Mr. RAYMO D. I desire to say a few words upon the bill before the House. We are called upon to vote for one of 2 propositions: the one authorizing the executive authorities to examine one particular site for a navy yard and to report whether it be or be not adapted to that purpose; the other, which is embraced in the substitute offered by the Gentfrom Connecticut, [Mr. Baaxononsfiauthorizin a commission to examine the several sites which have been proposed for navy yards, and to report which of them is best adapted for the purposes of a navy yard and station. Now. it seemsto me to be perfectly clear that it is for the interest of the Navy and of the country to have the best site for a navy yard which can be found in the U.S. I cannot therefore see any valid objection to the adoption of the substitute. It proposes that all the sites, including League Island, shall be examined by acomniission. Now, if the commission bea competent commission, and if League Island be, as is claimed by its advocates here, the best site in the U.S., indeed the only site fit for a navy yard, it is reasonably certain that it will be the site recommended. On the contrary, if it be not the best, I take it that nobody wishes that it should be recommended. Now, sir, I do not care to go be end that. That single consideration will decide my vote as between these 2 propositions. But if we look further, and find that one board of scientific officers has examined the League Island site and distinctl condemned it, that the Naval Committee oftiis House of the lust Congress also reported against it, and that there is no authoiitative or scientific decision in favor of Le:.gue Island except that of the Navy Dept, then it seems to me we are to presume that there must be some reason existing against the selection of that site which will render itgiroper that other sites should also be examine. I do not intend to enter at all into the examination of the Lea 0 Island site nor of any other site. But I (I: feel anxious that the country shall have the benefit of the best site that can be obtained; and I know of no better way of determining what that site is and where it is located than is afforded by the appointment of a commission to examine them all). I have listened with great interest to the debate on this subject. It has been mainly, and icrlraps I might say exclusively, under the connet of gentlemen directly interested in the one or the other of 2 sites. Certainly all that has been said thus far in favor of the League Island site has been said by gentlemen who do not for a moment profess that they are disin terested in this matter. The gentlemen from Philadelphia have strong reasons for advocating the League Island site. I do not mean to intimate that they are influenced by improper reasons; I do not mean to say that their interest would necessarily control their judgment; but they certainly have strong reasons for advocating the selection of that site in preference to any other; stronger reasons for urging the adoptionof that site than any other gentlemen on this door can have.