Washington Letter

The Tariff bill is still fighting its way through Congress, albeit at a slower pace than expected.

Perhaps it may be true, as has been constantly reiterated, that Mr. Stevenson ls not particularly friendly towards Mr. Cleveland and his administration,but his selection of the Democratic members of the Senate committee that to day began a Star Chamber Investigation of numerous charges of crookedness against Senators and outsiders, beginning with the cock and bull story concerning an attempt having been made to bribe Senators Hunton, of Virginia, and Kyle of South Dakota., to vote against the Tariff Bill and including the charges against democratic Senators of having speculated in sugar trust stock and of having given the sugar trust protection In exchange for its big contribution to the Cleveland Campaign fund, makes him appear very friendly Indeed towards the administration.
For instance, Senator Gray, chairman of the committee, ls known as chief ol the Senate "cuckoos," and a man who would do more for the administration than any other Senator while Senator Lindsay, the other democratic member of the committee, is in addition to being a cuckoo known as Carlisle's man. The significance of these selections will not be underrated when it is remembered that Secretary Carlisle, representing Mr. Cleveland, has been from the first to the last mixed up in all the dealings between the democratic Senators and the sugar trust. Senator Mills, of Texas has publicly stated that Secretary Carlisle gave the President of the Sugar trust a letter introduction to him and that he refused to see him when he called to present it.
The democratic ask credit for being fair because Senator Allen of Nebraska was put upon the committee, but they do not deserve it, as Allen has voted with the democrats on all political questions and is regarded as a democrat, although he calls himself a populist. It is clear that if anything is shown up by this committee it will be through the energy of two Republican members-Lodge Massachusetts and Davis of Minnesota. But nothing can be shown unless witnesses choose to tell what they know, the Supreme court having decided some years ago that a Congressional committee could compel them either to testify or produce books dealing with a citizens private affairs.

“Washington Letter,” Black Virginia: The Richmond Planet, 1894-1909, accessed May 12, 2025, https://blackvirginia.richmond.edu/items/show/1550.