Removed POV I removed undo criticism of Secretary Boutwell and POV Wikipedia is not meant to bash persons reputations whether alive or dead The following has been removed from the article Boutwell did little to withdraw paper currency from circulation shaping his financial policy to forestall either inflation or deflation Intellectual critics saw in these actions a want of guiding principle and a lack of solid theoretical knowledge He believed in knowledge just so far as it was convenient for him to justify his own theory that knowledge was a deception Henry Adams wrote in a much quoted analysis in 1870 He believed in common schools and not in political science in ledgers and cash books but not in Adam Smith or Mill as one might believe in the multiplication table but not in Laplace or Newton By a natural logic he made of his disbelief in the higher branches of political science a basis for his political practice and thus grounding action on ignorance he carried out his principle to its remotest conclusions Henry Adams The Session North American Review July 1870 p 36 But in a very corrupt time it spoke well of Boutwell that nobody thought that he made money out of his Cabinet post either for himself or his friends Living within his salary he lodged in a boarding house throughout his tenure His only pleasures lay in writing lectures and playing billiards or poker though never for money Chicago Times March 6 1875 He is an inaccessible man uninfluenced by fear favor affection or hope of reward and does not burst out into brillian exhibitions of love or hatred a New England politician wrote his brother Henry F French to Benjamin B French March 16 1869 Benjamin B French Papers Library of Congress Boutwell s financial policy was less dogmatic than pragmatic Liberal reformers had hoped that he would embrace civil service reform and rush the country towards the resumption of specie payments but while Boutwell appointed subordinates on the basis of merit for the most part he did little to rein in the spoils system outside of Washington remaining on friendly terms with the party bosses