The Montana post., 1869-04-09

tnero are permanently kept lU0 c0mpa-
nies of infantry and cavalry. The an
nual cost of an infantry regiment in
those distant regions is over 81 ,000. 900
"a cavalry regiment about 81 000, 900.
Rations, forage and general supplies for
these troops and posts have to be trans-
ported immense distances by wagons
and at the very highest known rates of
freight. At the last session of Congress
the point was made before a comm ittee
of the Senate that it the Kansas Pacific
road. commonly called the Eastern Di-
vision, was complete TO Albuquerque,
the larger part of the cost of this milita~
~ service and maintenance could be
saved TO the government General Sher-
man came before the committee and ties.
titled that If that road was in operation
10 the point named, one-half of the
troops could be dispensed with, and 3d.
SOC, 900 year be saved to the country.
The total annual saving to the Treas>
ury of the United States by the use of
section of the Kansas Pacific railroad,
only 466 miles long, from the end of its
subsidy in western Kansas southwest>
ward to Albuquerque. would amount TO
the immense sum of s ,0S2 S72.
BY n provision of Pacific railroad acts
30 per cent. of the compensation for SER
vice to the government is retained by
the Secretary of the Treasury to be ap-
piled to the payment of the interest and
the principal of the bonds advanced in
aid of the roads. In addition to the facts
above set forth the House Military Com
mittee found that the annual saving of
81 ,0S3, ,S12 would not only keep down the
interest of the bonds then asked for TO
build the Kansas Pacific road from Fort
Wallace to Albuquerque. but would pro-
vide an annual sinking fund, which. in
connection with the retention OF 30 per
cent. of the government transportation
dues, would wipe out the whole loan.
principal and interest, in SIX years
twenty-four years before it would fall
due.
A similar necessity for a railroad
to avoid the enormous expense of n
wagon transportation of military sup~
plies exists in the region between Lake
Superior and Puget sound. Within il
are 100 900 Indians. OF United States
military posts there are %. There are
of cavalry, artillery, and infantry 76
companies permanently stationed. The
stores required to supply them amount
TO 22,995 tons per annum. The cost of
Transporting these stores, estimated on
the basis OF contracts reported by the
Secretary of War in 1867. and the dis
tances declared by the Quartermaster
General IN 1867, is the enormous sum of
Sc, ,15S, 972.
There will be an immense conflict to
determine the question, which no philan-
thropy and no policy can avoid. whether
the northern region of the United States
between the lakes and the ocean, shall
be kept as an antelope park and buffalo
range for the use of the Indian hunters
or whether il shall be cut up and occu-
pied in farms by white men. And when
that conflict comes the cost of military
transportation. above officially stated at
over SO 100000 a year, will be trebled
and quadrupled. unless the North Pacific
railroad is built.
HOW ADDITIONAL LINES WILL OTHER
WISE PAY THE NATION.
These additional lines of Railroad TO
the Pacific. besides reducing the annual
expenditure, will pay the nation:
l. BY bringing into market hundreds
of millions of acres of good land which
are now dead property to the United
States-by adding millions of popula-
tion to the present number of its pro-
ducers and taxpayers of the country
| by doubling, trebling, quadrupling. and
I indeed. indefinitely increasing the an
nual yield of the precious metals in the
United States-by a vast increase of our
customs revenue to- be derived from i'm
pOrtations from Asia, into the harbors
/ of Puget Sound. San Francisco. and San
Diego-by the general stimulus of pro-
duction, manufactures and trade in all
the States east of the Mississippi, TO
upply the wants of the settlers in the
new regions TO be traversed 10y the
roads-by all that diversified good, N
pursuit OF which, England, France, Bel>
j gium, Holland and Austria have spent
such enormous sums of money, pledged
without stint their public credit, and
| found their reward in doing so, To the
first named nation. in the control OF the
trade and commerce of the world, and
to the others not only an astonishing in
crease of wealth, commerce and reve-
nue., but the sure means of paying their
several national debts out of sinking
funds for that purpose made part of
their railway systems respectively. Our
reward for the construction of these two
> additional lines to the Pacific will, upon
the English system we have unfortu-
nately been copyists of, be in any event
immense.
THESE RAILWAYS CAN PAY THE NATION.
: AL DEBT.
n But if we should engraft upon our
Pacific railway system the feature that
so wisely characterizes those of France.
, Holland, Belgium, Austria, Spain, Por-
, tugal and Italy, Ia make every person
who travels or trafiics by rail contribute.
without knowing il, n fractional sum
towards the discharge of the pablo
debt, and TO make the railways The
, agents of collecting and funding this
tax. infinitessimally small in amount.
and unaccompanied by any show of rev
enue machinery, and of handing il over
TO the State as a sinking fund TO pay Of
the national obligations, we would con-
. fer one of the greatest boons within the
! scope of Legislation upon ourselves and
our posterity. Among it's blessings
would be n settlement of most OF the