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LINCOLN. NBB., SATURDAY. MAY 7. I8US.
"RS
Enteredin the postoitick at Lincoln as
second class matter.
PUBLISHED EVERY SATURDAY
BT
THE COURIER PRINTIIG AND PUBLISHING GO
Office 1132 N street, Up Stairs.
Telephone 384.
SARAH B. HARRIS, Editor
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if advisable.
g OBSERVATIONS. 8
It has been several times announced
through the press since the recent
disastrous fire that unless the city
council shall abrogate its functions
and adopt with reference to the city
fire department, measures dictated by
fire insurance companses without re
gard to the wishes of taxpayers, Are
insurance rates in this city would be
increased from fifteen to twenty-five
per cent. It is reported that at the
last meeting of the council a member
of that body stated that the insurance
companies threatened, if their de
mands with respect to the fire depart
ment were not acceeded to, to at once
raise the rates to such an extent that
$125,000 more per year would be paid
for fire insurance in this city than is
now paid for the same indemnity.
The insolent arrogance of the threat
indicates that it is not entirely di
vorced from a source which has here
tofore assumed to dictate municipal
action but which in one instance at
least during the past year has ignom
inously failed. As a part of the pro.
posed plan a Mr. Ilartman, residing
in Omaha, who is designated as "the
compact manager," was brought to
Lincoln to instruct the city council
as to its public duties, at an executive
session from which the people who
bear the burden of oypressive taxation
were to be excluded. Owing to the
fact that Mr. Ilartman, "compact
manager" from Omaha, could not
afford to spend a night in the city and
as the council did not get ready to ex
elude the people who elected them and
whose servants they are, from their
deliberations until about the time the
late train left for Omaha, the coun
cil was deprived of the immense ad
vantage which must necessarily have
resulted from the disinterested advice
of the distinguished Mr. Ilartman,
"compact manager" from Omaha, as
to how the city should conduct and
manage its municipal affairs.
Under the circumstances it would
have been eminently proper had some
member of the council who "objected
to outside interference," risen in his
place to state that there oould be no
increase in fire insurance rates bene
ficial ro the companies without the
combined and concerted action and
agreement of all the companies doing
a fire insurance business here. He
could have read chapter 81 of the acts
of tlie last legislature which makes it
an offense punishable by the infliction
of a fine of not less than one hundred
dollars and not more that five hun
dred dollars and a revocation of license
authorizing the transaction of busi
ness, for any fire insurance company
or its officers or agents to enter into
any combination or agreement relat
ing to the rates to be charged for in
surance or the manner of transacting
the business of lire insurance in this
state. He might with profit have as
sumed a belligerent attitude and in
formed the "compact manager' and
his employers, the insurance com
panies, that at the first attempt on
the part of the insurance companies
to make good their threat and increase
the rates, the council would at once
proceed to enforce the law which re
quires such companies to pay a tax in
proportion to the value of their prop
erty and franchises regardless of the
act which the companies induced the
legislature to pass some years ago un
der which the personal property of
such companies is now valued for the
purposes of taxation. In conclusion
he could with propriety have handed
to Mr. Ilartman, "compact manager,"
his passports with the friendly sug
gestion that he immediately return to
Omaha and there among the adherents
of Hitchcock and Rosewater seek that
appreciation which he failed to arouse
in Lincoln.
The cost of running the city of Lin
coln amounts to just a hundred dollars
a day more than the total income. A
business man who managed his own
affairs so disproportionately would
lose credit and the respect of every
sane man. The council knows the
condition of the city treasury, yet
when importuned by representatives
of those who pay the larger part of
the taxes to reduce the expenses of the
city to its income, certain members
of the council talk about "outside in
terference." Messrs. "Winnett, Guth
rie and Webster are conscientiously
trying to make the expenses coincide
with the income but so far without
success. To vote taxes t.n other peo
ple's property is much easier than to
resist the appeals and votes of indi
vidual firemen and policemen and
supernumerary clerks though neither
the one nor the other class do a labor
equivalent for their wages. One of
the policemen w ho was afraid of losing
his job inadvertently remarked that
he had not worked for so long that he
had forgotten how. Yet the majority
of the council disregard the necessity
for a reduction of expenses. As a last
resort the citizens whose property is
being confiscated can enjoin the coun
cil from spending more than there is
in the treasury or from increasing the
assessment and there is a growing in
clination among the too-patient tax
payers to use the recourse accorded
by the statutes.
ji
It is not surprising that the officers
of the regular army are cheerfully
alert and a trifle impatient of the
pathetic farewells accompanied by in
undated tokens of affection which
female relatives are bestowing upon
the boys in blue with yellow gaiters.
The time has come which justifies
the existence of the military and
its cost. The volunteers are doing
their every day duty and the officers
fear that these pre-funeral services
will unfit the privates from regarding
themselves as humble portions of a
great machine. Peace to the military
is abnormal. War is the natural and
the expected and the civilians' ex
citemement and tears before any one
has been hurt, belong to the habits
and modes of thought of civil life
which your true soldier feels, if he
does not express, a contempt for. The
commandants, who in their lonely gar
rison life, have spent their spare time
in studying military science, who
know the number and quality of the
United States soldiery, who have
planned campaigns as successful and
brilliant as those of Grant's and Slier
man's and who have despaired of any
opportunity to prove their devotion to
their profession and their country are
now exultantly on their way to Chick
amauga or one of the other southern
points of mobilization. The3 do not
spend much thought over the danger
they are gallantly marching into ex
cept In that one sharp moment of
farewell from their families. They
think neither of danger nor discom
fort but of plans for the healthful
feeding and lodging of their troops of
how quickest to execute commands
from headquarters, of matters of dis
cipline and order and again of the
safety and comfort of their troops.
There are no idle tears on the faces of
these veteran officers whose oppor
tunity lias come for which they were
graduated twenty or thirty years ago,
and for which they have been study
ing and preparing ever since. Ten
years more of peace, and the grudging
appropriations for the military would
have been still f urtheT lessened, and
soldiers would be an anarchronism.
2o wonder then that the middle-aged
alumnae of the military academies are
cheerful and preoccupied. War is like
a revival of business to the merchant
and money lender. They are no
longer pensionaries-of the government
but its indispensable bulwarks and the
change from a dependant position to
a responsible one is a relief that fore
bodings can not alter.
j
"Rupert of Hentzau," Anthony
Hope's sequel to The Prisoner of
Zenda, now appearing in McCIure's
continues to cause a great deal of spec
ulation as to to whether the author
will dare allow thej-oung Englishman,
to reign in Ruritania. But the un
likely, if not impossible is no longer
miraculous when recorded by Anthony
Hope. The Englishman's fidelity and
chivalry force him into assuming the
personality of the king and when the
real king is killed his cousin cannot
disavow his pretensions without en
dangering the fame of his lady the
queen. The only obstacle now be
tween Rudolph Rassendyl and the
throne of Ruritania is Anthony Hope's
timidity. He is strengthening and
multiplying the circumstances which
make it next to impossible for Ras
sendyl to be anything but a pretender
for the rest of his life. When honor,
loyalty and self-interest are on one
side and hatred of a false position on
the other and an Englishman, created