Show PLAY SQUARE WITH ALASKA alaska is a great big country it is g country all of itself says the duhai minn news tribune it has not or 0 room but it has attractions opportunity opportune productive capacity to support a large pool ula tion it is not a north pole vol nor a land of perpetual lee ice it can have agriculture to make it as near self supporting as are many considerable countries it has inin minerals er to make it rich it cost us in 1914 its corn COM merce amounted to for 1915 this will be about it was one of the best investments this or any other country ever made for it did not cost a single life nor any international dispute since we bought it in 1867 it has produced in minerals of various kinds in fish products and in aquatic and land furs and animals I 1 its imports in 1914 were and exports were it has splendid harbors and countless coal fields that only wait for ways of transportation the government is now building a railroad that will tap the coal region but it also needs wagon roads and agricultural investigation it has the only tin mines on the continent and these should be developed ve its harbors should be improved and above all its native population should be cared for and educated congress is asked to appropriate 10 as a total for alaska of this 8 is for the railroad now under construction st ruction it should give every dollar that is asked it would then be appropriating but two fifths of what the house has voted in the wholly useless post roads bill with the completion of the railroad which should be constantly extended alaskan commerce and the value of this vast territory to the united states will greatly increase every dollar spent there is investment and we have never put back a tithe of the value received |