Democratic Sentinel, Volume 10, Number 6, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 March 1886 — CONGRESS. [ARTICLE]

CONGRESS.

What Is Being Done by the National Legislature. The Blair educational bill was again the subject of debate in the Senate on the 2d inst. Senators Call of Florida. Riddle Verger of Virginia, Berry of Arkansas, and Hampton of South Carolina opposed the Allison amendment relating to colored schools, and Senator Saulsbury ol Delaware opposed the biU with or without the amendment. ’ Senator Ingalls of Kansas asked who was to administer the fund ot 577,000,000 provided by the bill, and, answering his own question by saying that the Secretary of the Interior was to do it, launched into an attack of Assistant Secretary Montgomery, reading many extracts from a book entitled : “Drops from the Poisoned Fountain; Facts That Are Stranger than Fiction ; by Zach Montgomery, of the California bar.” President Cleveland sent to the Senate a message urging measures to protect Chinameu in the Western States and Territories, and insisting upon the punishment of citizens who commit outrages upon them. In the House the pensions appropriation bill came up for debate, and Mr. Cannon, of Illinois, supported it. Mr. Wilson, of West Virginia, vigorously defended Pensions Commissioner Black from the attack made in the House recently. He then said that he saw in the war the stately stepping of that Providence which used the wrath of men to work out its beneficial purposes. It had secured the preservation of the Union, but it had secured a greater result than the preservation of the Union in the extinction of slavery; and greater than the extinction of slavery was the utter annihilation of any ground, cause, or excuse for further sectional i prejudice or sectional hate. Mr. Matson (Ind.) supported Mr. Black in his charges against exCommissioner Dudley. Mr. Butterworth (Ohio) criticised Commissioner Black’s report as an insult to every man and woman in the employ of the Commissioner of Pensions. He spoke bitterly of the witnesses before the Warner Committee, especially Maj. Clark, who were so swift, he said, to assault their chief that they might become the pampered and favored menials of a coming incumbent. Mr. Butterworth declared that every one knew that wherever Democracy reigned an honest ballot and a fair count was a lost art. Secretary Manning sent to the House, in reply to the Bland resolution calling for information in regard to the past and future policy of the Treasury Department on the silver question, a document of forty pages, containing a vast amount of correspondence and statistical information. The Secretary declares that he has used his utmost efforts to get silvor into circulation, and says that he has already given nis opinion as to the propriety of expressing his views concerning the past and future policy of the department upon tne subject. Senator Habrihon, of Indiana, supported the Blair education bill in the debate in the Senate on the 3d inst., and opposed the Allison amendment. He would leave the fund to be administered as all education funds of all the States were administered—in the hands of the people of the States. All amendment of the Allison amendment, offered by Senator Hoar, was adopted, after which Senator Edmunds offered a substitute for the Allison amendment. Senator Blair accepted it, and it was agreed to. It provides that wherever separate schools for whites and negroes are maintained the money appropriated by the bill shall be paid out for the support of such white and colored schools respectively in the proportion which the white and colored children between the ages of 10 and 21 bear to each other. Prior to the adoption of the substitute, Senator Logan made a speech in which he attacked the South for suppressing the negro vote, and charged that the present bill was intended to raise money on the strength of the black population of the South for the benefit of the Southern whites. Mr. Frye presented a petition from citizens of New Jersey for the legal protection of young girls in ail localities under the jurisdiction of Congress. Mr. Evarts introduced a bill to permit the sale of goods by sample in any State or Territory by non residents. In the House the pension appropriation bill was debated. Mr. Weaver (Iowa) reported back to the House the resolution directing the House Committee on Expenditures in the Interior Dej)artment to investigate the past and present administration of thePensioußureau. The army appropriation bill was reportod to the House by Mr. Bragg. It sets aside $23,887,588. Thk debate of the Blair education bill was continued in the Senate on the sth. The FitzJohu Porter relief bill was reported to the Senate. Secretary Manning reported to the Senate that $6,385,550 of the bonds maturing April 1 are held by national banks. The Senate passed a bill accepting for the United States tne Grant memorial Collection presented to the Government by Mrs. Grant and W. H. Vanderbilt. The President nominated James C. Matthews, of New York, to be Recorder of Deeds for the District of Columbia, vice Frederick Douglass, whose resignation sent to the President on Jail. 5, is made public to-day. 011 motion of Senator’ Platt (Conn.,) the Senate adjourned, in expression of their sympathy with Senator Hnwly (Conn.) In his bereavement. A minority report on the Eads ship-railway bill was submitted to the House of Representatives. It says that the bill will take from the public treasury $37,000,000 for the benefit of a private corporation, located and to be operated exclusively in a foreign country, without any corresponding benefit to our country or people. Tlie pensions appropriation bill was passed after a lively partisan debate, during which the House was often in excitement and confusion ; also a bill extending the limit of the cost of the Peoria public building from $225,000 to $275,000. The Blair educational bill passed the Senate on the sth. The sum appropriated is $79,000,000, It provides for eight years after its passage there shall be annually aDpropriated from the Treasury the following sums in aid of common school education in tho St itas and Teiritories, aud District of Columbia an 1 Alaska: The first, $7,000,000; the second, $10,000,000; the third year, $15,000,000; the fourth year, $13,0 0,000; the fifth year, $11,000,000; the sixth year, $9,000,COJ; the seventh year, $7,000,000; and the eighth year, $5,000,000; in all, $77,000,090. Besides this there is a special appropriation of $2,000,000 to aid in the erection of schoolhouses in sparsely settled districts, making the total $79,000.000. The money is given to the several States and Territories in that proportion which the whole number of persons in each of tho age of ten years and over who cannot write bears to the whole number of such persons in the United States, according to the census of 1889, until the census figures of 1890 shall be obtained, and then according to the latter figure. In States having separate schools for white aud colored children tho money is to be paid out in support of such white and colored schools respectively in the proportion that the white and colored children between ten and twenty-on 9 years old bear to each other. No State is to receive the benefit of the act until its Governor shall file with the Secretary of the Interior a statement giving full statistics of the school system, attendance of white anil colored children, i amount of money expended, number of schools in operation, number and compensation of teachers, etc. No State or-Territory is to receive in any one year from this fund more money than it has paid out the previous year from its own revenues for common schools. If any State or Territory declines to take its share of the national, fund such share is to be distributed among the States accepting the benefiits of the fund. If any State or Territory misapplies the fund, or fails to comply with the conditions, it loses all subsequent apportionment. Any State or Territory accepting the provisions of the act at the first session of its Legislature after tlie passage of the act shall receive its pro rata, share of all previous annual appropriations. The right to alter or repeal the act is reserved by the Senate bill. The Senate adopted a resolution offered by Senator Halo (Me.) calling ou Secretary Whitney for all the papers and information in his possession relating to the Dolphin affair. The House passed the urgent deficiency bill, appropriating 8634,452 to meet the emergencies in various departments where the appropriations have proved inadequate. Dr. Joseph Leidy lately had submitted to him a spongy ice from the vicinity of Morristown, N. J., which contained great quantities of living worms, some an inch in length. They proved to be a new species of lumbriens, to which the common earth worm belongs. No living o rganisms have ever been found within clear dense ice, such as is usually served for drinking purposes.