Juggled Bonds

Another week's dredging of the Oil Scandals produced proof of how Oilman Harry Ford Sinclair's contributions to the G. O. P. in 1923, after a Republican cabinet member had furtively enriched Sinclair with the Teapot Dome lease, were camouflaged by the G. O. P. management. The star witness was James A. Patten, fellowtownsman of Vice President Dawes (Evanston, Ill.)--plainspoken, upstanding, oldtime "wheat king" of the Chicago Board of Trade.

Mr. Patten appeared before the Senate Committee on Public Lands bursting with readiness to talk. He had, he felt, been duped by a man he called his friend. This was his story:

In 1923, the late Fred W. Upham, then national G. O. P. treasurer, asked Mr. Patten to write out a check for $25,000 to help meet the deficit incurred in the Harding campaign. He said he would give Mr. Patten $25,000 worth of Liberty Bonds in return. The deficit still amounted to six or eight hundred thousands, Mr. Upham told Mr. Patten.

"My first impression," testified Mr. Patten, "was that I was indignant and mad at the tremendous expense the Republican Committee had gone to. . . . I simply stormed and I am afraid I used bad language."

Mr. Patten explained that Mr. Upham had a "taking" way with him. Mr. Upham used to say to Mr. Patten: "I am the dearest friend you've got. I cost you the most money." Mr. Patten, realizing that the deficit had to be met, handed over a check for $25,000. Mr. Upham said he would soon deliver the bonds.

"The more I thought of it, the less I liked its appearance," Mr. Patten testified. Why should Treasurer Upham dispose of bonds belonging to the G. O. P. so privately when there was a quick public market for them any day? Mr. Patten worried about it in bed that night. Next day he rid himself of these queer bonds by giving them as his subscription to the Evanston Hospital.

Serial numbers on the Liberty Bonds thus used to obtain a cash contribution in Mr. Patten's name, identified them last week as part of the $160,000 given by Sinclair to the G. O. P.--a sum which Treasurer Upham and his furtive colleague, onetime National G. O. P. Chairman Will H. Hays, were at great pains to conceal.

Satisfied that Mr. Patten had known nothing of the Sinclair-Hays-Upham machinations, Senator Walsh asked Mr. Patten if he knew of other Chicagoans who had similarly been asked to give cash for Liberty Bonds. Mr. Patten knew of none such, but he spoke freely of other Chicago patrons of the G. O. P. He named William Wrigley, "who is in Chicago hardly one month out of the year," and Arthur Cutten, another grain man. "I presume the McCormicks would come in that list," Mr. Patten added.

Senator Walsh, looking surprised and a little hurt, said: "I would suppose they contributed on the other side."

Mr. Patten: "Well, Cyrus calls himself a Democrat, but I don't know. Cyrus is a Democrat, I guess, because he was born that way, but I think he votes the Republican ticket about as often. . . ."

After Mr. Patten had stepped down, the Committee obtained more Chicago names from William V. Hodges, present G. O. P. treasurer, and prepared to summon them. It also sought the late Mr. Upham's secretary, one A. V. Leonard.

Then came another jolt for slippery Will H. Hays. In the mass of testimony, the Committee came upon a memorandum bearing minute pencil notations. A microscope revealed four names: "Weeks," "Andy," du Pont," "Butler." Two of these names the Committee could understand. In his testimony Mr. Hays had mentioned sending $25,000 of Sinclair's Liberty Bonds to the late John W. Weeks, at that time Secretary of War. Another $75,000 had gone to U. S. Senator Thomas Coleman du Pont, to meet a note due in Manhattan. Mr. Hays had not mentioned "Andy" or "Butler."

Said Senator Nye: "And who is Andy?' "

The witness (a Manhattan cashier): "I have no idea who 'Andy' can be. I can think of no one known as 'Andy.'"

While the Committee awaited an explanation from William Morgan Butler, present G. O. P. chairman, Secretary of the Treasury Andrew Mellon explained who "Andy" was. He had, he said, received $50,000 worth of Sinclair's Liberty Bonds from Mr. Hays, who asked for $50,000 cash in exchange. "Andy" said he had declined to have anything to do with the bonds, but contributed $50,000 outright. The investigators were sorry "Andy" had been so slow to disclose this additional light on the Hays-Sinclair performance, and invited him to come over from the Treasury Department to tell more about it.

Chairman Butler telegraphed that he had never received any of Sinclair's Liberty bonds from Mr. Hays. At the same time, Senator Borah published a letter that he had just written to Chairman Butler: ". . . The Republican party received large sums . . . from Mr. Sinclair, which the Republican party cannot in honor and decency keep. . . . The whole transaction . . . had in view an ulterior and sinister purpose. . . . I feel that this money should be returned to the source from which it came. We cannot in self-respect or in justice to the voters in the party keep it. . . . I venture the opinion that there are plenty of Republicans who will be glad to contribute from one dollar up to any reasonable sum, to clear their party of this humiliating stigma. . . ."

Chairman Butler's reply to Senator Borah was found "unsatisfactory" by the latter, who refused to publish it. Voters awaited further news of "this humiliating stigma."