New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1869-11-17
THE INDECENCIES OF POLITICS.

| We value highly vigorous Opposition. In
] q free country, the best Administration is i'm
proved, the worst is made more tolerable, by
pungent, fearless, unsparing criticism. A good
ruler or minister will sometimes err; aud o
stern, watchful, merciess antagoDism, whether
| it address the public originally through a par
liameltsry forum or directly through editorial
| animadversi6n, will often enable and encourage
it to tetrace its false steps before they become
reversible AS a general rule, falsehoOds and
groundless calumnies injure their authors more
than their subjects since the public, having
detected an assailant in one wantOn SANDER,
are slow to give credit to his subsequent accu-
sations. Hence, we contemplate with patience
and philosophy journalistic effort to damage
an Administration by the clumsy, coarse expe-
dent of throwing infinite mud, in the expecta-
ton that some portion of it can hardly fail to
stick or at least to stain.
The World evidently believes that it COM
mends itself to its own party by the extraor-
binary grossness and persistency of its impu-
tations on the President of the United States.
Perhaps it does We are no judges of the rank
ness Of that party appetite for abuse; but, judg
ing from what it has swallowed without pro-
test, of sneer, and jbe, and scOf, and sCurrility
aimed at the dead Lincoln, it cannot be fasti-
diOus-much less squeamish-with regard to the
living Grant. Yet it does seem to us that The
World Overdoes its work in uttering column
after column of such invectiye as the follow
ing:
1.-THE CUSTOM HOUSE, PRAUDs.-We do not propose to
derOgae the least from the special dishonesty OF the
persons especially implicated by tho disclosures OF the
Custom House frauds Neither do wish to avert the
CURED for scandaous recklessness with which has
arp u Se st tpt the Ts under Which these
been brought 20 light and under which far greater
is one which offers every facility INSCRIPTIONS place
men to aggrandize themselves"
Comments By The Tribune.
I. "The present Administration" has ap-
pointed to Office none of the persons implicated
in the Custom House frauds here and else
where which its agents have detected. On the
contrary, it had removed some Of them prior
to such discovery, and superseded the rest d-
rectly afterward. 1t is exactly as responsible
for those frauds as the sheriff is for the crimes
of the felon whom he has arrested and holds
in custody.
III. "The Tariff under which these swindles
have been brought to light" had nothing to
do with most, if any, of them. During the late
exhausting Civil War, it was found necessary
10 impose an Excise or internal tax on most
domestic manufactures. When exported, those
manufactures we're allowed drawback or re-
turn of this excise, upon due proof that they
had paid it, and that the goods thus taxed had
been exported. On this state of facts, certain
knayes out of Office cOnspired with other
kpayes in Office Zone here. another at Wash
;noton, IN syindle our hard-pressed Treasury
by means of forged papers. They succeeded
Large sums were obtained from the Treasury
by the unofficial contrivers of this fraud, and
appOrtiOned, four-ffths among themselves
one-ffth to their official confederates. In ALL
nearly million dollars was thus stolen from
the people Of the United States.
III. The duties on American Manufactures
were abolished so soon after the close OF the
War as they well could be-some three years
AGO. OF course, the drawback fell with them
This whole system of frauds necessarily Tel
with the excise and its drawback. No dollar