The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1871-02-02
SPIRIT or xzn PRuss.
Editorial Opinions Ofthe Leading Journals
upon Current TopiOs-compiled Every ;
Day for the Evening Telegraph.
RANK IN THE NAVY.
rom the ". Y. 7ribun,

From the NJ Y. Tribune.
A bill to regulate the rank of staff officers
in the navy has passed the House of Repre-
sentatives, and is expected to go through the
Senate, with possibly some slight amend
ments. SO q long quarrel and long in u.s.
tice will come to an end The bill proposes
only to place staff officers on a recognized
and positive footing as to rank giving them
no command, no right to interfere with the
line, no increase of pay or privileges.
1t provides that a surgeon in our navy
shall enjoy the same recognition that
is given to surgeon in the army
or o surgeon in any foreign service. The
relative positions of staff and line officers
in the army we're settled twenty years ago,
and there has been harmony between the two
classes Of the service ever since. In the Bri-
tish army and navy similar adjustment,
after long controversy, was made at the in
stance of the Duke of Wellington and Sir
John Pakington, with equally good results.
There is in fact no reason in the world, drawn
either from abstract principle or experience,
why medical officers, engineers, paymasters,
chaplains, mathematical professors, and con-
structors should not have the positive rank
which BELTS the Importance of their duties
and the length of their service.
But in the case of our navy there are rea-
sons much stronger than prevail abroad why
the two classes of officers should be placed on
an equality. Inc OppOS1tlOn on Jle part OF
the line to this simple measure of justice
springs from an impression that line officers
of the navy are the aristocracy of America
class of men above other men, and educated
if not actually born, to command. Graduation
at Annapolis is a sort of patent of nobility
carrying social distinction and precedence
Civilian officers, therefore, must be made to
feel their inferiority to the privileged CASTE
If the regulations of the service allow them
to wear gold bands and gilt buttons, and to
assume sort of underlined and purely COM
plimentary dignity known as ''assimiated
rank, it is only Gas Admiral Porter said) "to
identify them with their surroundings and
give propriety to their presence. This dan
gerous and growing aristocratic sentiment has
led many statesmen to doubt the propriety of
keeping up any Naval Academy at all. Its
best corrective is the introduction into the
service, on terms of perfect equality, of good
healthy civilian or, as Admiral Porter
would say-plebeian blood Personally, the
staff comprises some of the best men of
the service. They must, from the nature of
their duties, be educated at least as we'll as
the line, and probably the average of ac-
complishments is much higher in the officers
who have been trained in our civil schools
than in those who have obtain ed their educa-
ton at Annapolis. They are likely to raise
instead of lowering the character of any class
with which they are incorporated. Admiral
Farragut was strongly in favor OF such a
measure as is now before Congress-; and if
the American people want any other reason
for approving it, they will find one in the
fact that Admiral Porter is very much op
posed to it.