The answers of Mr. Mills and his supporters to these arguments were as indignant as to be expected. “Mr. Speaker,” said Mr. Mills, “we have sent to the Senate a bill to reduce taxation. They had originated in that Chamber, or were preparing before we sent this bill to them, in defiance of the Constitution, a bill increasing taxation on the people of this country, an act which they were prohibited by the great charter of our fathers from doing. They have sent that bill so prepared here in defiance of the rules of this House, and it is now proposed that we accept their invitation to appoint a committee of conference and pass this extraordinary measure, and that, too, at a time when the coffers of this Government are loaded with the excess of revenue, at a time when the people of this country are groaning with unnecessary taxation; a bill to reduce the revenues by destroying the commerce of the country and increasing the load of taxation upon the people for private purposes.” Mr. McMillan was equally severe: “The gentleman from Ohio (Mr. McKinley) has not even pretended that this Senate bill is an ‘amendment’ to the House bill. He could not. He is too intelligent to believe it and too candid to assert it. It is, as he describes it, an entirely different bill; a distinct proposition framed on a different ‘theory.’ As a matter of fact, the Senate does not assume to amend the House bill. The Senate struck out every section of our bill or threw it aside and framed one of their own. In doing so they violated the Constitution, and they now ask us to meet them in conference and concur in this demolition. “What I want to know of the members of this House is, are you ready to do this in the face of that declaration of the gentleman from Ohio that this is a different and new bill? Have you so far degenerated from those principles that your sires held of adherence to the Constitution as to be willing at the request of the gentleman from Ohio to give up the people’s right to frame a bill in accordance with the people’s principles, and give it over to the Senate, not elected by the people directly, but by the states? Others may do as they please, but for me, I will never, never consent to such a cowardly and ignoble degradation of the rights of the people and the privileges of the House.” The Allison Bill went to the Ways and Means Committee and that was the last of it under the name of the gentleman who had led in its making.