Democratic Sentinel, Volume 9, Number 36, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 9 October 1885 — How Bills Are Carried. [ARTICLE]

How Bills Are Carried.

The Tice meter, for measuring the product of whisky-stills, received the approval of scientific experts, but it was necessary to carry through the House a clause in a bill requiring their use by distillers. An adroit lobbyist, known as Boynton, undertook to secure a favorable report from tlie Committee on Ways and Means, of which Gen. Schenck was Chairman. He accordingly arranged for a quiet game of draw-poker in a parlor at Willard’s Hotel. Gen. Schenck, Tice the inventor, Boynton, and another member of Congress made up the quartet. The game was a lively one; $lO “ante,” SSO “blind,” and a “straddle” if anybody felt reckless enough to try it ou. When the party broke up rosy-fingered morn was rolling back the somber-liued curtains of night and ushering in another day, and old Tice’s wallet was empty. He was apparently very much crests Hen, and Gen. Schenck was correspondingly happy. The next day the Ways and Means Committee reported in favor of the Tice meter, and the bill became a law, very much to the sorrow of the distillers. The meter was a fraud of the first water. Each one cost from $1,500 to $3,000, giving Tice a margin of SI,OOO to $2,500, according to the size of the meter. Scores of distillers were compelled to pay for the “blasted fraud,” as they all called it, but not one succeeded in running a gallon of whisky through the so-called meter. Tice, however, was not to blame —so be said. His meter was a good machine, as he invented it, but the committee of scientific men who sat upon it under the act of Congress directed various improvements to be made, which rendered it impossible for a drop of high wines to get through it. —Boston Budget.