The Sentinel=record., 1917-03-06
WILSON DEMANDS
 CHANGE BE MADE
 IN SENATE RULES
WOULD MAKE IT IMPOSSIBLE IN FUTURE FOR HANDFUL OF MEN ITO BLOCK LEGiSLA-
 TON.
Thirty-three Senators Have Signed Agreement to Support Rule Prepar- ed By Senator owen Which Would Prevent in Future the Recent Ac' tion in the Senate.

i Washington March With pres ident Wilson's demand tor a change in senate rules to make impossible in
 the future such filIbuster as the one by which a handful of members de | feated the armed neutrality bill fresh | in their minds, senate oemocrats will 1 caucus tomorrow on a program for
 the special session. Thc session, call 1 ed primarily to pass upon appoint
 mcnts to office, began formally today and will get down to business tomor- TOW Senator Owen, who has been the chief proponent of a limited de bate rule for many years, is prepar-
 ed to bring the subject oi cloture be- fore the caucus, and thirty-three seh- ators, most of them democrats, have signed an agreement 10 support the
 rule he proposes
 If the caucus agrees 10 stand behind this proposal and make it the chief
 issue of the session, the senate may
 spend the summer in Washington in.
 stead of disposing of it's worK in feH days as usual Many senators
 who have participated in similar fights in the past believe it would be more difficult to get the senate to
 agree to a limited debate rule than
 1t would be to get a declaration of
 war against Gremany or to pass tho armed neutrality bill that died yes terday, because the rules say a sena-
 tor cannot be taken from the floor when he wishes to keep on talking. There has been no caucus among op- ponents of cloture, but republicans in
 the cloak rooms today predicted that
 the minority party almost to a man would oppose such a rule and openly declared that there would be demo.
 crat5 to side with them.
 The biggest present asset of those
 who wish a change in the rules is the president and the public opinion his statement denouncing the present rules is expected 10 arouse. Never before in the history of the many sug- gestions that have been made for such a change has a president openly aligned himself in it's favor nor has public attention generally been called to what he considers fault in the senate's method of procedure. The president is expected to continue his insistence for a change. but even op. timistic champions of cloture think it will be difficult to keep public inter est centered on such a question. A majority can force open debate but to
 do so would offer opportunity for pub lie discussion of the present situation and possibly strengthen the European opinion that the congress is divided
 in supporting the president in his in.
 ternational policy
 The republicans will oppose the
 proposed rule just as minorities al
 ways oppose it because unlimited de.
 bate is one of their most potent weapons The progressive republi-
 cans who participated in the killing
 of the armed neutrality bill are un-
 derstood to be exceedingly bitter over the presidents statement denouncine
 them. It is pointed out too that they
 have often profited by filibusters and
 some of them wete prepared to em- | ploy one this yeah against the river