New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1856-12-19

my soil grouuaiiy; ~ IL II, L must meAo ny
"grab at once or be turned of empty-handed;
30 be steals right aid left, impelled By con-
sciousness that his time is short. Next year,
new man takes bis place needy and voracious, for
gets bis virtuous and patriotic denuneahons Of
past peculations, aid is hardly warm in bis oiciA
chair before be looks wary about to discover some
chance for clandestinely filling bis pockets. VI
course, some good men are chosen to responsible
station, but constantly lessening proportion Oh
them to those which afford large facilities for pecu'
latiOn, because the men who mean to use those
facilities can afford to bride higher and promise
more in order to secure nominations for such poss
than honest men either will or can agree to do.
The City's need Of Reformed Charter and Gov
eminent is manifest and urgent, yet the obstacles
which impede it are unusually great. Some OF the
more Obvious are as follows:
{ l. The great mass Of our thrifty and comfort
girded citizens are inveteratey disincined to give
time and thought to public and especially to mu-
nicipal affairs. They find more congenial employ
ment elsewhere-more agreeable associations than
ward politics invove-and loathe the imputation or
suspicion Of office-seeking. Not one{ourth OF our
legal voters habitualy attend Primary Meetings or
have any voice in the selection Of candidates, and
those selections are generally made under the IN
spiration Of those who have axes to grind. Hence
our candidates for local Offices, save those whs are
known from the first to have scarcely chance OF
election, are rot as honest and fit as men chosen
by lot would be.
g Few men of ability will consent to be run tor
Aldermen and other local Offices, unless they either
expect to make money thereby in some ciandestlne
way, or hope to make them stepping stones to bet
ter places, or both.
3. We have a very able, ambitious, audacious,
interruptions politician at the head of our municipal
government, who means to make his present pos.
pave the way to one still higher, and who Yields al
the power within his grasp to that end. He knows
how to be a good Mayor, and for short time was
So but the cares of this world and the deceitful'
ness of riches soon choked the good seed, and now
the worst weeds have taken its place.
4. The natural antagonism between the industri'
GUS, SOBER frugal and thrifty, on one side, aud the
idle dissolute, knavish and Goddess on the other,
has been of late to good extent broken over and
efaced. The Know Nothing" intrigue divided
and paray zed those who should have been the true
conservative PARTY of our OF JUS
tice morality liberty and law-while the Slavery
discussion has developed new formation on the
side of immortality and wrong. Nme-tenths Of the
gamblers policy sellers, brothelkeepers and grog-
shop keepers of our city united in solid phalanx
under the banner of Pro-Slavery Democracy, and
unhappily the commercial piety AMI Responsibility
of our city, whereof The Journal Of Commerce and
The Nte. York Obserrer are oracles, is temporarily
rallied under the same banner. The thieves who
burrow about the Five Points, and our cottOn-bro-
kers and cotton Doctors of Divinity are ranged
politically under the same banner, and are equally
exercised in spirit by the dangers which threaten
the Union; their fears that fanacism and Abolition
lem may ,ubvertthe Church and give our land over to
IbfideIty are mutual, and their view Of the duties
and responsibilities of the patriotic citizen surprs-
ipgly identical and together they rally around the
standard of Wood and Buchanan Democracy.
While, therefore, We shall heartily second the
efforts of our friends who are working for Re-
formed Charter, we have less faith than they seem
TO have that their success will insure or be followed
by any practical mitigation of the misgovernmsns
and robbery from which our city now suffers To
that end not better charter only, but better men
in power under it, are necessary. However, let
us do what We can.