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YOLIY. NO. 20. NEBRASKA CITY , ; NOVEMBER 21 , 1901. SINGLE COPIES , 5 CENTS.
PUBLISHED WEEKLY.
OFFICES : OVERLAND THEATRE BLOCK.
J. STERLING MORTON , EDITOR.
A JOURNAL DEVOTED TO THE DISCUSSION
Or POLITICAL , ECONOMIC AND SOCIOLOGICAL
QUESTIONS.
CIRCULATION THIS WEEK , 13,915 COPIES.
TERMS OF SUBSCRIPTION.
One dollar and a half per , year in advance ,
postpaid to any part of the united States or
Canada.Remittances made payable to The
Morton Printing Company.
Address , THE CONSERVATIVE , Nebraska
City , Nebraska.
Advertising rates made known upon appli
cation.
Entered at the postoffice at Nebraska City ,
Neb. , as Second Class matter , July 29 , 1898.
Adjutant Gener-
ARMY TRANSal Corbin invites at-
PORT SERVICE , tention , in his an
nual report , to the
enormous expense of the army transport
service and recommends , on the grounds
of economy , that it be discontinued , and
the supplies for our armies in our insu
lar possessions and the troops to and
from them be transported by contract
and on the farther grounds of lending
encouragement to commerce between
these possessions and the States , by giv
ing business to shipping companies.
This economical part sounds well in
the public ear , for the people are ever
ready to listen to any proposition to out
down public expenses and taxation , and
particularly so to any suggestion that
will reduce the enormous expense of the
second-hand war we took off the hands of
Spain in the Philippines , at stupendous
cost and twenty millions dollars bonus
in addition.
The Conservative does not question
for one moment that our army transport
service costs too much , but does not be
lieve in its abolishment purely upon the
grounds advanced by General Oorbin.
Nor upon any other grounds until after
a cool , deliberate consideration of the en
tire subject.
First and foremost , it is generally be
lieved that the original purchase prices
of our army trans-
Purchase Prices , ports were two or
three times larger
than they should have beenand that their
conversion into transports , alteration
and repairs have been too great in the
same ratio , and that their running ex
penses could and should have been much
less , and may be materially out down
with much saving to the government
and no detriment to the service. These
are matters that can be definitely de
termined by a thoroughly competent
and honest investigation.
It is claimed that the transports lie
idle much of the time , or unnecessarily
are overh a u 1 e d ,
Indolent Boats , painted , etc. , about
every time they get
into port , at fabulous cost , and more in
the interests of those who get the con
tracts for the work and supply the ma
terial than in the interests of the ser
vice. In fact , the captain of one char
tered transport avowed that his ship was
kept waiting over in Manila Bay fifty-
three days , with steam up all the time ,
at government expense , besides the con
tract price of $750.00 per diem paid the
steamship company.
But what was worse , he avowed that
there was a whole fleet of transports ,
public and char-
Monumental Waste , tered , lying idle
near him the whole
time. There is another report that a
ship was chartered at fabulous rates for
a horse transport in which there was an
agreement that if the government re
tained the ship a certain number of days ,
it would revert to the government and
become public property ; that it was
then overhauled , fixed up with stalls
and other conveniences for transporting
horses and mules , at thousands of dollars
lars expense ; that a few days before the
ship would have reverted to the govern
ment , according to the contract , it was
released to the owners , restored to its
former condition by the government at
a cost that would have more than con
tinued the lease until it would have be
come public property ; but after all this
the same ship was soon so chartered for a
horse transport and again fitted up at
enormous cost to the government.
It is no secret that General Gorbin
himself , with his party , monopolized a
large part of a
Personal Extransport in a
travagance. junketing trip to
the Philippines last
summer , and that for weeks he had ex
elusive use of the transport Lawton
visiting the interesting points in the
Archipelago and on the coast of China
and this while hundreds of officers ant
thousands of men , many of them sick
were waiting at Manila for transporta
tion to the States and this at a cost o
thousands upon thousands of dollars to
the transport service.
Shipping companies complain tha
many people , not connected with the
v military service.nor
Parasites. even the public ser
vice in any way ,
are furnished transportation to and from
Manila on the transports to the loss of
heir legitimate traffic. Indeed , it is
said that some of this class of people
mve made trips around the world on the
army transports. The legitimate cost
of the transport service is necessarily
arge but there has been no doubt much
abuse and unnecessary expense that can
> e eliminated.
"We quote the following from the
Army and Navy Journal , touching upon
; his subject :
"In a personal letter , an officer of the
army says : 'I hope the Journal will
fight tooth and nail against abolishing
; he army transport system. No doubt a
big syndicate would like to get our
transports at half , quarter , or one-tenth
their worth , and then transport our
droops and supplies at their own rates.
The voyage to and from our insular
possessions is a long , weary hardship to
our troops , and no chartered vessels have
yet been properly provided for half way
decent care of our troops air space.cook-
ing convenience and hospital accommo
dations. Our troops go but little better
off than horses or cattle on chartered
boats , and no private enterprise can be
relied upon for good service at least
any equal to that ou.our own transports.
I consider them as necessary for our for
eign service as guns for our artillery , as
horses for our cavalry. ' "
To which may be added that if the
shipping company can get also big pay
for carrying the mail , and then a large
subsidy from the government to encour
age our shipping interests , that part of
our shipping interests ought to feel suf
ficiently encouraged to go ahead.
General Corbin gives as another reas
on for discontinuing the army trans
port service , its irregular delivery of the
mail at Manila. As the transports are
wholly under the control of the govern
ment , indeed the war department , and
as their number is ample , the regularity
of their departure depends solely upon
the proper exercise of military authority
in the management.
Before the army transport service is
abolished because of reasons advanced
by Gen. Corbin , a searching hunt should
be made for "A nigger in the wood
pile. " Possibly there may be a colored
corporation desirous of making a few
low-priced contracts with our common