The National tribune., 1908-04-02

to care for the Hermitage, the home OF
former President Andrew Jackson, who
is buried on the grounds.
The President visited Nashville and
Jackson's burial place last Fall on his
return from his Southern hunting trip
and was greatly impressed with the idea
that the Government should assume the
burden of keeping the burial place OF
the great President. The Senate has
passed bill appropriating s25,000, and
Mr.. Gaines's bill to make the amount
$4,000 is pending in the House.
Speaker Cannon is supposed to be
hostile, and Mr.. Gaines feels that the
President might induce the Speaker to
be lenient. The State of Tennessee has
spent $160,000 in caring for the Her
mitage and Jackson's tomb" said Mr..
Gaines, land the Ladies' Hermitage AS
sociation has collected and expended
S2S,000. 1t does look as If the Govern
ment could afford 10 take charge. The
annual cost is now comparatively
small" Mr.. Gaines does not know
whether the President will attempt to
influence the Speaker, but hopes that
he will say good word to the autocrat
of the House.
With the Collingwood school fire be-
fore their eyes the estimates for repairs
on old school houses and cost of re-
placing some of the more insanitary and
insecure ones have been cut down by
the District Committee in Congress over
q million and half of dollars. WASH
ington is notoriously bad off for decent
school houses, altho it should have the
finest in the country, because the chill
dren of the National lawmakers get
their education here. As was stated in
The National Tribune isst week, Con-
gress will appropriate for almost any
thing on earth for the District except
school houses. The streets must be the
finest, because the automobiles of Ma
donal lawgivers must have good roads
to run on. Millions of dollars can be
expended for House and Senate offices
for men who will be at loss what to
do with them after they get in them,
but when it comes to making little chill
dren comfortable in sanitary school
buildings the whole Congress rises up
in horror at the wanton expenditure of
money. This same Congress will spend
millions of dollars, however, to investi-
gate yellow fever, scarlet fever, diphthe-
ria, tuberculosis and kindred ills, yet
will herd a lot of kids in small, badly
ventilated fire-traps, where they Will
have a chance to incur all the diseases
in the catalog. Penny wise and pound
foolish" was the way the sages put it.
Many veterans question the statement
plans to erect in Arlington Cemetery
monument to the Confederate dead who
are buried there. President Roosevelt,
It should be remembered, had the Sec
ton set apart for the Confederate dead
all fixed up and laid out properly, in ac-
cordance with the general scheme of
burial at Arlington, and then had the
bodies of those Confederates who died
in and around Washington during the
war. and who were buried by them
selves at one side OF the cemetery, taken
up and reinterred. Until the Govern
ment did this the graves were neglect
ed, run down and so dilapidated that it
was difficult to find them except by con-
sulting the chart. After the Govern
ment restored the section devoted to
the Confederate dead, the Confederates
living in Washington began to decorate
the graves on their Memorial Day.
which is always the Sunday following
the 39th of May. The President sends
q wreath of flowers from the White
House exactly as he does for the Tomb
of the Unknown on May so, and has al
ways evinced a great deal Of interest
II that particular section OF Arlington.
He also sends on the 30th of May hand
some wreaths to decorate the Rough
Riders Monument and the anchor of
the Maine in the Spanish War section.
Lately there has been determined ef
LOtL otlolt5 Tie SOulSutidtt NcltIdIS u
erect a monument in the Confederate
section in Arlington. An entertainment
was given in one of the opera houses of
Washington recently for this purpose,
and the President was invited to at
tend The President seldom has time
for anything of this character, and so
he wrote a letter to the management
stating that ne had not time to attend,
but expressed deep interest in the
scheme to erect the monument, and
stated that he hoped that the amount
would speedily be raised. The letter
of President Roosevelt was printed in
all the newspapers at the time. Presi-
dent Roosevelt has never held any but
the highest opinion of the veterans of
the civil war, as he always refers to the
war of the rebellion, and at the Moth
ers' Congress, when he entertained the
delegates at the White House he stated
in his opening remarks in the East
Room, that this WIS the one body in the
world that he put ahead of the veterans
of the civil war. He said that for the
veterans of the civil war, those of the
South as well as of the North, he had
the highest opinion, and placed them
above every other organization except
the mothers. The Mothers of Men, he
said, were entitled to the very highest
consideration at all times.
Brig.-Gen. Royal Thaxter Frank, u.
S. A. retired, died at his residence In
Washington Saturday, March 21 aged
20 years Gen. Frank was born in
Maine May 6, 1886. and was appointed
a cadet at the Military Academy from
that State July 1, 1854; was graduated
and appointed brevet Second Lieuten-
ant of the 5th Inf. July /, 1858; was
promoted Major. He became Lieuten-
ant-Colonel of the Cd Art, Jan. 25, 1889.
and Colonel of the 1st Art Oct 25,
1Ss4. He was appointed BrigaGier-G Cen
erab OCT. II, 1899, and was retired
Oct. Is. 1899. at his own request, after
over 40 years service. He was appoint
ed Brigadier-General of Volunteers
May 4, 1898, and was honorably dis
charged May IL, 1899. Gen. Frank
was brevetted Major July 3, 1852, for
gallant and meritorious services dur
ing the Peninsular campaign. and
Lieutenant-Colonel Dec. 13, 1862, for
gallant and meritorious services in the
battle of Fredericksburg, Va
The sundry civil subcommittee of the
House Appropriations Committee gave
a hearing 20 Representative Sulzer, of
New York, last week, and about half a
hundred survivors of the Slocum disas-
ter on the Suizer bill now pending be-
fore the committee to appropriate a
trife more than $1,000, 600 for the re-
lief of the Slocum sufferers.
At the conclusion OF the hearing
which was quite comprehensive, the
committee adopted, by unanimous vote,
resolution setting forth that in the
Hppinion of the committee there was