Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1930-05-14
WASHINGTON OBSERVATIONS
BY FREDERIC WILLIAM VILE.

If the comparatively slim attendance
at the Senate foreign relations commit
| tee hearings on the naval treaty are
any criterion, popular interest in it is
| not very intense. An oil scandal Sc
ance or a lobby tragi-comedy would
have drawn immensely bigger crowds.
Seventy-flve per cent of the persons
present to hear Secretary Stimson ex-
plain and defend the London pact con-
sisted of women. Mrs. Stimson and
Mrs. David A. Reed, themselves hero
| ines Of the late unpleasantness on the
Thames, were among them. The I'M
| failing Alice Longworth, hatless. as
usual, had place of vantage near the
head of the committee table. The Sem
| ate itself is not very excited over the
| treaty. 1t will not begin to generate
the passions, pro and con, which the
| Washington conference agreements pro-
duced, to say nothing Of the battle Of
| the century over the treaty of YER
sailles. A common observation on Capt.
toll Hill is that, being harmless" the
| tilree-power London arrangement is as
slssed Of relatively rapid ratification.
X
Secretary Stimson caused Senator
Borah and the foreign relations chair
mans colleagues to smile over a refer
ence to the Chilean Argentinian naval
| treaty of 1902, which the Secretary de-
scribed as the almost forgotten fore
runner OF Anglo American parity"
| The two South American republics de-
cided they wanted parity" and agreed
to have 1t. Stimson said that the Span
! ish experts of the State Department
| never agreed on an exact English trans
| lation of the term employed in the
| Chilean Argentinian treaty, One render
ing is "a prudent equilibrium" while
another defines parity as "a discreet
equipoise."
When the treaty is under scrutiny
before Senator Hale's naval affairs COM
mittee, therell be much talk of tuns
and guns, especially guns. It Is likely to
be brought out, this observer learns, that
| the cleavage on 6-inch and 8-inch cali
bers among our Navy Department ex-
perts is a difference of opinion between
the younger and older officers of the
| fleet. The older authorities, of whom
Admiral Hilary p. Jones may be taken
as type, incline to the belief that the
higher callber Is the more valuable for
combat purposes. The younger school,
probably personified by Admiral William
v. Pratt, chief naval adviser at London,
| Is said to believe that in a modern feet
action 6-inch weapons would have
distinct advantage. The smaller guns
appeal IL CIllS GcCIIllCdl piOpOalOiOIl 10
here being correctly stated, to lend
themselves to more rapid fire than g.
inch guns.
Veraciously it is reported that when
a friend and admirer "razzed" Repre-
sentative Ruth Hanna Mccormick about
her $500 Illinois senatorial primary
expense account and asked how she ex-
pected to get away with it, she replied,
isn't it the woman, who pays and pays
and pays?"
X ~
Frank Morrison, veteran secretary of
the American Federation of Labor, rates
high on Capitol Hill these DAYS as a
political prophet. On the day before the
| recent vote on Judge Parker's nominal
ton to the Supreme Court, Morrison
| showed a reporter for Labor, the rail-
waynen's alert official organ in wash
| ington, a Senate tally sheet on which
the Federation official had checked of
each Of the e6 Senators. When the roll
was called "a hours later. the votes for
and against, including the pairs, were
oweA, without q single miss.
Frelinghuysen boosters in the New
Jersey Republican primary contest have
captured q Dawes-Carlos Dawes OF
Columbus, Ohio--as a recruit for their
cause. He is q nephew of Ambassador
Charles G. Dawes, of whom Rival Can
didate Dwight w. Morrow was recently
naval conference colleague In London.
Frelinghuysen publicity gloats: young
Mr.. Dawes, who is now speaking for
Mr.. Frelinghuysen, states that after he
and Gen. Dawes had encountered our