The Sun.
London, England, 1869-02-22 00:00:00

i_ 711 E WAR CHID,

►F 7HE FUTURE.

General SCHOFIELD'S evidence before the Military
) Committee of the Congressional Representatives is
worth attention in England. That officer is the
Secretary of War, and the work before the Com-
mittee was to obtain materials to instruct the House
in the means of working most effectively the mili-
tary forces of the United States at the lowest cost.
Now this is precisely the problem before the British
Government; and the evidence and opinions of such
celebrated and experienced officers as Gen. SCHO.
FIELD and of men taught in the practical school of
war, such as the chiefs of the Pay Department,
Commissariat Department, and Quartermaster's
Department, should be closely scrutinized by
English statesmen. The evidence hitherto has been
to advise the consolidation into one of all these de-
partmen ts, also the Ordnance and Artillery Bureaux
with the Engineer Corps and the Coast Survey.
The officers of the United States who know most
of these matters seem to concur in this recommen-
dation, startling as it may he to English officials.
The gist, however, of the General's evidence will
make the hair of the Admiralty, War-office, and
Horse Guards, wherever hair grows there, rise up
in horror—for he says war is one thing, not two,
and should be controlled by a single official only,
both for the army and the navy, each branch
being under the direction of a professional officer,
that for the land by a General, and for the sea
by an Admiral. In a few words, what he pro-
poses is but one Secretary of State for War, and
the principle to be recognized that whoever com-
mands, whether it be fleets operating with troops
against forts, or a General fighting a battle on
shore aided by gunboats, that the whole should be
a single, not a divided command. He did not be-
lieve in army and navy co-operation in war, hold-
ing that they were more likely to work at cross
purposes than to pull together. This is not the
opinion of a novice, but of a war-worn veteran
who has distinguished himself in many ways. Even
Washi%ton ;atat:tled by the boldness of. such
a ihrfitairreton its plain; Pietargrienie re-
commends it to the people. Those who know any-
thing of the English system must fully acknowledge
that there is no other country that more requires
such a unification. The machinery for setting in
motion the war power of the kingdom is as cumber-
some, complicated, and ineffective as ages of old work
patched and abuses could make it. There is no
use in adding a wing to the War-office or a storey
to the Horse Guards, making the former one-sided
and the other top-heavy, or scooping out a base-
ment for ballast in the building where the Lords
of the Admiralty gather, while a head is what
is wanted. There is not a man in England who
can accurately define the respective powers of the
Secretary of State for War and the Commander-
in-Chief, nor of their relations to the Admiralty,
nor the connection when they come together, of the
Navy and Army. The Minister of War scarcely
knows for what he is responsible to Parliament, but
he does know that he is responsible for much over
which he has little control. There is but one ad-
vantage the system possesses. When an office
seeker asks for a commission, or a post in connec-
tion with the army, he or she (more generally "she"
than " he") is met at the Horse Guards by the de-
claration that they have nothing to do with that, it
is under the control of the War-office. Off goes
the unfortunate applicant to the War-office, where
he is told that they have nothing to do with it, as
the arrangement rests with the Horse Guards. If
he persists, the chances are he eventually finds his
way into the Treasury, where he is " promptly
ditched." Mr. BRIGHT, in his now celebrated
speech at Fishmongers' Hall, declared that his
office, the Board of Trade, was one of advice, not of
action ; that the other departments were always
sending to his for advice, which, when given, they
never took. Now, this is the condition existing be-
tween the War-office and the Horse Guards. They
are Boards for advising each other, both exemplify-
ing the good old British system of " How not to do it."
If Mr. BRIGHT really saw his way to a reduction of
£20,000,000 a year in the national expenditure of
the United Kingdom he must have seen the plan
proposed by Gen. ScIIOFIELD, as applicable to Eng-
land, for it is only by such sweeping reforms a
saving so enormous could be effected. A Minister of
State controlling the war forces of the country and
responsible to the nation is what Gen. SCHOFIELD
aims at, with a single great office, over one wing of
which presides the General in control of theArmy,and
over the other the Admiral in control of the Navy,
each with its various Departments. The two chief
savings would be in expenditure and in unity of
action, which mean economy and efficiency. War
is one thing, not two, and should be the business of
one responsible Minister, with a head of the land
force on one side, and a head of the sea force on
the other. The whole plan of action would then
be before the individual chosen for the purpose, and
around his table would sit not only the chiefs of the
two great branches, but the heads of the depart-
ments which work each. The Minister could then
go from such a Council to a Cabinet meeting, not
to wrangle with the Secretary of another department,
but to lay before his colleagues the full and com-
prehensive combined Flan of action, and when it re-
ceived the sanction of the Executive his nod would set
the whole into motion. Can any person say that
this is not at least reasonable, nor that only, for
it is emphatically the plan by which despotic Go-
vernments work ? It is in copying a part, but not
the whole, by which such countries as the United
States and the United Kingdom make a muddle of
their military departments. An Emperor is always
himself the War-Chief we advocate, arranging and
controlling the whole strength of the nation, which
he sets into motion at a word. We copy the de-
partments, but not the unity of action by which
they are worked. The sooner the Anglo-Saxon
race adoßts for war purposes, the Russian, the
French, the German principle, so far as the respec-
tive constitutions of their countries will permit, the
better it will be for both nations, not only as a matter
of retrenchment, but as a matter of efficiency ; and
we would urge on the attention of Mr. CARDWELL
the advisability of procuring from the United States,
if Congress does not object, a copy of the evidence
tendered before the Military Committee.—Anglo-
American 7 imes.

Mr. Nelson has introduced a resolution into the
Tennessee Senate to amend the State constitution by strik-
ing out the word " male," which will vest the suffrage as
well in the women of the State. Tho preamble to this
resolution asserts that woman should bo the equal
of man before the laws and before the world,
as she is before God; that justice is the highest ex-
pediency, and that universal suffrage should be the
inalienable right of every law-abiding individual capable
of an independent national choice; that representation
should accompany taxation, and that woman, like man,
when arraigned for an infraction of the laws, should have
the right of a trial by her peers.
The President has appointed Professor W. P.
Blake, of San Francisco, and Edward H. Tilton, Esq., of
Philadelphia, Assay Commissioners of the Mint, in place
of Professor J. Upson, of Uamilton Cullege, and A. J.
Drexel, of Philadelphia, who declined.
Viscount Brenier de Moutmorand, Consul of
France at Shanghae, is appointed Consul-General at New
York, and is replaced in Shanghae by M. de Cazotto, Con-
sul at San Francisco.
In the Court of Oyer and Terminer, on Satur-
day, Jan. 30, George S. Twitchell, jun., was sentenced to
1 Government
againsterM a
them n ,
confessing of
w Nhei c 7:
York, V
its
N 0
execution for the murder of Mrs. Hill, the motion for a
new trial having been refused.
in-
abilityh a vS ei ffibtoeone nrardnoi dsdcuhScae testimonyirggedi s m
deGU i l
uld
warrant their being held for trial in the great smuggling
case. The Government has also comp • romised the civil
suit instituted for $53,000. Is not this
compounding a
felony, and does not the Government allow itself a latitude
denied to the citizens?

Brooklyn has been excited by an elopement in
"high" life; the wife of a New York cotton broker hav-
ing decamped to Europe with the son of a rich Chicago
grain merchant.

The American Association for Improving the
Condition of the POOl assisted 3,130 families, comprising
11,320 persons, during the mouth of January. The total
amount of money expended was 57,133 Pt.
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Depot 266, iligh Hollagn

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