New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1873-12-01

as not to be denied by any One-THE TRIB-
UNE made brief but certainly unambiguous
comments, and gave expression to not only
its own but the pubhc's profound disgust. No
one has gone prying into the Wisconsin Sen
ators private life, or sought occasion for his
arragnment. He himself sought notoriety-
thrust himself into it-fairly flung himself al
the publics head.
Let us correct an error or two. The IRIB-
UNE has not pursued" Mr.. Carpenter In any
sense. During all the discussion OF this mat
ter by the press of the country, In the course
of which Mr. Carpenter has sometimes, we
think, been unfairly followed into his early
life and personal habits, THE TRIBUNE has
sometimes, we know, been grossly msrepre-
sented. Twice only in these columns has this
scandal been referred to: once to lead out
Mr. Carpenter and show him to the Senate,
and once, when the Administration or
gan in his own city told him his
duty to himself and his constituents
demanded that he should take some notice of
the charges against. him, and if they were
untrue that he should prosecute THE TRIBUNE
for libel, to cordially approve the suggestion
aud corroborate the accompanying statement
that "THE TRIBUNE is journal OF ample
"pecuniary responsibility" If, now, Mr.. Car
penter has not been guilty of the gross i'm
moralities charged upon him-nay more
for without discussing the question whether
Government has anything to do with consld-
erations of abstract morals, we put
it on the broader ground of expe-
diency if he has not been guilty OF
glaring indecencies that invited criticism ana
oourted comment while they shocked anu
sickened the public sense, then The TRIBUNE
owes him the humblest apology and the am
plest reparatiOn. If, on the other hand, such
things as these may be and pass UNDECIDED, II
the presiding officer of the highest legisla-
tive body in the land may so Haunt
his shame in the face and eyes OF
decent men and women and escape
clean and wholesome criticism and deserved
rebuke, then indeed THE TRIBUNE has mis-
taken both the temper of a free people and
the mission of u free press. SO far as con-
Germs the motives governing us IN the matter
which, in the absence of any denial or de-
Tense against the charges. have been very
freely impugned, we need say nothing
People who talk of motives waste breath.
Here are facts of public nOtorety for the con-
sideratiOn of the Senate, and nothing else
needs be taken into the account.
There is very general conviction that Mr..
Carpenter, in this disclosure of character, mis-
conceived the spirit of the time and misap-
pretended the public sense. In addition to
the great and fundamental mistake which
every man makes IN vicious indulgence, he
labOred under the halucination that the pub
lie mind was itself debauched and could not
be shocked by the most glazing impr0prietes.
The popular sense was heavy with the con-
gestion of q series of sickening exposures of
folly and crime in high places. The Senator
from Wisconsin, mistaNng dulled ear
for dead Onscience with the brutal frank
ness which such men sometimes make merit
of, staggered to the front without so much
as n cloak for his RIGHTEOUSNESS, and seemed
amazed when nation bissed him. Not en-
tirely dissimlar either in its logic or its
results was the experiment tried few years
ago in the direction of finance by statesmen
who thought the public conscience never
"revoted at what the public purse profted
"by.n These gentlemen discovered that there
was more honesty in the people than they had
given them credit for. Mr.. Carpenters dis
coyely is in another direction, but equally
creditabe to the people and discreditable to
himself.
There was unusual significance in the time
selected by Mr.. Carpenter for his latest demon
stration against decency. A Congress of which
he was conspicuous member had just closed
session the most remarkable in the history of
the country for its exposures of wide spread
corruption and Generalization among our pub
lie men. The faint of the Credit Mobilier
speculatOns was on some of the most trusted
in both Houses of Congress it had been
proven that seats in the Senate were bought
and sold almost in open market. Senate
leaders had retainers from great corpo-
rations, Christian statesmen were shown
to have bribed others and accepted brides
themselves, and the party drunk with power
made farce of investigations and closed all
with swapping its fingers in the face of rising
tide of public indignation, and showing its
contempt for even the semblance of honesty
by raid upon the treasury without precedent
and without excuse. Among those who in the
rem0rseful next morning after this wild
frolic and debauch felt called upon to make some
justification oftheir excuses. was Mr.. Carpenter.
Obviously he had not recovered from it. 1t
was in this defense of the Salary Grab that
he talked fippantly of his charities, offering
himself to his constituents in the character so
attractive to rogues and fools of the free
handed, open-hearted spendthrft who "sheds
his money as the rains of Heaven fall, on
"the just and on the unjust" The key to the
speech and to the argument was in the prevail
ing thought that so long as man lived
generously and spent his money Free" the
people did not care where he got it or how.
And that nothing might be lacking to illus