Nashville patriot. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1858-1860, 1859-05-12
Federal Exfravagance iands .Corrup-
EXTRACT FROM THE SPEECH OF HON. WILLIAM c.
RIyEs, AT RICHMOND vIRcrSJA WAY 3D.

were intended to place the public liberty
securely under the guardianship of the public
virtue. 1t is these noble institutions which
daring official abuses, emboldened by i'm
punity, would now pervert to the destruction
OF Liberty, by undermining every guarantee
provided for its security-even the virtue and
patriotism of the people themselves. Shall
we not then, rally to their defence, one and
all of us? Shall we he told that this is the
cause OF party? Believe me, fellow-citi-
zens. it is the vital cause of constitutional
fFeedom-the common cause of every Ameri-
can citizen, Democrat, Wing. or by whatever
| party denomination be may have been hither-
to known, who values his birthright, and is
, manfully determined to defend it.
That have presented to you no exaggerat-
ed picture of our public situation is IN
fortunately too well established by facts.
now of universal notoriety. Revelations
brought out during the late session of Con-
grese have placed them before the public in
| form not to be questioned.
Look at the report upon public printing,
| and you will see there how deliberately and
ingeniously, in that large department Of the
public expenditure, corruption has been
( organized into system to multiply brides to
the employees and supporters of the Govern
ment. Every contract, whether for paper
for printing, for lithographing, for engraving,
has been SO managed as not only to yield a
the officer of the Government who awards the
contract, and to the intermediate agents
employed as brokers to procure it. Thus is a
single job made, by its ramifications, to en-
list and remunerate dozen or more political
retainers, at an enormous cost TO the
/ Treasury; for the prices allowed to the con-
tractor must be correspondingly high, 10
enable him to pay the customary tributes 10
his patrons and associates.
And of mt hos
passing under the very nose of the Govern
nent in the City of Washington. One of these
LEVERS OF black mail. one who received the
modest sum of $39. 900 for his goodwill and
patronage i'll the sale and brokerage ofpublic
contracts, was but the other day owner and
conductor of the official organ of the Govern
ment, and is even now, we are told, public
printer in fact though not in name.
Look now at the huge report made upon
the operations in the navy yards of Phila-
delphia and Brooklyn document gigantic
in it's proportions, but yet more gigantic and
startling in the official iniquities it reveals
| have not the time nor the patience to enter
into the disgusting details of these revela-
tons But one glaring and montrous fact
appears from them all--the systematic en-
ployment of contracts for every variety of
work and materials in both of these vast es-
adjustments, aud that with the direct appro-
partisan services, and to debauch the suffrages
of the people.
There you will see contracts involving
large amounts of public money, directed by
the Government to be given, in open viola
ton of the law, to the highest instead of the
lowest bidder, from the sole consideration of
the number of subsidized voters in the en-
plOyment of the preferred party, whose suf-
fragcs were required in the critical moment
~ fAI oil . IL 4
systematically was this policy carried ont in
one of those establishments [Brooklyn] that
Democrotic members of Congress representing
the adjoining districts were formally consti-
tuted by the Government its authorized
agents for making an equitable division of
the public spoils among its supporters and
in this manner the yard was filed to the num-
Der of several thousand with worthless and
incompetent men, whose only claim to en-
ployment was founded on political service
and among whom, according to the language
of the report, ''ideness, theft, INSTRUMENTATION,
fraud, and gross neglect of duty prevailed to
an alarming extent"
The developments made present the Gov
eminent as moving in constant circle of cor
ruptiOn. First, the Government. with the
public money, cOrrupts the contractors and
their employees to vote for members of Con-
gress; then the contractors corrupt the mem
bers of Congress. with stipulated per cent
age, to procure them other contracts and,
finally, the members of Congress, by some
species of influence or other corrupt the
Government to bestow the contracts which
they had stipulated to obtain.
But, fellow-citizens, | cannot follow out
these revolving details there they are upon
record, where you can examine them for your
selves, and ponder the mournful degeneracy
OF the public morals they disclose, and upon
your solemn duty, as men and patriots, to re-
buke and correct the evil. | have referred
to these things with the deepest humiliation
as an American citizen. l sincerely wish for
the honor OF my country that they could be
shown to be party libels, but, unfortunately,
the facts Is too notorious, the knowledge
of them are too widespread and universal to
admit either of denial or suppression.
The whole air is filled with them; they are
propagated on the winds to the corners ofthe
earth. What has made Washington, as the
central seat Of the Government, the public Of
fees, Congress itself. by-word and reproach
with the yet uncOntaminated mass of the peo-
pie but the belief that corruption testers
there, and is thence dIffused like subtle
poison through every branch of the public
Administration depending upon it? Have
not Senators of the dominant party, elevated
by their character as well as their position,
openly proclaimed in the Senate chamber
their solemn conviction that the Government
OF the United States, of which they form
part, "is the most corrupt now existing on
the habitable globe?n
The time is come, then, when patriots and
good men of all political denominations must
seriously reflect upon the duties which they
owe to their country. irrespective of mere
party considerations. If we mean to preserve
the noble heritage of freedom which our an-
cestors have transmitted 10 us, now is the
time to make the effort. Public morality is
the only basis on which free institutions can
stand. If that is once sapped. the edifce it
self must crumble TO the ground
have not been an inattentive observer
of what has passed in other
well as our own, during the
eventful epoch in which we live. have wit
messed the downfall of an ancient monarchy
in Europe. | have seen constitutional rep
Government. established upon its
ruins; and in eighteen short years have seen
that Government subverted by a revolution,
to make way, after u brief and convulsive pc
riod OF anarchy, for a military despotism.
What Occasioned the premature downfall of |
the Representative Government of Frances |
Ii was political corruption undermining it at |
ts base. Louis Philippe and his Ministers. in |
stead of resting on the virtue and Intelligence |
Of the country for support, sought to rule IL |
by an open and shameless system of cOrrup- |
lion. The elective franchise being confined to-
4 comparatively small portion of the nation, |
md that,fraction being itself corrupted by the |
the mass of the people could /
right themselves only by revolutions; and the |
fell
II is a remarkable instance OF the certainty
With which effects follow their causes in the /
political world. that NJ de Tocqueville, one
'i the most profound political philosophers in
his or any other age, announced from his
place in the Chamber of Deputies, while all /
seemed sure and stable in the eyes of the
that the country was sleeping
ipon a volcano, and that revolution was
II hand. And what was the ground of his
prediction There had then been no popu.