERY Is SARCASTIC IN
CONDUCTING FTLIBUSTER.
Gag Rule Necessary to End One
Man Opposition to Civil Ser
vice Pension Bill.

vice Pension Bill.
The following account of Congress
man Roddenbery's fight, almost sin
gle-handed, against a bill to pay spe,
ciaI pensions to certain government
employees is from the Washington
Herald:
In an extraordinary six-hour fill
buster against the passage of three
omnibus pension bills pending be-
fore the house Representative Rod
denbery of Georgia yesterday criti-
cised the committee of one hundred,
organized for the purpose of obtain
ing pensions for government clerks,
and advised government employees
who could not save for rainy day
to resign their positions and go into
the country and accumulate some
thing"
From 1890 until $50 the Geor-
gian held the floor against all oppo-
sition, protesting every item pre-
scented in the pension budgets, and
characterizing them as attempts at
bribery and "wasteful extravaganza
of the peoples money"
1t was not until the committee on
rules brought in a gag resolution
that the first of the three bills was
passed. The other two will be taken
up today.
The measures provide pensions for
353 veterans and their relatives at
an expenditure of approximately
$4,000.
The attack upon the committee of
one hundred and civil service pen
sions came early in the afternoon.
Advises Employees to Resign.
Yesterday" said Mr.. Roddenbery,
members of congress found on their
desks communications from the COM
mittee of one hundred proposing to
go down here in the pension depart
ment, where folks sit under electric
fans in the summer time and steam
heated radiators in the winter and
pension them.
1T is proposed to pension these
persons at the expense of the old
fellow who is sweating in the sun
shine, who is cleaning drains, who
is mining, and who is shoveling coal.
When did the American people
give civil service employees jobs all
their lives and then make a motion
to put them on the retired list when
they are unfit for active service?
If the civil service employe is so hard
pressed and unable to save anything
for rainy day let him go to the
country and accumulate something.
These ladies and gentlemen
who report by street cars at o'clock
in the morning, visit marble-lined
places when they knock off half an
hour for lunch, and quit work at
4:30 in the afternoon need hardly
be pensioned at the expense OF the
man outside.
Others Can Fill Places.
of they cannot save they should
go elsewhere. There are more peo-
pie hammering at our doors and re-
questing leave to fill the places al
ready held than we could hope to
provide for if we devoted our lives
to that purpose"
Roddenbery, while assisted at
times by Representative Tribble, also
of Georgia, bore the brunt of the
fiIibuster. Shortly before o'clock,
realizing that the bill could not pass,
except by a special rule, the rules
committee held a hurried meeting
and reported gag" rule that shut
off the Roddenbery protests.
Previous to the passage of the
steam roller over Representative
Roddenbery he had so delayed con-
sideration of the bill that less than
three of the twenty-nine pages in
the measure had been read. Rod
denbery's single-handed plan of at
tack was to offer amendments and
points of order against every sec
ton of the bill as fast as it was
read
The gag" rule presented by the
rules committee and cheered by the
house limited debate to only ten
minutes, and Roddenbery's only
chance to filibuster thereafter was to
make points of no quorum when the