Arizona republican., 1905-10-08
Our Congressional Visitors.

A party of congressman will arrive
in the southwest tomorrow for an OBJ
servatiOn of general conditions here
and for the gathering of data to be
used in the consideration of the joint
statehood bill which will be placed be-
fore congress early in the approaching
session We trust that the information
which will be collected will be used
by congress in other legislation affect
ing the territories.
The visitors will enter Arizona early
in the week and will probably arrive
in Phoenix about the middle or latter
part of it. Pains will be taken here
as. no doubt elsewhere in the terri
tory, TO impress upon the congress-
men the true conditions and to offer
them convincing reasons why Arizona
should not be joined to New Mexico.
Other congressional commissions,
official and semi-oficial, have come to
Arizona on similar errands. Unfortu
nateIy for US they brought with them
certain prejudices which obscured the
view they intended to take and him
de-ed the purpose for which they had
come.
The party now enroute is made up
of members Of varying opinions on the
statehood question but all of them We
are sure are fair minded gentlemen
whose preconceived views may be al
tered by the Introduction of proper ev-
idence; that is all the people of Ari-
IONA ask They only want to appear
before a fair court.
Two of the visiting gentlemen,
Messrs. Tawncy and Goebel, have been
in the territory before and are already
in possession of information regarding
conditions. especially in the northern
part of the territory. We are sure
that the knowledge which they have
acquired will be favorable to US. It
is regrettable that Speaker Cannon
has been unable to be a member of the
party as it had been earlier arranged
that he should be- for what he would
have seen and heard would have made
him, We believe, Arizona's powerful
friend His private secretary, Hon
w. L. Eusby, is accompanying the par
" and the knowledge which he will
gather will be prepared for the use Of
Mr.. Cannon.
There is nothing new for US to say
among ourselves in the way of argu-
ment against joint statehood The
whole subject has been threshed out
and much even has been said that was
useless and irrelevant. The question
should now be laid before the visitors
bare, Invested of all sentimentality. 1t
is the bare business like facts they are
coming here to collect. They will not
care to learn of our fear of the pos
sibIe loss of our autonomy and the
merging of our identity" and the wip-
ing off the map Of the fair land which
we have wrested from the savage
Apache and the still more hostile des-
ert." All shat is oratoricaI and aca-
demic; it has been heard before and
has never made Arizona vote.
This party was largely organized by
Mr. Tawney, who desired that his asso-
ciates in congress should learn as much
as he knows, of the resources, develop
ed and undeveloped, of this territory,
and of the wealth which is one Of the
qualifications of a separate state.
We must be prepared to present to
the visitors material reasons, why, if
we cannot be admitted to single state
mood, we should not be annexed to an
other territory. There are such rea-
sons in abundance. II will not be suf-
fcient for us to point out to the con-
gressmen the difference in language
and customs between the people Of
Arizona and those of New Mexico
though that is one of the minor rea-
sonabIe arguments against joint state
hood. And it would be highly improp-
er and ineffective for US to describe
the New Mexicans as foreign and ig
norant, for they are neither. They
have shown themselves to be patriotic
and they are educated in their way as
we are in ours.
But we can show to the visitors that
the intedests of the people of New
Mexico are entirely different from
those of the people of Arizona and
that this difference of interest would
lead to the enactment of unsatisfac-
tory legislation. We can protest to
the visitors against the unwieldy state
proposed to be created. In the argu-
ments on the Hamilton bill it was
urged that the new state would be
smaller than Texas, but it was not
shown in reply that communication
between the eastern and western parts
of it could be carried on only through
two widely separated mountain pass
Then we can direct the attention
he congressman .to. the foundation