New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1872-05-14
THE FRENCH ARMS COMMITTEE.

THE FRENCH ARMS COMMITTEE.
The report of the majority of the Committee
appointed by the Senate to investigate the sale
of arms to France is now before the country,
and it is about what was to have been ex-
pected. The fierce and injudiciOus opposition
with which the partisans of the President at
tackled the first proposition made In the Senate
for investigation, was sufficient indication OF
the spirit in which the Administration at once
resolved to meet the attempt to discover the
truth of the matter. A tedious and unseemly
debate ensued, in which the two Senators who
favored investigation gave their reasons for 1t
in speeches distinguished for their moderation
of temper, no less than for their ability and
the immediate friends of the President
occupied several days in Incorporate de-
nunciation of the proposers of the meas
ure. When at last the resolution providing
for the inquiry was passed, it was deformed
and degraded by an additional clause attached
to it by Mr.. Conkling, designed as gratuitous
insult to Senators Sumner and Schurz; and
in the selection of the Committee which was
to conduct the investigation, the Senate, in
contemptuous violation of the traditional rule
which provides that the friends of measure
shall form the Committee to which it is in
trusted, chose Board of violent opponents
of the investigation, and excluded from the
Committee its prominent friends. With such
beginning, the subsequent proceedings of
the Committee were clearly Ineligible, and
we have no reason to be surprised Mt their
report. 1t is one of the baldest and clumsi-
est attempts to stihe the truth that even our
partisan annals present.
It's manner il as bad as its matter. 1t is as
vulgar and coarse in its form as it is false and
disingenuous in its substance. A large pro-
portion of it is devoted to an attack upon
Senator Sumner which is marked by faulty
beyond the reach of satire. The Senator's
manly and strictly legal protest is referred to
as an effort to introduce artificial and ar
bitrary immunites belonging to feudal days."
resting on "monarchcal principles" and
"caste in society,"" and the report then goes
on to indulge in burst of flatulent clap-trap
about /" the law being the voice of the people"
1t is not probable that any one in or out OF
the Senate can be persuaded that these sapient
Committeeman are better lawyers or better
republicans than the ilustrious statesman they
are assaulting. Gen. Schurz is also referred
to, but with moro of innuendO than of asser-
ton. The Committee find, however, in the
Marquis dc Chambrun q subject entirely to
their liking. He is gentleman, foreigner,
holds no official position, and has no means
of defending himself against their attacks
They therefore give themselves a pleasant
moment with him, and abuse him with great
gaiety of heart.
AS to the facts of the case, they treat them
IL ofl IF HIM or
which they devote to their personal sketches
Indeed they have skipped SO lightly over
everything of Importance that we are COM
PEELED to go to Mr.. Stevenson's minority re-
port for any full information in regard to the
results of their researches. They say that the
product of the sales of ordnance gave a
met balance of $9,409,907 &c, all of which has
"been paid into the Treasury" But they leave
Mr.. Stevenson to say that "a balance Of
"$219,64 AZ was alleged to have been spent
"by the War Department in preparing the
earns and stores for sale, and the cost in
"curred in making the sales has never been
81 paid into the Treasury. The items of these
expenditures have not been given"
The Committee say that they find that the
sales were made according to the settled con-
struction of the statute of 1868 in the War De-
partment, with results exceedingly favorable to
the Government. What was this construction
/. That it was only necessary to advertise a
small quantity of arms for sale to authorize
the Government to go on indefinitely selling
any quantity of the same arms without fur
ther notice. 2. That when quantity, however
small of carbnes or muskets of a superior
model had once been introduced, all other
models, whatever their merits, might be sold
ms damaged or unsuitable" 1t is claimed, as
Mr.. Stevenson notes. that this construction
was adopted by Gen. Schofeld and commune
Gated verbally to the Ordnance Bureau but it
is shown, on the other hand, that the opinion
of tho Judge Advocate of the Army,
given in 1869, warrants no such construction.
The debates in Congress when the law of 1868
was passed, show that such was not the mean
were further shown to be illegal from the fact
that the arms sold were of better quality
than many which remained in the possession
of the Government.
In regard to the asserted violation of the
Neutrality laws, the Committee certainly take
broad and comprehensive position. They do
not intend 20 be caught upon any petty ques-
tons of fact, but with view of covering all
possible contingencies of exposure, they say
that, in the first place, the Remingtcns were
not agents of France, and
~ they bad been such agents. end II that fact had