Rensselaer Republican, Volume 20, Number 38, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 May 1888 — WASHINGTON NOTES. [ARTICLE]

WASHINGTON NOTES.

When Judge Kelley’s attention was called to the dispatch from this city announcing that, as a result of a conference by the Republicans of the House, it appeared that a majority of them are in favor of accepting Mr. Mills’s proposition to dispose of his bill at a single vote; and that in consequence of this resolution a tariff bill has been formulated as a Republican substitute for the Mills bill, upon which a negative vote was to be recorded before vot'ng on the Mills bill, he manifested an unusual degree of indignation and denounced the story as a wretched absurdity. He said: “It is true that a proposition was made by Messrs. Mills and McMillan to Messrs. Reed and McKinley, the only Republican members on the committee of ways and means they could find in the House when they solicited the conference, which resulted in prolonging the general debate. Messrs. Reed and McKinley, however, delined to commit themselves' to the proposition and said they had no authority to speak for their Republican colleagues on the committee, or for their party in the House. Indeed, they do not seem to have considered themselves charged with the duty of submitting the proposition to their colleagues. I never heard either of them refer to the subject till this morning, in th ecourse of an interview with Major McKinley consequent upon the appearance of the dispatch referred to. No Republican substitute for the Mills bill has been formulated by the Republican party, nor has any person on the committee been authorized to formulate

such a bill; nor, again/has anybody been authorized by the Republican members of the House to make such an agreement as Messrs. Mills and McMillin proposed, The Republican party can find no authority in law or parliamefitary precedent to justify it in staking the industrial and commercial interests of the American people upon the throw of a single dice or on abet between the points that are pressing the millions on one side and a few incompetents on the other, which is what this dispatch assumes to be probable. Should such an outrage be attempted the names of those who propose it would instantly come international prominence. They would go into history as the betrayers of the cause of protection when it was about to be nationalized and to confirm the national character of the Republican party by its discussion throughout the length and breadth of the country 4 , and as the assassins of the Republican party, the disruption of which wonld inevitably follow the betrayal of the vital piinci pies by which it defends the prosperity of the whole people.” A bill has been reported in the Senate allowing George B. Loring, ex-Com-missioner of Agriculture, $20,807, this sum having been expended by him for sorghum and other articles. The claim had been disallowed by the First Comptroller. The Republicans will not offer a tariff measure in lieu of the Mills bill. They will, however, offer amendments to the bill while under consideration. Tbeßanate^.Wednesday, corcunedim the report of the election committee confirming the title of Senator Tur pie to his seat. Congressman Long will retire from public life at the end of this session of Congress.