Los Angeles daily herald., 1889-02-01
WASHINGTON NEWS.
Frye and Reagan Combine
to Defy Bismarck.
THEY TALK, AND MEAN, BUSINESS
Importance of the HarbOr of Pago-
PagO to This Country-NO Fool
ing to Be Tolerated.
Associated Press Dispatches to the HERALD.

consideration of the Diplomatic
and Consular Appropriation bill. the
pending question being on the amend
ment referring to Samoa. Reagan offered
an amendment to insert the words;
'And for the protection OF the rights of
American citizens residing on said
islands, and to preserve the neutrality
and independence thereof"
Hale objected to the last clause. The
Senate should not declare the intention
to preserve neutrality or maintain the
OF any nation. That was
for the Executive to do.
Sherman agreed with Hale, saying that
the words proposed to be inserted, weak
ened rather than strengthened the state
ment of the matter. 1t was Fourth Of
July" language. No American had been
hurts far. After long exciting debate, in
which Senators Frye and Regan took
strong ground in favor of protecting the
independence of Samoa and securing q
harbor there for American ships,
it was intimated by them and by
Hale that the debate would come up
again soon in another aud more serious
form, ''perhaps involving the relation
ship between the United States and
Germany"
After Sherman's remarks, Frye did not
agree with Sherman that no wrongs had
been committed in Samoa against Amer
can citizens. He thought the evidence
conclusive that wrongs had been COM
hut L,ok ~ 10
sue, and he hoped the Senator from
Texas would not insist on his amend
ment now. 1t did not comprise all that
Congress ought to do. The remarks OF
the Senator from Texas came very
much nearer to it than the report of the
committee. 1t was not Germany; it was
not Bismarck; it was nothing but Ger
m an trading firm. That firm had abso-
lutte and supreme power to-day over the
Samoan Islands, and the German Con-
sui received his orders from it. The
Germans had, without any authority,
and with one OF the gravest insults ever
committed against the United States,
deliberately elevated to power and made
king rebel, Tamasese, who had not a
Samoan chief behind him-not one.
Tamasese was nothing but puppet in
the hands of the German trading firm.
If he were permitted to be established
and were recognized as king, one of his
first acts, under the instructions of the
German trading firm, would be to give
the necessary notice for the abrogation o'
the treaty with the United States, and
the harbor of Pago Pago would be utterly
lost to the United States. In
his judgment, the amendments reported
by the Committee on Foreign Relations
did not bring up the real Samoan
question. The real question at issue be-
tween the United States and the Ger.
mans was not necessarily before the SEN
ate for discussion under these items Of
appropriation, nor, in his judgment. was
the Senate ready to-day for the discus.
sion. He expected to see the day come,
and ere long, when there would be a
proposition before the Senate that would
bring up the whole question Of the differ
ences at issue between the United States
and Germany. The testimony of Consul
General Sewall was still a secret docu-
ment, and until it was made public, the
real question could not be properly dig
cussed. There is not fourth-rate power
in Europe which, il it had been party
to conference with Germany az to the
autonomy and independence of Samoa,
and if Germany, pending that conference,
and without notice, had deliberately or
dered her chips of war to violate that
autonomy and independence, would not
have risked it's life on the demand for the
immediate restoration of the status quo.
Reagan agreed with Frye's sentiments
He was sorry to see dispositit n t.
shrink from meeting the duty of the
Government. The Consular Agent of
the United States at Samoa, the officers
and crews Of American chips there, and
United States citizens residing there,
could not fail to be humiliated by the
fact that their Government permitted
Germany to trample upon their rights and
upon the rights of Samoa in the face of
treaty stipulations and understandings.
Instead of trying to cover them up, wis
dom and prudence and the interests of
the country required the facts to be met.
If the Government of the United States
had assumed obligations to Samoa, it
should execute them. If it owed duties
to its citizens there, it should peform
those duties. 1t the flag of the United
States had been insulted, if the property
of United States citizens in Samoa had
been placed at the mercy of German
traders through the action of the Ger
man Government, the fact eught to be
Recognized and one of two things must
be done. If the rights of the United
States we're to be abruptly abandoned,
the American Consul and the comman-
ders of the American ships ought to be
called home and not subjected to insult
and degradation, and whatever rights
the United States had there, ought to be
abandoned, or else the rights which be-
longed to this country ought to be as.
serted squarely and manfully.
Frye added some further remarks as
to the Importance of the harbor of Pago-
Pago to the commercial and other inter-
ests of the United States in the Pacific
ocean and then proceeded to read and
comment upon the Associated Press dis.
patches just received from Auck-
land, New Zealand. The dispatch
and comments ran along in this
way: Advices from Samoa state that the
German officials have given notice that
all vessels arriving there will be searched
for articles contraband Of war; 80 that
the right to search American vessels, if
this dispatch is correct, is asserted by
Germany. They have suppressed the
Samoan Times. If that is true, then free
speech is stopped in Samoa. A passen-
ger on British steamer, who visited
Mataafa's camp, was Immediately put
under arrest, but was subsequently re-
leased, in compliance with the demand
of the British Consul. If he had been
an American, [ euppose, il would not