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Show 'IHB' The Congressional Jokes: It has been reported that House legislaUve leaders intend to pick a few nimble - witted Congressional sharpshooters, who would be in constant con-stant attendance during sessions to make clay-pigeons of those who try to spread smears across the Cong. Record. It's about time. We hope their rapier-retorts will help enliven proceedings. Congressional history is crowded with swift reparteehee-ing. reparteehee-ing. Like some petty humans today, to-day, a small-time politico was once trying to make a name for himself by picking on an important Americanwho Ameri-canwho happened to be a Senator. Sena-tor. The human mosquito annoyed the Senator for months, who finally slapped him into oblivion with this story: "A skunk once challenged a lion to a fight. The lion declined. When the skunk asked loudly if he was afraid, the lion said: 'Very much so. For you would only gain famp hv havinff the honor to fiahl with a lion, while everyone who met me for a month would know that I had been in company with a skunk!" A lawmaker with a sensayuma once told this about himself. He sent a constituent a Cong. Record with a note stating that the Government Govern-ment prints and distributes speeches made by Congressmen without the slightest profit. The voter returned the note with this flip addition: "They are also read the same way!" Huey Long was called a demagogue dema-gogue after he concluded a teejus filibuster. Hooey foamed at the mouth, daring his critic to define the word. Which his critic did. "A demagogue," he snapped, "is a man who can rock the boat himself and persuade everybody that there's a terrible storm at sea." Here are some of the facts of life about Congress every citizen should know . . . Before times got too serious for such levity, a group of legislators organized a "Demagogues" "Dema-gogues" Club, which met daily in the House cloakroom. After a Representative Repre-sentative made a particularly demagogic dem-agogic speech for home consumption, consump-tion, he was haled into the cloakroom cloak-room and compelled to make the speech he would like to have made. Then he was asked to repeat the club pledge: "Vote for all appropriations appropri-ations and against all taxes," and inducted into full membership. The badge was a safety pin, worn under un-der the coat lapel , . . Some fun, eh? Then there's the one about the Congressman's wife who woke up in the middle of the night "Jim," she whispesjed, "there's a robber in the house" . . . Her sleep-befogged hubby replied, "That's impossible. In the Senate, yes, but In the House, never." This is one of the Congressional favorites . . . House Speaker Tom Reed had a barbed-wire tongue . . . One day one of the biggest bores in Congress got up, drooled out a lengthy diatribe and concluded by stating: "Mr. Speaker, I am like Henry Clay. I would rather be right than President!" Reed merely intoned: "Don't worryyou wor-ryyou will never be either." Rep. "Uncle Joe" Cannon loved to tell tall tales about his fishing. He once told a friend about a fish he caught Trying to beat him to the punch, the chum asked: "About the size of a whale, wasn't it?" . . . But the Congressman wasn't stopped: "Heck, no," he replied, "I was baitin' with whales." In 1914 the House of .Representatives .Representa-tives was evenly divided between both parties. The vote for House Speaker resulted in a tie. One independent in-dependent Progressive could cast the deciding vote. That man was Cong. Thomas D. Schall, who was blind. He felt handicapped in not bring able to Judge rival candidates by seeing their faces. So he asked a newspaper man who had "an honest hon-est voice" for counsel. The reporter suggested that with a war going on the House Speaker should belong to the same party as thc President The blind Congressman took his suggestion ond Champ Clark became be-came Speaker. In that position. Clark played one of thc most vital roles In world affairs and turned the tide of history. Contrary to popular belief, most Congressmen don't like to have the power of giving political Jobs. Through bitter experience a Congressional Con-gressional maxim has evolved: "Every "Ev-ery political appointment means one ingratc and a dozen enemies." No column of Irrelative anecdotes would be complete without the classic about the tot who visited the House of Representatives with his father. Thc youngster pointed to a man standing on the dais and asked who he was ... The father ex-plained ex-plained he was the chaplain of the House . . . "Does he prav for the members'" the child asked with logical reasoning. The father Informed: "No. my son. When he sees the members sitting there he prays for the country!" |