The Athens post. [volume] (Athens, Tenn.) 1848-1917, 1858-08-27
YOUR MONEY OR YOUR LIFE!
From the N. Y. Express.l

| way. But 1t IS difficult to read the eXtraordl-
nary editorial enforcing Tax upon office
holders, which we copied from the Washing.
/ ton Union (the Presidents organ on Friday
last, without giving expression in the strong
est terms to the sentiments of undissembled
and unmtigated disgust, which it cannot but
! stir up in the bosom of every man that pre-
| tends to the least selfrespect, independence,
or patriotism, without reference to party
principles, or party affiliations. Things in
deed have come to a pretty pass when the
oracle OF the Palace gives out that unless
persons holding places in the public service
submit to a specific assessment for party pur
poses, lie shall be dismissed at once and his
place filled with one who is liberal enough to
double the contribution" Here then. is pre-
sented the beautiful spectacle of putting up
the various places in the public service, as it
were, to the highest bidder! The patronage
of the federal government, regularly farmed
out, and only those wLo will pay most, get
ting the most lucrative offices Nor is this
all. Persons who refuse to recognize the
binding validity of this imperial edict, are
denounced, in advance, as "miserable scaven-
gers, and unworthy men," if not vertable
TRAITORS" to their country In order to es
innate this remarkable official rescript at its
proper value, it should be understood that
every Custom House officer, before receiving
his salary, is required to swear, substantially,
that no part of that salary shall be contrib
uted to political or party purposes. The
Union editor, of course, is aware of this fact.
Its masters the President and the Presidents
constitutional advisers the Cabinet-are
likewise aware of it. But, in order that
there may be no mistake on that point, we
give here a true transcript of the oath which
every officer of the Customs is obliged, by
law, to take, Immediately upon the*eceipt of
his salary;
THE RECEIPT.
Received from Augustus Schell, Esq, Col
lector Of the Customs for the District of New
York, on the = day of --, 1853. the sum
of - dollars, = cents, being in full of
my compensation for the period above stated,
having signed duplicate receipts.
THE OATH.
l. A B. G., - in the office of the Col
lector of the District of New York, do hereby
certify on - that have performed the ser
vices stated in the above account; that |
have received the full sum therein charged
to my own use and benefit; and that have
not paid, deposited or assigned, nor contract.
ed to pay, deposit or assign, any part of such
compensation, to the use of any other person;
nor in any way, directly or indirectly, paid or
riv cd In or Criua
ward or compensation for my office or EN-.
ployment, or emoluments thereof,
So help me God.
Sworn and subscribed before me,
this day of -, 1853.
Thus, then, right in the teeth of that SOL
emn oath, tits authoritatively promulged that,
unless persons in the public service contribute
a certain per centage of their salaries to the
support of the Democratic party-in other
words, unless they perpetrate deliberate per-
jury-they must put up with the prescribed
penalty-dsmissal from officel What is all
this, we should like to know, but subornation
of perjury. in high places
1t is not long since, that distinguished
politician asked in reference to the Presi-
dents policy in Kansas,-"Are we living on
ginning and ending of our duty to our coun-
try, simply in registering the DEGREES of Gar
or Sultan" We may ask again--with this
Palace Edict in the Union, before us-Are
weliving in the frs. instead Of the nineteenth
century of the Christian era-not in the
United States of America-but in some tribu-
tary Judea of the Roman Empre-under a
Tiberius Caesar, decreeing that "all the world
shall be taxedr' Or, few centuries later
are we in Rome itself under the Praetorian
Guards-selling out the imperial honors and
emouments to those who will bid the highest
for theml At any rate, if these nefarous
practices are to continue, if our Federal En-
peror, or his satraps, are to be permitted to
WELD his seeptre thus to the sacrifice OF every
thing like personal independence in those
who are called to aid him in the administra-
ton of the Government-then, when some
future Gibbon takes up his pen to write our
Decline and Fall, he will have to date from
A. ID. 1853, in the second year of the reign
James Buchanan, President of the then So
called American Republic.
Now, we do pretend to be unaware that
this system of assessment has been counte-
nanced and encouraged to greater or less
extent under previous administrations; but
the practice is one so odious in ITSELF and SO
corrupt and cOrrupting in all Its tendencies
that the organs of the government have never
been so lost to shame till now, as to make
public proclamation of the fact-much less
toInsist upon its scrupulous enforcement-as
the Union does now-as test Of party fealty |
and an indispensable duty, the neglect Of
which must entail pains and penalties equiva
lent to exclusion from office, if not positive |
deprivation of the victims daily bread
But, in truth, the practice is but one of those
demoralzing features of the odious political |
machinery of the day, which go to show how |
rotten to the core that machiery is and how |
utterly inconsistent it is with the whole thee.
ny of personal independence, upon which re-
publican government is based. If there be
in Washington city one man power, potent !
enough to enforce, by an arrogant threat, a
tax upon some forty thousand office holders,
for the special benefit of political cormorants,
then it lie all folly to talk about individual
freedom, or personal independence, or any
thing of that sort. Every man who needs
that threat, or obeys that edict, is to that
extent slave. lie does not own himself
His party is the proprietor Of him, soul and
body. lie is not, in the true meaning of the
term, an American citzen-but only servi.
tor of the Palace.
Still, we are not sure that the Unions Tax
alton Edict ought to be regretted, If it will
but help to open the eyes Of our countrymen