OCR Text |
Show ' PANAMA CANAL SUPPLIES 1 v lr T:" ' Congress has been spending a good deal of time over the question of where and how the needed supplies for the Panama canal should be bought It seems to us that fifteen minutes should have been time enough for. that work; that a board made up of men of - .known integrity and ability, each to draw a fair salary, should' have been, appointed to make the purchases, and that then the articles needed, from a pick to a steam shovel or hospitals should have been by contract to the lowest bidder, bid-der, and that all supplies should be purchased in the United States.- : ; . . By that plan there would have been sharp competition and the money to pay; for the purchases would have remained re-mained In the United States. The purchases will mount up into the millions. The effect of having.or not having sev-. sev-. eral millions of dollars in the volume of a nation's money means. a great deaL At present some $200,000,000 are ' lost annually in freights and fares paid by our people to foreign ship-owners. .That saved for ten years would be ! 'capital enough with which to fight a great war through. In a small way the buying of Panama Canal supplies will have its effect . " About ten years ago the head of the postal department . of Great Britain let a contract for carrying the malls to a foreign ship company. The indignation throughout Eng-. Eng-. -land. In press and Parliament, was general. The officer's 'plea that by it the Government 'would save money was ' hushed by a storm of protests. The money part was the Naet thing to be considered. Prltishpower, pride and prestige pres-tige were wounded, , hence the protests. The same rule Bhoutfl apply In our own country. . The Panama canal is an V Anrerican enterprise,' Americans should supply it |