The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1871-03-10
General Malone.

Ii. . General Malone.
Towards this gentleman personally we
have not one unkind feeling. We honor
him for his services, and we give him all
due credit for his capabilities-hiS un1lag-
ging energy and his ineXhaustible perse-
verance-qualities invaluable when rightly
employed. But we regret that the claims
of Gen. MALONE are pressed, as we think,
without prudence and to a length that
must sooner or later turn against him the
| tide Of public opinion so decidedly as to
bring disaster upon him.
General MALONE, taking up the idea of
consolidation, pressed it through. sweep
ing before him all opposition and the presl-
dents of all the lines he swallowed up. He
next induced the Legislature to sell out to
him all the stock held by the State in his
consolidated line on ten years credit, CIV
ing him and his boards the vote upon this
stock and securing to them the power to
perpetuate their authority in spite Of op-
position from private stockholders. Yet,
again. he applied to the Legislature to
make the duration Of his tenn five years
instead of one. This seemed to be unne-
cessary, rs the selfperpetuating power he
already held placed him beyond the reach
of removal. But it was alleged that the
extension of the duration Of his term OF
office would give him better chance to
borrow money-[some of that "foreign
capital" now so denounced and distrustcd
by his followers]-capitalists saying that
they would trust this line on his account,
and would lend him the more readily if
they were assured that he would continue
in office.
In no other case, we believe, has the
tenure Of office in railroads been thus
extended for such reason, or for any
other.
These facts show how the Legislature has
gratified Gen. MALONE in yielding to his
wishes. Certainly this is no warrant for
believing that there is not q limit to this
kind of favor; but it is still pressed with
unremitted perseverance.
The General mixed himself up in the late
" Bucktail war" in alliance with corpora
tions not deemed friendly to this city nor to
the commerce of Virginia /; and, as we think,
most imprudcntly. for his line was in no
way interested in the war, as he himself at
one time declared. He sustained defeat, and
now he comes here under the pretext that
the Richmond and Petersburg road is about
to pass into the hands of foreign capitalists,
and that the State should eonfde to him the
duty of her defence from aliens, and asks
that that road be turned over to him.
We can perceive no danger far less than
from the Seaboard and Bay line, to all in
tents and purposes foreign corporation,
with which Gen. MALONE cooperates in the
war now being fought in the Legislature.
At best the enemy, proclaimed to be an
enemy by the followers of Gen. MALONE,
is but fanciful. The preteXt is forced, and
the accusation unsustained by single fact.
If this be sufficient to justify the violent
measure of seizing the Richmond and Pc
tersburg road and placing Gen. MALONE
over it, it will be equally easy upon SINH
lar preteXt to put him over the Orange and
Alexandria railroad and the Danville road.
Indeed, we have heard each Of these roads
named as likely in turn to become victim
in this patent way.
We trust, for General MAHoNE's own
sake, that he may not be permitted to pro-
coed any further in this march towards the
control of the railroads in Virginia and
equally should this check be desired for the
welfare Of the State.
General MALONE will do we'll if he but
deyotes himself to the interests of the line
he has been placed over-much better than
should he continue to be lobbyist and
participation in the railroad legislation of
all sorts that comes up in the General AS
sembly. The States interests will be best
promoted by maintaining the independence
of competing lines. Thus we shall have pro-
lection from monopoly and grinding policies
of roads which have no competitor. With
entire freedom of every road, at least every
through line, from the control of other
roads, or alliance with them, we shall have
protection to the public, low fares, liberal
accommodations, and general prosperity.
The State may well pause in the matter
of reposing excessive power in the hands
Of one man; and Gen. MALONE having
already an amount of honor and trust quite
equal to moderate ambition, we beg leave
to suggest, viii be safer to rest satisfied
than to press his claims for a more expanded
power.