The weekly Minnesotian. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn. Territory) 1852-1858, 1853-01-15
THE MINI TIA n
Saia, Paul, $e.rrhaa. sanuaru Is, 1858.
hsscais " Moraliy'' and " Technically"

hsscais Moraiiy'' and " Technicaiiy.'
Were president of St. Paul to take up an East
ern newspaper, and find therein paragraph
stating that q wealthy gentleman of the State
of New York, worth cay STE, 200, had recently
died interstate, leaving large family of minor
heirs; were this person to Immediately post off
for the residence Of the family Of the deceased,
and after reaching there, although an entire
stranger to them should, by putting on pleas
ing exterior-for we read the devil himself can
'assume pleasing shape"-lavishing presents
upon the younger members of the family, and
holding out great Inducements Of increased
wealth to the older ones, so far gain their conf
dence as to induce them to name him admin
istrator of the estate, with provision attached
to his letters of authority, that the disposal of
the entire avals should be left to three men of
his own selection-three Of his particular
friends; were it possible for just such a tran
saction as this to happen, how would it be
looked upon by honest, sensible, straight
forward men in the community where it occur
red! Would not a universal protest 60 up
from the neighbors and friends Of the deceased
against such procedure. Would not A, B
and C, the daily associates and close compan-
ions Of the dead while living, and who had a
right to suppose that they. or one of them,
would be called upon to settle the affairs Of the
estate, and honestly see that it was carefully
husbanded, feel shocked and mortified at the
want of foresight manifested by the family in
the selection they had made! In short after
the transaction had become entirely public,
and had been talked Of and turned over in the
minds Of the neighberhood, what motire would
one and all attach to the conduct of the 9isia-
terested stranger, who had journeyed more than
thousand miles to take upon himself the tedi
Gus and unpleasant task of settling up the COM
plicated affairs of busy lifetime? Could it be
possible for any one, save some green fool Or
hopeless numskull, to believe for a moment,
that the object was not to play out game of
grand swindling-to rob widow, orphans and
creditors Of all that was theirs? No sane man
could come to any other conclusion. Yet, if
Court Of Probate could be found sufficiently
base to ratfy the knavish plot, it might be car
ried out ; and after the scoundrel had pocketed
the greater part of the estate, leaving debts I'M
paid and the family penniless, would be ac-
counted among men of his stamp sharp"
and "cute" fnancier. Among honest men,
he would be branded as an Infamous rascal,
and driven from decent society. Had he bro
ken into the vaults of bank, and stolen the
money belonging to the estate there deposited,
he would have been consigned to the peniten-
tiary. Yet, coming into possession of it the
way he did, he could easily trump up straw
claims to show that he had only taken sufficient
to defray the expense, time and trouble he had
undergone in connection with his disinterested
services and with the connivance again of the
corrupt officer Of probate, could slip through
the meshes of the law. Yet in the sight of
honesty and integrity, and before high Heaven,
he would stand equally arraigned as scoun-
drel of the deepest dye, let him have procured
the money by whichever process he might
Now, let US take the case Of this man Sweet
ser, as connected with his operations among the
Sioux Indians the past fourteen months, and see
how precisely analogous il is to the one we have
supposed. His miserable and convenient tool
the editor Of the Democrat, admitted three or
four weeks since, that he procured the informa-
ton upon which he based his brigand attack
upon Gov. Ramsey from Sweetser--n other
words, Sweetser was the moving spirit of the
whole affair; and having once shown that
Sweetser left Fort Wayne, Indiana, with this
grand scheme of wholesale robbery fully ma
tured in his mind, Gust as any villain would
have arranged the maraudng onslaught upon
the New York widow and orphans) it will nat
urally follow, of course, that the editor of the
Democrat is particcps crimiuis, and deserves
no more mercy at the hands Of honest men than
the chief culprit himself
The Sweetser power-ofattorney has been
seen by all our readers The character of the
document is illustrated by the character of the
letters Of administration we have adduced-
The man originally stood in the same position
to the Sioux Indians that any one base enough
to attempt the deed, stands to the New York es-
tate. He was California adventurer, resid-
Ing at the time thousand miles away from
here, and read in the newspapers, or heard
from some other source, that a treaty had been
made with tribe Of Indians, entire strangers
TO him. and that they were to receive large
sum Of money. We have every reason to be-
iieve, that the instrument by which he expected
to write his name high upon the list of free
hooters of modern times, Was drawn up before
he left home. Certain it is the arrangement of
the appliances by which be induced that por-
ton OF the Indians to sign it whose names
there appear, was the result of moro than ord;
nary deiiberation. A scheme of wholesale viii
ialny so deeply laid is not matured in single
oay' even by minds so thoroughly debased as
o"eetsers' Let Col. Il. L. Dousman again be
Drought to testify here, and give his tes-
simony as to the character and nature of these
appliances de is o witness the Democrat has
never dared to impeach, and never ,ciU. All
over the West-from st. Louis to the sources of
the Mississippi-to the Eastward in New York,