The Wheeling daily register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1864-1878, 1867-09-05

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ing legislation, the people here believed
that their prosperity was secure. They
were released from a section with which
they had little identity; they would no
longer be required to pay taxes for that
sections improvement; the only drain
upon their resources and their energies
would be for their own advancement,
and they confidently expected an uuex-
ampled career of happiness and pro-
gress under the altered situation. 1t is
not the fault of the new State per Sc
that these expectations have been dis
appointed, but il is the fault of those
who have had charge of her affairs. The
expected Improvement has not come; the
incapacity of West Virginia authorities
has defeated the best results that should
have come from West Yirginia's crea-
tion. We are now laboring under load
of local taxation, heretofore unequalled
initimes of peace. The greed of office
holding has caused the creation of num-
berless petty places, all to be filled and
supported at public cost. The State is
plagued with official vermin. They
swarm like lOcusts; they feed with a
hunger that cannot be appeased; they
strip the State of it's freshness, and their
track is waste place and desOlation.
The evils that prevail in particular
departments of our State Government
should not be forgotten. sc. P.'s" last
article illustrates our meaning. That
article shows clearly the abuses that ex-
ist in the Executive Department, and
they are but sample Of the whole. In
addition to this we have the Asylum
frauds, depicting the treasury ofdollars
by the hundred thousand. Then we
have the Penitentiary humbug, which
will cost the State fully five
times the original estimate, or nearly
one million dollars. These are the
greater wrongs. Smaller ones are so
abundant Us to he countless. We have
frauds upon the school funds, swindles
in county buildings, robberies i'll boun-
ty matters, and local defalcations and
corruptions inuumerable. When COM
bined they show an amount of Off
cial incompetence and unfaithfulness
seldom equalled.
This disordered and disgraceful con-
dition of things demands remedy. Will
the taxpayers apply it' 1t is not a
mere matter of partisan interest. 1t is
a matter that concerns the people of all
political views. Radicals, alike with
Democrats, are interested in thorough
reformation. The former, as mass,
have Just as much anxiety about cheap
taxes and honest government as the lat
ter. Neither desire to be swindled;
neither desire to pay premiums upon
public robbery. 1t is small consolation
to a Republican to know that he is
impoverished by his own party's ex-
travagance, just as it would be no re-
lief to Democrat, wero the Democracy
in power, to feel that the mismanage-
ment of his own associates made taxes
high. There is nothing i'll party alle-
glance to require u man to uphold, by
his vote and purse, the frauds of his
political allies, and the people of all
parties should consult their own and the
States advantage by displacing incom-
petence and corruption, wherever they
may exist in public position. The ques-
tion ofreform and retrenchmenti is one OF
vital Importance in West Virginia, and
we are glad to see disposition on the
part of many Republicans to join hands
with Democrats in the work of official