THEY HATE THE LIGHT, BUT THEY CAN’T ESCAPE IT.
PUCK, March 26th, 1890.
The Senate of the United States has been called the pleasantest club in the country, and perhaps it is. It is certainly a very pleasant club, and it is not unfair to say that very large entrance fees have been collected in certain State legislatures from gentlemen whose wealth constituted their only claim to be admitted to it. But, in view of the fact that the people of the United States pay the members of this delightful club reasonably generous salaries for belonging to it, it may be questioned whether it does not exceed its privileges in keeping up its indulgence in what are known as “Executive Sessions.” There was a time in the dim and distant past when Executive Sessions were rarely secret, and had some excuse in reason and common-sense. But it is many years now since there has been an Executive Session that was not promptly and fully reported in every paper that would give space to its generally unimportant doings. It is, no doubt, a pleasant thing for a Senator to have the doors of the Senate-Chamber closed, and to smoke his cigar in lazy comfort while the reading clerk monotonously and perfunctorily, but as unobtrusively as possible, drones through the thousand and one articles of the treaty to which the law-maker is supposed to be giving his statesman-like attention in spite of the fact that its acceptance or rejection has been decided upon in party caucus weeks or months before. But the people of the United States pay the Senator, and the people of the United States built the gallery in the Senate Chamber, and they really have a right to sit there at all times during his business hours. It is a right that they will sooner or later insist upon. We do not know, however, that there is any serious objection to letting the Senator smoke while they look at him.