The Evansville daily journal. [volume] (Evansville, Ia. [i.e. Ind.]) 1848-1862, 1860-06-22
Communicated.
Communicated
80 ANSWER A Fool According to His
FOlIy.o


Folly"
In the Inquirer of the goth, is an article
having personal application to the under
signed, which justice to myself requires that
| should answer. That article, evidently
prompted by malice, relates to a difficulty
which the printing Office with which 1 was
connected at indianapolis had, over year
ago, with few members of the Indianapo-
lis Typographical Union. The Union de-
nounced the Office as rat Office" and
will now proceed to sketch the circumStan-
ces under which this was done.
The very honest and incorruptible (?)
Democratic party, to which the Enquirer
men belong, had been accustomed for years
to peculate upon the State treasury through
the Public Printing. The evil had become
alarming, and at the special session of the
Legislature of 1858, The Citizen, a paper
with which | was connected, opened up its
batteries and laid bare to view the shame
tul transactions connected with the Public
Printing.
The subject came before the House of
Representatives, and q committee was APP
pointed to investigate the alleged frauds,
with power TO send for persons and papers.
That committee performed its functions with
impartiality, and in due time made report,
which established the fact that the Demo-
cratic organ had been in part sustained by
the printing plumber; that the Democratic
Platform, n campaign paper published in
1856, had been printed a portion of the time
on printing paper belonging to the State,
without compensation; that the Democratic
Secretary of State was in the habit of APP
proving bills for printing done for the State,
without the proper examination; that the
Democratic Auditor of State regularly audit
ed those wrongful bills, and the Democratic
Treasurer of State regularly paid them; in
short, the report exposed abuses of the most
astounding description continually going On
under Democratic officials in this matter of
the public printing, resulting in the loss of
thousands of dollars to tine honest taxpayers
OF Indiana. The report of the committee
was published to the world, and now stands
as witness against the Democratic party
and its officials implicated in the frauds
Very naturally, a number of very sensi-
tive toes were trampled on, and their owners
waxed indignant at the publishers of The
Citizen, who first called attention to the
abuses. One of the individuals VINO had
been particularly hurt by the investigation,
swore vengeance on The Citizen and its
publishers. He belonged to the Typograph-
zeal Union, and amongst its members were
several persons who were his employees and
tools, bound to do as he directed At his
bidding, a crusade was commenced against
The Citizen Office, on frivolous pretences;
and because the proprietors of the perse-
cuted Office chose to make their own rules
for its government rather than to obey the
arbitrary commands of the sore head in
the Union and his satellites they were ia
hooed-put under ban. Their office was
published as ''rat Office" Many of the
members of the Union were subsequently
ashamed of the pitiful part they had been
induced to play and confessed their regrets
to The Citizen proprietors.
When the spite was played out the
ban was taken off. Whether before or af-
ter | sold my interest in the office, neither
know nor care. 1t was a matter Of no par
ticular uneasiness to either of the proprie-
tors, for them to rest under the malice of a
few interested individuals i'll the Union,
when they were personally friendly with
most of the members, and had some of them
in their employ even while the ban rested
on the office.
The Enquirer has seen fit to publish a
mean and malicious personal article this
subject, and if in this answer its precious
party gets few backhanded ticks, it can
console itself by reading the caption of this
article JAMES II. MCNEELE.