The Senate's Sudden Revolt Against Corporate Power
In an unexpected political shift, the U.S. Senate moves to curb the influence of corporations on Congress, shaking up the power dynamics in Washington Territory and beyond.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
The Senate of the United States has done one of the most extraordinary things, a thing which astonishes its friends, annoys its enemies, and makes the states themselves sit back in their seats, look at each other, and wonder whether they have not entirely lost their identity. The Senate has actually passed the Interstate Bill, forbidding members of Congress from accepting retainers, fees, or valuable considerations of any kind from any corporation which has received a land grant or any other aid from the government. What is more, it has actually passed the bill by a majority of more than two-thirds, only ten members having voted against it.
Such action on the part of the Senate is extraordinary indeed. That body has long been looked upon as being composed of about equal proportions of corporation attorneys and millionaires, with an occasional outlier, such as Van Wyck or Beck, who has crept not surreptitiously into the sacred halls from some out-of-the-way state in which King Monopoly has not yet secured a very firm hold upon the people. What has caused the revolution in the body, which made so large a majority of its members vote with Beck and Van Wyck, it would be difficult to say. The measure represents a change of heart. Do they fear the wrath to come? Or did they vote as they did in a fit of congressional abstraction?
“The Senate has long been looked upon as being composed of about equal proportions of corporation attorneys and millionaires.”
This 1886 report on the Senate's push to decouple corporate money from legislative influence echoes the ongoing, modern-day struggle to address the role of lobbying and concentrated wealth in Seattle and national politics. It is a striking reminder that the tension between corporate interest and public service has been a foundational theme in the Pacific Northwest for over 130 years.
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