Western men are getting clamorous about their
right to the same privilege in turn. Capitalists of San Francisco offer
to contribute five millions of dollars towards the erection of the
western Capitol, besides building and fitting out a Presidential mansion
in their city. This is handsome; and, since the central Capitol at St.
Louis, now nearly finished, has involved the expenditure of about twelve
millions, such liberality may be needful for the success of the project.
One of the California Senators has written an article on this topic in
the last number of the _North American Review_. He proposes, among other
things, that a statue of Abraham Lincoln shall be erected in front of
the Capitol at St. Louis, and one of William Penn at that of San
Francisco. At the three seats of government we shall then have
perpetuated the memory of the three noblest and most era-making of
American statesmen: Penn, representing the grandeur and security of
Christian justice and peace; Washington, loyalty to national
independence and republican institutions; Lincoln, the triumph, by
sacrifice, of liberty throughout our continent.

* * * * *

This mention of Abraham Lincoln suggests some retrospection. I remember
that when, sixteen years ago, in 1915, our national debt was all finally
paid off, great exultation was felt. In a Fourth-of-July oration at
Omaha, the speaker, a young colored lawyer, referring to the civil war
of 1861-65, as so largely adding to the national debt, said that his
grandfather was one of the first men of color who ever sat in the Senate
of the United States. Now, there are eight colored Senators, and fifteen
members of the House. Of direct African descent also, are the Governor
of Louisiana, and the Mayor of the city of Richmond, Virginia; the
immediate predecessor of the latter having been a member of one of the
oldest historical cavalier families of that State. The general officer
in command at West Point, too, is a colored gentleman, of excellent
reputation and qualifications. All prejudice of race, in fact, has now
very much disappeared, and is looked back upon as a preposterous error
of the past. Indian members of Congress number this session at least
seven--two Senators, Cherokees, and five members of the House from the
two new States formed from what was once the Indian Territory. The white
population of those States is also well represented in the Senate and in
the House.

We