Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1926-01-08

Congress is not content with the
talking 1t does on its own floors. 1t
wants vastly increased facilities for
conversation by telephone. The Wash
ington telephone company has just
installed beneath the dome of the
Capitol an expanded exchange large
enough to serve q city of Is, 900 peo-
pie. AS Congressman are likely to talk
at any hour of the day or night. Sun
days and holidays included, the new
exchange gives service "a hours a
day. Its switchboard has IS posi-
tons" serves 1903 main and extern
sion stations in the Capitol and House
and Senate Office Buildings. and has
ia trunk lines to the telephone com
panys central office. There are 3S
''tie lines" to other private branch eX.
changes of Government departments,
thus giving the administration direct
connection with the Capitol. OF course,
Congress not only talks, but is talked
to. The added phone facilities, in other
words, are required for accommoda-
ton of the patriots and taxpayers who
want the ears of Congressman, as well
as by Senators and Representatives
themselves. The chief operator of the
national citadel Of loquacity is wom-
an, Mrs. Harriet CT. Daley, who oper-
ated the first switchboard ever INSTALL
ed at the Capitol.
X
Who is the United States Senator
recently described by an exalted Fed
eral parsonage as "a good fellow, but
without intellectual curiosity? It's
just possible he may be one of the
men whom DR. Samuel A. Eliot of
Boston, speaking at the Woodrow
Wilson birthday dinner, classed as
Important mediocritieS."
y N-*
Twelve or fourteen young American
officials lost all Of their private prop
erty during the earthquake in Japan
in 1923. To compensate them a bill
has just been introduced in Congress,
sponsored by Senator Mckinley of
Illinois and Representative Acker-
man of New Jersey. 1t calls for a
total of 100000 Six or seven Off
GERS of the foreign service. four at
taches of the Department Of Com
merce and one Treasury official come
within the scope Of the proposed
grant. Representative Ackerman's
interest in the bill is derived from
the fact that he and his family hap
pened to be at Nikko, the famous
Japanese shrine resort, at the time
of the earthquake. A few days later
he had occasion to learn of the heroic
services rendered by the American
officials during the earthquake and Its
aftermath. Army and Navy officers
of the United States, who suffer per-
sonal loss under such circumstances,
receive fixed compensation for loss
incurred "in the line of duty But
our civilians are not so Unidentified.
*x n
The Swiss Minister to the United
States and Nine. Mare Peter have 8
couple of semi AmericaniZed sons with
rival alma matters. There is In con
sequence an occasional rift In the lutte
of an otherwise conspicuously happy
and cultured household. The Peters
who have been at Washington since
Nav, 1920, sent one of their boys tc
Harvard and the other to the Univer
sity of Virginia. Ever since Their
| there has been q near feud In the
| family as to the respective merits Of
| Cambridge and Charlottesville. The
Harvard man now and then taunts
his Virginia brother with having &C
quired an atrocious Southern accent
| Whereupon the graduate of Virgins
retorts that even that is preferable
to a New England drawl with nasa
motifs The elder Peters youth re
Gently became an instructor at Har
ward. The Swiss Minister is a lawyer
by profession and resident of &c
neva The Peters home is only g
of the League Of Nations, on the Quay
Woodrow Wilson.
Judge Edwin B. Parker. Texas Dem
y ocrat, Is getting to be Uncle SAM