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Show MANY BILLS. Within two days after the present session of Congress had been called to order and the President's Presi-dent's message urging economy upon them had been read, no fewer than two thousand special bills had been introduced, each with an appropriation attached. at-tached. About half of these bills called for river and harbor improvements, and the other half were for new and expensive public buildings. This is an average of about four bills to each member of the House and Senate. It is not hard to imagine the haste with which the introduction of these bills was reported to the newspapers in the different districts for the edification edifi-cation of an admiring constituency. 'No doubt every newspaper of any importance in the United States received a "Special" from Washington saying say-ing that Representative John Doe today introduced a bill into Congress providing for the dredging of I J . ' Goose creek, carrying an appropriation of $500,-000. $500,-000. The bill will go to committee, but Representative Representa-tive Doe is confident that it will meet favorable action at the hands of congress, etc. If the district dis-trict has no creek to be dredged, change that portion por-tion of the dispatch to a harbor improvement, a million-dollar postoffice, custom hcuse or court room, or anything of that sort. The bills will not pass; that is, most of them will not. Probably 90 per cent of them will never be heard of again except in the districts directly affected. There they will be given just enough publicity pub-licity to keep an admiring constituency in the proper frame of mind; to show that their statesman in Washington is doing everything in his power for the good of his home district. It is one of the tricks of the practical politicians. poli-ticians. It used to deceive a few, and maybe it does yet. It is a comparatively harmless practice, and it makes the deceived ones feel well toward their representative. |