National defense upon the organized militia of the States, these three bills will, perhaps, make it somewhat more effective. Such bills as these, however, ought to be made entirely unnecessary by the development of a real National Guard under Federal control and based on universal military service.

The other two bills relate to the physical and military training of boys and girls. One of these bills, known as the Welsh Bill, is good in that it provides for an experiment worth trying; the other, known as the Slater Bill, is bad and ought to be vetoed.

The Welsh Bill provides that after the first of next September all boys and girls over eight years of age in public and private elementary and secondary schools of the State shall receive physical training. This shall include not only training in physical posture and bearing, mental and physical alertness, and so on, but also training that will develop 'self-control, disciplined initiative, sense of duty, and spirit of co-operation under leadership." The courses of instruction shall be determined by the Regents in conference with the Military Training Commission.

The other bill, introduced by Mr. Slater, provides for military drill for boys. It applies not only to boys in school, but also to other boys of school age unless they are lawfully employed in an occupation for a livelihood. This bill is bad, not because it provides for such military drill, but because its provisions are so faulty and the money it provides so absurdly inadequate that it exposes the boys of the State to very real physical and moral danger. The bill bears on its face no evidence of being the product of a wellthought-out plan of military experts who are acquainted with the whole problem of military training and service, but appears rather to be a well-intentioned attempt to provide military instruction somehow.

The most dangerous feature of the bill is that which relates to the field training. This provides that the State Military Training Commission (which is created by the bill itself) shall establish and maintain State military camps for the field training of boys. The location of the camps is left to the determination of the Commission; but the bill provides that fair grounds held by an organization receiving moneys from the State shall be subject to use for this purpose of military training. Of course fair grounds are not selected because they are good camp sites, and may be totally unfit from a sanitary point

of view as well as other points of view for the encampment of boys. Yet, as this bill provides only a hundred thousand dollars for all expenses, it is hardly conceivable that any I other sites will be obtainable. The whole scheme is amateurish to a degree. All who believe in real military training and all who have the interest of the boys of New York State at heart should urge the Governor to veto this measure.

These five military bills serve to make it more than ever evident that the several States should be relieved of the problem of National defense, and that the whole question of miltary training and service should be left solely to the Federal Government under the direction of a Council of National Defense.

A NEW PLATTSBURG CAMP

The "Plattsburg idea" is growing. It originated, we believe, with Major-General Leonard Wood. Its primary purpose is to train men in civil life by giving them instruction in summer camps so that we should have in this country a reserve body of civilians competent to furnish officers for volunteer regiments in time of military need. It is a volunteer and civilian movement, although it has the approval and supervision of the War Department of the Federal Government. It is a successful attempt to put into practice by voluntary action the principles of military and civic training which the Swiss people have adopted as a part of their fundamental political structure. These military training camps, which are popularly known as Plattsburg Camps," because of the great success last summer of the camp at Plattsburg, New York, are peculiarly American because they are at once voluntary, civil, and military. Although promoted by associations of citizens, they are directed and managed by the Federal Government, through the War Department. The function of the citizens' associations is to distribute information, arouse public interest, and obtain the volunteers; the function of the War Department is to have control of the moral, intellectual, military, and disciplinary education in the camp.

We have already reported how the attendance at these camps has grown from eighteen hundred in 1913 to an estimated thirty thousand in 1916. As originally planned, an age limit was set for the Plattsburg camps this summer. No applicant under eighteen or over forty-five years of age was to be accepted. But some of the head masters of the

prominent preparatory schools of the country believed that school-boys under eighteen years of age should receive the benefits provided by the Plattsburg camps. Under the leadership of Dr. Drury, of St. Paul's School, Concord, New Hampshire, a committee was organized some weeks ago to plan a training camp for school-boys between fifteen and eighteen. The plan has been approved by General Wood and by the War Department, and such a camp will be maintained on the Government reservation at Fort Terry, on Plum Island, Long Island Sound, New York. The Fort Terry Camp is an extension of the Plattsburg idea and will be managed on the same basis and under the same general regulations as the camps at Plattsburg. It will be held from July 6 to August 10, inclusive. All applicants must have had a grammar school training or its equivalent. It is hoped and believed that there will be a large representation from the public high schools and grammar schools of the country, as well as from the private preparatory schools. The camp will be educational, democratic, and civic in the very best sense of these words. The instructors of the camp will be officers of the regular army, and the physical condition of each attendant will be given the close personal attention of competent medical authorities. The total cost to each boy, exclusive of transportation to and from the camp, will be in the neighborhood of fifty dollars. This sum will cover board, camp expenses, ammunition, uniform, and shoes. The Federal Government will provide tents, blankets, cots, pillows, ordnance,

etc.

We can think of no better way in which an American school-boy can spend five weeks out of doors than at the Fort Terry Training Camp. Further information about this camp may be obtained by addressing The Officerin-Charge, Fort Terry Training Camp, 475 Fifth Avenue, New York City. The Military Training Camps Association, 31 Nassau Street, New York City, will supply full information regarding the Training Camp movement throughout the country, with records of its growth and success.

THE SPRING ELECTION
IN LOUISIANA

There are sometimes interesting and exciting primary elections within the Democratic party in the Southern States, but it is not often that we are called upon to record a

general election of importance between two parties. But the recent spring contest for the Governorship between Colonel Ruffin G. Pleasant, the regular Democratic nominee, and John M. Parker, the nominee of the Progressive party, is worthy of more attention than we have seen given to it except in the New Orleans newspapers. John M. Parker is a close friend of Colonel Roosevelt's, and was the Progressive leader in 1912 in the State of Louisiana. His total vote in the election for Governor the other day was close to 50,000, while his Democratic opponent received between 75,000 and 80,000. The city of New Orleans gave Parker about 15,000, and Pleasant about 28,000. In the country districts of Louisiana Parker received about 33,000, and Pleasant about 47,000. The Third Congressional District, which now has a Progressive Congressman, as a result of the fight over the sugar duty, increased its .Progressive majority over 1914, and the Progressives also made a strong entering wedge in the Seventh Congressional District, which has protective tariff inclinations and many Northern-born people.

In the estimation of the New Orleans "Times-Picayune" several important political facts stand out, the first being that forty per cent of the biggest vote cast in Louisiana since the Negro was deprived of the suffrage was polled by the Progressive candidate.

In the second place, the Progressives very greatly strengthened their previous hold upon certain portions of the State. In the third place, the vote in the city of New Orleans was very large, considering the weakness of the Parker political organization there, and it seems to presage a fight of the reform element for civic control.

There is strong opposition in Louisiana to the Wilson tariff policies and strong sympathy for protection. There is also great opposition to the old Democratic ring methods in that State. It is much more difficult to set up the two-party cleavage in the South, because of the fear that the Negro may hold the balance of power, but where the elements of economy and moral protest are sufficiently strong the cleavage is nevertheless sure to come.

THE NEW YORK POST-OFFICE

When will the people of the United States learn to treat their public business as they treat their private business? The New York

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City Post-Office furnishes just now a striking illustration of the inefficiency of the American public. The New York Post-Office is an efficient and successful institution. In the calendar year ending on December 31, 1915, it did a gross business of $30,000,000. Its operating expenses amounted to $10,000,000. These figures show a gross profit of $20,000,000. The executive under whom this remarkable showing has been made has been trained to the postal business from his young manhood. He began his work as a letter-carrier in the New York Post-Office, and to-day is the head of this institution, whose figures we have just quoted. The stockholders of any private manufacturing or merchandising corporation which made such a financial showing and had such an executive would be literally tumbling over one another to retain his services if they possibly could. But we Americans do not handle our public business in that way. What we must have just now in the New York Post-Office is not a good postmaster but a good Democrat.

The President of the United States and the senior Senator from the State of New York, realizing that what we want is primarily a good Democrat and secondarily a good postmaster, are doing their level best to fulfill our wishes. Senator O'Gorman would like to have Mr. Joseph Johnson take Postmaster Morgan's chair. Mr. Johnson was formerly a newspaper man in Atlanta, Georgia, and became Fire Commissioner of the city of New York under Mayor Gaynor. When ex-Judge T McCall became Tammany's candidate for Mayor, Mr. Johnson became Mr. McCall's campaign manager, against Mr. Mitchel, who was elected on the Fusion ticket. He naturally ceased to be Fire Commissioner when Mayor Mitchel took office. So far the President has refused to appoint Mr. Johnson, apparently because he is not the right kind of Democrat. He has asked the Hon. Robert Wagner, whom he thinks is the right kind of Democrat, to accept the postmastership, but Mr. Wagner has declined.

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While the President and Senator O'Gorman are discussing the exact degree of Democracy which the New York Post-Office ought to have, the present Postmaster, Mr. Morgan, goes right on doing a business of nearly $100,000 a day, at a gross profit to the people of over $50,000 a day. But we are an idealistic Nation. We do not care for the almighty dollar. Revering the memory of Jefferson as we do, we must have the right

kind of Democracy in the New York PostOffice, no matter how much we have to pay for it. When Postmaster Morgan, who has served the people of the United States in the New York Post-Office efficiently and successfully for forty-three years, is supplanted by an ideal Democrat, some sordid private corporation will undoubtedly avail itself of Mr. Morgan's great abilities as a business executive. The private corporation will not ask him whether he is a Democrat, a Republican, a Progressive, or a Socialist. He will be simply asked to do the work intrusted to him, to do it well, and present his balancesheet as the best testimony of his efficiency. But no true American wants the Post-Office conducted upon the sordid basis of a private corporation. Its great function, of course, is, not to carry letters and newspapers, but to carry elections.

OUR PUBLIC BUILDING
POLICY

Whenever Congress appropriates money for a site for a public building the value of a possible site for such a building doubles or trebles. And when Congress appropriates a sum for the building itself, or a lump sum for both site and building, it is a familiar fact that the value of the land and the cost of the structure are quickly adapted to coincide with the appropriations.

Last January, in the House of Representatives, Representative Clark, of Florida, Chairman of the Committee on Public Buildings, said, as reported:

In the very nature of things it is utterly impossible for Congress to determine to the dollar. what a public building for each and every city and town in the United States should cost, and therefore a measure of discretion had to be lodged in the executive department charged with their construction.

In February Representative Garner, of Texas, spoke as follows, as reported:

There are half a dozen places in my district where Federal buildings are being erected or have recently been constructed at a cost to the Government far in excess of the actual needs of the communities where they are located. Take Uvalde, my home town, for instance. We are putting up a post-office down there at a cost of $60,000, when a $5,000 building would be entirely adequate for our needs. This is mighty bad business for Uncle Sam, and I'll admit it; but the other fellows in Congress have been doing it for a long time and I can't make them quit. Now we Democrats are in

charge of the House, and I'll tell you right now, every time one of these Yankees get a ham I'm. going to get a hog.

In providing public buildings the country is thus confronted with two problems: first, the impossibility of supposing that Congress can determine, within many thousands of dollars, just the sum required for a public building; and, second, the fact which Mr. Garner points out in homely but forceful language, that so long as public buildings are provided as a basis for political prestige and as a satisfaction for private greed, a system of graft must continue. As an evidence that one or both of these defects are involved we have but to glance at some examples from the latest building appropriations of Congress. We find, for instance, that the town of Vernal, Utah, with a population of 836, with postal receipts of about $6,400, and with a yearly rental for its present quarters of $836, is to have a new building costing no less than $50,000. Nor is this all. It will cost the Government $3,565 yearly to maintain that building.

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This is the kind of thing which has been going on in shameless fashion for years. his minority report to the Public Buildings Commission, appointed by Congress in 1913 to make a study of this whole question, Postmaster-General Burleson stated:

No standard whatever has apparently been observed in authorizing buildings or determining in advance the limits of cost. As a consequence many expensive buildings have been authorized for places where the needs of the Government do not warrant their construction, and widely varying limits of cost have been fixed for buildings in which the needs are the

same.

Mr. Burleson recommended, therefore, that no appropriations be made where the postal receipts were less than $15,000, where the population was less than five thousand, or where the annual rental was not in excess of $1,000. As to determining the size of the building, Mr. Burleson said:

The definition of the public building policy must rest upon the decision of the question as to whether authorizations of buildings shall be based upon political or economic grounds. If the former, the policy depends for its justification upon the Nationalizing influence of Government architecture. . . . The true policy is one under which buildings will be authorized primarily for utilitarian purposes. At the same time requirements of broad public policy as well as ideals of architecture may be satisfied in a reasonable degree.

How is it possible that men have come to think that because a building is to be erected for utilitarian purposes it has no connection with architecture-except to satisfy the architectural requirements "in a reasonable degree." The House of Representatives betrayed the same attitude when it applauded the reference to the "æsthetic dreamers" in the supervising architect's office. Esthetic dreamers indeed! What else can they be when they are handed the order to design a $50,000 building, and when the most elementary knowledge of architecture tells them that a $20,000 building would serve every purpose and permit architecture to play an honest rôle? ...

For years they [Congressmen] have encouraged a public building policy which ignores the first elements of architecture-that the building shall be worthy of the purpose and the purpose worthy of the building.

On every public building authorized for a community where the appropriation provided for a building is out of all proportion to the needs of the community, every participant becomes a party to the crime against architecture. Wherever an architect allows his love of the monumental to interfere with his duty of planning and designing a building which shall give the maximum convenience, comfort, and efficiency with the minimum of expense other crime is committed in the name of architecture.

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How may inaccuracy of estimate, elimination of graft, and proper æsthetic embodiment be attained? Mr. Whitaker suggests the following method:

The supervising architect's work should begin with a bureau of estimates. This bureau should examine and report upon every request for a public building, and would thus provide Congress with an intelligent survey of the situation. In the case of a post-office, for example, the bureau would make a study of the needs of the town; its past and probable future rate of growth; the amount of postal receipts; the character of the postal service, whether concentrated or widely distributed; the floor space required to take care of present needs and provide for