The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1869-10-29
THE CITY COUNCILS.


SEVERAL matters of interest came up for con-
sid ration before City Councils yesterday.
Mr.. Hockey, one of the Democratic men,
bers of Select Council, showed disposition
to Andrew Johnsonize the Mayor, and to get
mp q tenure of Office issue in regard to
the policemen, but his efforts were not
attended with any great degree of success,
and his failure is apparently attributable, in
part, to his abandonment of his own project.
After offering resolution directing the
Mayor to reinstate certain policemen who
were summarily removed, which was amended
by adding other names, and after declaring
that he doubted if the Mayor had the autho-
rity to summarily dismiss officers without
The consent Of Select Council, Mr.. Hockey
voted for postponement of the considera-
tion of the whole subject, but it was finally
referred to the Committee on Police. There
is but little hope, however, that that body
will discover any legal remedy, under the
present system, for the glaring evil of a
partisan reorganization of the police force
whenever Democratic Mayor succeeds a
Republican, or gice 0erS0. The people must
look to the Legislature for an amendment of
the vital defect in the Act Of Consolidation
which permits these wholesale removals.
They are no longer tolerated in
any other large city, and if they
are to be continued here the eff
cheney of the police will be SO much weakened
that it will be scarcely worth maintaining
Since the citizens are called upon to pay
about million of dollars per annum to sup
port this standing army, they have a right to
expect and demand that it shall be so consti-
tuted as to render the greatest possible
amount of good services but when their
money is wasted in supporting men who are
the serviceable allies of the dangerous ene-
mics of society, who give information to
criminals to assist in their escape
from justice, and who refuse to ap-
pear in Court to testify against ar
raigned prisoners, they are taxed to sustain
and aid, rather than to repress crime. While
ballot-box suffers can demand as a reward for
their guilty partisan zeal that their criminal
associates shall be quartered on the city as
policemen, we can never expect creditable
force, especially as they supplant hundreds of
men who had served the city long and WE'LL
lut who were turned adrift solely on account
of their refusal to subscribe to Democratic
doctrines and to support Democratic candi-
dates. There is no excuse for a refusal of
the Republican Legislature of the State to
provide remedy for these wrongs. If they
disregard partisan considerations altogether, let
them so arrange a commission that hereafter
the force may be composed of Republican
and Democratic appointees in approximately
equal proportions; but let them, at all events,
rescue the city from the manifest evils arising
from changes on political grounds, and the
substitution of raw or unworthy new APP
pointees for faithful and trustworthy officers.
A deep interest was also excited by the
message of the Mayor vetoing the resolutions
approving the sureties of the Republican
can 1idates for City Solicitor, City Controller,
Receiver of Taxes, and City Commissioner,
whose right to hold those offices was affirmed
by the late decision of the Court of Common
Pleas Under the circumstances, the Mayor
no doubt felt constrained to give to his fellow
candidates on the Democratic ticket of 1868,
who were less fortunate than himself, all the
benefits that could possibly arise from his
veto while the appeal to the Supreme Court
remains undecided. But his action appears
to have met with little favor in Common
Council, where the sureties were approved,
in spite of his veto, by vote of 81 to 7. The
Select branch did not act on the subject, and
if the question assumes a strictly partisan
aspect there he may be sustained, as the Re-
publicans do not possess atwo-thirds vote, but
it is considered not improbable that he will
also be overruled in that body
In the Common branch, after the passage
of an ordinance appropriating 500. 600 to the
Commissioners of Paramount Park, spirited
debate sprung up on an ordinance appropri-
ating $53, 400 to the Water Department. in
the course of which the action of the present
Chief Engineer was on the one hand bitterly
denounced and on the other warmly de-
Tended. Councilman Evans entered the lists
against him, charging that he had expended
more money during his administration than
his predecessor, Birkenbine, and making the
bold allegation that the evils arising from the
recent drought were owing to ohisincompetency.
Mr.. Hanna, in defense of the Chief Engineer,
declared that the assaults made by Evans
were prompted by personal feeling Final
action was prevented by the absence of a
quorum, and the discussion is only important
on account of it's exhibition of hostility on
the part of several Republican members to
the present Chief Engineer
MAKING TIE NA VAL SER VICE
POPULAR.