The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1891-05-13

MIR. CRISP of Georgia and Mr. Mills
of Texas appear to be the leading cam
didates for the speakership of the next
house, with Messrs. Mcmillan of Ten
nessee and Wilson of West Virginia as
dark horses. Between Crisp and Mills,
the former is much the better man for
the position. Mr.. Mills is strong de-
batter, and he has done his party great
service in advocating free trade doc
trines, but he has not the judicial acu-
men and the self-control 80 essential in
a presiding officer. These qualities
Mr.. Crisp is said to possess.
THE face value of the certificates
issued by thirty-one endowment orders
doing business ia Massachusetts, is re-
ported to be S52, $50, 195, while the bal
ance on hand is S9O0,1 The differ
ence in size between these totals must
make the certificate holders a little I'M
easy. OF course, it is expected that
lots of money will keep coming in and
that the lapses will grow more numer-
GUS, but it looks as though the whole
business was based on eggs that may
or may not yield chickens. 1t is also
stated that in the past year these COM
panies have paid out $464 ,791 in bene-
fits and that their expenses have been
81 1887 1924.
The United States consul at Van
couver, B. c., is to be sent home, 80 it
is said, because he refuses to sing
"God Save the Queen and TO drink
the queens health at banquets, etc.
His refusal to do these courtesies has
something of patriotic air about it,
but the British officials by whom he
was entertained can hardly be blamed
for regarding the act as in bad taste.
AS far as diplomatic relations are con-
cerned, the different governments and
their institutions must be regarded as
of equal dignity, and as such demand
ing kind of respect which intrinsi-
cally they may not be entitled to. If
the report from Vancouver is correct,
the consul appears to have acted indis-
creetly and unwisely.
The insurance commissioner of New
Hampshire is evidently doing his duty
in protecting the people of that state
from the 200 or more endowment orders
that are doing business there. He has
called for statements of the financial
condition of all the companies, and he
will issue no licences unless he is salts
lied that the applicants are sound inan-
cially. Already he has received returns
from twenty-eight companies, and APP
plying the rule that " the last man
insured should be equally protected
with him who has taken the first risk or
policy" he finds no one of the twenty
eight worthy of a license. The figures
which influenced the commissioner in
his decision are these: Face value of
the certificates issued by the twenty
eight companies, SIG, 1854, $50; paid in
benefits and endowments, $1O7O47;
salaries and expenses, S350,S7S; bal
ance on hand, S32S,041.
SENATOR EDMUNDS is as much inter-
ested as ever in the idea of a national
university at Washington, and he
thinks the project will not lack cham
pions in the senate. He says in this
connection: 81 have no objection to
any ones being a papist if he or she
desires to be, but do object to the eff
forts which are being made by the
papacy to combine the church and the
state. The people of the United States
must and will see the necessity for TAX
ing firm stand in this matter, and one
of the results of their firmness will be a
great national university" The sub
ject of the location suggested to him
the remarkable changes which have
taken place in Washington in the past
twenty-five years. Regarding these
changes, he said to a reporter that just
after the war there were no pavements
on Pennsylvania avenue and that the
mud in the side streets was literally
hub-deep, except in midsummer. "The
place was semi-barbaric 80 far as archi-
lecture was concerned; pigs, COWS and
geese wandered unhindered through
nearly all the thoroughfares; great I'M
finished public buildings stood along
side dilapidated novels, all of them SET
in seas of mud or clouds of dust, as the