1568 CONGRESSIONAL PROCEEDINGS. 
upon the District of Columbia, upon the few people here. Let it be 
borne by the people of the United States, where it will be a very small 
addition to their burden, while to the people of the District it might 
be a very serious one before it goes very far. 
Mr.. Hate. Does the Senator from Ohio move to strike out the 
clause ? 
Mr. Suerman. I move to strike out so much as relates to the Dis- 
taict of Columbia paying one-half for the Zoological Garden. 
Mr. Hate. The committee in reporting this bill has taken no new 
ground on the subject. 
The provision that is found at the end of the amendment which 
obliges the District to pay half of the bills for the running of the 
Zoological Garden is the present law, the present rule, and all action 
in regard to that park was taken deliberately in the ae Congress. It 
was discussed most fully. 
Mr. SuermMan. This is a mere limitation in an appropriation bill. 
Mr. Hatz. Of course it can be changed at any time. It is law so 
far as appropriations have been made heretofore and which did not 
pass sub silentio. It was thoroughly debated here and in the other 
branch during the Fifty-first Congress, and the deliberate decision of 
Congress was that this park was so largely for the benefit of citizens 
of Washington, for the benefit of the taxpayers of Washington and 
their families, that the most which should be asked of the General 
Government was that it should pay one-half of the bills and the Dis- 
trict the other half. 
I suppose, Mr. President, that the agitation for the erinehalld of this 
property, the movement which resulted finally in its purchase, and 
the setting it up as a great institution and a great feature of Wash- 
ington, came largely from the citizens of the District. 
But I do not choose to go largely into that question now, only 
saying to the Senate that the Committee on Appropriations has sim- 
ply followed in the line that was set for it in the last Congress, and it 
is for the Senate to decide now. It is a question upon which a good 
deal, as Roger de Coverley remarked, can be said on both sides, and 
which side has the better of the bargain I am not certain, for one, but 
we do not want to open it, we do not want to attempt to countervail 
what the House of Representatives has done, and the Senate has done, 
and the law has done, and raise a conflict upon it, and therefore it 
seems to me that under present conditions it is better to let the 
clause stand as itis. If the question is to come up, let it be investi- 
gated by the District committee or whatever other committee can give 
more time to it, and make a fixed policy, if any new policy is needed. 
Mr. J. 8. Morriiz. Mr. President, I desire to correct a statement 
of the Senator from Maine in one respect. The bill for the estab- 
lishment of the Zoological Park was reported from the Committee on 
Public Buildings and Grounds, and so far as I know no citizen of this 
District appeared before that committee or any of its members in 
