Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1907-06-06
At THE WHITE HOUSE
Nothing Decided Regarding Pro-
posed Prosecutions.
TO PROMOTE CRAFTSMANSHIP
Interest of the President in National
Rifle Association.
GOV. MAGooN's ADMINISTRATION
Armenians Seek the Sympathy of the
Chief Executive-Gift From
the japanese.

l tho japanese.
| In the face Of all the rumors that are In
circulation about the railroad prosecutions
| the Hartman prosecution and the other
prosecutions that the Department Of JUS
| tice may or may not institute. 1t may be
definitely said that nothing has yet been
decided by the President. There will be q
conference between the President and sew
| eral' members of the cabinet at the White
House after the cabinet meeting tomor-
row. Some members Of the interstate COM
merce commission and some representa-
| tives of the Department of Justice may
| also be present. The general subject of
| trust prosecutions will be discussed. There
are q good many questions of policy In
connection with these prosecutions that
will have to be settled beside the mere
| question whether the government has evil
dence enough to obtain a conviction
1t is possible that the disposition of some
| OF the trust cases may be determined at
| the conference. but not necessarily so. The
whole matter may be allowed to go over
| TIL after the President leaves Washington.
and there may be further consideration of
the subject during the summer at Oyster
Bay.
Improvement Of Workmanship.
Gen. ]. A. Drain, president of the Nation
al Rifle Association, called on the President
on his way to New York today to thank
him for what he had already done for the
association and to assure him of the appre-
citation of the members. Both the President
and Gen. Drain much interested in
! bringing the standard Of craftsmanship
among the citizens with the service rife to
something like what it is abroad where mil
1tarS service is COmpulSOry The
mans chief objection to entering the Ma
tional Guard is that he has not time for the
military service that 1t entails. The aim Of
the National Rifle Association is to enable
the citizen to become reasonably expert
with the service rife without giving up the
time that it takes to be national guards
man. The President is an honorary member
Of the association and memberships have
been taken by Secretary Taft. Gen. Bell,
Gen. Crozier and a number of other promi-
nent persons who are interested in the work
of the association and want to help it
along.
AS the law now stands, any one who is
interested in rife practice can form a club
by getting nineteen other men similarly
minded and writing to the parent society
for authorizat ton to affiliate. The club can
then buy the regular service rife from the
government and get the of the near
est practicable National Guard or other
rifle range. The cost of the service rifle
is roughly SO. and the full charged ammu-
| milton costs SIS per 1.OO). though a reduced
cartridge is sold for short range practice
at 81 per leo rounds. When the national
the President hopes to have the service
| rifles available free of charge for regu-
larry organized clubs and thus to largely
/ reduce the expense to the members.
There will be an international match in
which the national association members
/ will participate In Ottawa in September.
The British team will stop there on its
way to Australia. and the Canadian team
Will also take part.
Duty to the National Guard.
Gen. Drain took up with the President
matter of general interest to national
guardsmen. He is the chairman of the ex-
ecutive committee of the National Guard
Association, and he called the Presidents
attention to the action recently mentioned
in the papers of the threat of the postmas-
ter at Lorraine Ohio to discharge two of
the employees of the office who had been or
dered on strike duty with the National
Guard, to which they belonged
The President said that as a matter of
public policy members of the National
Guard should be allowed to go on duty
whenever it was officially required of them.
| He knew that there was a good deal of ra-
luctance among private employers to ex-
cuse their employees for guard duty but
that the government should set them an ex-
ample and he wanted government officials
to see to it that members of the National
| Guard were allowed to serve with their
companies without undue interference
| whenever circumstances demanded.
Praise of Gov. Magoon.
Reports from Cuba are very commenda-
| tory of Gov. Magoons administration there.
Harry Dougherty. member of the Spanish
treaty claims commission. who has lust
| spent six months In the island called at the
White House to pay his respects to the
President He says that one of the nota BILE
tnlnss about the situation in Cuba today is
| the unanimity of the people in supporting
Gov. MaSoOn. There are, of course two
| very bitter parties in the island and the
governor cannot side with either of them all
the time; but they seem to feel that he is
| giving them clean. honest asfministra
| ton, and they are willing to support him
| loyalty without reference to partisanship
Arrangements for taking the census are
| being rapidly perfected. The people want
a good census, and after that an election
How soon the election can be held is aues-
| ton, but that event is what everybody is
now looking forward to.
Appeal From Armenians,
Representative Roberts of Massachusetts
was at the White House today to see the
| President on behalf Of some of his Ar
menian constituents II Boston They want
| the President to take up the subject of
turkish oppression of the Armenians and
| present it formally at The Hague confer
ence mere is very large Armenian Dopu-
| latlon in Massachusetts and especially in
| and around Boston. There are number
| of societies. and a paper is regularly pub
| lished. There is good deal Of strife amons
| the patriots themselves. and not SO long
| ago an attempt was made to assasstnate
| the editor of the Armenian paper in his Of
| flee because of trouble over the distribu-
| ton of large relief fund that had been
| collected.
The President said that as he was going
away SO soon 1t would hardly be practicable
| for him to take up the <natter of the Ar
! menian protest himself. Representative
| Roberts said that there was a delegation
| of Armenians who wanted to be received
| at the White House. But the President
| said that under The circumstances he
| thought 1t would be better for them to call
| at the State Department and present all
the facts in the case to Secretary Root.
Appreciation of Japanese.
| w. E. Tempe OF the Japanese famine re-
| lief committee today presented to the Pres-
| dent a small silk scroll. the gift of the
mayor of Shiroshiki, in Japan. The scroll
| was of grass cloth silk. 1t had no particu-
| lar intrinsic value, and was not an ANTIQUE
| but the mayor of Shiroshiki said that he
| wanted to send 1t as mark of apprecfa-
| ton of the Presidents humanity in issuing