Show NAVAL SNOBBERY The recent appointing of an army officer offi-cer whothad risen from the ranks to the position ot AdjutantGeneral at Washington Washing-ton with the rank of Major as recognition recogni-tion of thirtyseven years of efficient service ser-vice in war and peace has set the eastern east-ern press on to the fact that such a thing could not be in the navy as it is now organized or-ganized and theBoston Daily Advertiser the organ of the beaneating blue bloods of that wondrous place thus discourses I on the subject j It is worth while to remark that while j men from the ranks are every year promoted pro-moted to be officers in the army there is no I road to a commission in the navy save through the academy at Annapolis It is I the boast of naval officers that while common com-mon people may secure military oommis I sions they are not eligible to rank in the I line of the navy This is not American and J I not profitable for if the boys on our naval training ships could look forward to a I chance for promotion to be officers the class of sailors would be materially better and the standard of the officers themselves might be improved This is in part true and shameful because i be-cause it is true Men who enlist in the i naval service cannot rise above the rank of a warrant officer which includes Boatswains I Boat-swains Gunners Sailmakers Carpenters and Masters Mates No matter how I long they serve nor how competent they I might become if the way was open to them their horizon of glory is bounded by the guerdon of a warrant to be the butt of beardless boys and the common enemy of all below them in standing Bad as is the case with warrant officers I it is still more humiliating with gentlemen gentle-men who served nobly during the war as volunteer officers and who were admitted admit-ted into the regular service in a reduced rank by what was termed competitive examinations Some of these gentlemen notably LieutenantCommander Gor ringe and a few others though they have proven themselves a thousand times better than men who are jum ped over them have never gone above the rank of LieutenantCommander and never will for the reason that an examining exam-ining board composed of officers above that rank and all of whom are graduates of the Academy have to pass upon their merits and abilities and the fact that they are not graduates keeps them from advancement beyond that grade So strict is the line drawn between the officer offi-cer who was a volunteer and the regular graduates that LieutenantCommander who has been in the volunteer service is never appointed to an executive position over regular officers even of less rank and with those who are but Lieutenants they are always so assigned that they become be-come the junior of the deck officers or those who control the ship watch and watch at sea or in port An assumed superiority by the graduates has caused more heartburnings and unhappiness in the service than any cause known and by it good men are subjected to all manner man-ner slights from which they have no appeal or means of redress Even in the location of a room or seat at the table or place in formation these petty tyrannies are practiced and a man of feeling who I Is sensitive simply suffers through a foreign for-eign cruise looking longingly ahead to the time when he shall return to shore duty as relief from the worse than prison life he led on the cruise If men who have proved themselves superior to graduates grad-uates of their own rank cannot attain an equal rank in the naval service it cannot can-not he expected that an enlisted man can The quarters furnished to warrant officers in naval vessels are so poor and the service so demeaning by reason of the cringing servility miscalled respect exacted from them by even midshimen I that it is seldom it is held long I except it be by that class of men who could not live away from the navy and who have that cringing spirit well developed The navy has a great load of wrong to bear but no one item is greater than this snobbery perpetrated by the graduates on the volunteers and the common disdain in which the former I hold the enlisted man It is a crying evil and will yet break out Washington Washing-ton and when it does the country will be electrified at the disclosures of petty vanities and childish conceits which it i will expose |