Democratic Sentinel, Volume 11, Number 5, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 4 March 1887 — CONGRESSIONAL. [ARTICLE]

CONGRESSIONAL.

ork of the Senate and the FTr>rise of Representatives. A bill to regulate the pay of officers of th" a-my and navy who refuse or neglect to provide for rhe support of their families was favorably reported to the Senate on Feb. 22. The military academy appropriation bill was passe l .‘.u adverse report was made on the act t. a .tmrizrf the sale of the barracks at Newport, K>- , in I the purchase of another site. John Sherman't nderad his resignation as President nro tern <>i the Senate. John F. Norrish was confirms I surveyor General for Minnesota, and Tuonns C. Manning as Minister to Mexico. The l’r*s la it approved the act for the construction of a or. J over the Mississippi River near Dubuque, lowa. Tne House of Repieseutatives, notwiths“and ng a personal appeal from Mr. Bland, of Missouri, refused to pass over the President’s veto a bill increasing the.pension of John W. Farris. The bill to create a Department of Agriculture passed the Senate Feb. 23. The bill creates an executive department to be known as the Department of Agriculture and Labor, with a Secretary and Assistmt Secretary to be appointed by the President, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate. The Secretary is to receive the same salary as the heads of the other executive departments, and the assistant the same salary as the Assistant Secretary of the Interior Department. The Bureau of Labor and the Weather Service Bureau are to be transferred to the Department of Agriculture. The Senate passed the pension bill of Thomas S. Hopkins over the President’s veto. The President transmitted to the Senate the correspondence with Mexico in the Cutting case. The House of Representatives passed a substitute for the Senate bill authorizing the Senate to retaliate upon the Canadians for shotting out American fishing vessels. One soot on of the new measure makes liable to forfo t re any foreign ship lound taking fish within three marine miles of our coasts or harbors. Bills authorizing railroad bridges over the Mississippi at Grund Tower, 111., and Sioux City, and granting a railroad right of way through the Crow reservation in Montana, passed the Senate on the 24th inst. A House bill was reported favorably for a right of way through iridian Territory for the Chicago, Kansas and Nebraska Road. Senator Ingalls, of Kansas, was nominated by the Kepuulicarr Senatorial caucus to be President pro tempore of the Senate, vice Senator Sherman, resigned. Ihe II >use of Representatives reluse i, by a vote of 159 „o 13J, to concur in the Senate amendment to toe postoffice appropriation bill setting aside Slu u ,uuofor Central and South American mails. Mi. Matson called up tbe dependent-pension bill, with the veto message of the President thereon. Mr. Conger tuought- that tne report of the "Committee on Invalid Pensions was a complete answer to the President s hyperbolic criticisms on the measure. He commented upon the action of tne President in vetoing the pending measure, yet signing the Mexican pension”bill. The only protests agu.nst the bill had come from the Southern cities and the money centers. Mr. O'Hara favored the bill, and criticised the ruling of the Pension Office denying aid to colored women who had lost their sons in the war. When the Fifty-fourth and Fifty-fifth Massachusetts Regiments, composed exclusively of colored men went out, and.. the Paymaster offered to pay them less than other regiments because they were black, they spurned the money, and said: “No; we are in the cause of liberty, and if you cannot pay us what you pay other soldiers we will tight for our flag and country without compensation." Mr. Bragg, of Wisconsin, said it was time for the memoers of the House to look after the interests of the real soldier and the business interests of the country. They had drifted along, impelled by a species of sympathetic influence, regardless of reason or judgment, until tne period was reached which culminated in the presentation and passage of one of tne most scandalous bills which had ever been sent to a President for his signature. The people of the country, without regard to party, had every reason to be thankful that this bill had been presented to an executive who had backbone enough to meet the situation. In a few years the soldiers of the country—not the bummers—would have arrived at an age when he could come to Congress and demand as as a right—not ask as a charity—that groviefion be made for them. Let not Congress ankrupt the treasury before that time arrived by yielding to the demands of deserters, coffee-coolers, and bounty-jumpers. The men who advocated this bill were not the friends of the true soldier. They advocated this bill, many of them, simply because the men could vote whom they expected to buy by this bill. Mr. Bragg said the press opposed the bill and sustained the President. That gallant soldier, the Governor of Maine, Chamberlin, stood by the President. The great soldier, Palmer of Illinois, stood by the President. Gov. Cox of Ohio stood by the President. Old Dan Sickles of the Third Army Corps said that the veto was a most glorious deed. Brave men of all parties stood by the President, It was only the liitle minds that went buzzing about like insects that opposed him. It is only the class of gentlemen who hang around the Grand Army posts, who crowd themselves in to get $5 a week and to live upon their comrades, who are making this grand huo and cry. ’’ Mr. McKinley did not believe with the' gentleman from Wisconsin that the beneficiaries were either shirks or vagabonds or good-for-nothing scoundrels. He believed that there were thousands scattered over the country who fought as bravely as the gentleman from Wisconsin, though they were not here to tell of their deeds of courage and glory. These men generally did their fighting on foot. Mr. Hepburu said: “The statement of the gentleman from Wisconsin [Bragg] that the Grand Army has repudiated this bill is as untrue in word and essence as the greater portion of all of its diatribe of abuse against his own comrades. It is not an uncommon thing for a skilled huntsman to use decoys. So it is that the Solid South that opposes this bill, and that stimulated this veto, puts forward all of these Northern gentlemen to represent it. Not one of them, for political reasons, has had the courage of his convictions and has dared to speak here as he will vote. Why? Because it would challenge attention to this conspiracy between those that once were opposed to us and who are now ‘our friends,’ ana the wealth of this country r.nd the metropolitan press of this country.” The question was then put: “Will the house, upon reconsideration, pass the bill, the President’s objection to the contrary, notwithstanding?” And it was decided in the neg-ative-yeas, 175; nays, 125—not the Constitutional two-thirds in the affirmative.

Mr. Edmunds’ substitute for the pleura-pneu- ‘ monia bill was adopted by the Senate on the 25th ult. It appropriates 81,000,000, to be expended under the direction of the Presidents and, in his discretion, through the Commissioner of Agriculture, to aid the proper authorities of the several States in preventing the spread of pleuro-pneu-monia, the appropriation to expire at the end of two years. A motion to reconsider the vote bv which the Edmunds substitute was adopted was pending when the Senate adjourned. Senator Ingalls was el eted President pro tem. of the Senate. The House passed, under a of the rules, the Senate bill-* providing for agricultural ex] eriment stations. The general deficiency appropriation bill was reported to the House. It makes a total appropriation of 83,573,504, while the estimates aggregated 87.558,914. On the assembling of the Senate, on the 26th ult., Mr. Ingalls was sworn in as President pro tem. The [Consular and Diplomatic Appropriation bill was passed by the Senate after a long discussion. A bill from the Committee on Library appropriating 820,010 for the completion of the monumen to Mary, the mother of Washington, at Fredericksburg, Va., was also passed. The Senate bill reimbursing the depositors of the Freedmen’s Saving & Trust Company passed the House. The Naval bill was also passed by the House after being subjected to some amendments.

Studies in Names.

Texas has a newspaper called the Bedbug. The Deer Creek Bip Saw is the name of an Ohio newspaper. Farmer Wheat, of Bucks County, Pennsylvania, has a son named Buck Wheat. Preserved Smith was the name of a prominent gentleman who died recently in Ohio.