[229 CONGRESSIONAL PROCEEDINGS. 
The fact that they will hold meetings about the country to interest 
the people in the different cities in their work does not give it any the 
less a national character. 
Mr. Epmunps. I think we had better see the bill in print, not that 
I have the slightest objection to this particular thing, because it is a 
most useful and I dare say valuable arrangement, but it would make 
avery strong precedent for incorporating business corporations with 
power to do business all over the country, and I think the bill ought 
to be printed so as to give us a chance to look at it. 
The PrEsIDENT pro tempore. Shall the bill be referred to a com- 
mittee or lie on the table? 
Mr. Hoar. My honorable friend the chairman of the Committee 
on the Judiciary has himself recently promoted the formation of a 
corporation whose whole business is to be done at Nicaragua, outside 
of the United States, and it strikes me that this objection is a little 
hypercritical, but I have no objection to the reference if he desire it. 
Mr. Epmunps. I may say in reply to my honorable friend from 
Massachusetts that I have promoted to the best of my ability a cor- 
poration to be incorporated by Congress to carry on business in Nica- 
ragua, which I think is an entirely different thing from Congress 
incorporating a body of people to carry on business anywhere in the 
United States, for I believe it concerns our foreign relations and, in a 
very broad sense, the public welfare. That is within the Constitution, 
and I do not think there is any comparison in respect of the power of 
Congress to create a corporation to colonize Africa, if you please, or 
to build a canal through Nicaragua or Panama and a corporation to 
do business in the State of Kansas or of Massachusetts or of Vermont. 
So I must say, with great respect to my honorable friend, that I think 
his implied criticism of my inconsistency is entirely unfounded. 
The PresIDENT pro tempore. Shall the bill be referred to a com- 
mittee or lie on the table? ‘ 
Mr. Epmunps. I move that it be referred to the proper committee. 
The PrestpENT pro tempore. It will be referred to the Committee 
on the Library, if there be no objection, and printed. 
December 19, 1888—Senate. 
Mr. Wiit1am M. Evarts. I am instructed by the Committee on the 
Library, to which was referred the bill (H. 10323) to incorporate 
the American Historical Association, to report it with amendments, 
which are rather in reference to the exactitude of expression than 
otherwise. I ask that the bill may be .put upon its passage. The 
Senate passed a bill at the last session equivalent to this, and the House 
has passed this bill. The changes here made, as will appear from the 
reading of the amendments which I send up, are merely as to the 
exactitude of phrases. 
The President pro tempore (Mr. J. J. Incautus). The Senator from 
