The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1900-05-07
A NEAT TRICK.
The Government Seems Likely
to Find Itself
With an Army of Officers on Its
Hands.
CLEVER JUGGLERY
By Which the Reduction to
Ante Bellum Figures
Is Made to Apply Only to the
Rank and File.

New York. May IA Tribune special
from Washington says:
Congress will perhaps be surprised to
learn that the army law of 1899 does
not provide for the reduction of the
regular army to its dimensions prior to
1898, as is now popularity supposed. Ex-
perts say that only the rank and file
Will be reduced to $4,000 men, that there
is thimble rigging phraseology in the
law which retains all the additional
officers in the service. Investigation
appears to confirm this assertion. Be
fore the Spanish war the regular army
consisted of only % 267 men all told,
namely, $4,000 rank and file, 81 militars
cadets and seven professors at West
Point, 2,164 general stan and line OH
GERS in the active service, besides ,29S
enlisted men and 663 officers on the re-
tired list. AS enlarged from time to
time under the various war legislation
that followed the United States army
cadets and eight West Point professors,
1855 general staff and line officers in
the active service with LAT enlisted
men and 1853 officers on the retired list.
Besides these regulars there are approx
imately $4,000 volunteers in the active
service. These figures show the follow
ing increases in the various grades of
the active service: Enlisted men &c. $50,
officers 422, professors 1, cadets 10. On
the retired list there has been an in
crease of 80 officers and 149 enlisted
men.
In the expiring hours of the Fifty
fifth congress by the agency of a con-
ference committee a law was rushed
through and approved on March.2, 1899,
containing a clause which provided
that on and after July l, 1901, all the
general staff and line officers appointed
to the army under this act shall be dis
charged, and the numbers restored in
each grade to those existing at the
passage of this act, and the enlisted
force of the line of the army shall be
reduced to the number as provided for
by law prior to April 1, 1895" This
army law of 1899, known as the Cock
ll-Gorman bill, is a muddle Of in
eXpicable contradictions. The positive
recitatiOnS of the foregoing paragraph
apparently leave no escape from the
nearly universal conclusion that on
July l. 1901, the army is to go back to
its original strength before the Spanish
war unless meanwhile there is supple
mental legislation. That such is the
understanding in congress has been
made manifest by the utterances of
members and senators in the discussion
Of pending army legislation. This
threatened event is used constantly as
an appeal to legislation to put the army
/ on a permanent footing. Nevertheless
q vague hint has somehow got abroad
/ recently that this law of March 2, 1899.
/ does not provide for reducing the Off
( GERS of the regular army on the date
! named or on any other date, although
/ a superficial reading leaves that i'm
/ preston, and that was undoubtedly
what congress thought it was provid-
! ing for when it passed the act. A care
/ full investigation leaves little room for
/ doubt that both congress and admins
tration circles err in any presumption
/ that the Cockrell-Gorman act puts the
| official personnel OF the army back to
/ its old number before the Spanish war.
/ 1t unquestionably compels the reduction
/ of the enlisted strength to the old max
! imum unless the present congress pro-
vides differently, and also the muster
out of the volunteer general staff and
line officers and the volunteer sOldiery.
| But few, if any, of the additional reg
ular officers required for the Spanish
and Philippine wars will, can or are in
tended to be discharged under it's pro-
| visions.