Daily Kennebec journal., 1904-04-12
IN THE HOUSE.
Houses Passes the River and harboI
Bill.

| Washington. April 1.-THE House to
day passed the bill reported by tn.
| committee on rivers and harbors an
propriating $4,000, 900 for the restora
| tion or maintenance of channels or O
| other river and harbor improvements
| Burton chairman of the committee il
| explaining the bill, urged the adoption
| Of settlement principles with regard t.
| river and harbor work.
| MeSSrs. Burgess of Texas, and Rams
| dell of Louisiana favored increases il
| the appropriations for river and harbo,
! improvements the former urging thai
| they should be doubled and the latter
| regarding 800, 100000 as not too much
Clark, of Missouri made a plea for The
| Improvement of the Missouri river.
a large number of bills of minor i'm
portanCe We're passed.
When the House met today it was
ordered that bills relating to the dis.
trict of Columbia which were to have
been taken up today shall be considered
on Saturday next.
The House then went into committee
OF the whole for the consideration of
the emergency river and harbor i'm
provement bill.
Burton (Ohio). in charge of the bill.
made an explanation of it and gave a
general survey of the subject of river ard
harhor improvements. He said that the
amounts expended for this purpose when
the vast extent of our waterways was
considered, was very small. He favored
the adoption of policy of pushing mat
ters to completion as rapidly as possible,
and declared that Congress should not
undertake anything which could not be
completed within 4 reasonably short
time. The system pursued in the United
states. he thought, cOntraSted most un-
1hvorably with those of foreign countries.
The one great defect in our system was
the ineficiency of the engineering corps
OF the army. Burton said as far as pos
sible appropriations should be in accord
anoe with settled principles with no re-
gard for compromise or to give so much
to each state but with the thought only
Of considering each project according to
its merits and the general benefit which
would be conferred on the whole country.
Discussing the question OF inland wa
terwayS. Burton called attention to the
vast sums, amounting TO many millions
of dollars. which would be required to
construct them. and he declared that the
adoption of any one OF them would fur
niSh precedent for the adoption of all
General debate was closed by Small IN.
O., who spoke of the necessity for an
inland waterway between Chesapeake bay
and Beaufort inlet n. c.
ilamlin tMoD offered an amendment
arrropiiating $5oo.GU for continuing the
Improvement of the Missouri river at
Herman and Washington. Mo.
Clark tMoD alluded to the acquisition
by the United States of the Sandwich
islands, the Philippines, Guam and Porto
Rico ''on the pretext that homes are
u, lr.t, No, al
there is more farming land, out Of which
to make such homes. that is ovcrf,owed
and destroyed and made barren by the
floods Of the Missouri river than could be
found in all these islands. "Instead," he
vigorously declared amid applause. ''of
suuandering money to hold the Filipinos
in subsection. to educate the Ilawaiians
and to carry the mail at an eXhorbtant
price to the cannibals of the Fiji islands,
You better be taking care of land you
have got at home.
\ point of order against the amendment
was sustained.
Cowherd tMoD referred to the crying
necessity for the improvement of the
kaw river at Kansas City, which elected
from Burton the statement that the kaw
river was not now and had not been nav
ieahle for % years and no Cne Interested
in that river had sought to promote navi-
CATION on it.
amendment. Under its provisions the
money appropriated became immediately
available ana IS to be expended under
the direction of the secretary of war and
the supervision of The chief engineers.
Williams. the minority leader. rising to
n question of privilege called attention
To last Saturdays vote on the proposition
to lay on the table the Cochran resolution
regarding the Presidents pension order.
He said that the Congressional Record
showed that both Morgan of Ohio. and
Dovcrner of West Virgini;t. wcie recorded
as voting aye" and at the same time
appeared as being paired with Shook Of
Ohio. and Trimplc Of Kentucky. reSpor
lively, which would have made the vote
1O1 to 1Go. He said that neither Shook
nor Tiimblc voted the names of Morgan
and Dovener and should be taken from
the list of yeas.
The speaker informed the House that
the stating of pairs in the record is pure
ly n non-Official matter. but the statement
of the vote itself is official.
After Williams announced that he was
not criticising anybody, the matter was
dropped.
Al 5OJ o'clock the House adjourned.