Evening star., 1938-05-08
Capital Sidelights
BY WILL p. KENNEDY.

veteran employees at LNe CAPITOL, VINO
have become specialists in certain lines,
like experts in various other branches of
the Federal service who have made their
jobs labor of love and who have made
important discoveries and inventions of
great value to their Government, oftimeS
go along their humdrum routine without
receiving proper appreciation and recog-
milton.
Take for example, Hans Jurgensen, jr.,
who is modestly listed as an employe in
the Office of the clerk of the House. He
is tally clerk at a small salary-totally
without acclaim of any sort. Yet he has
designed an electric voting machine,
daily in use, which has done good service
for every member of the House and
which has saved much time in the
pinches, where time counts and delays
are costly. He is an accountant, and his
machine is similar to an adding machine.
1t records the yeas and nays. absent and
present, paired for and paired against
votes of each individual member
Under the previous old system rubber
stamps were used and it took at least
three months to compile the voting rec
ords of the 435 members. With a con-
gressional election coming along, there
is at present tense interest in how he has
speeded up this process, since the voting
records of the members play such an i'm
portant part in their campaigns. Ten
small rubber stamps were used and each
had to be handled ABS times For ex-
ample. assume that there were 200 roll
calls during the session. Each of the 10
stamps would have to be picked up 200
times for each of the 435 members-some
$1,000 times. The new electric machine
developed by Tally Clerk Jurgensen can
do the same job in less than two weeks.
The advantages of the Jurgensen sys-
tenn are that it saves time. insures greater
accuracy, is more ready for reference,
permits duplication of records, which
was never done before makes subse-
quent applications easy, puts each men,
ber's record in more concise form and
each individuals complete voting record
can be seen at glance. Also, an index
is furnished, which, if checked, can also
tell the subject matter on which the vote
was registered.
Remember, this recording of the vote is
only fractional part of Hans Jurgen-
sens Job. He also prepares the volum-
inous daily calendars of the House, the
committee lists and the State lists and
he keeps the history of all bills in both
the House and Senate.
X *
Senator Theodore Green and Repre-
sentative Aime j. Forand of Rhode Is
land the other day observed Rhode Is
lands independence day by telling the
world about it in both Senate and House
chambers. On May 4, 1776 declaration
Of independence from the British En-
pire was officially adopted by the Legis-
lature of the smallest Colony with the
longest name-the State of Rhode Island
and Providence Plantations This was
two months before the Federal Declara-
ton OF Independence, and constitutes
Rhode Island the Oldest sovereign State
In the western Hemisphere. The large
congressional party which is going to
visit newport next Sunday will be re-
MINDED that the destruction there of the
British sloop Liberty was the first overt
act OF the American Revolution, followed
by the burning of the British schooner
Gaspee at Providence, which occasioned
the first bloodshed of that Revolution
Also the congressional party will have
pointed out to them where the first naval
engagement of the war took place. Sen
ator Green also emphasizes that Rhode
Islands Governor was the only one who
refused to take oath to support the no
torious Stamp Act, and son of that
State, Esck Hopkins, was the first COM
mander in chief of the American Navy,
while another son, Nathaniel Greene,
was the major general, who, next to
Washington, commanded the American
Army. Senator Green points with espe-
cial pride to Rhode Islands Declaration
of Independence because it was his own
great-great-grandfather, Jonathan Ar
mold, who drafted that courageous and
historic document. He further calls at
tention that Rhode Island pioneered
from its very foundation in 1886 by Roger
Williams on two fundamental princi-
ples-O religious liberty and the entire
separation Of church and state; and ca
political liberty and the rights of all peo-
pie. The little town of Providence was
the first in all history to carry these
principles into actual effect, so success
fully that they were incorporated into
the National Declaration of Independ-
ence, the Federal Constitution and the
constitutions of all the American States.