National Republican., 1883-01-12
Arc rhcrc other pcnth rrnpsi


Are There Other Death Trapst
The killing of scventy-nve or hundred
| people by the burning of one house will set
people to talking. If in battle or an earth
quake there is loss of life it is bad enough,
but battles and earthquakes menace soldiers
and citizens as fates no wisdom can avoid.
When it comes to a house in which people arc
invited to dwell it is not unreasonable to
claim that there should be a way provided to
get out in case of fire. The Newhall house
seems to have been built for the purpose of
! getting people into its rooms and keeping
them there as long as possible, with
no care or provision for escape; so,
when the fire camc, it caught the people
sleeping and burned many of them to death.
The proprietors knew perfectly well that
they were suhjecting every man they booked
and sent up to his room to a irightful danger
Of death. The proprietors can not even pre-
tend that they did not know that they were
deliberately putting people to bed in death
trap, for the insurance men have been telling
them so for years. and very emphatically of
late, But they found that the public would
stand it and they were making money, so
they continued until Wednesday morning,
when the blow came, and they stand in the
light of murderers, not to put too fine point
upon it. The victims are not all dead yet, so
the subject will be uppermost for n few days,
even in this age of turning from horror and
soon forgetting it. People will think and
talk about this for certainly a week or two,
and in that time let us hope that something
will he done about the other hotels that are
waiting for victims. There are hundreds all
over the country that are nearly or quite as
bad. Every large city has one particularly
dangerous hotel, and others of different de-
mccs of badness. 1t is interesting to noto
the alGcrity with which Chicago looked
over her hotels the day after this horrible
fire in Milwaukee. A dispatch in another
column gives the result of this inspection, but
does not tell what will be remembered by
some who read it--thst this satisfactory con-
dition is the result of vigorous and out
spoken public demand for it. There were
some bad arrangements in the Chicago hotels,
and none so good as now, until there had
been exposures by some Of the newspapers,
and demands for reform that could not pass
unheeded. 1t might prevent another whole
sale murder, or several such if there could be
an examination all around, and there should
be no shrinking from duty. 1t would be
better to tear down hotel or two in each
city than to burn down half as many and
roast hundred people in each one. Each
case would try to beg off, and there might
be some opposition to harsh measures
This sort of opposition has been the cause of
hundreds Of deaths, and made this latest hor-
ror possible There never was hotel, no
matter how ncsted with inside rooms and
complicated with labarynthine passageways,
but could manage somehow to induce tray-
elers TO come in and take their chances. The
public has had too little to say about 1t. 1t
is possible, even, that some of the hotels here
in Washington are badly constructed for egress
in case of fire, and still mora badly managed
as to means of eXtingushing an outbreak of
this element of swift destruction. If they are
al! right. with Il trained force Of employees
who know just what to do in the moment of
danger an examination would help to
establish confidence; and if they are
not what they should bo in this re-
spect no one can say the inquiry is ill
timed. How about the matter? 1t would
be better to learn gradually by n reasonable
examination than in one horrible chapter
such as the Ncwhall house fire afforded Mil
wauIee and the whole country. Congress
provides by law that steamboats, shall bo con
, structed with view to the protection Of life,
5 and they are not half as large nor so compli,
Gated as some of the hotels. The congressman
! who depend upon hotels for homes here might
) at least dare to incur the accusation of meddl'
ing, should they be 50 mindful Of the public
welfare as to think the matter over when they
go to bed, and remember that congress is all the
city council the District of Columbia has tC
look after the rights of the residents and the
: impostiors of hotel keepers. Some inquiry
like this at Chicago yesterday should be de-
manded by the press and public Of every large
C city. No really safe hotel can suffer by it
and heaven knows there are bad ones that
ought to suffer to save greater suffering.