Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1913-02-05
Fair Play for Washington.

OF COiun1Dla ana tlie
Yesterday in the House of Representa-
tives point of order raised by the chair
man of the District committee against
the validity of half-and-half participation
by the United States in the liquidation of
the Districts funded debt was, after a
brief and in no respect exhaustive discus
sion. sustained by the chairman or the
committee of the whole. and this decision
was sustained by the House in committee
by a rising vote of 81 to 81; tellers being
refused with the consequence that no
record was made of the manner in which
the House divided that momentouS
matter In this casual and offhand man.
ner did the House of Representatives, sit
ting as in committee of the whole. repu-
date the actions of Congress running
back for thirty-tive years i'll a matter IN
volving the placing upon the Dlstrlct OF
Columbia possibly of an obligation
amounting to S;;O,0tUOOo-
This same question was raised year
ago when the District appropriation Dill
was under discussion, hut with a different
result The chairman of the District
committee made then. now, a point OF
order against the appropriation to meet
the requirements of the sinking FUND on
the haIf-and-half basis. The chairman of
the committee of the whole. however,
undertook no snap judgment on the point
of order. but reserved his decision for
several DAYS to permit it's careful study,
after which he ruled against it. Had time
been taken in the same manner on the
present occasion to give the subject the
thought which it's Importance demands
probably negative action would have
been once more recorded. and the House
hoy hoon arad ha
spectacle of a reversal on point of order
of a practice enduring for over third of
a century and founded upon a formal
enactment by the Congress of the United
States.
In 1880 Washington was bankrupted as
a result of trying to build up capital
in accordance with the national stand
ards during the years of federal neglect
of the city which had been created as the
seat Of government. In that year Con-
gress gave relief from the accumulated
debt on the admission that it had been
incurred by the people of Washington
III performing national task, which did
not properly belong to it. Again in the
seventies a debt was incurred in similar
circumstances, from public-spirited mo-
tives, in the assumption by the District
of capital-building work that equtably
belonged to the United States, and in
1873 Congress- by the passage of what is
known as the organic act. engaged to pay
One-half of all the approved estimates of
expenses of the District government, and
in accordance with this enactment it pro-
ceeded without demur to pay on the half
and-half basis interest and sinking fund
items in connection with the Districts
debt. The District Commissioners treat
a.
nuaI obligation for capital maintenance
and submitted their estimates in accord
ance with this view, and Congress I'M
questioningly accepted them as the basis
OF equal payments from District and fed
eraI funds.
For the House now to refuse to con-
tinue to meet the sinking fund obliga
tons on the half-and- half basis is not
merely to attempt to repeal the organic
act. but to repudiate and declare irresu-
lar and unauthorized all the payments
that have been made in the thirty-odd
years on this account on the half-and-
half basis. The District would have good
ground for complaint if this were done
by the House after full debate. after an
examination of the question by a COM
mittee. with hearings and arguments and
a report submitted in season to be d.
gested in detail. No consideration of
equity could really in any circumstances
warrant the Reputation of the federal
obligation to carry half the burden of
District debt liquidation, on an account of
capital building by the District on the
national scale. But to reach decision
by way of point of order raised in the
course Of the routine debate upon the ap-
preparation bill and sustained by the die
tum of the temporary occupant of the
chair without consideration, virtually
without discussion and in the immediate
presence of a mere handful of members
is in the last degree unfair and is both
an injustice to the District of Columbia
and a slur upon all the Congresses
that have since 1873 followed the half
and-half principle in the matter of the
funded debt and on more than one occa-
sion in the past refused to reverse the
established practice.
As for the merits of the question
raised by Representative Johnson yester-
day and sustained by Chairman Rodden-
berry. there is no reasoning which recog-
nizes the obligation to meet one-half the
capital expenses after 1873 which does
not raise or conccde a like obligation in
respect to the abnormal capital building
expenses on national lines incurred i'm the
seventies privr to 1873 and represented
by the funded debt. Since the nation
ought to have paid all or. by the 1878
compromise. one-half of this debt, and
since il has paid annually one-half OF
the interest and sinking fund TO meet
this debt, it is astounding to find the
House, over thirty years later. to be now
declaring that Congress did not tech
nically say that II would do what ii
ought to hav. done and what in fact II
has done.
The chance remains that the House
when the committee of the whole rise.
and reports. will recognize the injustic,
both of the decision and in the manner
Of its rendering on this vital question OF
the Districts financial relations with tn,
United States. In the light of precedent.
and in view of the language of the stat
utes IL is to be believed that when tn,
bill is reported back to the House thu
item stricken out on yesterdays point o
order will be specifically restored or tina
the entire measure, which has beef
stripped in the course of this so-callet
debate of its most meritorious provisions
will be recommitted for the purpose Of