Memphis daily appeal. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1847-1886, 1872-04-13
TIE PAVIORS
And the City's Saviors-Intolerable
TRasdIe and Awful Transformations
to be shed while Contemplating
the City's Woes.

OfAl1 the seedy, wretched habiliments
in which an empty humbug was ever
apparelled there vas never n that
strutted forth before the world more alb
surdly tricked out than the little tabu-
lar statement of the eity's account with
the street paviors5 as published in the
Ledger of yesterday.
INTEREST.
1t, isEeomplained that the interest
claimed is a large sum. Most men adj
NIT that the interest for five years on
four hundred thousand dollars makes a
very respectable addeadum to ones in
debtedness, and that Is the precise con-
dition and misfortune of the city, and
the heavier is the contractors loss. To
him the cash would have been worth
ten and fifteen per cent. The hardship,
In this case, certainly rests upon the UNI
fortunate contractor, and not upon the
city.
SUMS COLLECTED. ,
1t is remembered by everybody that
when the city could not meet its in
debtedness 10 Messrs. Brown q Co.,
they were substituted for the city and
collected money directly from tax.psy-
ers. They could not get money, and
took hay, and corn and bacon at heavy
loss to themselves. The city should have
psid them money, and, instead, gave
'chips and whetstones." The loss was
properly the city's.
LAWYERS FEES
1t was the business of the city to sue
taxpayers. Instead of this, Brown d
Co. hired lawyers and prosecuted null
tiplied suits and settled with the law
yers. An excellent lawyer swears that
this work was cheaply done, and that
the city should have been charged with
twelve or fifteen thousand dollars on
this account instead of ten thousand dol
lars.
COMMISSIONS.
In collecting sums from taxpayers
which the city should have collected
and paid over in cash TO Brown & Co.,
these gentlemen employed collectors
and agents, and paid as commission
and in losses on bills against lot-Owners
the sum of twenty-five thousand dollars.
In fact, there is no material difference
between Brown & Co. and the city ex-
cept as to the question whether Brown &
C0., having a money contract, y should
accept payment in scrip, bonds, chips
and whetstOnes. In the account pub
hshed in the city's organ, Brown d Co.
are charged with city bonds as if these
bonds were cash. The stupidity of the
public must be amazing if it be deluded
by this absurd mode of rendering the
account. Brown q Co. are charged with
forty thousand dollars, as the account
appears in the eity's organ, when in
fact this forty thousand dollars was paid
to Brown & Co. in scrip worth thirty
five or forty cents. Brown & Co. are
charged with three hundred and seven
tg-five thousand dollars, when they only
received this sum in city bonds worth
about fifty cents on the dollar. II
the Supreme Court of the United
States were to charge Brown &
Go. with the face value of the
citvis paper when the city had
agreed to pay greenbacks, the Supreme
Court would become infamous. There
il not an intelligent child ten years OF
age. whose instincts of right would not
revolt against the absurdly wrongful
proposition.
THE BOOT ON T'OTHER LEG.
While the marvellous city government,
seeming utterly incapable of determin-
ing the moral quality of actions, would
force its employees, by taking advantage
of their poverty and dire necessities, &c
take the eity's worthless paper as cash,
the public should know that when the
boot is on t'Other leg the city is singu-
Larly blind. If it owes a man green
packs, by special contract, it openly
and defiantly refuses to pay the
greenbaeks, and forces the ceedit-
or to accept instead a credit
on tax account. The creditor worked
for the city that he might use the money
to buy scrip to pay taxes; but when the
! city gets the citizen in its clutches, Il
deliberately violates its agreement. Nc
citizen respects such a government. anc
no government should be suffered tC
! exist which, in its own practices, cor
/ rupts popular morals By violations of it:
pledges. If it can't pay, it should say
so; but It should never exert its pOwel
to compel a citizen to submit to wrong
and robbery. 1t has done these things
l and now, when Brown & Co. compel 1
to pay cash, as 1t agreed to do, the soul
less creature howls for pity, and resorts
to all sorts of lodges to win populal
sympathy.