The Dawson news. (Dawson, Ga.) 1889-current, 1914-11-24
SHORT SESSION WILL
Be A LIVELY One
BIG SCRAP IN CONGRESS OVER
RIVERS and HARBORS BILL
is IMPENDING.
PORK BARREL" CRY is RAISED

| menCS Budget tut rOFUy MIluoh
! Dollars as the Lowest Figure the
Department. VIII Ask.
WASHINGTON, D. C.-Though
practically nothing but appropria-
ton bills will be passed by the COM
| ing short session of congress there
are no signs in Washington that the
session will be a dead" one. When
congress adjourned in October for
the elections nobody could have stirr-
ed up a fight prospect with ten-foot
pole, but already the vanguard of
next session has begun to put in APP
pearance with every indication that
the appropriation bills will not be
passed without a number of swift
passages at arms.
The brunt of the trouble will be
borne by the rivers and harbors bill,
as was the case last session. Unof-
fetal estimates of the war depart
ment's budget put forty million dol
lars as the lowest figure the depart
ment will ask. Rivers and harbors
men in congress have not been in
| the least daunted or discouraged by
the slicing of the last bill to twenty
million dollars. In fact, they have
been spurred to greater efforts and
are busy gathering figures to show
how much money the government
lost through this "niggardly'' policy
The cry of pork barrel will be
worked as it never has been worked
before, and with the argument that
hard times have made it necessary
for the government to economic to
the limit. The country has been so
thoroughly imbued during the past
few months with the idea that the
rivers and harbors bills are nothing
but a grab that the point was raised
hundreds of times in the campaigns.
Candidates were compelled in many
instances to say in advance of the
election whether they were or were
not in favor of the "river and harbor
BILL" and their replies will in some
instances undoubtedly result in con-
gressmen voting against improve
ments in their own states.
Argument of Advocates.
Rivers and harbors advocates have
gone further than ever before to de-
fend the bill against attacks. They
will show that the small lump sum
appropriated at the last congress re-
suited in enormous waste; that along
the Mississippi many hundred thous-
and dollars worth of contractors ma
terials were lost or spoiled as in the
case of quantities of willow mattress
es employed in dredging which could
not be used under the small appro-
priation and which are useless the
second season. Hundreds of tempo
rary trestles run out into various riv-
ers for use in carrying debris and the
like have been utterly spoiled for
lack of money to keep them in shape
and will have to be rebuilt.
Then, too, comes the undesirable
argument that large river and harbor
improvement projects cannot be car
rfed on by dribbling appropriations
extending over a period of several
months. They require a great deal
of money expended in a comparative
ly short time and must be maintain
ed or will be useless for the pur-
poses for which they were intended.
The final and perhaps the most eff
fective card to be played by the riv-
ers and harbors advocates is that OPP
ponents of water improvements are
standing in with the railroads. Ev-
cry river improvement means COM
petition with railroads, and the pork
barrel holler," say the rivers and
harbors advocates, is the most fire.
quently traceable to the railroads.
This argument furnishes a most eff
fective alibi to the candidate who
wants to support the bill after haV-
ing declared hostility to it and it
bids the rivers and harbors dyed-in
the-wool opponents pause. 1t is cas-
Ter to explain a vote for a bill that
carried a substantial improvement
for a stream in ones own state than
it is to explain a vote against meas
ure that would have forced railroad
competition.