News and Miscellany

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Feb 5, 1914

News and Miscellany

Notes and clippings from the daily and weekly press

— On January 24 the Alaskan railroad bill passed the Senate. This authorizes the construction, at a cost not to exceed $40,000,000, of a government-owned railroad in Alaska.

— It is generally believed that President Huerta of Mexico will soon either resign or be forced to leave the capital. In either event, it is reported that 3,000 American marines are ready to land and proceed to Mexico City. This force will not only protect Americans and foreigners from massacre, but guard the city from attack by Villa and his rebel troops. With Huerta eliminated from affairs, it is believed the United States government, to avert a continuance of present troubles, will not permit any man named by Huerta as his successor. A fair election will be guaranteed.

— Surrounded by troops and coast artillery, Miss Fern Hobbs, secretary to Governor West of Oregon, has closed

all saloons at Copperfield. Martial law was declared and saloon keepers were given a few hours to ship every quart of liquor and their saloon fixtures out of the county. There was great excitement when Miss Hobbs demanded the resignations of all members of the city council and other city officials on the ground that they had violated the ordinances regulating saloons. Her demand was refused, and Governor West's representative at once ordered Col. B. K. Lawton, superintendent of the State penitentiary, to declare martial law.

— It is estimated that the Protestant churches of America gave over $16,000,000 for the cause of foreign missions last year.

— Mr. and Mrs. Francis B. Sayre, the White House bridal couple, arrived in Washington last week, returning from a two-month honeymoon in Europe. They will spend a short time with the President's family before taking up their residence in Williamstown, Mass.

— On January 24 London was reported to be in the throes of the greatest industrial crisis the city has faced in many years, with every indication that the situation would become more acute. More than 200,000 men were out on strike in a dispute involving the coal drivers' and building trades' unions. The coal men seized the psychological moment to strike, for the city was in the grip of one of the most severe cold spells of the winter. The resulting shortage of fuel caused much suffering in the poorer sections of the city.

— Henry Ford, of the Ford Motor Company, of Detroit, Mich., a plant employing over 20,000 men, has announced his decision to divide a ten-million-dollar annual bonus among the employees of the firm. Beginning January 12 and continuing monthly, the wages of all men more than twenty-two years of age were doubled, regardless of the length of time they had served the corporation. The working day has been shortened to eight hours. This decision to create a system of profit sharing among their workmen has brought a storm of protest from industrial leaders, and is branded as "an economic mistake."

— Lord Strathcona and Mount Royal, high commissioner for Canada, died January 21. His life spanned nearly a century, and his active career a full three quarters. In his eighteenth year, as Donald Smith, he sailed from Scotland for Canada. His first years in Canada were those of an adventurous youth in what was then a real wilderness. Later he bent his energies toward opening up the West, and he is credited with having pressed the Canadian Pacific Railway to completion across the continent. He also had political experience as a member of the Manitoba legislature and the Dominion parliament for many years.

— A semicontractual agreement among sixteen European nations not to participate officially in international expositions except at three-year intervals, beginning October, 1912, was reached by representatives of these governments at a meeting in Berlin, Oct. 8-14, 1913, according to information made public recently. The American government was represented only unofficially at this meeting, and did not become one of the signatory nations. A copy of the document of agreement—the original is in possession of the French government—has been placed in the hands of the State Department. The understanding, known in Europe as the Berlin agreement, is the sole basis for the recent reputed anti-American contract apparently manifesting itself in a refusal to give official recognition to the Panama-Pacific Exposition at San Francisco, according to the opinion of the American peace committee.