Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1929-12-08
Fifty Years Ago
In The Star

Ever since Presidents have been send
ing messages to Congress there has beer
Premature temptation to get their
texts In advance fol-
Publicity. the sake Of advantage
of priority Of knowl-
edge. In . few cases confidence has
been betrayed In the premature publ
cation Of these documents. Such q
case occurred so years ago with the
message Of President Hayes and the
report Of the Secretary Of the Treasury
The Star Of December ;, 1879, thus
comments:
1.-THE publication Of the Presidents
message and Secretary Sherman's re-
port In advance Of their deliveries to
Congress Is still q subject Of discussion
Speculation Is rife as to the methods
employed to procure the document and
numerous are the theories suggested
Half dozen times within the memory
Of persons now ut the Capital have
public documents appeared In the news
papers before the appointed time and
without the consent Of the oflcialS who
had them In charge. In 1857 Presi-
dent JohnsOn's message got into the
papers generally before 1t was read In
Congress and 1t was stated ct the time
that the journals publishing 1t paid
500 apiece for the document. The
President was openly criticized in Con-
gress for permitting the message to get
into print, but 1t was explained that 1t
happened without his consent and that
he had been deceived by his friends.
In 1858, the very next year, Secretary
Of the Treasury McCulloch was very
much disguised at reading his report
In the columns of q New York paper
before 1t had been sent to Congress.
Because Of these accidents the Gus
tom Of printing the reports and mes
sages and having them ready for dis
tribution to the press upon being read
In Congress was discontinued for a
time, but was again adopted as being
on the whole the most satisfactory ar
rangement for the accommodation Of
the public.
cit Is now intimated that to prevent
premature publication the Presidents
message and the department reports
will In future not be printed in advance,
but viii be sent to Congress In manu-
script This plan would restore the old.
time scramble amongst the newspapers
for priority in getting the message on
the streets, including hurried copying,
telegraphing and typesetting, resulting
in annoying plumbers In the presenta-
ton OF the matter, together with a
great waste Of time and money. Nor
does the manuscript plan insure safety.
It will be remembered that one Of
President Lincoln's messages or its
main portiOns-was published by q New
York paper before the original manu-
script left the White House. The best
course for the President and his cabi-
net officers to pursue in future Is to
print the documents as usual and take
little more care to prevent pilfering"
An attempt to kill the Gear of Russia
by an explosion under the imperial
The CSar as railway train so years
ago led to the following
q Target. comment In The Star Of
December 4, 1879:
1.-THE nihilists Of Russia have Just
failed in their fourth attempt to aSsas-
sinate the Csar. This time they under
took TO blow him up with an internal
COW intent upon his plan for the es-
Enlistment Of an advisory council or
parliament. At this distance and to
the American mind 1t would seem that
this last attempt Of the nihilists upon
the Cars life must have the effect Of
weakening his enemies, even II 1t does
not create sympathy for him. While
he was endeavortng to comply with
what appeared to be the demand Of
the masses for some sort Of participa-'
ton in the affairs Of government 1t
would have been decent. II not polite,
TO AFFORD him every facility Of putting
his plan into operation.
1.-THE pistol has been tried upon the
Gear three times without harm to him.
The nrst time was when q peasant
named ossip konmissaroff rushed In