The sun., 1919-04-07
What = "Damned Hog" Does.

THE Sun called attention a few
months ago to the Illuminating arti-
cles by HENRY LIrCHFIELD WEST, pub
lished in the Bookmdn, on the sub
ject of extravaganza and wholesale
waste in the Bureau Of Public Print
ing at Washington; and now 1t be-
lieves that Mr.. WEsT's scholarly ex-
position has an interesting complement
tary in a speech made in the House
Of Representatives on the last day Of
the Sixty-fifth Congress by the Hon.
ALvAN r. FULLER of Massachusetts,.
II the Representative from Maiden
lacks in speech any Of the searching
analytic qualities which distinguish
Mr.. VESTS writings. he makes up for
1t by the deeply human, sometimes
almost brutal. character Of his ex-
posure of great national abuse.
Representative FULLER, who had
heard that from 10000 to 10000
pounds Of mail matter was sent from
the House Office Building every day
under Congressional frank, went to
inquire about 1t.
ct took the liberty the other day OF
calling on the superintendent who
has charge OF thu clerks who send
out this mass OF stuff. and he stated
that at times there were from 500
to 500 clerks employed doing nothing
but packing free literature into free
envelopes to be sent through the
mails free OF expense for Congress
men. lie stated that these clerks
could address and send out about
1900 each in a day. ! asked the man
in charge how many parcels a Con-
gresham could have, and he said as
many as he liked. Well I said.
Yes And then I inquired how many
envelopes, and ne said as many as
Congressman wanted. asked him
how about the printing. and he said.
NO charge TO a Congressman And
I asked him about the Thanking priv
ilege. and he said these things were
all franked out, and then he said. by
way OF offering a defence, that OF
course 10 Congressman. unless he
were a damned hog. would take more
than a hundred thousand"
All this seems TO have astonlshed
Mr.. FULLER, who was serving his first
term in the House. We imagine that
many of the oldsters yawned over his
discoveries, and those members whose
campaign methods require that they
become damned hogs" probably
grunted and went to the cloak room
and away from Mr. FULTER's wrath.
That there ara such damned hogs
is evident from a further extract
from Mr.. FULLER's speech:
zone OF our Congressman a while
ago desired to have his name con-
sidered in connection with the Cover
norship of his State. with the result
| that he conceived the idea OF send
| ing out nice COlleCllOn OF DOCKS 10
the voters OF his State. He sent
out 100000 parcels Of books in one
day. and upon inquiry at the post
Office ] found that the postage would
have been to ordinary mortAls 46
cents each a parcel. 1t is a simple
matter in arithmetic to see that e4o.-
900 parcels at 45 cents apiece cost
Uncle SAM over 100000 for postage.
OF course the cost OF the books them
selves would be greatly in excess OF
this amount"
AS an example Of the manner in
which a wrong minded Congressman
may hurt the Government at the Gov
ernments expense Mr.. FULLER cited
the case OF pro-German Represen
tative who had his attacks on pre-
paredness printed at the public's cost
md then sent out under Congressional
frank to German peace societies
franked envelopes being included 81
that tho societies could In turn, send
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