Democratic Sentinel, Volume 17, Number 2, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 January 1893 — HIE SENATE AND HOUSE. [ARTICLE]

HIE SENATE AND HOUSE.

WORK OF OUR NATIONAL LAWMAKERS. Proceedings of the Senate and House ol Representatives Discussed and Acted Upon—Gist of the Business. The National Solons. The hill granting additional quarantine (towers and imposing additional duties upon the Secretary of the Treasury and the marine hospital service Was passed by the Senate Tuesday. After the quarantine hill was passed the special order, the hill prohibiting immigration for one year, was perBlitted to lapse. The anti-option bill was taken up, and Mr. Vilas (Deni., Wls.) completed his argument against it. There was to action on the bill, the Senate adjournmg for lack of a quorum. The House met ruesday morning in continuation of Monlay’s session and resumed consideration )f the bill for the admission of the Norfolk t Western Railroad into the District of Columbia. and after a ’ sharp die Mission it was passed. The House

proceeded to the consideration of the Crain joint resolution, proposing] imendrnenti to tho Constitution, substituting the 31st day of December for the 4th ilav of March as the commencement and termination of the official terms of mem-. Ders of the House of Representatives and Df the United States Senators and providing that Congress shall hold its annual meeting on the second Monday in January, tnd substituting the 30th of April for the Ith of March as the date for the commencement, and limiting of the terms of the President and Vice President The vote Drdering the joint resolution to a third reading resulted: Teas, 49; nays, 121; thus defeating the measure. The House then adjourned. Immediately after the reading of the journal of Wednesday Mr. Blackburn (Ky.) rose, and, announcing the death of Senator Kenria, offered resolutions expressive of :he sorrow with which the news of the Death was received. A committee was appointed to take charge of the funeral, and is a further mark of respect the Senate adjourned. No business hut the reception of the Banking Committee's majority and minority reports on the repeal of the Sherman act was done in the House. Senator Kenna’s death ,• was announced, and tha House adjourned. Both houses of Congress left work Thurslay to take part in the funeral of Senator Kenna. Funeral services were held in the Senate chamber. The body of the dead Senator was carried into the Senate wing of the Capitol and laid in state In the mar-ble-room under a guard of Capitol police. The casket was not opened. When the Senate was called to order Senator Faulkner, colleaguo of the deceased, secured for the West Virginia legislative delegation the privileges of the Boor, and the Senate took a recess. A bier had been placed at the head of the main aisle. Soon the members of the lower bouse entered the chamber led by Speaker Crisp, who took a place beside the Vice President. The President, his Cabinet, the Supreme Court Judges and the mourning widow came next They were followed by a procession of robed priests preceded by acolytes bearing censor and candles. Capitol police bore in the casket and Bishop Keane, of the Roman Catholic university, In purple roheq with the priests ranged about the coffin. The bishop preached the funeral sermon.

In the Senate Friday Mr. Sherman (O.) reported hack to the Senate the bill to extend to the North Pacific Ocean the provisions of the statute for the protection of fur seals and other fut-bearing animals. The bill was pussed. At 2p m. the aptioptlon bill was taken up, the pending question being the amendment offered by Mr. White (La.) to strike out the last provision of Section 2. The proviso is “that such contract or agreement shall not be made, settled for by delivery or settlement of difference, or by any other mode of performance or settlement in or upon any board of trade,” etc. The amendment was rejected—yeas. 15; navs, 32. So the proviso Is retained In the bill. In the House filibustering was indulged in all day against the consideration of private war claims bills, with the result that , nothing was accomplished. Most of Saturday’s session of the Senate was occupied by Mr. Morgan of Alabama an the Nicaragua Canal hill. In the course as his speech he spoke sadly of the Monroe doctrine as “worn, torn and fragmentary,” and as having been kicked by the Senate Into “doll rags. ” Mr. Morgan, speaking of the provision of the hill for ten Governmen directors (out of fifteen) said that if the French government had its own directors In the Panama Canal Company the robberies which had taken place and which had disgraced and nearly destroyed the French republic would not have been perpetrated, and that the fraud and corruption and vlllglny which was now shocking the sensibilities of that great and noble people would have been avoided. At the conclusion of Mr. Morgan’s speech the anti-option hill came up as a special order, but (In antagonism to it) Mr. Walcott (Rep) of ’Colorado moved to proceed to the consideration of the first bill on the calendar. On that motion Mr. Washburn (Rep) of Minnesota demanded the yeas and nays, and the result was yeas 9, nays 31—not a quorum voting. After a brief executive session the Senate adjourned. The time of the House was principally consumed In consideration ol the bill ratifying the agreement with the Cherokee Nation of Indians for the cession to the United States of the tract of land known as the “Cherokee Outlet, ” The hill was passed and the House adjourned.

For almost an hour Monday morning the time of the House was consumed in the consideration of a resolution to which there was not the slightest opposition Id any quarter, and which was finally adopted without objection. It was one calling upon the executive departments for Information as to-the number and amount of war claims allowed or disallowed by such departments. Then a motion to suspend the rules and pass a hill to settle the claims of Arkansas and other swamp-land grants failed to secure the necessary two-thirds vote, and was defeated. The motion to suspend the rules and pass a joinl resolution for a constitutfonal amendment for the election of United States Senators by popular vote, was carried without a division. Three prepared ipeeches were read in the Senate. The first was by Mr. Morrill (Vt.), against the McGarrahan bill; the second by Mr. Peffei (Kan.), In favor of a constitutional amendment limiting the Presidential office to one term; and the third by Mr. Call (Fla.), in defense of the constitionaiity of the antioption bill. After a quorufn was procured as the result of a call of the Senate some considerable progress was made on the anti-option bill. An amendment wa‘ agreed to fixing July 1. 1593, as the time when the bill is to go into effect. Ths resolution offered on Saturday by Mr. Wolcott (Col.) Instructing the Committee on Foreign Relations to Inquire as to the expenditures in and about the construction of the Nicaragua CaDal since the accounts of expendlture rendered two years since, was agreed to.