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are now required for the 18 pension agencies." If the service were consolidated in the Washington bureau, much bookkeeping and clerical work would be obviated, closer supervision of accounts could be maintained, and pensioners would be paid more promptly, as "the certificates would be issued by the bureau and mailed to the pensioners on the same date they are now mailed to the pension agency."1 Congressional inquiry was made, hearings were given at which the Commissioner of the Interior, the Commissioner of Pensions, and other officials explained the matter,2 and the proposed reform was approved and recommended by Committees of the House. It has repeatedly passed the House of Representatives as a proviso of the Pension Appropriation bill, and the Senate has regularly amended the bill, restoring the eighteen agencies, and increasing the appropriation accordingly. On every occasion the House has submitted.

Mr. Gardner, one of the House conferees, who in March, 1909, reported a conference agreement yielding to the Senate, summed up the situation as follows:

"Mr. Speaker, I think it is due to the House to say that for three years we have gone to the Senate with substantially the same proposition. We have met the members of the conference committees at every point, and they have never successfully met our contentions in the matter. They have said in substance, 'We do not want to and we will not concede anything; we care nothing for economy.' They say, 'We want these agencies, and we want them all.' Now, that is the ultimatum, and I might as well be plain 1 Congressional Record, January 22, 1909, p. 1289.

2 House Documents No. 352 and No. 785, 60th Congress, 1st Session.

A full discussion of the subject is contained in the Congressional Record for January 18, 1909, pp. 1075 et seq.

about it. We have fought the ground over and over and over again with different conferees in three different sessions, and have come back to the House with that ultimatum every time, 'We want the agencies, and we are going to have them, and you cannot help yourselves.' That is the situation. To recede and concur means an absolute backdown on what the House has three different times said is the right position to take. The Committee, Mr. Speaker, leaves it with the House." 1

That being the situation, Mr. Mann of Illinois held that there was nothing "left under the usage of the two bodies except for the House to recede." He remarked:

"I think, Mr. Speaker, the conferees are entitled to the thanks of the House for the work they have done. I have always voted with the gentlemen to abolish the agencies, and I think now it is time to pass this Pension bill."

Mr. Mann's motion was agreed to without a division. The proceedings of Congress show that the Senate has ample license to pad appropriation bills according to its own will and pleasure, and that it is able to have its way, despite the protests of the House. This has been frequently admitted on the floor of the House. In 1897, Chairman (since Speaker) Cannon, in reviewing the work of the session, declared that "the General Deficiency bill, in recent sessions, as it leaves the House, providing for the legitimate deficiencies in the current appropriations for the support of the government, is transformed into a mere vehicle wherein the Senate loads up and carries through every sort of claims that should have no consideration except as independent bills reported from competent committees." "

1 Congressional Record, March 4, 1909, p. 3830.

2 Congressional Record, Vol. 29, part 3, 54th Congress, 2d Session, Appendix, p. 74.

In 1903, Chairman Cannon recurred to this matter of senatorial use of the General Deficiency bill, characterizing one item forced upon the bill by the Senate as "legislative blackmail." In reporting to the House the conference agreement reached in that bill, he remarked:

"In May last, on the omnibus claim bill then passed, a basis was fixed for the adjustment of the accounts of Virginia and Baltimore and South Carolina with the United States, growing out of the War of 1812-1815.

"The auditing officers of the Treasury, in pursuance of that law, adjusted the accounts of Virginia. An indefinite appropriation was made to pay the respective States whatever should be found due by the auditing officers. Upon that basis and under that legislation the sum of $100,000 in round numbers has been paid to the State of Virginia.

"Under the same law, which is the law to-day, the auditing officers, in the adjustment of accounts, found due to the State of South Carolina the sum of 34 cents. Now, the Senate of the United States, notwithstanding the law to which I have referred, proposed legislation on an appropriation bill to the extent of granting to the State of South Carolina $47,000.

"The House conferees objected, and the whole long delay has been over that one item. In the House of Representatives, without criticizing either side or any individual member, we have rules, sometimes invoked by our Democratic friends and sometimes by ourselves, — each responsible to the people after all said and done, by which a majority, right or wrong, mistaken or otherwise, can legislate.

"In another body there are no such rules. In another body legislation is had by unanimous consent. In another body an individual member of that body can rise in his place and talk for one hour, two hours, ten hours, twelve hours. It is a matter of history that a Senator on the Republican side, in a former Congress, talked to death a river and harbor bill.

"Unanimous consent comes to the center of the dome; unani

mous consent comes through Statuary Hall and to the House doors, and comes practically to the House. We can have no legislation without the approval of both bodies, and one body, in my opinion, cannot legislate without unanimous consent. There was the alternative.

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"In my opinion this applied not only to the Deficiency bill, but to the Naval bill. Your conferees had the alternative of submitting. to legislative blackmail at the demand, in my opinion, of one individual, I shall not say where, or of letting these great money bills fail. Now, what are we going to do about it? This bill contains many important matters - your appropriations for public buildings, legislation lately had all along the line of public service to the extent of $20,000,000." 1

What the House did about it was to adopt the report, carrying with it the item denounced as "blackmail."

This report in still other respects makes an interesting exhibit of the mastery of the Senate. By the terms of the agreement the Senate receded from fifteen of its amendments, while the House receded from its disagreement to 118, and in addition acceded to compromises proposed as regards four other disputed items. But even this disparity does not tell the whole story, for it is the practice of the Senate to throw in amendments for the use of the Committee of Conference in reaching an agreement, so that the concessions made by the Senate are often only mock concessions.

An exposure of this practice was once made, indirectly, but none the less completely, by the late Senator John Sherman of Ohio. The disagreements between the Senate and the House over the Tariff bill of 1894 were not settled by conference, as it was feared

1 Congressional Record, March 3, 1903, p. 3306.

by the leaders of the House that if the measure were again brought before the Senate by a report from the Conference Committee, the report would be rejected, and the bill thus defeated. So the House passed the bill just as it came from the Senate, loaded down with amendments. Thus amendments put on in aid of senatorial strategy, and not really intended for enactment, were included in the final enactment. Senator Sherman complained that "there are many cases in the bill where the enactment was not intended by the Senate. For instance, innumerable amendments were put on by Senators on both sides of the chamber . . . to give the Committee of Conference a chance to think of the matter, and they are all adopted, whatever may be their language or the incongruity with other parts of the bill." 1

Thus it has come about that the House, instead of being the dominant branch of the legislature, is the subordinate branch. In this respect the anticipations of the framers of the Constitution have been altogether falsified by events. As matters stand to-day, the House of Representatives is the weakest branch of the government. It has lost the power of the purse which was originally regarded as its peculiar prerogative. Instead of being strong and masterful in its relations with the Senate, as had been expected, it is abject and supine. The case becomes still more remarkable when the general characteristics of constitutional government are considered, as exhibited in the civilized world. When thus extending our view, we find that ordinarily it is the tendency of the representative assembly to

1 Congressional Record, August 19, 1894, p. 10109.

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