rican merchant vessels.

"A similar bill already has passed the House of Representatives by a
vote of 403 to 13.

"Under the rules of the Senate, allowing unlimited debate, it now
appears to be impossible to obtain a vote prior to noon March 4, 1917,
when the session of Congress expires.

"We desire the statement entered in the record to establish the fact
that the Senate favors the legislation and would pass it if a vote
could be obtained."

The Senate continued sitting until the stroke of twelve noon on March
4, 1917. The President was in the Capitol receiving reports of the
course of his opponents' tactics. A vote not having been reached, the
Armed-Ship Bill went down to defeat, having been talked to death, and
the Senate automatically adjourned with the expiration of the last
session of the Sixty-fourth Congress. The bill was assured of passage,
had a vote been permitted, by 75 to 12. The twelve obstructionists
were Senators La Follette of Wisconsin, Norris of Nebraska, Cummins of
Iowa, Stone of Missouri, Gronna of North Dakota, Kirby of Arkansas,
Vardaman of Mississippi, O'Gorman of New York, Works of California,
Jones of Washington, Clapp of Minnesota, Lane of Oregon--seven
Republicans and five Democrats.

The situation produced an indignant protest from the President, who,
in a public statement, described the termination of the session by
constitutional limitation as disclosing "a situation unparalleled in
the history of the country, perhaps unparalleled in the history of any
modern government. In the immediate presence of a crisis fraught with
more subtle and far-reaching possibilities of national danger than any
other the Government has known within the whole history of its
international relations, the Congress has been unable to act either to
safeguard the country or to vindicate the elementary rights of its
citizens."

"The Senate," he proceeded, "has no rules by which debate can be
limited or brought to an end, no rules by which dilatory tactics of
any kind can be prevented. A single member can stand in the way of
action, if he have but the physical endurance. The result in this case
is a complete paralysis alike of the legislative and of the executive
branches of the Government.

"Although, as a matter of fact, the nation and the representatives of
the nation stand back of the Executive with unprecedented unanimity
and spirit, the impression made abroad will, of course, be that it is
not so and th