Jasper County Democrat, Volume 1, Number 15, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 July 1898 — WASHINGTON LETTER. [ARTICLE]

WASHINGTON LETTER.

(From our regular correspondent.) The administration is not toting square with the people in the matter of giving out news concerning the extent of the yellow fever in our army at Santiago. This is a blunder almost as great as that which allowed the Spanish to send the yellow fever refugees out of Santiago into our lines, previous to their surrender. As long as the people found ’ out before the news began to be sq rigorously censored that several hundred cases of yellow fever existed in our army, it is unwise to keep them in igbrance as to the continued spread of the disease. Almost every section of the country is represented in our army at Santiago, and it is a shame not to allow the people to know just which regiments the yellow fever is in and what success is attending the efforts that are being made to stamp it out. It is altogether probable that yellow fever also exists among the twenty-five thousand Spanish troops who surrendered to Gen. Shafter. If so, w’e will have to take-care of them, as the condition of surrender, under which we are to send them back to Spain, binds us not to allow any of those infected with yellow fever to go upon the ships. * * * It is now stated that Commodore Watson’s fleet is at once to start to Spain, but there are still those who refuse to believe it before it actually goes, and others who believe that if actually started, it will go with no other intention than to scare Spain into asking for peace. Cablegrams from Madrid and other European points, say that Spain has already asked for terms of peace, but it is officially denied in Washington. * * • It is semi-officially said that no movement on land against Havana will be started until fall, owing to the fear of yellow fever, and officially stated that the movement against Porto Rico is to be started at once. “At once” has not, however, meant immediately in the administration lexicon, in connection with war movements. Representative James Hamilton Lewis, who began his Congressional career by being called a dude, but who has long ago won, by his common sense and all around ability, the respect of Congress and of

the eastern public—the people of Washington, the state he represents in the House, recognized those qualities long before they sent him to Congress—has tendered his services to the government as a field officer in the volunteer army. He has been connected with the Washington State militia, of which he is now Inspector General, for about eleven years. Unless the outlook for peace grows promising enough to stop army appointments, it is likely that Mr Lewis will get a commission. * “The war has been a very lucky thing for the republicans of HL, for if it had not occurred they would have been ingloriously defeated.” That is what Mr. P. E. Furman, a well known democrat of that state, says, and the same thing will apply equally as well to the other states, for it is as plain as the nose on your face that the republicans are going to make their campaign on the war, although they deserve no more credit for the action of Congress in voting all the money the administration asked for to conduct the war than do the democrats and the populists, who voted for all the war appropriations. As to the policy of the party in his state, Mr. Furman says: “The Illinois democrats stand steadfast by Bryan and free silver, both of which they indorsed at their state convention, the other day.” * • * The man who claims that any one party monopolizes all the patriotism in this country thus proclaims his own ignorance. It seems to be pretty generally understood in Washington that the republican Congressional Committee intends to make the implication, if not the direct claim, that republican patriotism in Congress was the whole thing, the basis of its campaign documents this year —an implication as false as it would be possible to make. As a matter of fact, if any one party in Congress deserves more praise than the other for unselfish patriotism, it is the democrats. Although they knew that the administration being republican, and a majority of the House being republican, the successful conduct of the war would necessarily be beneficial to the republican party, not a single democrat hesitated either in advocacy of the war or in providing the money to carry it on successfully. If the action of the democrats, and the populists in

Congress was not actuated by pure and unselfish patriotism, some republican should tell the country what actuated those men who voted for the war, although fully aware that their votes would, temporarily, at least, be beneficial to their political opponents. Let the truth be told no matter who wins. * ♦ * Brave old George Dewey has been at it again: Results: destruction of the Spanish fort in Subig Bay, five hundred prisoners and a notice served on the German Emperor, through the Commander of the German cruiser, Irene, to keep his fingers out of the Philippine pie.