The Prince George's enquirer and southern Maryland advertiser. (Upper Marlborough, Md.) 1882-1925, 1908-11-20
OUR WASHINGTON LETTER
WASHINGTON, D. c., Nov. IA, 1908
Mr. EDITOR:


Cabinet making for the President elect.
1t is predicted that Myron 2. Herrick,
former Governor of Ohio will be nomi-
mated for the Secretary8hip OF the Urea
sury. It is believed that Mr.. Garfield
will remain in his present position as
Secretary of the Interior. In such case
there would be two Cabinet Ministers
from Ohio but there is recent prece-
dent for such an arrangement for has
not President Roosevelt three Cabinet
officers all from the State of New York
in Root, Cortelyou and Straus. The
old idea that Cabinet Ministers must be
picked out with delicate consideration
for Geography might as well be aoan
doned. When the right man is wiling
to serve for ten thousand dollars year
and such fame mingled with reprooa-
ton as the pace may afford him and
his wife he ought to be nominated by
the President and confirmed by the
Senate whether he halls from Nevada
or Rhode Island or any intermediate
state. 1t is pretty well understood tnat
Secretary Root will be sent to the Sen
ate from New York after March the
fourth next as successor to Senator
Platt, president of the United Stares
EXPRESS Company on the floor of the
Senate and opposer Of the parcels post
and any program in the postal service
that will in any way interfere with the
exorbitant and oppressive profits OF the
express companies. Postmaster-Gen-
eral Meyer has just completed his year
ly report from the Post Office Depart
ment from which it appears that this
department is nearly seventeen millions
in arrears. A more humiliating and
discraceful condition cannot be shown
in Russia, China or any country on the
face of the Earth The pos master Gen
eral is in no way responsible for this
condition. He has again and again be-
sought Congress as body and Con-
gressmen as individuals to enact a mea-
sure which will not only make the Pos
tai Esta blishment self supporting in
stitution but will make it source OF
rev cnue to the Government. There are
over thirty thousand rural route en-
ployes tramping the country with small
packages of letters and papers. This
wear a few dollars added to the salary
of each will increase the expense OF
rural mail delivery about three million
of dollars. If as the Postmaster Gen
eral has urged these rural reuters were
permit ed to deliver parcels weighing
from one to eleven pounds at cost Of a
few cents each it would wipe out the
deficit Of fifteen millions or more. and
make the postal service self sustaining
as is the Patent Office.
1t is disgrace to this Government
that this has not long since been done
and that agents of the Express Com
panies on the floor of the Senate and
the House of Representatives with the
al breyiation Hon. preffxed to their
names have stood in the way of such
salutary and necessary legislation. All
European countries have long enjoyed
and profited by the parcels post. 1t is
working beautifully in what some con-
slider the half civilized countries of the
Orient, but owing to the superior power
of. the Express companies lobbyists in
the vaunted freest and best Govern
ment In the world the American citizen
is denied its benefits. When Secretary
Root instead of Plat shall represent
the wealthiest and most populous state
in the Union it may be predicted that
there will be something doing. He is
not military man but during his ser
vice as Secretary of War he succeeded
in having legislation enacted in the
teeth of the old fogy generals that was
not short of revolutionary. Since he
has been Secretary of State the Consul
lar Service has felt his vitalizing and
and purifying touch and the Depart
ment of State which was cobwebbed
with red tape and clogged with hum
drum fogyism has been placed on an
effective rational working basis. 1t is
impossible that such man in the Sen
ate can be quiescent or useless much
less venal and obstructive like the man
he is expected to succeed. There has
been a wonderful change in politics and
politicians during the seven years which
will be known perhaps in the future as
the beginning of the Rooseveltan re-
form era There are others to carry on
the work and will not be arrested by
the departure of the President to Africa
What change for example has come
over the spirit of politics in New York
as demonstrated in the election, for the
second time, of such man as Governor
of the fiercest opposition of the machine
politicians Eight years ago Secretary
Root would have stood no chance of
coming to the Senate from New York.
New he will take his place as the most
| conspicuous representative in the Amer
lean House of peers and if he does not
begin at once like Senator LaFollette
to make himself heard and understood
New York and the country will fail to
get all they are entitled to.
Optimistic tariff reformers are pre-
dieting that the work on the tariff
schedules will be well advanced by the
fourth of March and that after Presi-
dent Taft has called special session
the Sixty first Congress for the revis-
ion of the tariff Congress will find
probably have completed the much