Rensselaer Republican, Volume 12, Number 16, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 2 January 1880 — Reporting the Proceedings of Congress. [ARTICLE]

Reporting the Proceedings of Congress.

To A stranger it seems simply incred-’ ible that a verbatim report can be taken of the verbal whirlwinds which visit the House of Representatives so frequently. One member nominally has the floor, but a dozen or twenty other members are §n their feet making all sorts of noises, interrupting, contradicting, appealing to the Speaker, interpolating all sorts of parliamentary abuse, nonsense and retort, while the Speaker is adding to the din by rapping on the desk with nis mallet, demanding order. Inarticulate shouts of approval and disapproval contend for the mastery. Meanwhile the member entitled the floor is sawing the air and beating his desk in dumb show. But the reEorter, practiced in such scenes and nowing what they mean, who are making the noise and what they are making it about, catches a word here and there, supplies broken sentences, makes grammar out of disjointed phrases, has the intelligence and discretion to know what is simply the chaotic accompaniment to be ignored, and which the stream of essential melody running through it all to be noted ana preserved, an i thus, with the help of occasional assistance from his fellow-re-Krters and the recollection of the comtants themselves with regard to the controversy just ended, he can present to the readers of the Record next morning a report which will be almost absolutely correct, of the stormiest scenes of the session. And if his record is not faithful he will be very apt to know it next day, for although the proceedings of Congress are not the most exciting feature of the day's news to the general reader, we may be certain that there is one man who reads the official report of yesterday’s proceedings with a critical attention, ana that is tne person whose utterances form part of those proceedings. Hence it follows that the reporter’s work passes in review every day before exacting critics, and that a reputation for good or bad work is speedily acquired. —Good Company.