Evening star., 1938-04-17

years ago, With complications in Con-
Making New gn1is,ce gGsss owing hs to partisaa
States. April II, 1888. says:
One of the most in
teresting features of this session of
Congress is the political maneuvering in
relation to the Territories seeking admis-
sion to the Union. The Senate is now
considering the Republican proposal for
the admission of the southern half of
Dakota, which is supported by strong
array of facts and arguments. The
Democrats, who have made their policy
subject of caucus rule met this with
the demand for the admission Of Dakota
as whole, in connection with Mon
tana, Washington and New Mexico The
partisan character which has been given
to the controversy threatens to leave it
as far from settlement at the end Of the
session as it was at the beginning It Is
certain at any rate that no new States
will be voted into being before the presi-
Dental election. Besides this political
maneuVerlng. other interesting discus
slons are going on. The complaint is
made in Idaho that the Stewart bill,
permitting the citizens OF Northern
Idaho to vote whether they shall send
delegates to the constitutional conven-
tlon OF the proposed State of Washing
ton. ignores the right of the whole Terri.
tory to vote on the question of dismem-
berment and it is charged that all this is
only preliminary to the execution of an
other design of Senator Stewards to an
next Southern Idaho 20 Nevada. Then
too, many profess to see in the plan for
admitting New Mexico a deep scheme of
the Mormons to capture a State and
thus carry their peculiar institution" of
polygamy from under the control of Con-
gress. They are said to have obtained
already a strong grip on the politics of
New Mexico by the quiet immigration of
saints into that Territory from Utah"
*x
Flrehghtlng and life-saving apparatus
was not as efficient fifty years ago as at
Saving Lives April -, 1885, t thus ns15 notes es
at Fires. the possibility of i'm
provement in one fea-
'ture of the system:
After all the scaling ladders and
telescopine rescue poles and patent
escapes of every known material, from
iron to asbestos rope. have been tried
and found Ineffective against certain
contingencies at great fires, the life
saving authorities have finally turned
their attention to perfecting a system
which will enable persons in burning
buildings to jump out of the upper win
dows into net held by circle of men
on the ground. The trouble with every
device of this kind thus far consists not
in the quality of the net. or the diff
Guilty of inducing persons to jump. but
in the unsteady nerves of the undisci-
plined volunteers who hold the net
They become panic stricken, either
through anxiety for the safety of the
jumper or through fear that the falling
body will strike and crush them. They,
therefore, at a critical moment, either
rush toward each other. thus slackening
the net, or pull in diagonally opposite
directions, thus distoring its shape, or
drop their hold altogether, which is worst
OF all. It may not be advisable to re-
quire professional firemen to leave the
other work which they are specially
qualified to perform and to become net
holders. but the idea suggests itself
whether. in every large city, there could
not be organized corps of citizens, in
the nature of a charitable or mutual
defensive association, who would submit
to regular drill in this line of work and
hold themselves in readiness to respond
to certain kinds of fire alarms, which
would indicate that the burning building
is thlckly peopled in its upper stories"