Saint Paul weekly Minnesotian. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1858-1859, 1859-03-19

NOR
The Peculation Business at Wash ing
".J.t ton. i. s '
The degree to which the public service has
become demoralized during the last five OF
six years, and particularly under the rule iol
the party now in power, may be judged in part
by the reports Just made to Congress, by Mr..
Sherman, Of the Naval Investigation, and Mr.
Tayfer, relative to the printing frauds. The
two show, in a light more clear, and in Language
more forcible than has, At any previous time
been used, how thoroughly saturated all the
political offices at Washington are, with the
spirit which animated the parties to the Ma
ival7coa contract, the yliye oak ten per cent.
agreement and the military post Jobs, at
Wllett's Point. An Office created for the es-
pecial purpose of preserving the public pro-
perty required in the government printing,
becomes at the very outset mere machine to
destroy that property, and to turn every
purchase into apecplation. .....-...,. ,,...
The chief party. to the pecufations, dis
closed by Mr.. Tayior's report, which we give
in full in another column, was A.. q. Seaman,
who held the Office of Superintendent of Pub
lie Printing, from December, 1852, to Dec:
/ 1857 though probably it should be said that
Mr.. W Wendell, The actual public printer for the
last six years, was at all times the principal
in these transactions, using Seaman as the ex-
ternal manager, and giving him nearly hall
the profits From the date of Seaman's ap-
pointment, it appears to have been an estab-
iished rule in his office to tax all contracts,
for paper, engraving, and all other works or ma
terial passing through bis hands, from fifteen
to twenty-five per cent. on the gross amount.
This sum was sometimes paid through sham
"agent," professedly as compensation for get
ting contract, but oftener direct to Seaman
or Wendell, as sloan" The aggregate Of
the sums directly traced to these men is
$50, 900 to Seaman on jobs of paper and en-
craving, $4,000 to Wendell for engraving
the last named thus getting an aggregate of
$4,000. Other and large sums are unac
counted for, and probably, if the truths were
known, much more money in addition would
be found to have been paid to them by parties
not brought before the committee, or by some
of the parties questioned, who had the
skill to avoid disclosing all that had been
done.
1t must not be forgotten that the transac-
tons of this office were " investigated by a
Senate committee, at the close of 1855 and
early in 1856, which committee came unani-
mously to the conclusion that all was right in
the office, and on the part of its superinten-
dent, and, Immediately afterward, the Senate
almost unanimously confirmed his appoint
ment for two years more. The present in
vestigating committee find that this course OF
proceeding has been characteristic of the Office
from the date of Mr. Seaman's appointments in
1853, and the evidence irresistibly establishes
the corruption of the entire machinery which
Wendell controls, for most of this time, if not
the whole of it. All that relates to the pub
lie printing is really in the same boat, and
this corrupt relation of all parties to the work
done in this particular Office, will be found to
belong to nearly all the departments embraced
under this general head printing, engraving,
paper purchasing and binding 1t isa generic
feature of the set called democratic at Wash
ington, to foster and prefer such men as Sea-
They pay far the heaviest sums to carry elec-
tons, and the money they get by these pecu-
lations is paid out by thousands, when polit-
ical trial comes. No man is so liberal as Wen
dell in aiding the party, and we now see how
easily he repays himself.
The burden of this exposure ought to rest
on the system of using money to carry elec-
tons, so afectingly alluded to by the gentle.
man who wrote the Duquesne letter. 1t is
this system which so poisons the atmosphere
at Washington, that such men as Seamen get
place, and riot in the public money unchecked
for many years. He and Wendell are indices
and exemplars of the whole company of parti-
sans in place there ordinarily, and one who
undertakes an opposite course, as Mr. Bow.
man has done, finds his couch all thorns, and
himself pursued and stung as by a hornets
nest. .. g.. ~rHa- gf| ,oa- ..
1t NAV be observed that this report is
studiedly mild and careful in its tone, ap.
parcntly leaving the larger share of facts un-
noted, and half the deductions unsaid. This
was, evidently, for the purpose of obtaining
the signature of every member of it, and to
avoid the dissent of any member, which might
break its force Three Democrats sign it.
and they confne themselves rigidly to the or
iginal inquiry, leaving all collateral subjects
out of the report. Not word appears of the
uses to which the sums obtained by Seaman
and Wendell were put, while it is highly pro
bable that some of the witnesses would cheer
fully have detailed their political services il
extenuation of their sins in robbing the pub
lie purse. The next Congress should pursue
this subject, and uncover the whole list o
shameful transactions enacted in every de
partment of the public printing, if not, indeed
in whatever relates to the share of the public
service especially directed by this Admins
tration and its predecessors. Philadelphia
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