The National tribune. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1877-1917, 1908-07-30
PENN.

Theodore Roosevelt, President, was in
town.
For altho he is far away at his Sum-
mer home in oyster Bay, the Presidents
two pronunciamentoes of recent date
have walked up two Departments of the
Government. True, few of the big
uns" are at their desks. Big officials
do not worry much about working when
the President is away. But plenty of
understrappers are about When the
President began calling expert Navy
officers over to Newport for a big con-
ference at the War College, where he
was to attend, every Bureau Chief and
all his assistants began to take notice.
People over at the Navy Departme
have been talking about little else of
late than that big Newport powwow
and the Presidents speech for large
and hard-hitting Navy. 1t came right
the Navy officers at the Department had
almost nothing to do except plan how
they could get a vacation. The New
port conference took a number of the
Department experts on construction,
ordnance and equipment, who FASTENED
away gladly, altho with some wonder
as to whether the President was going
to swing his big stick at any of the
Bureau Chiefs. OF course, there was
no particular danger of that, altho the
possibility of it has kept many on the
qui vive.
A Jolt for the Department of Justice.
Then. just as the Navy Department
was waking up, the Department of JUS
tice received jolt from the decision of
the United States Court of Appeals, re-
yersing the verdict of Judge Landis's
District Court in the 29,500,000 Stand
ard Oil cases. There was really but lit
tie that the Department of Justice could
do. The orders to retreat or to go
ahead must come from the Attorney
General, Mr.. Bonaparte, who. like ether
Cabinet officers, is out of town, or from
the President. The orders did come
from the President, and it set a lot of
the Department lawyers to studying
various phases of the cases which prom
Use at this stage to have some political
as we'll as legal Importance.
In spite of the Presidents announce
ment that the Standard Oil Company
is undoubtedly guilty and his reflections
upon the United States Court of APP
peals, which resulted in much unfriend-
ly criticism of him in the newspapers,
there is a feeling here that the Standard
Will hardly ever be convicted on these
particular rebate cases. There is other
litigation, of course, against the trust
but many old timers here will be sur
prised If the trust does not escape on
the cases which were tried before Judge
Lands. They predict that it will be
the Beef Trust over again, and that
after little splurge, just to show that
the Governments law officers are on
the ramparts, the cases will be dropped
Officers in the Navy Department say
President Roosevelt's utterances at the
Newport conference last Wednesday are
only part of his program for a big
Navy campaign this Winter. They say
it is to be not alone a campaign for freer
criticism of battleship defects and the
adoption of more progressive ideas
about construction, but a campaign
again with Congress for big Navy bill
and for large authorization of ships
Long after the Senate Naval Commit
tee last Winter had concluded its hear
ings the President had not tired of sar-
castle comments about the committees
work. In his private conversations he
did not spare the Senators of the COM
mittee. Some of his pithiest remarks
about them We're made before such Off
GERS as Commander William S. Sims,
his Naval Aid, who is inspector of target
practice and the champion of latter
day battleship criticism, and also Lieut.
Commander A. L. Key, who wrote the
paper about the designs of the North
Dakota, which was Instrumental in
bringing about the Newport conference
That committee, on the evidence pre-
sented, accepted the Judgment of Ad-
miral George Converse, retired, and
others of the Board of Construction that
our ships are as well built, ship for ship,
as those of any navy in the world. The
President never accepted that verdict
without some reservations to the effect
that there is opportunity for improve
ment, and that the Navy Department
Bureaus are not doing their best posi-
BILE work in turning out fighting ships
of advanced design and efficiency
The Presidents Naval Program.
His immediate purpose, however, isl
to have the Utah and the Florida, the
latest of the four Dreadnaughts already
built on the most modern
lines possible. and incidentally to haveI
as many changes as possible in the |
North Dakota and the Delaware, which
ships are already well under way. But |
changes of any Importance in the two i
latter would affect their structures down |
to the very keels, and therefore are not |
likely to be feasible in any striking de- |
gree. Work on the designs for the Utah |
and the Florida has been suspended. |
pending conclusions of the Newport con-
ference.
But the President also wants twol
thorized by Congress the coming Win
ter. so as to make a fleet of six Dread
nughts. 1t is quit possible that those
ships would become eventually the nu-
,ieus of the Atlantic fleet, much dis
cussed of late on the superstition that
hereafter a considerable number of the
battleships now in commission will be
kept in the Pacific. In spite of the
proclamations after the last Navy ap-
bill passed the Senate that
The Senate leaders had acquesced in
he -battleships-a-year pro-
gram, there are good reasons for be-
ieving that two ships will not be grant
ID at the next session without another
big struggle. Senators of the Navy
Committee denied stoutly that they had
agreed to any such thing, but they were
90 weary over the long wrangle with
he White House to emphasize their
lttitude then. They reasoned that there
would be time enough for that whens
he next Navy bill reached them.
The General Board of the Navy will
,e starting work on their estimates in
.bout a month, when the Admirals have
'eturned from their Midsummer rest |
There is no doubt but what they will
recommend to Secretary Metcalf the
forthwith of at least two
,iant fighting ShiDS and perbanS moro |