The Portland daily press., 1899-02-07
WON'T PASS SENATE.
Little Hope for Hull Military Bill
This Session.
TIME TOO SHORT TO REACH AN
AGREEMENT

strong Opposition on Part Of Many
Republican.-AsT Temporary ExPedi-
emit Resolution WIN BE Adopted Ell
tending Time OF Army I'm Present
Emergency sine.
Washington, February 6.-The feeling
about the Capitol Is that the bill Tor the
increase and reorganization Of the Army,
which passed the House last week, VIII
not mass the senate There will undoubt-
edly be much hostility to 1t there as there
was in the House. and there Is 30 much
important legislation pressing forward In
the remaining four weeks Of The session
that the senate will have no difficulty
in keeping itself very busy without the
Army bill. While the bill passed the
House there was much opposition to 1t,
and net great satisfaction with 1t among
many who voted for 1t. or course the
Democratic opposition was expected as .
matter of party tactics although there
were q few strong friends Of the bill on
the Democratic side. But the opposition
which made itself felt was on the Repub-
lican side. There was manifested among
Republicans, especially those from the
where the labor element is strong, a fear
that 1t would mean the ruin of the Re-
publican party for many years to come
IL 1t should play upon the country an
army of one hundred thousand men. 1t
was pointed out that such an army would
be larger than England's, and that, with
the pensions which we already pay and
which we will have to pay for tho soldiers
who are invalided in the tropics, we
should have more costly military estab-
lishment than any one Of the great Euro
pean nations. Members who were mildly
acquiescent or even heartily in favor Of
expansion would not face the proposition
of such an army and such an expense.
There would be fifteen thousand officers,
perhaps, in such an army, distributed
among very influential people In the coun-
try, and more than one Congressman has
heard to say that IL would not be very
pleasant for any memb Der OF the House In
the future to propose to reduce military
establishment which would have so many
W SUR uP ihhhVhoc pNtsAh1s tAsS
proposition. So the members favorable
to the bill, as the only means Of saving 1t
from defeat, proposed the makeshift OF
lea wing to the President to determine the
size of the Army. This plan WAS not very
satisfactory to any one. but was adopted
as a rHmpron.ise. 1t will probably be a
long before the President decides to
make the army hundred thousand men.
Such being the condition of the bill In
the estimation of the House where IL was
passed, 1t is quite evident that II Will
not pass the Senate without much debate
and something of a contest finally be-
| tween the House aud Senate as to many
details As there Is hardly time for this
| during this Congress IL is generally as
sumed that the bill win fail and that a
| resolution will pass both Houses to con-
| tinue for time the standing army at Its
present emergency size, namely about Co.
| 600 men. This would probably give as
| efficient IL not moro efficient body OF
men than would be gotten together under
| the new bill Such resolution will
probably make unnecessary an extra ses-
sion of Congress.
| The presentation of the statues of Ben
ton and Blair by the State of Missouri fills
| the quota of that State In Statuary Hall,
which is the old hall Of the HOUSE West
Virginia will soon present the statue of
Kenna which is her first contribution to
the Val halla. All the New England
States except Maine have filled their
places Vermont has Collamer and
| Ethan Allen, statesman of the Civil War
period and hero of the Revolution; Rhode
| Island has Nathaniel Greene and Roger
Williams, soldier of the Revolution and
| founder of the Plantations; Massachu-
sets has John Winthrop and Samuel
Adams, Puritan Governor and popular
| Of Rnuntnttnn
Ham pshire has Stark and Webster, the
victor of bennington and the orator Of
the Constitution. Maine has William
King, the FIRST and best" Governor, as
the saying was. The other place to which
Maine is entitled will probably not be