tives, but now they were victorious in the Senate.

The methods of Senator Quay were tried by other Senators on both sides,
though they were less frank in their avowal. After the struggle was
over, Senator Vest of Missouri, who had been in charge of the bill,
declared:

"I have not an enemy in the world whom I would place in the position
that I have occupied as a member of the Finance Committee under the
rules of the Senate. I would put no man where I have been, to be
blackmailed and driven in order to pass a bill that I believe is
necessary to the welfare of the country, by Senators who desired to
force amendments upon me against my better judgment and compel me to
decide the question whether I will take any bill at all or a bill which
had been distorted by their views and objects. Sir, the Senate 'lags
superfluous on the stage' today with the American people, because in an
age of progress, advance, and aggressive reform, we sit here day after
day and week after week, while copies of the census reports, almanacs,
and even novels are read to us, and under our rules there is no help for
the majority except to listen or leave the chamber."

The passage of the bill in anything like the form in which it reached
the Senate was plainly impossible without a radical change in the rules,
and on neither side of the chamber was there any real desire for an
amendment of procedure. A number of the Democratic Senators who believed
that it was desirable to keep on good terms with business interests
were, in reality, opposed to the House bill. Their efforts to control
the situation were favored by the habitual disposition of the Senate,
when dealing with business interests, to decide questions by private
conference and personal agreements, while maintaining a surface show of
party controversy. Hence, Senator Gorman of Maryland was able to
make arrangements for the passage of what became known as the Gorman
Compromise Bill, which radically altered the character of the original
measure by the adoption of 634 amendments. It passed the Senate on the
3rd of July by a vote of thirty-nine to thirty-four.

The next step was the appointment of a committee of conference between
the two Houses, but the members for the House showed an unusual
determination to resist the will of the Senate, and on the 19th of July,
the conferees reported that they had failed to reach an agreement. When
President Cleveland permitted the publication of a letter wh