People's Pilot, Volume 4, Number 44, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 April 1895 — Washington Letter. [ARTICLE]

Washington Letter.

Washington, April 19.—One es the immediate effects of President Cleveland’s Chicago letter, as seen at Washington, is the consternation among the politicians, who have been hoping against hope that some way would be discovered to fight the Presidential campaign withont having to squarely meet the issue of the coinage of silver. Just at present the consternation is greatest among the democratic dodgers, but the republicans are not enjoying the situation which Mr. Cleveland's championship of the gold standard has forced upon the democratic party, because of their knowledge that his action has made it certain that the republican party will also have to meet the same issue before the formal opening of the Presidential campaign. The populists and other silver men say they are thankful to Mr. Cleveland for having helped them to force the financial issue to the front this year, instead of next. They say they have nothing to fear from the aggressive fight which Mr. Cleveland and his friends propose making on silver from now on;that the more financial discussion there is among the people the more voters there will be for the free coinage of silver. Previous to the publication of President Cleveland’s attack upon silver the men were not disposed to take much stock in the talk about Mr. Cleveland being desirous of again becoming a Presidential candidate, upon a Single standard gold platform; but that publication, together with what has since been said by members of the administration, who are preparing to fake the stump against silver in Kentucky and Illinois, has convinced them that he has the desire. Time only can tell whether it will be gratified.

Every once in a while something occurs to show that the checks against wrong doing in the goverment departments are easily evaded by clever rascals. Last year the discovery was made that nearly all of the papers needed to prove the embezzlement of government money by Cap tain Holgate had been stolen from the file of the Treasury department, and now an examination of the charred remains of the contents of a big storage warehouse, which was burned some months ago, has brought about the discovery that a quantity of the official records of the General Land Office were stored in boxes in that warehouse. That these records were stolen in certain, but who was the thief or what was the object may never be known, as the books of the warehouse, which would have shown w T ho stored these records, were burned up. It is only a few years since a clerk in the Land Office resigned and became a millionaire within five years, by making use of certain knowledge he had acquired from the records of the office. At least, that was the explanation given by his friends for his suddenly acquired wealth. It is certain that the man was an impecunious clerk and that very soon after resigning he was wealthy. Treasury officials say it will be impossible to make an estimate of the amount that will be reciev■ed from the income tax for some weeks, as all the blanks handed Jn by taxpayers will have to be gone over and tabulated twice, once by the collectors in the several districts and again by the Internal Revenue Bureau of the Treasury ' department, before the total will be known. Deputy collectors are expected to be kept busy between this and the first of July, when the tax becomes payable, assessing the delinquents. A'pplication was this

week made to the Supreme Court for a rehearinsrof the income tax cases,but even if it is granted, which isn't certain, there is little probability of the hearing be. fore the fall term of the court. The Cabinet is a unit for the abolition of 20 per cent duty on beef, but that doesn’t help the beef consumers any, as that duty can oniy be abolished by Congress. The changing of the rules regarding the entrance of Mexican cattle into the United States is expected to help the situation some, but the beef trust will probably see that it doesn’t help very much, by buying up the Mexican cattle just as fast as they come in. No member of the administration as yet suggested that the beef trust be proceeded against under the anti-trust law. The worthlessness of that law was made apparent by the failure of the cases against the sugar trust. Still, it would look well, even if it accomplished nothing more than the inconveniencing of the “Big Four, of Chicago”, who com pose the beef trust, for the Attorney General to make the at tempt of applying it to the beef trust. Secretary Morton said: "If anything is done to bring relief from beef extortions the newspapers will have to do it. Th® John Sherman anti-trust law willneither punish nor protect; it was made to be evaded.”