The Lancaster news. [volume] (Lancaster, S.C.) 1905-current, 1917-08-28
SENATE HAS POWER
TO STOP TALKF[ST
LEADERS RELUCTANT TO
RESORT TO CLOTURE.
La Toilette and Nardaman Co.
terie May OvertaX Their
80. Colleagues Patience.

Washington, Aug. 25.-Limited
cloture in the senate was adopted a
short time before the United States
and Germany entered formally de
clared state of war.
Imminent prospect of war un-
doubtedly had much to do with this
partial victory by the cloture advo-
Gates. They had the administration
strongly behind them, because the,
executives knew that ability to has
ten necessary Legislative action when
the war began would make our par
ticipation doubly effective.
surely Now's the Time.
But the senate has been peculiarly
reluctant, and apparently much too
reluctant, to make use of even the
limited cloture device with which it
has equipped itself for the war
crisis. A threat to invoke the rule
with an exhibition of enough sena-
toral signatures to make the threat
operative. was made last month,
when the debate on the food control
bill had become public scandal.
On agreement by the obstructionists
to have vote on a fixed date after
an additional allowance of nearly
two weeks of vociferation. the adj
ministration leaders returned the
cloture sword to it's scabbard
Up to the present. therefore, al
though the war has been In progress
four months, and although the
weary prolongation of discussion be
comes more and more the speciality
OF those senators who are openly or
at heart opposed to the position their
country has taken, there has been
no actual application of the chatter
checking device which the senate has
at hand in the greatest emergency
the country ever faced. Surely the
time has come to use the limited
cloture rule ''to the limit" and If
the limit is not enough to extend it
as for as needed.
Power of Expulsion.
Aside from the questions of limit
ing debate in order that necessary
business may be transacted there is
point in time of war beyond which
the freedom of utterance cannot be
permitted to go in either house of
congress without giving aid and
comfort to the enemy. No man
ought to be permitted to fill column
after column OF The Congressional
Record with matter poisonous to the
cause for which the United States
is belligerent. And IL is incon-
ceivable that this sort of thing will
be permitted indefinitely.
The senate, like the house, has
the power under the Constitution to
expel any member by a two-thirds
vote. This power has been invoked
in the past in war time, and it may
easily be invoked again in the near
future If certain tendencies t. abuse
the freedom of speech in the ma
tional legislature continues At this
period, the abuse is in the senate:
the house is practically in recess
waiting for the senate TO act on the
war revenue bill. Very wisely. the
house recess, effected by a gentle.
mans agreement, does not include
leave to print the lucubrations of
representatives.
:. speech Control. Essential.
=. 1t is absolutely necessary that the
country prosecute the war with
vigor. That is the only way to bring
the war to an end without greater
loss and suffering. The two-thirds
majority I'm congress has the means
of properly limiting rational discus
sion and of Kidding itself OF the pres
ence OF those who indulge in treas
enable or fanatical TRADES against
their country's stand in this war for
civilization. We have food control
and fuel control and trade control:
speech control in congress is now the
thing most needed to win the war.
NLur HIGH NON