Jasper County Democrat, Volume 2, Number 28, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 21 October 1899 — WASHINGTON GOSSIP [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

WASHINGTON GOSSIP

The recent tight money market with It high rates has led to several suggestlom for relief by the Government. The proposition is being discussed in Washington that there should be some provision for keeping the money of the country in circulation instead of having large sums locked up in the vaults of the treasury and the shbtreasuries. The Government has a cash balance of $288,000,000, of. Which nearly $83,000,000 is on deposit i»\ banks. The other $205,000,000 is stored in Government vaults. it is earning nothing for Uncle Sam and is performing no function as a medium of exchange in business transactions. The suggestion is made that the Secretary of the Treasury should deposit a larger proportion of this enormous fund in banks, whence it would find its way into circulation in times of tightness, but this suggestion is coupled with the proposition that the Secretary should charge the banks interest at the rate of 2 per cent per annum. ) . liiplrna! Revenue Commissioner Wilson will recommend to Congress that a refund be made of the taxes paid by cigar dealers on the cigars manufactured and sold by Counterfeiter Jacobs at Lancaster, Pn. The Government knew for a long time that* these bogus stamps were being used, but did not interfare with the unlawful business for fear of permitting the escape of those who were engaged in circulating the famous SIOO counterfeit Monroe note. For months cigars with forged stamps were being sold, and when the counterfeiters were arrested all the cigars bearing these stamps -Weto‘seized by the internal revenue officials: It was decided, however, that the rprntlTSsers were innocent of any fraud, nnd they were permitted to have possession of the cigars by the payment of the lawful tax.

The State Department has no records .ifegft'ing the number of Americana In the firfßtVaal. There is 4 directory giving the names and addresses of the more Anfemincnt business' men in the Republic,

Ortt this does not indicate their nationality. The population, according to the census of 1896, was 245,000 whites-and an estimated population of*' 600,000 blacks. The State Department makes an effort to keep track of the Americans in barbarous countries. There are lists furnished annually by the American consuls In China aud Morocco. The Transvaal has never been regarded as an uncivilized country, and no effort has been made to keep track of our citizens who go there.

Admiral Dewey is expected to connect himself with St. John’s Episcopal Church ir. this city. He has never been conspicuous as a religious man. In fact, he has been known to utter robust and resounding ensswords, iu moments of stress and excitement, yet so far as he is anything he is supposed to be an Episcopalian. Hia relatives belong to that church and his leanings are that way. A Congregational church up in Vermont claims him as a member, but that was in the long distant past when the admiral was a boy. St. John’s is the fashionable Episcopal congregation of Washington, and it naturally wants to include Admiral Dewey in its fellowship.

New Department of Justice Building. Front Elevation of the New Structure for Washington. According to the latest bulletin issued by the bureau of labor there are 140 cities in the United States having a population of 30,000 or over. The bureau has been collecting and compiling a mass of municipal statistics, and for purposes of correct comparison has broken away from the last census population figures* now nine years old, and mode estimates of its own. Massachusetts leads off with. 17 cities of 30,000 and over, Pennsylvania with 13, and then conies New York with 12, Ohio with 0, Illinois with 6 and Indiana and Texas with 5 each.