1370 CONGRESSIONAL PROCEEDINGS. 
has a zoological park buys the land and maintains and improves the 
park at its own expense. 
Gentlemen will recollect that these corridors were hot with the feet 
of the good people of the District of Columbia a year ago asking for 
lesgislation establishing this park at the joint expense of the General 
Government and the District of Columbia, and now, having got the 
park, they are equally hot to try to get out of paying their share of 
its maintenance and to saddle the whole thing upon the Treasury. Con- 
gress has plenary power to continue the improvement of this park and 
to place it under the control of the Smithsonian Institution, and this 
bill proposes to do that, and, so far as my voice and vote are concerned, 
as long as I am a member of this Housé of Congress, they shall be 
given in favor of this park being maintained at the joint expense of 
the District and of the Federal Government. 
Mr. F. T. GREENHALGE. Can the gentleman tell us how the tax rate 
on residents of the District of Columbia compares with that of other 
places? Is it much lighter or otherwise? 
Mr. Cannon. It will not average one-half of the burden that is 
generally borne in other cities and towns throughout the country. 
Mr. Biownr rose. ; 
Mr. Cannon. How much time does the gentleman desire? 
Mr. Buounr. I should like ten minutes. 
Mr. Cannon. I will yield ten minutes to the gentleman, but I would 
be glad to dispose of this matter within the hour. 
Mr. McComas. Mr. Speaker, I wish to be recognized in my own 
right on my motion. 
Mr. Cannon. If the gentleman from Georgia [Mr. Blount] will 
excuse me, I think it is only courteous and proper that I should first. 
yield to my colleague upon the committee, the other gentleman from 
Georgia [Mr. Clements]. 
Mr. J. C. Cuements. I am very much obliged to the gentleman, 
but I prefer that my colleague [Mr. Blount] shall proceed now. 
Mr. Buount. Mr. Speaker, this appropriation itself properly belongs 
to the sundry civil bill, and, if it was to be reported at all, it should 
have been postponed until that bill was reported to the House; but 
measures like this relating to expenditures for matters of taste, seem 
to have a peculiar fascination for the Senate, and that body appears to 
have been unwilling to await the ordinary course of legislation, and 
has therefore assumed jurisdiction over a matter of appropriation 
which does not belong to it, and hence the subject is now before us 
for consideration. 
My own opinion is that the better way to dispose of this bill would 
have been for the House, at an earlier stage, to have reported it to 
the committee and allowed it to remain there, or else to have made the 
issue in a more formal way with the Senate. But not being in charge 
