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HP GOODWIN'S WBBKLY. I
HUN . -lB
HJI'i good fellows and did not mean any wrong.
H( There should be a little book prepared for
Hsm1 use in the schools, to show that civilization
H'l'v and society rest on man's surrender to the
K sovereignty of the laws.
M J WILL NOT WIN.
i' . Senator Stewart showed his level head
i when he warned the Democrats in the
Hit Senate the other day that they were mak-
Htf j ing a mistake in trying to create prestige
H for their party by denouncing the army.
jH ' No doubt there are some bad men in
jH . the army, but the ratio of such men is
H ', ' not greater than in civil life. Moreover,
H ii those men when they enlisted offered
H'M their lives, if needs be, in upholding the
H , flag. Their mothers live in all the States
Hl ; of the Union, the ties of sympathy be-
H''i' tween those soldiers and the people at
H ' i large are very close, and ' the politician
Hi who seeks to make party capital by seek-
H)' ing to picture them as murderers and the
H i savages of the Philippines as a liberty-
H' loving, oppressed race, surely makes a
H J mistake. The people will repudiate every
H $' such effort.
H The men most to blame for the attack
H are Senator Rawlins and Senator Patter-
Hjij son. Both know what has invariably
Hi; happened when the men of the West have
Hri gone on Indian raids and have overtaken
mJ the enemy. Patterson tried the other day
HV' to justify Indian killing, giving Indian
H j" attrocities as a reason. But he knows
Hf that the barbarians in the Philippines
Htt could have taught old Geronimo tricks in
HH V cruelty that would have made him sur-
H , ift render his chieftain's feathers in admira-
H ( tion and awe. The American army has
H the admiration of all civilized peoples,
H 1 except on the part of a few men in the
H Congress of the United States, and the
1'h, few will have a difficult work in creating
H! party capital through their denunciations
H j of the men to whom the honor of the flag
HjiL is committed among the assassins of the
HjJ Philippines.
Hlf, Immigrants.
H i J It is noted at Ellis Island that the percent-
H hi age of illiteracy among immigrants is in-
H'! creasing. Last year the percentage of illit-
H-ri eracy above 14 years of age was 28. It is
H; expected that 500,000 will come this year.
Hj'p Some thoughtful people east are worried
H ! h over this. They note that there are many
Hjg more males than females arriving, and are
Hfff counting from this year's importations a
H II solid phalanx in a few years of 1 50,000 voters
Hj who can neither read nor write and who of
HH jv necessity can know very little of the institu-
li tions of our country.
H II The only consolation is in the fact that
HH this has been going on for a hundred years
Htifliffi and still the Republic rides on an even keel.
Hffl A worse feature than the illiteracy is the
HHK character and nationalities of the comers. A
flK& generation back nearly all comers were from
HB northern Europe, from the races that are
fB disciplined at home, who believe in law and
HS order, and who, if a law seems wrong, have
the patience to gc about its repeal through '
the legal channels". The comers now are
from lands where the people are bound to
superstitions and often governed more by
passion than reason, and who are prone to
construe liberty as but another term for li
cense. That true liberty which is liberty
under the law they have no conception of.
There is a cause for their coming. During
the past five years the volume of trade in
favor of the United States has been some
thing unknown before in any country. Most
of that balance has been paid by Europe
and times have" been growing hard there
faster than they have been growing prosper
ous on this side of the Atlantic. It means
more poverty For the people there, more
illiteracy and a growing anxiety to find a
new home in a land where people are per
mitted to hope.
Such of them as are hpnest and come with
honest purposes we have no right to keep
out. We must receive them and trust to the
assimilative powers of the great Republic to
absorb them, for the earth and the air are
free to all of God'speoples. The only excuse
for refusing domicile to any people or class
is where the coming puts in jeopardy the
health and morals of our own people.
Right and Wrong.
Referring to Mr. Harry Matthew White's
proposition in Scribncr's that the Gulf stream
has no effect upon the climate of the British
Isles and Northern Europe, that ocean cur
rents do not affect the blimate of any coun
try; that the warmth enjoyed in Northern
Europe is entirely due to aerial currents cir
culating over the entire Atlantic basin, it is
sufficient to explain, touching the first pro
position, that it was more ably discussed
twenty-five years ago, and touching the
second, it is not borne out by the experience
of the men who have been studying air cur
rents from the time of Professor Maury
down to the present day. In the slang of
the street his dissertation is mostly "hot air."
It is true no doubt that the Gulf Stream
does not directly affect the climate of Ire
land, but the air current that follows along
its course all the way from the Gulf becomes
warm, and that air current spreading over
the land does the work.
A Railroad straw.
One who thinks he knows calls attention
to the fact that no work is being done on
this end of the San Pedro road, none by the
Short Line in Nevada, and declares that the
explanation is that negotiations have been
going on for months between the magnates
of both roads for the former to sell out to
the latter or for the latter to sell that part
of its line running south of this city; that
negotiations have progressed so far that the"
two companies are growing in close accord;
that the influence of both was asserted to
push over the mayor's veto the spoliation of
the property of the Rio Grande-on Fourth
West street.
We have never, reaspning from a business
standpointrfelt at all sanguine that two roads
hence to Los Angeles would be built, unlessH
the new road pushed west from this city toH
Deep Creek and thence southwestly throughH
Nevada, because there is not much senti-H
mentality in strict business, but we knowH
that the original purpose of Mr. Clark wasH
to build west to a suitable point in Nevada,B
thence southerly through Nevada and thel
southeast corner of California to Los An-H
geles, while the main line would continueB
west to San Francisco bay. Knowing howB
resolute of purpose he is, our conviction is
that the Short Line will eventually absorb
the San Pedro, but at the same moment Sen
ator Clark will become a dominant factor in
the Harriman western roads.
This comes only from trying to estimate
what a man like Senator Clark would natur
ally seek, anil it seems reasonable to con
clude that he would prefer a mighty owner
ship in fifteen thousand miles of completed
road rather than the control of one thousand
miles that are yet to be constructed and
with the two or three years' worry necessary
to construction.
The Telegram's agitation for a "LadyH
United States Senatsr" is bearing fruit. The
Sacramento J3ee suggests that we try a
gentleman first. The Bee is becoming personal.
The Flag's birthday.
Not every American knows that June 14
is the birthday of the American flag, but it
is, and there is to be a concerted movement
this year to give the day a significance never
before given it by making a general display
of the flag on house tops, in public and pri
vate ways, by having every child in the
schools carry 2, flag. A request has been
sent to every post of the Grand Army to ob
serve the day.
It is a good thought. There is no other
such flag, especially'not since its retirement
from Cuba. That act gave to it a new sanc
tity. It symbols the glory of the Republic, and
more, it is to this land what the blood on the
lintel and the door posts was to Israel in
Egypt, a notice to the nations that every
home is safe, that the humblest home is the
concernment of the whole people, and the
flag represents the protection which the na
tion offers to its children.
There is more even than that to it. When
in the ports of kings it flashes out from some
mizzen mast, -he eyes of those on shore read
upon it a promise that if they will go to the
land whose sovereignty it reflects, all their
immemorial shackels will fall off and they
will stand religiously, personally, politically
free and that every opportunity of the great
land will be theirs.
When on the ocean it is dipped in salute
to some passing ship, all those on Taoard of
that other ship know that its highest sig
nificance is that it stands for freedom and a
square deal at home and abroad.
Why should not its birthday be celebrated?
Who is so poor that he cannot display a flag
on the 14th of June, the great standard's
birthday?
