Knoxville weekly chronicle. [volume] (Knoxville, Tenn.) 1870-1875, 1872-01-10
XPuBLICsTIrENDraRY At THE CHIB.
ne PIead- hts own case.

The County Court was called upon on Mon
day TO fix the salary Of our new Attorney Cen
eral which position the recent General Assem-
bly, has graeiopsls created for the benefit of the
lucky appointec, the editor OF the Press and
Herald, Mr. Fleming was on hand to favor the
Ignorant and peculiar, mountaineers' who
compose the County Court with his sage ad
vice on the subject. He showed his disinterest-
Co y ma oegud pT no OS de%f poC o
ple led him to do this, of course.
He intmated that if he wac looking at the mat
ter from selfish point of view, he would pre-
fer that the Court should fix no salary, but allow
him the fees fixed by law. But if he was JUS
tice of the Peace, acting for the people, he
should feel compelled to vote for the payment
OF the salary of 81, 200, as the law provides he
may have
The Legislature, it will be remembered left
it optional with the County Court to pay a sal
airy or to allow the Attorney General his usual
fees. He, to show that he was entirely dis
interested in the matter stated that he
did not expect to continue in office longer
than next August, and that the salary fixed now
would apply to his successor as we'll as to him
self We are left TO infer whether or not he
means to dispose of all the special cases on the
docket by that time. This may have influen-
ced him in such statement, and again, it might
have occurred to him that the people-the
voters Of Knox county, did not see so much vir-
tue in him rs does Democratic General As
| sembly, and q Democratic Governor. The
| honest yeomanry of this country do not always
| agree with the Legislature, and this Mr.. Flem-
| ing well knows. But the court. strange to say.
| did not rely so implicitly on the statement of
| Attorney General Fleming as did the Legisla-
| ture which created the Office for him, and about
| two-thirds of the justices present voted that he
must look to his fees for compensation. They
failed to see "a good thing" for the county in
the gentleman very disinterested solicitude for
the condition of our county exchequer and he
went away sorrowful He, no doubt, is excrcis-
| ing his skill in mathematics, to know just how
many persons are to be found guilty upon pre-
| sentiments and indictments, in order to yield
him decent income. With q fixed salary,
all these troublesome calculations might
have been avoided. $1,000 per annum
would be very nice for q sinecure po-
sition, and then how popular an At
torney General would be, if he brought
| only few indictments. How he would point
to the contrast between ThorDburgh and him.
| self? "Thornburg," he would say, "prosecut-
ed you fellows who occasionally violated the
law, without mercy, behold what merciful
Attorney General q Democratic Legislature has
provided you, doing for you what you would
not have done for yourselves" But the Court
was too stupid to see the matter through the
glasses which Mr. Fleming held to their eyes
and voted that he must root hog or die" Ht
wields sceptre invncble, over the TENNESSEE
Legislature, but before the Ignorant and pc
culiar mountaineers" of the Knox County
Court, he is powerless. He perhaps consoles
himself with remembering that prophet is no
without honor save in his own country.