The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1854-05-03


troversy Mr.. Carson cannot prevent thieves
from obtaining admission to houses, in the
garb of fremen he cannot prevent or alc-
quately punish stealing even among
the regular members of the depart
ment; and it further appears that instead
OF deriving aid or assistance from the J
Common Council, when such practices are dis
covered, that body has actually screened and
and in one instance reinstated the thief il
his office. Is any thing more needed to sho
that, under voluntary system, plumber nv lst
be the rule and not the exception?
Mr.. Carson is of opinion that over half the
fires which occur in New York are the wo rk of
incendiaries: and most Of US would be rec .dy to
endorse this statement. But neither Mr. Car
son nor any one else knows whose busip ess it is
to ascertain the cause of fires, or pre- vent in
cendiarism.
The condition into which we have fa lien would
really be Uncomfortable, if it were lot reali-
ty. The Chief Engineer swearing t. lat half of
the fires which occur are the work # incendia-
ries, and confessing his own help essness and
that Of his brother officers to de tect or check
the progress Of the crime-the y lme officer ad-
hitting that thieves have found their way into
the Fire Department that som g have been ex-
| PEELED, while others, known to have stolen, arc
retained in ofice-and declaring that in his
opinion bands of organized robbers make a
practice of attending fires, and plunderiEg
| under the garb of freusen- discloses q shat of
| things which will shool1the most resolute mind
What is safe, if half Of the houses that are
burnt are set on fire, eur goods stolen by the
very men who profess to save them, and our
| utter helplessness to prevent these things de-
\ monstrated? Is not this the lowest depth
among the miseries Of anarchy?
Tomorrow, shall we say, the store occu-
pied by Mr.. A in one of the business streets
in the city, is set on fire by scoundrels
who want to plumber it. 1t is done at dead
of night, when no effective assistance can be
rendered As soon as the flames appear the in
cendiaries emerge from their place of conceal
ment and pass themselves off as iremen. In
that disguise they obtain admittance to the
house, which is closed to honest men, unless
they be fremen. They carry of what they
please; and authorities, police, and Chief En-
gineer Carson himself, know the whole affair
from beginning to end, but cannot prevent it.
This seems an incredible case; but that it has
occurred scores of times, and will continue to
occur until the entire framework of our NUM-
cipal institutions is changed we have no man
ner of doubt
That change has already begun in the Police
Department. The control of the police has
been wrested from the City Council and placed
in the hands of three respectable citizens.
Since then the police have begun to evince
little efficiency; and the escape Of criminals
has been less matter of course than it used to
be- The attempt made to place things on their
old footing having failed, there is some ground
for hoping that year or two hence we may
have police force that will be of some SER
| vice.
! 1t now remains for us to effect somewhat |
| similar changes in the Fire Department. The |
bill for depriving the City Council of the power
| to reinstate thieves in the department must be
| carried, and the control of the fremen mast be
| placed in honest hands. After Mr. Carson's |
| evidence, we should think, no opposition will |
be made by our present fire. companies
to the abolition Of the voluntary system.
The respectable men who constitute the bulk Of
the body will be glad to escape from the odum
to which such practices as those disclosed by
the Chief Engineer must give rise. Shown as
it is that it is impossible to prevent thieves
from buying and wearing iiremen's caps and
badges and SO obtaining admission to burning
houses for the purpose of plumber no one can
be so unreasonable as to contend that the sys-
tenn ought to be maintained. No advantage
which it may possess can outweigh this fright
full drawback. The question in fact now
10 81 10 ~ ,on
pursue our past course, it being proved that it
stimulates theft and incendiarism? or shall we
revert to the system which in Boston and in
European cities has been found to 90 a long
way towards extirpating both, besides diminish
ing the number of fires? We are content to
leave the solution Of the problem to the fremen
themselves. Looking at it in their double ca
pacity of fremen and citizens, a proper degree
Of pride in the one case and sense of interest
in another cannot but induce them to take the
lead in agitating for the reform. They have
nothing to gain by unfolding system under
which their good character is used by mis-
creants to cloak criminal practices; while they
have, in common with all of us, much to lose
by the prevalence of crime and the frequency of
fires in our midst. 1t cannot be that we shall
have appealed to them in vain.
The old proverb warns us against grasping
too much at once, and we will only add that
the reform required in the city Council must
be as thorough as that in the Fire Department.
If it has ever happened that we have had occa-
sion to speak well of the Council, the circum-
stance has escaped our memory; and to the
best of our belief, the renstatng Of thieves in
the Fire Department is entirely consistent with
the whole tenor of their administration Of the
public service. New York will not breathe
freely till they are swept away root and branch