The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1899-02-23
SETH LOW CRIT|CISES ALGER
POOR OPINION OF THE WAR
DEPARTMENT.
Contrast Between the Army and Navy
Departments Too Great to Be Ex-
planned Away.

Philadelphia, Feb. 22.-Washington's
birthday was celebrated here with ex-
ereises at the Academy of Music. under
the auspices of the University of Penn
sylvania. Some 1000 students marched
in procession and enliveneG the day
with their college songs and class slo-
gans. The exercises at the academy
opened with prayer by Bishop OH w.
Hittaker, and the students in chorus
sang the national Eymn, America, :"
and the university hymn, Hail, Penn
sylvania.'
The orator of the occasion was Seth
Low. LII. D., of Columbia university.
His topic was THE United States in
1899" Mr.. Low dwelt at length upon
the recent war with Spain, saying, in
part:
THE mechanical skill and ready eff
ticiency so characteristic of the Amer
lean, told with overwhelming effect in
the overthrow of the enemy.
Il wish it could be also said that the
American genius for organization and
for business had displayed itself dur
ing the war TO equal advantage. In
the navy 1t did. There was something
admirable in the way in which every
thing that it fell to the lot of the navy
to do was done quietly, without con-
fusion, and with absolute success. In
the army it did not. 1t must in all
candor be admitted that the task of the
war department was much the heavier.
1t had to multiply the army ten-fold,
and 1t had to do quickly on a large
scale what it had only been in the habit
of doing slowly on a small scale.
But 1t is precisely under such cir
cumstanceS that genius shows, and we
are obliged to admit that on the side
of the war department, the genius that
had made our railroads the most eff
fectiVe in the world, the genius that is
enabling our manufacturers to conquer
the markets of tina world, was not
forthcoming. The Santiago campaign
of the army was splendidly and bril-
hantly successful, I'D if the war had
lasted longer, [ dare say we should
have had a better criterion than we
have now by which to judge how much
of the dreadful suffering in camp and
field is inseparable from war at the
very best. But the contrast between
the work of the navy department and
the war department is too great to be
wholly explained away. 1t is as clear
as the MONDAY sun that the organiza-
ton of the war department and the
army is absolutely unfriendly to eff
ficiency. The presidents commission
to investigate has pointed out some of
of the remedies. It remains for public
opinion to see that these remedies, or
others equally effective, are promptly
enacted into law. l am glad that the
president has appointed a court of in
quiry to go to the bottom of the griev-
Gus charges that have been made
against the commissary department,
for it is hideously in contrast with the
self-sacrificing heroism of our troops
that such charges can be mooted, much
less made by the commanding general
of the army. Now that the inquiry has
been ordered, the people may well
await the finding with patience and
with an open mind. as a people at once
too great to do injustice, even to a
single one not known to be at fault,
and too earnest to permit any who may
be proven guilty, either of wrOng-dOing
ing fury of their wrath
Mr. Low upheld the course of the
administration in the Philippines.