The Washington times., 1922-05-08
A Dangerous Precedent
In Congress
BY BILL PRICE.

House and Senate, doubtless as a matter of egis-
lative convenience have established the most dan
gerous precedents in the history of Congress ih ac-
cepting the fscal-tax amendment of the District
appropriation b first ENACTED INTO LAW BY
CONFEREES, without either body of Congress hav-
ing considered the proposition beforehand We ven
ture the humble opinion that this newly established
precedent will yet make serious trouble for Congress
and that it will not be many years before statesmen
will make issue of the growing power and au-
thority of cOnferees.
The parliamentary situation of which the
wise old Senate should at least have been suspicious
If the methods of the conferees-accepted by both
houses of Congress in the face of ongestablshed
rules forbidding such action-are followed then the
most important legislation hereafter will be made by
conferees and not by the full membership of Con-
gress.
The precedent thus established is exceedingly
dangerous from dozen points of view. 1t is al
ready by-word that legislation which can not
possibly be forced through either House Senate
stands a royal chance when in the hands of CON
ferees, that legislation plainly desired by House
or Senate is often throtted through conference
Juggling.
The conference room is fast becoming the burial
ground of legislation which the nation wants and at
the same time the spot where ''hidden interests"
may get in their undesirable work
The conference room of a legislative body is no
place TO write new legislation. Every law of the
land should be made in WIDE OPEN DAYLIGHT,
with the nation looking The conference process
may mean secret legislation, with the public entirely
of the influences back of it.
The present Congress is, of course, honest, and
what is said here does not apply to anybody. 1t
Auny<$
MADE IN THE DARK, much on the order Of
cellar hootch distillery or a bootleggers mixing
establishment.
Every rule of Congress has long been against
conferees attempting legislation not previously con-
sdered by either house. And those rules are the
rules that should govern in free Republic The
reason is perfectly plain. Too often unworthy in
terests control legislation adopted in open session
in legislative bodies, but the pathway of the tainted
lobbyist is made easy if there is established prece-
dent that gives conferees the widest sort of au-
thority to put in what they please and what they be-
lieve they jam through their respective bodies
under the pretext of legislative emergency or ne
cessty
That, Congress accepted the action of the con-
ferees in way alters the dangers involved in
legalizing future star chamber methods. 1t may not
be the poor old District of Columbia that will be the
next victim. 1t may be the people of the nation
who vote and who know how to vote, even if they are
sometimes little slow in getting on to all the
wrinkles of their elected statesmen
The Congress studies this new departure
from recognized principles of DAYLIGHT LEGIS-
LATION, the certain that it will realize the
dangers involved
The use Of subterranean passages to facilitate legis-
ation isn't going to be healthy. The District is of
course, deenseess and Congress simply took short
cut to impose additional taxation on the people of
Washington. In doing so. though it has made the
pathway for lobbyists and insidious interests much
smoother.