Salt Lake Tribune | 1917-01-29 | Page 1 | More Assertions on the 'Leak' Inquiry

i REPRESENTATIVE S. BEN NET of New York, who declares contents of peace note were known in advance. ad-vance. i Hi u sv I W - " f J! J MORE ASSERTIONS ON THE 'LEAK' !1Y i . Representative Bennet of New York Makes Statement State-ment to Press. NEW YOKK, Jan. 2S. Emphatic declaration by one member of the houfo rules committee " that there was a "leak" on President Wilson's re-ccut re-ccut peace note and promise by another an-other that he would insist that the congressional inquiry extend to alleged "leaks" on presidential messages generally gen-erally came tonight while plans were bein made for resumption tomorrow of the hearing here. Representative Bennet, Republican, of .'ev York, declared there was a "leak." He originally made this declaration at a private dinner last night and today when a "leak" developed de-veloped on his speech, he issued a written writ-ten statement about it. "1 said that there was a 'leak,' " the statement read, "that people iu Wall street knew of it (the president's peace message) forty-eight hours before the time it was released for publication, publica-tion, and that I had in my pocket at the time a paper showing that some one had the foresight to sell 20,000 shares of steel while it wa's rising." Representative Chiperfield of Illinois. Illi-nois. Republicans, who last week criticised criti-cised Mr. Whipple's conduct of the examination ex-amination of a witness, anuounccd he would demand an inquiry into "leaks" on other presidential messages. He said: "T think we should go back to the opening of congress about leaks. We should learu if there was a 'leak' on the message last week." Chiperfield also intimated that he would have further objections to the conduct of the inquiry if it is not confined con-fined more closely to "leak" rumors. He is opposed to investigating methods of the stock exchange. Rumors of division in the committee along party lines as to the conduct of the hearings are vigorously denied by both sides.