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- <text id=92TT0504>
- <title>
- Mar. 09, 1992: American Notes:Congress
- </title>
- <history>
- TIME--The Weekly Newsmagazine--1992
- Mar. 09, 1992 Fighting the Backlash Against Feminism
- </history>
- <article>
- <source>Time Magazine</source>
- <hdr>
- NATION, Page 31
- American Notes
- CONGRESS
- Scandal in The Mailroom
- </hdr><body>
- <p> Neither snow nor rain nor gloom of night, it seems, will keep
- the House of Representatives away from scandal. Only last
- October came embarrassing revelations that some lawmakers had
- written rubber checks totaling more than $100,000 at the House
- bank and had tallied $300,000 in free meals at House
- restaurants. Last month the House named a six-member bipartisan
- task force to look into a new imbroglio at the House post
- office.
- </p>
- <p> The facility has more than 100 employees, hired and
- supervised by the lawmakers. As of mid-February, four employees
- had been charged in U.S. District Court with selling cocaine,
- kiting checks and embezzling more than $35,000 from the Federal
- Government. Postmaster Robert Rota is under pressure to resign.
- </p>
- <p> Some Congressmen say the time has come for the House to
- scrap the patronage system and hire a professional administrator
- to oversee its operations. Says Kansas Democrat Dan Glickman:
- "The House has grown...into a 13,000-employee, $875
- billion-a-year operation, but it's managed the same way it was
- 100 years ago."
- </p>
-
- </body></article>
- </text>
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