Nashville union and dispatch. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1866-1868, 1868-08-07
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ENORMTTY OF THE PUBLIC EX-
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PENDITERES.
The Radicals have issued a whites
washing campaign document, through
Mr. David A. Wells, Special Commission
er Of Revenue, intended to parry the
charge of e1trayagant expenditures. AS
nearly as we can learn the origin and
secret history of this Whitewashing mans
festO, it was got up at the instigation of
Horace Greeley, says the New York
World, who wrote, some four or Eve
weeks ago, to speaker Colfax, telling him
that unless the statements in Governor
Seymour's then recent speech were re-
butted, they would do great damage to
tue Republican party. Commissioner
Wells was thereupon charged with the
task Of. cooking up an exhibit to explain
away the enormity Of the Republican
expenditures. We will not, at present,
enter into any detailed criticism Of the
report, thinking it more useful to call at
tention to the bad state Of the case as
exhibited in this apologetic document.
What is here confessed cannot afterwards
be denied and, Judged by their own
figures the Republicans deserve to be
stripped Of the power they SO grossly
abuse ..'
+ According to Mr.. Wells statements,
the total expenditures for the army and
navy from the close of the war to the
Both of June, 1865, were as follows
E For the army. ............. s917.11ZOl3
For the 49, 1876
Total ............Sl $50. 237, $40
Thisisat the enormous rate gilmore than
$3OOO0O,OOO year in time of peace,
while previous to the war the whole ex.
penses of the government were only
$7O,OOO0O0 a year, army, navy and
everything included. 1t is no wonder
that the Republicans felt that the saliva
ton of their party is staked on their abil-
ity to explain away these facts, or to
raise dust to cover them. .....
Being compelled to admit the facts,
what is their Apology Why, that the
scale of expenditure was altogether
larger during the first nine months after
the close of the war than it has been
since. Nobody disputes that but when
Mr. Wells attributes it topaying off the
disbanded soldiers, he warily avoids 60
ing into details. If he had told the exact
amount paid to disbanded soldiers in
each quarter of his nine months, we
should have had the means of Judging of
his apology. We challenge him to pro-
duce such statement What we want
to know is the number of soldiers
mustered out during each of those
three quarters, and the amount of
money paid them on quitting the
service That a prodigious amount
was spent at that time We grant; but
that it all went into the pockets Of dis
UduuCu bOlulGIb VIC 10 uOb DGutNG, anu
challenge the proof Vague generalities
about the vast expense of disbanding the
army will not answer; we demand an
authentic transcript from the muster
rolls and pay rolls, before we can Judge
how much of this apology is fact, and
how much fiction. Mr.. Wells whites
washing campaign document slurs over
and suppresses the details, because the
details would expose the insulhciency of
his apology.
Without further discussing the expen-
diturcs of those first nine months until
We are in possession of fuller and more
detailed information than Mr.. Wells sup-
plies, we call attention to the enormous
taxes which the people paid in the third
year after the close of the war, as adj
mittcd in his whitewashing report The
customs revenue, collected in gold,
amounted to $IG3,500,OOO Reducing
this to its valde in currency to avoid the
confusion Of reckoning in two kinds Of
money, the revenue collected in the fiscal
year ending the 30th Of last month was
as follows
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