The ALASKA
!
Vol. I. No. 14
Douglas, Alaska, Tuesday, December 5, 1911
10c a Copy
ALASKA COSTS UNCLE SAM $2,000,000 A YEAR
Of course, iu some essentials, the
government of the United States has
treated Alaska like a “bound boy.
But it is hardly fair to say that the
government has been stingy with us.
Indeed, fairness must compel us all,
in full view of the facts, to admit that
she has been more generous with us, in
dollars and cents, than with any other
of her territories. There is not a single
state in the union on which the gov
ernment spent so much in all her terri
torial days.
The United States treasurer does net
keep an account with Alaska. Per
haps it is just as wrell for Alaska that
this is true. A year ago, during the
winter session, when an effort was be
ing made to secure something like an
adequate appropriation for roads and
trails, a southern representative, arose
in his place and protested. It was not
with him a question of Alaska—her big
ness or her needs. It was merely that
the appropriation looked larg« to ! im.
The argument that Alaska was a coun
try in which it was good business for
the United States to spend large sums
for development, did not appeal to him.
To the southern statesman, it wras mer
ely an immense sum going a loeg way
north, and on behalf of his people, ho,
protested. The house of representatives
mistook his voice for “Vox Populi,’’
and the appropriation was cut down ,
accordingly.
More than one Alaskan has seen
conspiracy against the northland iu the
fact that the sums spent here by the
national government, in all the various
ways in which the government morey
is expended in Alaska, are not all tab
ulated and set over against the im
raense sums which more than one Al
askan believes is poured into the cof
fers of the United States. Probably,
if the sums spent in all the appropria
tions made for Alaska wero tabulated
and totaled, and set over against the
revenues derived, not merely would a
representative now and then feel that
the wishes of his constituents demand
ed that he should arise in his place and
mildly protest. But scores of watch
dogs of the treasury would feel called
upon to howl their heads off.
The appropriations for Alaska come
under many heads. They are segregat
ed, with other appropriations under
heads of departments, miscellaneous ap
propriations, and otherwise which
makes the tabulation of government
money spent in Alaska a difficult task.
A man, however, once attempted this
task, and after a fashion accomplished
it. Ilis name was Asmun Brown, and
he was a Washington correspondent.
With the courage of the Dickens
hero, he went from office to office with
his persistent, ‘ ‘ I want to know, ’ ’ un
til he was as unwelcome a visitor in
the departments at Washington as his
predecessor in the English circumlocu
tion office. His labors were near
enough completed when he finished his
"work to estimate that the sum appro
priated for all purposes in Alaska to
taled $2,000,000 a year.
Certainly the $2,000,000 expended by
congress in Alaska is not disbursed as
it would be if the appropriations were
handed over in a lump sum to an elec
tive legislature of resident Alaskans.
Certainly many Alaskan emphatically
deny that all of it is properly expend
ed. But whatever mistakes congress
may or may not make in the spending
the money has little bearing on the
(question of whether she is stingy or
generous in matters of money with Al
aska. Quite naturally we had rather
spend our own “pin” money, than
have congress lay it out for us, but
probably not the most sanguine of home
tule advocates expect the government
to. give us along with home rule, the
right to spend this money according to
pur own ideas of how to make Alaska
a better country in which to live and
acquire wealth.
The appropriations made in behalf
of Alaska for 1911 for miscellaneous
and direct purposes alone was over
$864,000. This does not include the
salaries of any officers, nor the main
tenance of officers, nor the adminis
tration of justice, nor the eost of runn
ing the court houses, nor the care of
prisoners sent to penitentiaries, nor
the administration of Alaska fisheries,
except the special appropriation noted
in the list below.
These appropriations are as follows:
Care of the insane, $50,000 (this will
have to be raised this year to $60,000).
Aids to navigation, $85,000.
Special appropriation for roads and
trails, $150,000.
Land surveys for homesteads, $30,
000.
Cable extention and improvements,
$125,000.
Protecting seal and salmon fisheries,
$100,000 (this does not include the ap
priation of $375,000 for administration
of Alaska fisheries, nor the cost of
maintaining the Albatross).
Education and relief of natives,
$200,000.
Care of reindeer, $12,000.
Supressing liquor traffic among na
tives, $12,000.
Over and against this, the govern
ment collects for salmon taxes, saloon
licenses, occupation taxes, and stamp
'mill receipts, every dollar of revenue
except the customs, a bare $398,135.
And only a portion of this goes into
the United States treasury at Washing
ton. The saloon licenses, and occupa
tion taxes collected in incorporated
'towns all goes back to the town treas
uries. That part of it which does go
to the United States treasury goes into
the Alaska fund, and seventy per cent
of this is spent on roads and trails in
addition to the special appropriations
for that purpose, and thirty per cent
of it goes to the support of schools
outside of incorporated towns.
Certainly it is not the opinion of the
Sourdough that congress has been any
too generous with Alaska, even
though it does send back to Alaska
every dollar collected here, and then
six times as much besides. The Sour
dough holds no brief for congress, but
the Sourdough fears that the congress
of the United States is more generous
with Alaska than she might be if her
left hand knew what her right hand
was doing, for it is doubtful if the
United States appreciates the necessity
of spending immense sums in addition
to her initial expenditures of seven
millions for the greatest and richest of
the territories of the United States,
past, present or future. But let us
not lay at the door of the United States
congress, unjustly, the charge of parsi
mony.
WHEN THE CHINESE WERE DRIVEN OUT
There was at least one man in Alas
ka in 1886 who was not in sympathy
with the anti-Chinese uprising which
occured in that year. That man hap
pened to be Governor Swineford of
the territory. But according to his own
account, however, his opposition cut
very little figure:
“In January,” he said in his an
nual report, “an attempt was made to
blow up a house in Juneau in which
six or eight Chinamen were living.
None of them were injured, though
the house, which occupied a central
position in the town, was badly wreck
ed, and other adjoining buildings more
or less badly damaged. The better
class of citizens, justly incensed, held
a meeting, appointed a committee of
safety and subscribed the sum of $1,
400 to be paid for the detection, arrest
and conviction of the guilty parties,
but all efforts at their discovery7 failed,
and the few Chinese in town leaving
and going to the island, matters finally
quieted down and no further trouble
was experienced until during the past
summer, when the question of driving
the Chinese from Dougles island be
gan to be agitated. Meetings were
held in. Juneau early in August at the
.first of which meetings a committee
was appointed to wait on Mr. Tread
well, the superintendent of the mine
and mill, and request or demand that
the Chinese miners and laborers be dis
charged and sent away. This demand
being refused, the second meeting was
held within closed doors, and it was
determined to forcibly remove the
Chinamen the next day. In accordance
with this plan a body of men number
ing one hundred or more went over to
the island the following day, August
6, and taking the Chinese from their
work and houses, carried them over to
Juneau, where they were the same
night packed into two small sailing
vessels not large enough to even mod
erately accomodate one-third of them
(there were about eighty of them), and
dispatched them to Wrangel” says the
governor. ‘ ‘ They were supplied with
plenty of rice upon which to subsist
while the vessels were enroute, but
packed as they were like sardines in a
box, they must have suffered dreadful
ly during the week they were on the
way,” he continues in his annual re
port for that year.
The next day after the departure
of the Chinese for Wrangell, the tug
of the Alaska Mill and Mining com
pany arrived in Sitka, then the capi
tal, and brought to the governor a let
ter from the deputy United States mar
shal at Juneau, John McKanna. The
letter said:
“ ‘The white men of Juneau are
now on the island reinoving the Chin
ese from their dwellings and driving
off the Chinese working men from the
mines. I am powerless to enforce the
law, and have exhausted every means
to prevent trouble. T consider the oc
cassion perilous, and T deem your pres
ence, with sufficient force to enforce
the law essential, and therefore request
you to come as soon as possible.”
In 1866 there was a warship in Al
aska. It was the Pinta. It was a dis
tressingly slow craft, but it was equip
ped with a company of marines, and
some cannons, and looked formidable
enough. Governor Swineford immed
iately got into communication with his
navy and requested the commander to
proceed at once to the seat of war.
The governor of Alaska was by no
means commander in ehief of the army
and navy of Alaska, however, and the'
spirit of “please mister,” permeates
all the correspondence between the gov
ernor and his battleship. The com
mander of the ship, however, was
agreeable, and the next morning the
battleship sailed for Treadwell. Know
ing how slow the ship was, the gover
nor preferred to go by the company’s'
tug, figuring that he could beat the
ship to the scene of the trouble. The
tug ran on a rock, however, and delay
ed the governor over a day after the'
departure of the battleship. But at
that he arrived at Treadwell only a
few hours after the Pinta.
Before leaving Sitka, the governor
had some proclamations printed, order
ing the mob to disperse and go home.
Tie never used them however, for when
he reched Treadwell it was all over but
the shouting, and indeed, what little
there was of that was over too.
The governor determined that the
Chinese should be brought back, and
that the participants, who seem to
have included in their numbers nearly
everybody in Juneau, should be arrest
ed and punished. He ordered the dep
uty marshal to swear out warrants for
all his friends and neighbors, but the
deputy refused, and when the gover
nor insisted, the deputy resigned.
In his effort to have the Pinta pursue
the sailing vessel and bring back from
Wrangell the shanghaied Chinese, he
met with no better success. The com
mander of the creeping warship did
not want to go, and finally he flatly re
fused. Two days later the commander
of the battleship offered the governor
a ride in an easy chair back to Sitka,
and this governor declined, and the in
cident was closed.
However unanimous the general feel
ing was against the Chinese on the
Gastineau channel generally may have
.been, there was one Chinaman in Ju
neau who was not affected by it. That
was “Old Joe,” the one chinaman who
lives on the channel today. There is a
story to the effect that Joe endeared
himself to the pioneers at a time when
there was no currency in the country,
and another baker had insisted n tak
ing his pay in gold dust( and when
bread is paid in gold the b>k r has
much the best of it) but that Joe told
the prospectors to wait till the currency
returned and in the meantime he
would charge the bread to ’ Old
timers say that this story - hout
justification in fact, however. 1 Joe
had simply lived a long tim >mong
them, and he was liked bv the ers.
During the trouble there. was ■ com
mittee of pioneers who go him
until the danger was passed.
AGENT GUPTILL’S r!QN7"'
“Mr. Guptill’s cor-bfior <• uies
to improve daily,” s Vd r- ,hiG,
when questioned on t’e v
representative of thi; mo > ‘Mr.
Guptill is beginning t jn_
terest in affairs surre ■■ md
the world at large,’ ,er]
“and for the past i has