The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1907-1939, 1922-05-04

going on with the interminable race
OF naval arguments, and in the end
would have meant, the administration
felt. very much greater tax burdens
than the $4,000 increase of the navy
personnel could possibly mean.
1t is generally believed here that
many Of the people of the country will
disapprove of the enlarged personnel
voted for the navy, because of the fact
that government funds, raised by
taxes on the people, are required to
support them. By proponents of the
$4,000 navy, this is regarded as an in
eVitable but somewhat peculiar state
of mind.
/ One of the senators who declared he
would fight the naval limitation treaty
If the $4,000 personnel was not made
an issue by the White House, points
out this situation:
Would Weaken Navy
If, in the negotiations between the
powers of the world which led to the
treaty, the United States had agreed
to write into the covenants an agree
ment that it would scrap one more
battleship than England, there would
have been a veritable roar of protest
from the people of the country. Then
he said, Messrs. Hughes, Lodge, Root
and Underwood might as well, have
voluntarily retired to private life.
They would have been looked upon, he
contended, as having betrayed their
country by permitting it to be weaker
specifically in naval power than an
other great power of the earth, and as
having invited trouble by that action.
The interest and excitement aroused
by the agreement all through the coun-
try is guarantee of this fact, he said.
AS a matter of fact, this senator
said, cutting down the personnel of
the navy so that all of the ships allow
ed the United States could not be
kept in commission and the men train
ed to their duties, amounts to exact
iy the same thing. The ships and
guns alone are nothing, without train
ed crews to operate them. Assistant
Secretary of the Navy Roosevelt is
authority for the statement that with
$1,000 personnel, the navy could keep
in commission only Is of the IS cap
ital fighting ships allowed it under
the treaty. The other vessels would
have skeleton crews on them only, to
keep them from going completely to
pot while lying idle for periods of
years.
This senator, who comes from
state where the question of Japan is
ever in the minds of the people, said
that the people of his part of the coun-
try were alive to this fact They felt
that the United States might Just as
well scrap five of its big fighting ships
as have that many out of commission
and unable to render service when
that service was needed
All of this, it is understood, was
communicated to the White House.
President Harding saw the Justice of
the situation. The administration was
torn between going counter to it's own
leadership in the house of representa-
tives and the possibility of falling to
nave the senate ratify the naval treaty.
Even If the opposition which would
nave sprung up in the senate had not
been strong enough to defeat the
treaty, it would have caused a big
break in the ranks of the Republican
majority there, thing which natural
ly the president was anxious to avoid
In this dilemma, President Harding.
whose own views were opposed to hav-
ing idle and undermined vessels.
went before the members of the house
OF representatives, and by his in1u-
ence secured adoption of the larger
personnel for the limited American
navy.