also in the case of the United States vs. Kellogg, Brady, and Price?— A. They were incidental questions.

Q. Was there evidence submitted before that grand jury by the district attorney in the case of the United States vs. Kellogg?

The WITNESS. Now, Mr. Chairman, are you not going a little too far? I think I ought not to answer that question.

Mr. STEWART. What is the question?

The CHAIRMAN. Whether there was evidence presented to that grand jury by Mr. Bliss as Government counsel in the case of the United States vs. Kellogg. I have not asked what the evidence was, but simply whether evidence in that case was presented. [To the witness.] What is your answer?-A. I decline to answer that question, sir.

Q. I will put another question: Did Mr. Bliss appear before that grand jury as the attorney representing the United States ?-A. He did, sir; and before admitting him to the grand jury room as counsel for the United States, I investigated to ascertain whether he had been sworn as assistant district attorney, and finding such to be the fact, he was admitted to the grand jury room.

Q. You may state (as you have already made such returns to the court) in what cases you made presentments at that term?

A. (Referring to a memorandum.) I find by reference to the court record that in case No. 14,336, the case of Dorsey, Brady, and others, the presentment was made on the 20th of May.

Q. Was that the first indictment against Dorsey, Brady, &c. ?-A. Yes, sir. This that I have here is simply a note of my own. I find that in cases No. 14,357 and 14,358, presentments were made on the 17th day of June.

Q. Were there presentments made in other cases?

The WITNESS. Connected with star-route matter?

The CHAIRMAN. Yes.

A. I do not recollect in regard to that. These presentments were made on the 17th of June; the indictments were ordered and presented to the court on the same day, and the grand jury were discharged on the same day.

Q. How long was that grand jury in session?-A. About three months. It seemed to me about forty years.

Q. Have you read the testimony of Mr. George Bliss given before this committee in reference to the cases which he submitted to that grand jury 1-A. I have.

Q. Is there any part of that testimony given by Mr. Bliss as to what he did before the grand jury and the evidence which he submitted there, in regard to which you desire to make any explanation or statement? A. Yes, sir; there are some matters in regard to which I would like to say a few words. From my reading of Mr. Bliss's testimony it appears that in the Dorsey case where the indictment was found there is no question made at all. There is very little reference made to it by Mr. Bliss. What he has to say is mostly in regard to the Salisbury and Price case. In one of his statements, page 164, in reply to a question, or perhaps in connection with his general statement as to why there was so large a number of witnesses brought here, Mr. Bliss says: Of course, therefore, we had to be very careful not to bring unnecessary witnesses, and at the same time we wanted to bring, as far as possible, witnesses who would be fair, and it required a great deal of care and occupied a great deal of time to make up the list. Then, too, of course, we must have witnesses to prove our whole case as to a given route. If we brought five or six witnesses here in relation to any one route, at heavy expense, and missed one whose testimony was necessary to cover a particular point, our chain was broken.

I make reference to that simply because I part of his testimony in connection with it. to the Salisbury matter, he was questioned swered as follows:

propose to refer to another On page 200, in referring by the chairman and an

Q. Before you leave this subject, let me ask if you can explain the statement you made yesterday with regard to the papers in the Post-Office Department being very meager as to the Saulsbury matter-A. stated I had no evidence on the subject.

My impression is simply gained from this fact, that when you find a route of the Dorseys, a route 150 miles long with perhaps ten or a dozen post-offices on it, extending over four years, you will find a pile of papers very frequently 6 or 8 inches thick, and you will find a vast mass of papers which, if you could take up Mr. Woodward's analysis in the cases, you will see how these little things that are on file there dovetail in with affidavits and information that was given with regard to the routes, and which go very far to make up a complete case. dictment, we found nothing there but the merest formal papers. When we came to the Saulsbury inthing that inculpated anybody, except there was a big order of expedition. While There was not anyit is of course possible that the Saulsbury combination did their business in a different way, and they did not put on file such things, yet it is hardly probable, because a great many of those papers, for instance, would not come from the contractors; they would be complaints from people along the routes, stating the mail was not carried, and all that sort of thing, which would go on file with the papers of the route to which they related. We did not find anything of that kind in the Saulsbury cases. The difference was very marked. Mr. Woodward discovered it and said nothing about it, because really I was so very busy that Mr. Woodward and I had very little time to confer except with regard to more important matters. opportunity to talk over the matter I found the same thing, and there was no evidence But when we did get an that anybody had taken any papers at all.

And he says that when that matter was brought to his attention after wards by Mr. Woodward he found upon investigation that it was true and he remarks in another part of his testimony that the case had event, ually been "milked" before he got to it.

Q. Do you give this as a reason for the grand jury not making a presentment in the Salisbury cases -A. No; I do not pretend to give any reasons as to why the grand jury did not find an indictment. It is patent to everybody that the grand jury did not find an indictment, and they had their reasons for not finding it; and the only protection I ask is that I shall not be required to give the reasons why the grand jury acted as they did.

The CHAIRMAN. I do not ask that.

The WITNESS. No, I understand not; but that is all the protection I ask. Now, in another part of Mr. Bliss's testimony, page 170, he says.

I had no evidence of it; but I believe, and believe implicitly to-day, that the files of the Post-Office Department, so far as they related to certain of the Salisbury routes, had been interfered with-in a technical phrase, had been “milked," and that many of the papers had disappeared.

Mr. CRISP. Mr. Chairman, this evidence is all before us, and I do not see the necessity of reading it again by piecemeal.

The WITNESS. The only purpose I have is to show that the action of the grand jury was perfectly justifiable according to Mr. Bliss's own statement; to show that he did not get the witnesses there that he expected, and that he gives three or four instances in which the witnesses that he expected to produce either did not appear, or, when they did come, did not testify as he had expected.

Mr. CRISP. Well, I submit that we are not investigating the conduct of the grand jury at all.

The CHAIRMAN. No; but I suppose this is admissible, not as relating directly to the conduct of the grand jury, but in reply to testimony already given by Mr. Bliss before this committee.

Mr. CRISP. But we have that testimony before us now, and therefore I do not see the use of having it read to us again.

Mr. STEWART. Mr. Mitchell is not called upon to defend the action of the grand jury; nobody makes any imputation upon them.

The WITNESS. Mr. Bliss does, in his testimony.

Mr. STEWART. Not as to the Salisbury cases.

The WITNESS. That is just where he does it.

Mr. CRISP. But if there are other portions of his testimony which militate against or explain those portions, all that testimony is before us, and it is to be assumed that we will consider all that is before us. The CHAIRMAN. Do you desire to have this part of the testimony of this witness excluded, Mr. Crisp?

Mr. CRISP. No, sir; but I do not see any necessity for repeating here what is already before us.

The WITNESS. Mr. Bliss in his statement says that he put certain "briefs," which are printed in his testimony, before the grand jury. Mr. Bliss never left a brief or paper in possession of the grand jury for one minute.

By the CHAIRMAN:

Q. In making that statement do you refer to the printed brief marked A, which appears on page 173 of our record, and to the briefs marked B and C, which appear on page 174, and to the one marked D, which appears on page 175-A. Yes, sir. I have no reason to say that those papers were not in the grand-jury room, but suffer me to explain. Mr. Bliss came in with piles of papers, sometimes with a hamper basket full of papers which it required two men to carry. That was so in the Dorsey case particularly. Every morning he came down to the grand-jury. room with those immense clothes-baskets filled with papers, which it was just impossible for any grand jury to read. These "briefs" of the testimony, which he desired to refer to, Mr. Bliss brought with him, and he first selected a package of papers and then took out of the jackets such papers as he desired to lay before the grand jury and read them for our information.

By Mr. STEWART:

Q. Do you say that he read the papers referred to in the briefs?—A. It is utterly impossible for me to say whether he read all the papers or not. I could not begin to answer that question. I could not say whether he did or not. There was a vast amount of documentary evidence there. I went to the judge and asked the question whether the grand jury were compelled to accept all this mass of material-basket-loads of itas being evidence.

By the CHAIRMAN:

Q. What was the instruction of the court on that point?-A. It was that if we believed that they were official documents from the PostOffice Department, we should accept them as evidence.

By Mr. STEWART:

Q. They were not withheld from your inspection, I suppose? They were open to your inspection, were they not?-A. They were all there. Mr. Bliss had been, as he says, two years eating and sleeping and breathing the Star-route cases, and here were a lot of laymen just brought into the case and expected to make an investigation in regard to it in the course of a few days. But Mr. Bliss never left the grand-jury room leaving any papers in our possession.

By the CHAIRMAN:

Q. Were those large baskets of papers which you have described carried out of the grand-jury room every day?-A. Yes, sir; when the court adjourned they were carried out.

Q. Were they carried out when Mr. Bliss went out?-A. Yes, sir; they went out with him. Not a scrap of paper from the Post-office Department in the shape of an official document was ever left in the possession of the grand jury for an hour. It would seem to me from the reading of these "briefs" that they were simply Mr. Bliss's own briefs or private notes of the testimony that he desired to present. For example, in one place he says:

It would seem, however, that so far as the people everywhere, except at Hamlinton, were concerned, this unauthorized change, while benefiting the contractors, certainly did not injure any one else. But it was a violation of them contracts.

In another brief he says in regard to French: "This fact, I think, I failed to call to the attention of the grand jury." From the reading of these I would suppose that they were simply his private notes or briefs of the testimony that he desired to present.

Q. Can you state whether the documents referred to in the briefs were read to the grand jury and explained?-A. It has been two years since these things took place and I could not say. I can say that it is impressed on my mind very positively that in several cases, I would not like to say how many, the oral testimony did not bear out the documentary evidence.

Q. Now, I will return to the question to which objection was made: Was there any documentary or oral evidence submitted to that grand jury by Mr. Bliss in the case of the United States vs. William P. Kellogg? A. Yes, sir; there were incidental matters brought there in regard to Mr. Kellogg.

Q. Incidental matters ?-A. Yes, sir.

Q. Were witnesses examined?—A. Yes, sir.

Q. Who appeared?-A. Mr. Walsh.

Q. Were there any other witnesses produced in that case?—A. None that I recollect of. I could not say positively.

Q. Was Mr. Walsh sworn and examined by Mr. Bliss in the presence of the jury?—A. Witnesses are not sworn in the presence of the grand jury. The witness goes before the clerk of the court and is there sworn, and a certificate is issued that he has been sworn, and then he is permitted to come before the grand jury.

Q. Did Mr. Walsh appear there and testify?—A. Yes, sir.

Q. How long was he in the presence of the grand jury?—A. Twenty minutes, I should think, would be the limit of the time. I may be mistaken in regard to that.

Q. Did he present any documentary proofs in connection with his oral testimony?-A. Yes, sir; he had some papers with him.

Q. Did he read them to the grand jury, or were they read to the jury?— A. Some, he did; he did not read all the papers that he brought with him.

By Mr. VAN ALSTYNE:

Q. Do you know why he did not read all the papers?-A. I do not. Q. Was he interrogated by Mr. Bliss as to all of them?-A. He was interrogated in regard to certain facts, matters connected with the case; but whether in regard to all of them or not I do not remember; I could not say. Mr. Walsh kept possession of his own papers. Taking a seat in the center of the grand-jury room, as the witnesses always did, he drew up a chair this way [illustrating] and put his papers on it. I was not within ten feet of him, consequently I could not say whether Mr. Bliss interrogated him in regard to all the papers that he had in his possession or not.

Q. Did Mr. Bliss make any statement to the grand jury with regard to the effect of Walsh's testimony or in what way it should have been considered?—A. That is a difficult question to answer. You had Mr. Bliss here long enough to know him pretty well in regard to his manner. He was always talking in regard to something; what was his particular line of thought and idea and language at that particular time I could not pretend to recall now.

Q. Did he prepare and submit to the jury in that case a bill of indictment against Mr. Kellogg?

Mr. STEWART. They do not prepare the indictment until after the bill is found.

Q. The practice here is to file the information first, and upon the presentment by the grand jury the court orders an indictment to be prepared. Then the indictment is prepared and submitted to the grand jury and the foreman indorses it.

Q. And it never was presented in this case?-A. As there was no presentment made to the court of course there was no indictment.

Q. Was there a presentment made by that grand jury against Brady and Price?—A. Not unless it was in one of these three cases which I have referred to. I have no recollection of the names; I could not call up the names.

Q. Did Mr. Bliss state to the grand jury that it was a serious matter to indict a United States Senator?

Mr. VAN ALSTYNE (interposing). Did he say that either in words or in substance?

A. Personally I have no recollection of Mr. Bliss ever having made that remark, and I inquired this morning of two members of the grand Jury, who were with me, if they had any recollection of it, and they said that they had not. Further than that I cannot go.

By the CHAIRMAN:

Q. Was it known to the grand jury that the Kellogg who was mentioned by Mr. Walsh in his testimony was Senator Kellogg?—A. Yes,

sir.

Q. That fact was known to the grand jury?—A. Oh, yes.

Q. Was there any other evilence in that case brought to the attention of the grand jury than that which was brought to their attention by Mr. Bliss-any testimony, paper, or document in the case? The WITNESS. In the Kellogg case?

The CHAIRMAN. Yes.

A. The Kellogg case was not an individual case. The Kellogg case was only an addendum to the Brady case.

Q. But Kellogg was subsequently indicted.-A. That was by another grand jury. I do not know anything about that.

Q. In the case before the grand jury of which you were forman the charge was against Kellogg, Price, and Brady.

Mr. STEWART. He has not said that.

By Mr. STEWART:

Q. What case were you investigating at the time Walsh was exam ined?-A. I am not clear in my recollection in regard to that. It has been two years since.

Q. Was it not the Brady and Price case ?-A. It may have been. I could not say. It must have been before the Brady indictment was found, from facts that are in my mind.

Q. Was it your grand jury that found the indictment against Brady and Price?-A. I think not; I think it was subsequent one.

H. Mis. 38, pt. 2-27*