The Tacoma times. [volume] (Tacoma, Wash.) 1903-1949, 1910-02-14
BY w. s. Crouch.

The battle to get water under
the navy is on again.
Secretary Meyer, the Roosevelt
remnant in the Taft cabinet, hav-
ing recognized the bureaus by
executive order, appealed to con-
gress for legislation to make the
reform permanent. Chief Con-
structor Capps and Paymaster
General Rogers promptly went
before the house naval affairs
committe and poked the Meyer
argument full of holes. The house
naval affairs committee grabbed
at this excuse to back away from
the Meyer recommendations. There
the matter now stands.
This is the old fight between
congressman and rockingham
admirals on the one side, and
the line officers who sail ships on
the other. Meyer has followed
Col. Roosevelt in taking up the
cudgels for the line officers. Sen
ator Hale and the gang which
wants to exploit the navy yards
for patronage and political pur-
poses fought Roosevelt savagely.
Meyer, they thought, a quiet
voiced, easy-going chap, could be
baffled without either difficulty
or cutlery. Meyer has fooled them.
He is using language that was new
Ter taught in Harvard.
The bureau system of the navy
has three big flaws:
Cd Out of 100000 or SO
ANNUALLY voted for the United
States navy the bureaus have
succeeded in spending the greater
part on shore. Much of this money
has been absolutely wasted.
CD The bureaus have built
ships, armed and outfitted them
without regard to the recommen-
!dations of the officers who sailed
them, recommendations based on
actual experiences.
CD All the bureaus are indie
pendent of each other and more
or less independent of the secre-
tary of the navy. The bureaus
would never cooperate, because
each feared the loss of some of
its dignity and importance.
Both the civil and Spanish
American wars saw the rocking
chair admirals fall down hard.
Both times a sort of unofficial CEN
trial authority had to be hastily
Iimprovised. 1t was to escape Or
ldefs from an outfit of this kind
that Admiral Dewey cut the cable
at Manila. Despite these failures
of the bureau system in time of
war, the system came back strong
after peace was declared.
/ Senator Hale, Capps and the
Portsmouth navy yard offer tri-
| angular illustration of the whole
Igame. Presidents and secretaries
of the navy come and go, but Hale
has been chairman of the senate
navy committee for years, and he
is the navy. The Portsmouth
navy yard, although in New Hamp-
shire, is on the Maine line. Hale
has filled that yard with his con-
lstituents, and his naval policy has
consisted in keeping the Ports
mouth yard busy. Portsmouth is
a bad harbor for big modern ships,
but Hale met that problem by re-
lsisting the building of batt1eships
bigger than 10000 tons displace-
ment. Thus he held back the navy
for years after foreign nations
built the Dreadnaught size.
Heads of naval bureaus such as
lChief Constructor Caps are de-
tailed to their jobs for four years
at time, with the title and pay
of admiral. They can be redetail-
led as often as is desired. Caps,
having secured his detail through
Hale, naturally adopted the Hale
Portsmouth and other policies.
lCapps advocated small battleships.
tCapps saw that Hale men got jobs
in Portsmouth, and that Hale's
friends sold supplies there. Where
fore Caps could wear gold lace at
lpink teas in Washington, while
other officers sailed the stormy
lseas.
In similar fashion Capps looked
naval affairs committee, and rep
resentatives likewise.
Other bureau chiefs did as
Capps did.
Portsmouth is not the only navy
yard maintained for political pur-
lposes.
To further illustrate the waste
of money, it is worth notice that
such bureaus as construction,
steam engineering, and yards and
docks, each had it's Independent
power plant and electrical plant
and machine shop in the same
vi 90 he
bureau chiefs demanded this du-
lplication, and members of con-
Igress got jobs for constituents as
a result of such duplication.
The saltwater officers would
not have kicked so hard, perhaps,
liz the rockingham admirals had
given them good ships to handle.
Caps, though, would demon
Istrate by differential calculus that
a battleship didn't need much
| freeboard. When the line off
GERS found they couldn't fire their
guns in any kind of a sea because
tofi this lack of freeboard they
growled. There were the 10000
ton battleships. too, and defective
Iturrets and old-fashioned guns
and other faults perfectly plain to
the men who sailed the ships. Col.
Roosevelt and a muckraker or
two took up this battle of the line
lofficers. This forced an investi-
cation, WHICH SENATOR HALE
lCONDUCTED. He and his COM
mittee browbeat and bullied every
Terrific who appeared and let Capps
tell the story of his life and call
lall the critics names at will. The
Hale verdict found the ships per-
fleet and Capps great man. 1t
was fine model for the present
Ballinger-Pinc inquiry.
4 After Roosevelt left sigh of