Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 36, Number 66, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 8 April 1904 — BURTON 18 CONVICTED. [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

BURTON 18 CONVICTED.

Kansas Senator Foupd Guilty of Accepting Fees for l|is Influence. Senator Burton, of Kansas, was found guilty by a jury of using his influence as a United States Senator for a money

consideration to preArent the Post Office Department from barring the mails to an alleged bucketshop keeper in St. Louis. The federal grand jury returned an indictment against Burton on January 23. He was charged in nine counts with

accepting five checks of SSOO each from the Rialto Grain and Securities Company between November 22, 1902, and March 16, 1903, while a United StatedSenator, for his alleged services of interceding with the Postmaster General, chief post office inspector and other high post office officials, to induce them to render a favorable decision in matters affecting the permission of the Rialto Company to use the mails. Senator Burton’s conviction is the first under this section of the statute, which was enacted by Congress in 1864. Senator Joseph Ralph Burton is 49 years old and a native of Southern Indiana. He began life as a farm boy, such as was pictured by Edward Eggleston in “A Hoosier Schoolmaster.” By giving lessons in elocution he paid his expenses at college. Later he practiced law at Princeton. Ind., where he married Miss Carrie Webster, a cousin of Congressman S. 8. Cox, of New York. For the last twenty-two years Mr. Burton haji been a citizen of Kansas. He gained national distinction by his debates with Senator Pfeffer. In 1896 he secured the caucus nomination for the Senate over John J. Ingalls. A Populist was elected that year, but Burton won in 1901. Senator Burton is an eloquent orator, and during every campaign since 1876 he has devoted from two to four months to stump speaking. He has served three terms in the Kansas Legislature, and during the World's Fair he was commissioner from Kansas. He once had a fortune, but the collapse of the Western boom wiped it out.

J. R. BURTON.