The results of the year 1884 were chiefly interesting because they demonstrated, after much bitter debate and heated discussion, that the cause of the new navy had acquired impetus sufficient to vanquish the party passions of even so violent a Presidential campaign as that which marked that year. That campaign over, the Forty-eighth Congress, at its second session, took up with zeal the promotion of the new navy, and the act approved March 3, 1885, authorized four additional vessels, toward the construction of which $1,895,000 was appropriated with practical unanimity. The Act of March 3, 1885, marked an epoch in the history of the new navy. Prior to that time, the legislative practice had been to require separate enactment to authorize the construction of new vessels for the navy. In this case the authorization appeared in the body of the regular Naval Appropriation Bill, and that practice has been followed ever since. This innovation was debated in Committee of the Whole, and a point of order made to strike out the proposed authorization. The point of order was overruled by Hon. James B. McCreary, a Democratic member from Kentucky, with the approval of Speaker John G. Carlisle; Mr. McCreary being Chairman of the Committee of the Whole on the Naval Bill. Mr. McCreary ruled: 1st. That legislation in pursuance of any settled or established policy was germane in the annual appropriation bill which dealt with that subject matter. 2d. That the increase of the navy was clearly a settled and established policy, to which all branches of the government were committed. 3d. That in view of that fact the authorization of additional vessels of war could not be considered new legislation in the meaning of the rules, but must be regarded as progressive legislation in a direction previously sanctioned by Congress; that therefore the authorization of new ships was germane to the regular naval appropriation bill for each year, and was in order.