The Coconino weekly sun., 1892-04-07
CAPITAL CORRESPONDENCE.
Special Correspondence.l

nat the senate Will do the same thlnS pr something very much like it, and hen assuming what will be the fact, that Mir. Harrison will quietly place his Presidential extinguisher upon such a bill and snuff out the elaborate work of both houses, l can conceive of no greater anomaly in American politics than will be presented in the campaign of 1892. With no iuconsiderable DOT ton of the Democratic party clingiug tenaciously to tho free coinage idea in the Western and Southern states, and another large portion of the same party | the inevitable financial disaster that must follow free coinage in the Eastern states, no political | soothsayer can divine the manner in ! which these two elements may be rec onciled, or by what method Presi- | deutial candidate may be agreed upon who will be able to effect anything | like a compromise. The determination of the Silver Democrats not to elimi- nate the question from the campaign of '92, is piece of good fortune for Republicans, of which, of course, they will not be slow to take advantage. With an astonishing degree of com placency the Republican members of the House, then, are looking at the progress of the contest now going on, for, whatever may be the upshot, they arc to be the gathers. In the quiet way characteristic of the thoroughly well-trained leaders, Mir. Reed and MT, Burrows, the Democratic contestants are urged to the combat, as the back CTS of favorite mastiffs urge them to get their death-grip. Without enter ing into the merits of the question, for or against free coinage, it is no hazard to predict that the Bland bill is the death-grip of Democracy, because of the divisions it has created That cer- tainly is the concensus opinion at the present time in Washington,
 The Democratic majority in this Congress ayowedly set out with the in- tention of making record of so-called economy for political effect, and with the prince of Choose-ars, Holman, at the head of the appropriations commit tee, it was reasonable to suppose that some success in that direction would be attained. But it is now apparent that the only reduction accomplished will be at the expense of the public service, and of our naval growth. In the Sundry civil bill as reported to the House, Mir. Holman has lessened the aggregate over that of last year by cutting of a few clerks, and scrub women here and there, and by striking out most of the appropriations for pub lie buildings. But this narrow policy is not real economy. In all places where public buildings arc projected the Government is renting more or less unsuitable quarters at very high price. Right here in Washington Gov ernment bureaus are distributed around in various private buildings and parts of buildings at an annual rental which is mighty big interest on the amount required to erect suitable quarters for all these growing departments. But this is the Democratic idea of economy and good business management. It
 has the outward appearance of saving q few dollars, and is expected to do
 service for campaign effect.
 The only other place in which the appropriations are likely to be percep- tibly reduced is in the provisions for continuing work on our new Navy and coast defenses. It may not be many months before Democratic short-sight- edness in this respect is brought home to the country with terrible effect, If war with Great Britain should result from the present differences over the
 tendency of the Canadian poachers to
 steal our seals, our commerce and sea
 port cities would be almost entirely at
 the mercy of English gunboats. Dur
 ing the past six years we have made a
 fair beginning towards the building up
 of navy corresponding with our im-
 portance among the nations of the
 earth, but it is only beginning. Our
 navy is still much weaker than that of
 any other great power, and would have
 barely overtopped that of little Chile
 had a conflict occurred As against
 the British navy, ours is not in it. !"
 Under sdch circumstances it requires a
 good deal of courage to twist the lions tail in the manner President Harrison
 has done. Had we such coast defeuses
 and such navy as we ought to have,
 Lord Salisbury and all the rest of them
 would be exceedingly cautious how
 they tread on our coat tails. One or
 two hundred millions expended in such
 equipment would be we'll invested If
 they saved the country from g single war. It is much easier to spunk up