Year: 1874

SCOOu 10 nave agreed upon d measure 10 De submitted to Congress, in which govern ment will be asked to guarantee interest on bonds of the company to the extent Of forty or fifty millions, which would aggre- gate three to four millions annually. Bonds thus endorsed can be readily nego- tiated in Europe. The government will be secured by first mortgage on nearly five hundred miles completed road which 1t can purchase whenever the road fails to pay interest on these bonds. Members from the south and southwest are believed to be united in favor of aid to the road.

 There can surely be no sound objection to government aid on such basis, for in any event there could be no loss on the actual transaction. Then the gain from many sources would come under no other head than that of immense. We can hardly state it clearer and no stronger than is done in this clipped from an ex- change:

 When the enormous expense of the mill itary establishment in Texas, New MeXi- co and Arizona is considered, and when it is remembered that the cost of tranSpOrta- tion alone along this line is over four mil- lions of dollars per annum, 1t will require no further argument to demonstrate the advantage to the government which will result from the opening of the Texas and Pacific Railway. But the reduction in the cost of military transportation is only a fraction of the amount which the govern ment would save by the completion of this road. A line of railway through Tex as, New Mexico and Arizona along the Mexican frontier, would enable the gov ernment to reduce the military force one half-a saving of six millions of dollars yearly. The establishment of great through line of railway, with the cOnSe- Quent settlement and development of the trX- no Ind There would soon be an end of Indian wars in that region of our national dO- main; and who can estimate the saving, not in money, merely, but in human life, that would thereby be accomplished? Let the national government aid this railway upon the one ground of economy, if upon no other.

 If Congress were made up of men with independence enough to meet every ques- tion upon it's merits, the aid sought by Scott & Go. would be promptly granted. CongreSsmen are just as well disposed as the average man, but like the average of men of business, trim 10 what seems to be the popular breeze. The newspapers call CongreSsmen gang of demagogues, and we admit the charge is measurably true; but the chief of all demagogues in Ameri ca sit in editorial rooms. These latter demagogues are so impudent and persist ent and often plausible and apparently honest, that the majority of voters make up their opinions from their favorite newSpa- per, and therefore the ambitious Congress- man becomes a second-rate or manufact- ured demagogue and excuses his course by saying it is his duty to obey the will of the people, when both he and the people are led by set of editors who as a lot are not noted for thrift, great enterprise, or re- markable deeds of any worthy kind. The | shrewd but interruptions editors know the masses have no time to devote to care full examinations of questions bearing up- on important interests, and will therefore l mostly accept and act upon such as they 1 find in their preferred journal, and they | also know that the average Congressman | will act according to what appears to be | the wish of the body of the voters There | is hardly newspaper Of big or little pre- tension in the nation that is not irration- | ally yelping with apparent sincerity for economy, and at the same time demand ing that appropriations shall be made to benefit its particular locality. Each Con- gressman feels safe in being liberal and even eXtravagant wherein such action will benefit those who elected him, but very unsafe regarding anything not of im- mediate advantage to his own patriotic and economic supporters; and upon this line of conduct, great measures of econo- my to the whole nation and direct benefit to one-half or more of the people, are strangled.

 For the reasons set forth above, we fear that Congress will decline to grant aid to the Texas and Pacific railway--an enter prise of national advantage in every way the true statesman regards it. More lands are not asked nor payment of any bonds a guarantee of payment of interest on bonds only being required to secure the ready negotiation of securities and early completion of the road. If the company should fail to pay the interest, govern ment could come right in and reposseSs it. self of all the millions of acres of public lands already granted with many hun dreds of miles of completed road and all rights of the company. The bill of Scott & Go. has such merit as should secure it's prompt passage.

 IT is very rare that we reproduce con- plimept paid to ourself or our paper, but the following comes from a well-posted