Jasper County Democrat, Volume 8, Number 10, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 June 1905 — WASHINGTON LETTER. [ARTICLE]

WASHINGTON LETTER.

Political and General Gossip of the National Capitol. Special Correspondence to The Democrat: President Roosevelt has capitulated to the “stand patters.” He has agreed not to call Congress iu special session until after the fall elections, although they are few and unimportant and it is obvious that they are put forth as a reason for postponing the session only for effect. According to the president, own announcement he has agreed not to summon Congress to Washington until November 13, precisely three weeks before the date set by law for the beginning of the regular session. Those who have heard the President’s emphatic assertions that nothing would prevent his calling Congress in session on October 16, now believe that there will be no special session whatever. The “stand patters” are moreover convinced, and with reason, that the President has himself delivered a deathblow to the tariff revision in the next session of Congress. t + +

Having presuaded the President to postpone the special session until November 13, the “stand patters” will now proceed to show him that that leaves only three weeks before the regular session. They will add that nothing can dissuade Congress from adjourning the special session at least a week before the date of the regular session, December 4, and that means that the extraordinary session would last just two weeks, a ridiculously short time, as everyone admits. The reason that Congress would insist on adjourning a week before the date of the regular session is that the members would be determined to secure their extra mileage. It will be recalled that when Congress last permitted a special session to be merged into a regular session they lost their extra mileage. Now the president will be asked if, in bis estimation, the two weeks special session is worth to the people the $190,000 for mileage which it is certain to cost. That he will be compelled to answer in the negative seems almost assured. It may therefore, be safely predicted that there will be no special session of Congress next fall, which is precisely what the opponents of tariff revision and railway rate legislation want. t t t

Senator Gorman, speaking tor the Democrats in the Senate, promised Senator Aldrich, the Republican manager of the upper chamber, that the Democrats would permit any tariff bill sent over by the House during the special session to come to a vote before the beginning of the regular session, bat that was when the President had agreed to call the extaordinary session for October 16. Now that the President has gnne back on that agreement at the behest of the “stand patters” Senator Gorman con Id not be asked to agree to vote at the curtailed special session, even if the house could frame and send over a tarriff bill, which it oould not.

t t t With the tariff disposed of ao far aa the special session is concerned, the House will olaim that it is impracticable to send over to the Senate a tariff bill at all for fear the discussion might be prolonged, the business of the country nas too little time to become adjusted to the new schedules before the fall elections and the Republican members of the House suffer at the polls as a result of the unsettled condition of business, during the fall of 1906. This arguement will doubtless prove quite sufficient for the pres*

dent, and the tariff revision policy of the administration may now be laid away on the shelf as one of the policies killed by the president’s vacillation. t t t But the president regards railway rate legislation as even more important than the tariff readjustment, it may be said, and this is doubtless trne, but is not the postponement of the special session a yielding on this important issue? It may not be. It is possible that the President will yet win out on the policy and will refuse further to yield to the influence of the leaders of his party but those who fnlly appreciate the magnitude of the struggle he has undertaken in this direction fear that he will have content himself with very little remedial railway legislation. And meanwhile, “the tariff hogs will have all four feet in the trough,” to use his own expressive mataphor, while the consumers will be absolutely unable to secure that beautiful “square deal.” He himself has said that they cannot get a square deal in the absence of the adjustment of the tariff schedules to the changed conditions,

t t t The President’s selection of Charles J. Bonaparte is proving even a greater shock to the Republican politicians than was at first anticipated. Mr. Bonaparte is a confirmed reformer, too old to change his ways and absolutely intolerant of the methods whereby so many Republican politicians attain success. He is a determined enemy of the spoils system and the Republican politician who comes to seek his influence in behalf of this, that or the other contractor who has “alwajs voted straight and contributed generously to the Republican campaign fund” will find little comfort in a rigid Bonaparte. The politicians seem to appreciate this fact and they are giving vent to their wrath in unvarnished terms. Moreover, it is pointed out that Mr. Bonaparte has quarreled with both the Republican factions in Maryland and his selection will do nothing to strengten the party in that State, ft is just possible that the President selected Mr. Bonaparte becaase he wanted him in his cabinet and never thought of the effect on the Republican organization in Maryland but the thought is absolutely inconceivable to the average Republican politician We want your eggs, highest market price paid.

FENDIG’S FAIR.