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Show REPORT OF COMMISSION It Finds That Public Printer Palmer Was Partial. OYSTER BAY, Sept.' ll.-Presldent Roosevelt yesterday made public the report re-port of the Keep commission on its recent re-cent investigation of affairs in the Government Gov-ernment printing office at Washington. The inquiry was made by special direction of the President on account of a protest which he had received from officials of the Mergenthaler Typesetting Machine company against the award of a contract by Public Printer Frank W. Palmer to the Lanston Monotype company for seventy-two machines of its make. By order of th President the contract with the Laneton company was held up untJl an investigation could be made with the view of ascertaining whether the charges of favoritism and corruption In the letting of the contract were substantially substan-tially founded, as heretofore chronicled in these dispatches. The President decided, after an examination of the Keep report, that the contract for the Lanston machines ma-chines should stand. The Keep commission reported that if the contract could be set aside "such a course would be desirable," although the commission stated expressly that "no corruption, cor-ruption, payment or promise passed from the Lanston Monotype company to the Public Printer or to any person in the Government service." It developed by the investigation, however, how-ever, that two important assistants of the Public Printer were indirectly interested in the Lanston company, "their wives being be-ing stockholders therein." The commission commis-sion shows that a fair and impartial test Of the Lanston and Mergenthaler machines ma-chines was not made, and reports that the purchase of so large a number of Lanston machines was "Improvident," and indicated "great partiality and bias on the part of the Public Printer." The commission regards the purchase as "maladministration." The report of the commission Is voluminous, volumi-nous, containing about 16,000 words. Accompanying Ac-companying it is a memorandum by President Presi-dent Roosevelt, in which he approves the report except as to the disposition of the contract for the Lanaton machines, which he has directed shall stand. |