The Wenatchee daily world. [volume] (Wenatchee, Wash.) 1905-1971, 1908-12-24
CONGRESS TAKING
HOLIDAY RECESS
NOW BECOMING POPULAR TO RE-
MAIN IN Observation-Disclosures
PASS LAW WORKING A HARD
SHIP ON MEMBERS.
Special to the World.

BLESS WOTk0Q nara III Oru0r 10 &C
complish as much as possible before
the holidays and adjourned on the
21st inst. for holiday recess of ten
days. The members of the lower
House and Senators will return to
their nearby homes, but since the
anti-pass law was enacted, it has be-
come more fashionable to remain in
Washington during the holidays and
it may be safely assumed that the
member from Hawaii as we'll as some
members on the Pacific coast and in
termediate points, will remain at the
national capital until the post holi-
day work in congress is resumed.
Secretary Root, the man who re-
organized the War Department and
the Army and who has been invited
by the President to do the same work
for the Navy Department, has recent
ly told the Committe on Appropri-
ations that reorganization will soon be
indispensable in the State Depart
ment. This department has always
been looked upon in Washington as
the smuggest and most refined of all
the departments and the clerical force
there has piqued itself on being a lit
tie better than it's brothers and sisters
of the clerical force in the Post Of
flee Department, the Interior Depart
ment, or even the War and Navy de-
partments. They occasionally touch
elbows with the clerks of the ambas-
sailors and foreign ministers and i'm
agine that their desks are diplomatic
centers and that they have something
to do with international politics. Sec
rotary Root does not share in all of
these illusions of his clerical force,
but since the United States has risen
to eminence ana prominence among
the nations of the world in finance,
in manufactures and in agriculture,
and since Secretary Root has shown
the world that he can make an agree
ment, if not treaty, that the Sena-
tors from Texas and Georgia cannot
puncture. there is necessity for an
improvement and reorganization in
the department over which Mason,
Fish and Olney once presided.
The report of Mr.. Wilson, the Mes
tor of the cabinet and the Secretary
of Agriculture, is before Congress
and is a summary of staggering fig
ures. The value of the combined
crops for 1909 is estimated at eight
billions of dollars What do these
figures mean? The secretary has
doubtless been careful in his addition
and the farmers scattered through
out the length and breadth of the
land, if they make an economical and
judicious use of this remarkable
bounty of nature, may possibly prof
it to the extent of eight billions and
it is perhaps fortunate that the
wealth remains at the source of pro-
duction and is not in the treasury
of the United States in Washington
But it is diverting to imagine what
a lot of things this eight billions
might buy. The Secretary diverts
himself by the observation that it is
enough to cancel the interest bear
ing debt of the United States and to
pay for the Panama Canal AMI fifty
biggest battleships.
Those who have been interested in
the. development of the movement
for the improvement of the inland
waterways, initiated two years ago
by the President and given impetus
by the convention in Washington
which has just adjourned. understand
that the present plan is to abandon
the old method so long prevailing
in congress, of improving rivers piece
meal, and to undertake the work on
broader scale and at greater cost.
It is expected that the work In the
future will be expedited in degree
never before attempted. Taking
the Ohio river, for example: In
stead of projecting work covering a
period of from fifty to seventy-five
years to make the river navigable at
all seasons from Pittsburg to its
mouth at Cairo, maintaining nine
or ten foot channel throughout, the
new plan is that these improvements
shall be prosecuted so vigorously and
with the colossal steam dredges such
as are now used on the Panama
Canal, that they will be completed
within ten years. To accomplish
this great project, however, will re-
quire the expenditure of about sixty
millions of dollars according to recent
estimates, and congress could not, OF
course, make appropriations on such