Muck-Rakers of Other Days: Speech of Hon. Julius Kahn of California in the House of Representatives, Saturday, March 26, 1910 (Classic Reprint)
(Excerpt from Muck-Rakers of Other Days: Speech of Hon. Ju...)
Excerpt from Muck-Rakers of Other Days: Speech of Hon. Julius Kahn of California in the House of Representatives, Saturday, March 26, 1910
The accusation in question is no less than having, while commanding a party of 'american troops, fired on a flag of truce, killed the officer in the act of reading a sum mons under the sanction of such a flag, of having attempted to vindicate the act, and yet of having signed a capitulation in which the illing of that officer and his men was acknowledged as an act of assassination.
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Equitable Distribution of Captured War Devices and Trophies ..
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Julius Kahn was a German-born American politician. He served as a member of the U. S. House of Representatives from California's 4th district.
Background
Julius Kahn was born on February 28, 1861 in Kuppenheim, Baden, Germany. His parents, Herman and Jeannette (Weil) Kahn, emigrated to America when he was five years old, settling first in Calaveras County, California, and afterwards moving to San Francisco.
Education
Kahn attended the public schools in San Francisco until reaching the age of sixteen. Later he studied law and in 1894 he was admitted to the bar.
Career
About 1877 Kahn started to work in a clerical capacity. Then he went on the stage, and for about ten years followed the theatrical profession, playing in companies with Joseph Jefferson, Edwin Booth, Tomasso Salvini, and other hardly less well-known stars. His last role was that of Baron Stein in Diplomacy.
In 1892 he was elected to the California Assembly. He served one term in that body, and at the end declined a nomination for the state Senate. In 1894 he began the practice of law in San Francisco, where he soon became a member of the firm of Foote & Coogan. In 1898, he was elected as a Republican to the national House of Representatives. Reelected in 1900, he was defeated two years later, but in 1904 he won back his seat, which he retained until his death in 1924.
Kahn was appointed a member of the committee on military affairs in 1905, twice its chairman and was ranking minority member at the commencement of the World War. He had helped to organize the National Defense League in 1913, and later became its chairman. Convinced of the unpreparedness of the country, he labored in season and out, and against heavy odds, to impress the committee with the need of planning for the emergency which might arise. The National Defense Act of 1916 was one result of his efforts. By this measure, at least a skeleton organization for defense was outlined.
When finally the United States entered the War, it fell to Kahn, owing to the lack of Democratic support for President Wilson's program, to formulate and carry out the military policy of the government. The outstanding piece of legislation with which his name soon became identified, was the Selective Draft Act (1917), carried in the face of very strong opposition which included the Democratic speaker, the floor leader, and even the chairman of the committee on military affairs. Kahn also took an important part in the amendment of the Army Emergency Increase Act (August 1918), providing for a reservoir of men not included in the Selective Draft Act.
He was keenly interested in the development of aviation, in both the army and the navy. His last big piece of legislation was the National Defense Act (1920), which reorganized the whole military establishment. Kahn displayed exceptional ability to secure legislation favorable to San Francisco and the state of California, such as large appropriations for development projects, and laws for the protection of fruit and other agricultural products from the ravages of insect pests. Other measures of more distinct national interest with which his name was prominently associated include the insertion in the Panama Canal Act of the clause providing free tolls for American ships--the repeal of which he afterwards vigorously opposed--and the extension of the federal publicity statutes, applicable to campaign funds, to cover primaries as well as elections.