The Birmingham age-herald., 1924-06-01
PRESS ON WHEELER INo11IRy

], tended Tn the press. Some editors even go so far as to say Chat the senate has ' transcended its constitutional powers in
 considering case already in the courts Others emphasize the constitutional au- \ thority of the senate at all times to sit 7 Tn Judgment on the conduct of any of ! its members. The fact that the senate voted by a large majority to exonerate MT. Wheeler, and that some of the five
 who opposed exoneration did so because x they thought the senate exceeded it's functions and not because they believed
 the senator guilty, has caused a sub-
 sidence of whatever protest there was :. against the inquiry.
 -s-8~ Says the New York Times, which dis , approves the inquiry: Senator Wheeler's [ sinnocence is to be presumed. If he had < been tried and convicted, it would be the ' constitutional right of the senate to de- eide whether it wanted him to remain in \ that honorable body or not; anG to expel 7 him if a two-thirds vote could be ob-
 tained. But it couldn't Swait. It ap-
 pointed special committee to investi- ] gate the indictment. The senate seems 2 to have imagined that it is a kind of < criminal court of review, gifted with ~ the power to examine cases before they
 sre tried" In all this, however, the Times strangely overlooks the peculiar . circumstances under which the indct- | ment was sought by an attorney general s himself under suspicion and more than suspicion. The senate was properly in quiring into an apparent effort to rail- road into court one of their number who : was carrying out the senate's instruc- ]; tions and who was being injured because z of that function. Further, the Times < takes no account of the fact that the ' senate sought in no way to interfere
 with the federal court, and that the court action will proceed regardless of
 the senate inquiry. The senate was :; merely looking into the fitness of a member who, if guilty as charged, would f be unfit to continue in his responsible
 duty as committee prosecutor.
 In a more liberal view the Springfield P Republican remarks: ''The public may z reach its own conclusions as to the in- . .dictment and the motives that inspired 1t. All the evidence heard by the sen-
 ate committee overwhelmingly indicates "a conspiracy between certain politicians of the Republican national committee ' and the department of justice under Daugherty to get Wheeler for the pur-
 pose of executing political reprisals. . The department of justice was prosti- !. tuted to that base end. There remains
 for the senate to consider the signifi- :'eance of such an assault upon it's rights, : for the indictment of Wheeler was an
 attempt to terrorize him and his col 7 leagues into paralysis while in the per
 formance of duties which the senate had
 asked them to perform" Those who
 criticize the senate's inquiry into the \ basis of the indictment should be asked :. to explain why they have found no equal < svehemence of criticism for the astound-
 ing manner in which the authority of the
 department of justice was used to po-
 litical purpose by leaders of the party
 in power.
 : In the opinion of the New Orleans .,.Times-Picayune Senator Wheeler's ex-
 o1eration by a senate committee does
 not nullify the indictment, but should
 prove a powerful aid in his defense.
 Senator Borah's affirmation of his inno-
 cence should be even greater help"
 Then the Picayune spells it all by con- { cluding: "Yet some of us who have fol-
 lowed Mir. Wheelers methods and prac-
 tices as prosecutor of others before
 senate committee cannot help wonder
 ing whether he, armed with such docu-
 rnentary evidence involving a person he
 was prosecuting as was produced in his own case, would have been as generous, fair and high-minded in his handling and r discussion thereof as Senator Borah has .S been in MT. Wheeler's case" MT. Wheel
 CT was dealing with malefactors of high / rank, and his course has been courageous = in the extreme. It is not of record that < he has done any intentional injustice, Wand certainly he has rid us of Daugherty.
 Nor that he can be forgiven many things 1S--more, probably, than there are to for give!
 Now that the senate has given the
 senator a clean bill of health, the Mem
 phis Commercial-Appeal believes that,
 if the jury also generates him, "there
 should be a continuation of the issue to
 the point where full and complete jus -tice for all parties and for the nation Eshould be established. If Senator
 Wheeler is guilty of no sort of offense
 that would justify his indictment, then
 the bringing of the indictment against
 him was a crime in itself, an instance ! of official tyranny and oppression that
 demands some penalty. If Senator j Wheeler be vindicated all around, then
 the sense of justice and fair play native
 to Americans of all political beliefs will demand the exposure of the conspiracy Q against him and the punishment of the < sconspirator. A crime has been com
 mitted somewhere by some person or per-
 sons and full justice will not be served until the guilty are punished. The Commercial-Appeal thinks that Attorney -.General Stone must go through with
 this, no matter how difficult it may be politically for him to do so.
 r5f Tn similar manner the New York World: There is one way to set
 the record straight. It is the one way
 in which responsible leaders of the Re
 publican party can dissociate them sese4ves from complicity after the fact in the most deliberate and sensational Eframe-up of a government official
 which this country has witnessed in re- /. cent years. There has never been a ,snoment in which Senator Wheeler stood ,Ibefore the bar of public opinion as an