ich he had
written to Chairman Wilson condemning the Senate bill, the fact was
disclosed that the influence of the Administration had been used to
stiffen the opposition of the House. Senator Gorman and other Democratic
Senators made sharp replies, and the party quarrel became so bitter that
it was soon evident that no sort of tariff bill could pass the Senate.

The House leaders now reaped a great advantage from the Reed rules
to the adoption of which they had been so bitterly opposed. Availing
themselves of the effective means of crushing obstruction provided by
the powers of the Rules Committee, in one day they passed the Tariff
Bill as amended by the Senate, which eventually became law, and then
passed separate bills putting on the free list coal, barbed wire, and
sugar. These bills had no effect other than to put on record the opinion
of the House, as they were of course subsequently held up in the Senate.
This unwonted insubordination on the part of the House excited much
angry comment from dissatisfied Senators. President Cleveland was
accused of unconstitutional interference in the proceedings of Congress;
and the House was blamed for submitting to the Senate and passing the
amended bill without going through the usual form of conference and
adjustment of differences. Senator Sherman of Ohio remarked that "there
are many cases in the bill where enactment was not intended by the
Senate. For instance, innumerable amendments were put on by Senators
on both sides of the chamber... to give the Committee of Conference a
chance to think of the matter, and they are all adopted, whatever may be
their language or the incongruity with other parts of the bill."

The bitter feeling, excited by the summary mode of enactment on the part
of the House, was intensified by President Cleveland's treatment of the
measure. While he did not veto it, he would not sign it but allowed it
to become law by expiration of the ten days in which he could reject
it. He set forth his reasons in a letter on August 27, 1894, to
Representative Catchings of Missouri, in which he sharply commented
upon the incidents accompanying the passage of the bill and in which he
declared:

"I take my place with the rank and file of the Democratic party who
believe in tariff reform, and who know what it is; who refuse to accept
the result embodied in this bill as the close of the war; who are not
blinded to the fact that the livery of Democratic tariff reform