People's Pilot, Volume 3, Number 36, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 February 1894 — FROM WASHINGTON. [ARTICLE]

FROM WASHINGTON.

An Interefltlnv Batch of New* From the Capitol. From our Regular Correspondent. Washington, Feb. 16, ’94. Can women vote for members of congress under the Constitution? Representative Pence, of Colorado, says they can, and he has introduced a bill providing that the right of citizens of the United States, of either sex, above the age of 21 years, to register and to vote for such representatives shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex. Mr. Pence contends that women have always had a constitutional right to vote for congressmen and that they have been unfairly denied the privilege, and the delegates to the twenty-ninth annual convention of the National American Women’s Suffrage Association, now in session here, endorse the contention and propose to lend their aid toward getting the bill acted upon by congress at this session. The house judiciary committee only the other day turned down a bill introduced by Representative Bell, of Colorado, providing for a woman suffrage amendment to the Constitution, but that committee will not get a whack at Mr. Pence’s bill, which will go to the committee on the election of president and vice-presi-dent and representatives in congress. • • • Representative Bland’s bill for the coinage of the seigniorage in the treasury has had a majority in its favor from the first, but the minority composed of Democrats and Republicans under the leadership of ex-Speaker Reed have sturdily fought it all the week, Mr. Reed at one time causing Mr. Bland to lose his temper to such an extent that the authority of the Sergeant-at-arms had to be invoked to restore order. It has been to a certain extent a revival of the silver fight of the extra session. It is not the present bill that the anti-silver men really oppose; it is their fear that its passage will soon be followed by a bill for the free coinage of silver, that makes them fight. Mr. Bland has such a bill now in the hands of the coinage committee, of which he is chairman. • • • Postmaster General Bissell did not allow the Honduras Lottery Company, said to be merely a change of name and location on the part of the old Louisiana Lottery, to get fairly started before he put it on the fraud list and notified* the postmasters at the following cities: Port Tampa City, Tampa Bay and Tampa, Fla.; Mobile, New Orleans, Galveston, Laredo, El Paso, and San Francisco, not to deliver registered letters or pay money orders to Paul Conrad, president of the National Honduras Lottery Company, the Graham Printery or L. Graham & Sons, and to return all registered letters so addressed to the senders after stamping them “fraudulent.” The postmasters at New York, New Orleans and San Francisco have been directed not to issue money orders payable outside the United States to parties known to be cohnected with the Honduras Lottery. • • • Senator Gray, of Delaware, is entitled to the credit of having made the best defense of the administration’s Hawaiian policy. He spoke during a portion of two days and unquestionably made the most of the materials at his disposal, but it must have occurred to him several times that some of it was “mighty poor” material. Senator Morgan is at work upon the report that is to be made to the senate of the investigation made by the committee on foreign relations and he hopes to make it of such a nature that it will be signed by every member.of the committee, but others are not sanguine of his success, although it would make a very desirable and patriotic ending of the whole affair for the senate to adopt some sort of a resolution unanimously. • • • A week ago it was said that the sub-committee in charge of the tariff bill would report that bill with amendments to the full senate committee on finance during the past week. Now, members of the sub-committee say that the bill will certainly be reported to the full committee early next week. It is not the making of a large number of changes that has caused the unexpected delay, but the difficulty in reaching an agreement as to sugar, iron ore, coal and several other articles. It is certain that a

duty will be put upon several articles that the house bill puts on the free list. In fact, a senator who has been in conference with the sub-committee told me that it was fully settled that coal would be put upon the dutiable list, but that the amount of duty had not yet been agreed upon. The income tax men are a little shy of the proposal to put a duty on sugar, as they fear that the income tax feature might then be dropped as unnecessary, but others say that both will be necessary iu order to raise the money to meet the obligations of the government. The committee refused to grant hearings, but its members are compelled to listen individually to their constituents who call on them, and their name is legion just now.