The San Francisco call., 1898-04-26
House and Senate Act Very Promptly on the
 Message.
of the Presidents View That Spain Began Hos tilities by Giving Wood=
 ford His Passports.
Call Office, Riggs House.

Call Office, Riggs House. Washington. April 25.
 The Senate to-day passed a bill de- claring that a state of war existed be- tween the United States and Spain.
 The bill was in the same language as
 that passed by the House.
 The debate Tn the Senate was based on an amendment offered by Senator Turpie providing for the recognition of
 the belligerent rights of the insurgent Cubans. the amendment being practi-
 cally in the following language:
 We hereby recognize the rights of the Cuban army under General Gomez
 to be treated as belligerents, the free dom and independence of the Cuban people having heretofore been recog- nized by act of Congress"
 The same amendment had been urged in the Committee on Foreign Relations previous to the reporting of the bill to the Senate and the Indiana Senator only agreed to the bringing in of the bill on condition that his amendment should be presented to the Senate. Both in committee and In the Senate Turpie made elaborate arguments in support of his proposition. He contended that so long as the insurgent rights of the Cubans were unrecognized they could only be regarded as subjects of Spain, and hence urged that our position in declaring for the recognition of the freedom and independence of the Gu ban people was entirely inconsistent with our refusal to recognize their bel ligerent rights. He also repeated his argument made upon the resolution providing for the intervention of this country in the Cuban war, in regard to l the interest of holders of the Spanish bonds in preventing the recognition of the rights of the Cuban insurgents. The roll of the Senate was called upon this amendment and it was defeated by
 a majority of fourteen, the vote stand 1 ing 24 to 3S.
 There was also some criticism of the fact that the bill fixed a date in the past when the war had begun. Senator PettigreW declared that the Fist was evidently used in order to make legal the capture of the lumber vessel, the Buena Ventura, on that date. He char acteriZed this as small piece of buSi- ness for either the administration or
 Congress to indulge in, and said that under the circumstances. if he had been the President, he would have returned the ship to its owners. He predicted
 that the courts would in the end settle the claim against us, regardless of this declaration.
 Senator Davis replied briefly to this point, saying that the date was not fixed by the capture of the Buena Ven tura, but by the recognition of the Spanish Government of a state of war,
 as made on the Fist, and as outlined in the Presidents message.
 Senator White took up the Pettigrew contention holding that the President had not indicated any date for the be- ginning of ho~ ilities, but that he had rather shown in his message that he considered tkat the negotiations had
 by no means reached the point of hos
 tilities. The President speaks" said the Senator "of our reasonable de- mands upon Spain. Did he," he asked.
 expect Spain to take the view that his demands were reasonable when he had asked Spain to part with a large portion of her kingdom and to come up smiling in view of this polite request?"
 Continuing. White said that it was his purpose to support the administra- tion in all reasonable measures for the prosecution of the war, but he did not regard the fixing of this date as in any sense a response to a Presidential request.
 There was g general plea for speedy action on this bill, and no amendment was pressed for change of date. This motive also actuated Senator Davis to withdraw an amendment suggested by
 the Committee on Foreign Relations directing the President to prosecute the
 W to successful termination. This amendment was withdrawn in order to leave the bill just as ha passed the House, thus dispensing with the neces- sity of conference. and making it pos sible to send the bill to the President to-day.
 There was no division on the passage of the bill
 War and war measures were the only | topics discussed by the Senate to-day | during more than four hours of it's ses-
 sion. The body had scarcely convened
 When the message of the President urg-
 ing Congress to declare the existence of
 war between the United States and Spain was laid before it. Without comment the
 message was referred to the Foreign Re- l lauonS Committee.
 Alien of Nebraska introduced the fol- | lowing Joint resolution, which he asked
 10 10 nave referred to the Committee on Foreign Relations:
 That state of war now exists and since the l5th day of February, 1898. has
 existed between the United States Of America and the kingdom of SpaIn" Consideration of the naval appropria tion Dill was then resumed the pending question being upon the amendment of. fered by Butler of North Carolina to reg
 ulate the price of armor The amendmeTt provides that for the armor for inc
 three battleships now in course of con struction the Government shall not nav
 to exceed AGO ton. including the nickel
 and that subsequent contracts for armor shall not call for a greater price than
 s3DO ton: In case the price cannot be
 obtslhe" .hS AoeCi tSiiS oI lne Navy Is authorized at once to purchase or estab-
 fish a Government armor factory. for which s1 800, 900 is appropriated, and in ad
 dition 900 is appropriated for the manufacture of the armor.
 Butler strongly advocated the adoption of the amendment and said the ships of this country were covered with defective armor.
 Hawley challenged this statement. .I emphatically deny" said he, that there is any such amount of defective armoron our war ships as the Senator from North Carolina declares there is. And even if the statement were true I leave it to the country to judge of the propriety of Haunting the defects before Spain
 While I am in entire agreement with the Senator from Connecticut" inter- iected Chandler of New Hampshire, q am also satisfied that the Senator CBut- ler) is mistaken. Investigation has shown that the tests of the armor were satisfactory"