rSSr-rw-fB(Wiwp'-R
6
The Commoner
VOLUME 3, 'NUMBER 24
f" T"7?F'T3TP"
iRCCURKeNT TOPICS 11
IT IS BECOMING MORE AND MORE APPAR
ent that a rigid congressional inquiry into
tue affairs of the postofllce department as well as
into those of all other departments of the fed
eral service willj)e necessary. On July 22 Fourth
Assistant Postmaster General Bristow announced
" that Charles Hedges had been removed from the
office of superintendent of tho free delivery post
oflice department. The charge against Mr. Hedges
Is that ho falsified his diary and loaned his trav
eling commission. It is alleged that Hedges re
ported himself as being at various places when
in fact he was not at those places on the dates
mentioned, in some instances being hundreds of
miles away. Mr. Hedges has issued a statement
la his own defense asserting that while Mr.
Machen was ill he (Hedges) was called to Wash
ington to take charge of the entire service, that
while he so acted he received $2,000 salary as as
sistant superintendent while Mr. Machen received
$3,500. Mr. Hedges says that it was necessary lor
him to obtain a per diem allowance in order to
mat.o up the difference in salary, tho theory being
that strictly speaMng under the law ho was not
entitled to per diem when at headquarters. On
July 22 It was announced that John R. Garrison
of the treasury department had been appointed
auditor of the District of Columbia to succeed
James T. Peity who was removed as a result of
tho alleged embezzlement of $73,000 of the funds
of the office by James M. A. Watson, a clerk.
Petty was pormitted to resign. ,
IT IS NOW WELL UNDERSTOOD THAT AN
organized movement is on foot looking to
the political destruction of Fourth Assistant Post
master General Bristow. The rural free delivery
service was recently placed under Mr. Bristow's
charge and the officials in that service are very
hostile to the fourth assistant postmaster general.
It has been charged that Mr. Bristow is not at all
friendly to the rural free delivery scheme. His
friends deny this accusation and say that the
charge is made only for the purpose of forcing
Bristow's removal or resignation. It is claimed
that behind this antl-Bristow move will be found
many of the officials of the rural free delivery ser
vice as well .as the friends of tnose republican
officeholders who have been exposed as a result of
Bristow's investigations. The Washington corre
spondent for the New York World says that every
senator and representative who has heretofore
utilized the rural free delivery patronage in build
ing up his personal machine is also after Mr.
Bristow's official head.
MR. BRISTOW'S FRIENDS ADMIT THAT A
powerful fight Js being waged against him,
but they say that Mr. Bristow declined to begin
tho postofflce Investigation until ho was personally
assured by the president that he would be pro
tected after its conclusion. Mr. Bristow is credited
with having said: "But one fate overtakes the
investigator, ho always gets singed." Tho Wash
ington correspondent for the World says: "The
politicians have waited for a pretext to make war
on Mr. Bristow, and it has now come in the alle
gation that he is unfriendly to rural free delivery.
His announced policy that each route must have
100 families, with 3,000 pieces of mall matter af
forded the opportunity desired. He had previous
ly announced that In the establishment of routes
the indorsement of a senator or representative
should weigh no more than tho ordinary citizen.
Protests against Mr. Bristow are now pouring in
to Oyster Bay and coming to tho postmaster gen
eral. Ho Is credited with being an enemy to rural
froo delivery and seeking to ruin the service.
Rural free delivery is tho popular fad of tho
masses and no more appropriate watchword could
be chosen than that Mr. Bristow Is hamperinc tho
isystem." b
THE OPINION IS EXPRESSED BY THIS
Washington correspondent that tho presi
dent is not likely to long hold out against the
combined solicitations of all the men In public
life; that ho must yield sooner or later and that
then Mr. Bristow must either withdraw from tho
service or have his power taken away from him.
s correspondent says that on September 1,
1902, Mr. Bristow was slated for dismissal and
only the fact that he had gained some renown
through his Investigation of the postal scandals
in Cuba saved his position at that time. It is re
ported that Senators Hanna, Elkins, and Scott of
West Virginia, are leading tho crusade against
Bristow and while it is admitted that Bristow's
success in the present inquiry will servo as a
means of grace for a time, it is predicted by this
correspondent that "when the newness has dimin
ished and the edge of his achievements is dead
ened, his retirement seems inevitable." At the
same time it will be readily understood that Mr.
Roosevelt will be a bi embarrassed when ho
comes to yield to the demands for Bristow's scalp.
Outside of a few republican politicians and other
interested persons no one believes that Mr. Bris
tow is at all hostile to the rural free delivery
scheme. He is generally regarded as a faithful
public official whose only offense has been that
he has sought to discharge his duty without fear
or favor and that he has been tho relentless foe
of corruption In his department Mr. Roosevelt
may find it inconvenient to refuse to yield to the
clamor of influential republican politicians, but
he will doubtless discover that whenever Mr.
Bristow is removed there will be a very general
demand among the people for a reasonable excuse
, for the dismissal of a faithful public official.
ip ac
WILLIAM A. MILLER WAS RECENTLY RE
moved from the position of assistant fore
man in the government printing office on the
ground that he had been expelled from tho local
union of the international brotherhood of book
binders. Complaint was made to the civil ser
vice commission and that body demanded that
Mr. Miller be reassigned to duty. On July 13 Mr.
Roosevelt wrote to tho secretary of commerce, in
whose department the government printing office
Is, directing that Miller bo reinstated. In that
letter Mr. Roosevelt said that he would withhold
final decision of the whole case until he had re
ceived the report of the investigation. In this let
ter Mr. Roosevelt said: "On the face of the papers
presented Mnler would appear to have been re
moved in violation of law. There Is no objection
to the employes of the government printing office
constituting themselves Into a body if they so
desire, but no rules or resolutions of that union
can be permitted to override the laws of the
United States, which it is my sworn duty to en
force. Please communicate a copy of this letter
to tho public printer for his information and that
of his subordinates." The book-binders union
has issued a statement with relation to the Mil
ler case. In this statement It is said that the or
ganization does not seek to direct tho policies or
to conduct the affairs of the government printing
office, but that the rules of the same control all the
union officers in tho country. In this statement
it is said that Mr. Miller ignored the notices to ap
pear before the delegates of his union and says
that while the union has never requested Miller's
discharge from the government printing office, the
union's constitution forbids members to work,
with a suspended or expelled member.
ft. tf
THE CENSUS BUREAU HAS ISSUED AN IN
terestlng report concerning the electric rail
dys of the country. The Brooiuyn Citizen says
that this report "puts at rest all rumors regard
ing the greater prosperity and stability of steam
roads; for, it shows clearly tho increase in the
wp of HPPtrioity as a motive power with a cor
responding abandonment of other forms of en
ergy and the extension of the trackage used every
wiiere." in this report it is shown that there are
817 operating street and electric railway companies
in the United States, and 170 which are leased to
? , . L whicn tnoy aro operated, making- a to
tal of 987 companies controlling 22,577 miles of
single track; while the par value of tho capital
?oonkooaonodftn?nded debt outstanding amounted to
?J,dU8,282,099. The income aggregated $250,504,027,
and tho expenditures $219,907,650; and it was
found by statistical calculation that while the
operating expenses had increased since 1890 129.5
per cent, the income had 'increased 173.2 per cent
showing unmistakably that as a whole tho com
panies had prospered in proportion as they sup
plied "a long-felt want" There were paid in
salaries of officials and clerks $7,439,716, and as
wages of 133,641 employes $80,770,449, to which
immense sum nearly 5,000,000,000 passengers con
tributed by the payment of fares; this bemir in
1902 an Increase of 3,000,000,0u0 since 1890.
T7 OR THE LAST DECADE ALL RUSSIAN
JL vessels have enjoyed the unusual privilecG
of having the Suez canal dues refunded by tho
state exchequer. It was recently announced from
Odessa that the Russian minister of finance had
decided that this practice should be continued lor
another decade, although of late years it has cos
tho imperial government about 100,000 pounds ner
annum. Some objection has been raised to this
priyilege being given to the Russian vessels as it
frequently happens that vessels trading in ports
in European Russia or the far .east are under the
Russian flag while in reality they are partly owned
by men of other nations and that, as is often Uio
case, when their cargoes are consigned to foreign
European ports, the refunded canal dues of 9
francs per ton are really a premium paid directly
into the pockets of non-Russian ship owners. De
spite these objections, however, the minister of
- finance has determined to continue the concessions
for another ten years.
THE NEWSPAPERS OF THE COUNTRY
have recently contained references to what
"W. T. Stead, the noted newspaper correspondent,
calls "the latest outrage perpetrated upon tho
moral sense of mankind." nis applies to the de
cision to impose upon the Inhabitants of India
one-half the cost of maintaining in South Africa
a British garrison. Mr. Stead declares that be
fore the late war a garrison of 6,000 men was
ample to keep the British flag flying in that sec
tion of the world and he adds that after spend
rog 200,000,000 sterling and killing 40,000 men,
20,000 children and 5,000 women, it is now dis
covered that flags are unsafe unless South Africa
- is permanently garrisoned by '25,000 men.
THE MASSACRE OF THE KING AND QUEEN
of Servia together with several members of
tue royal household and the subsequent accession
of Peter I. to the ill-fated throne has served to
call attention to many phases of the situation in
Servia, One curious fact is pointed out in a re
cent cablegram from Belgrade. This refers to tho
fact that no king of Servia has possessea a crown
since the fourteenth century and it seems that tho
new monarch has determined that he must havo
one at last He has therefore delegated the task
of discovering the form of the ancient crowns worn
by tho kings of Servia in olden times and tho
search is being made In all the libraries within
his reach, in order to ascertain how the new
crown shall be constructed. One report has it
that the treasury in Servia is so depleted that tho
king must pay for the bauble out of his own
pocket
? v?
AN INTERESTING COMPARISON OF THE
ship building activity in America today with
what it was some time ago was recently made by
a writer in Leslie's Weekly. This writer declares
that in the early days of the industry fine ship
building timber grew right down to the shore
on the Atlantic coast and that there was hardly
a bay on the New England shore where there was
not a ship building yard. This writer says: "Ships
built of Essex oak are famous for their longevity.
The oldest ship in the world, the mail schooner
viligaut, running into St. Croix, French West In
dies, is now under the French flag, but was built,
bo I have been told, in 1802, of Essex oak, at Es
sex, Mass., and was long under the stars and
stripes. But, alas! Americans in these days can
neither afford to build ships nor to sail them as
American ships, except in the coastwise trade,
where they are protected by law. It costs nearly
one-fourth more to build a steel steamship in
America than in England or Germany, and when
they are built they are either not as good or
are more unlucky. The underwriters' records
show that American-built ships do not stand the
racket compared with the Clyde product" '
to SO
THE STORY OF HOW MEERSCHAUM, THE
beautiful white earth which Is used for
making expensive pipes, Is mined and made up
Is told by a writer in the Cincinnati Enquirer.
This writer says that the clay is found in excep-