New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1873-09-01
BROOKLYNS CHANCE FOR REFORM

We call attention again,-and we shall do
so repeatedly hereafter,-to the absolute neces-
sity of a thorough overhauling of the public
accounts of Brooklyn as the only means of
saving that city from further pillage at the
hands of Kingsley, McCue, Fowler Sprague,
Mclaughlin, and the minor freebooters of the
Ring. What has lately been developed of
extensive frauds justifes the persistent
clamor for reform which we have made
for two years past, and which we
have urged unaided by the New-YOrk
papers, except The World, and opposed
by the Brooklyn organs of the Ring, for I'M
happily there are no other sheets published
there than these. All, and more, too, than we
have charged, has been proved; deficit of
half a million dollars has been discovered to
have existed for four years; the tool of the
thieves who used these Treasury funds rested
in Jail for the first time Oh Saturday night,
though it is quite clear that he ought to have
been there years ago; the Controller, aroused
to a sense of his duty relieved of the demon
alizing influence of the Ring, which had
tempted him with promises, has at last charged
crime where others suspected it for long
time; and the Ring itself, frightened for the
and institutes a farcical prosecution of its
"catspaw" once, its "scapegOat" now.
But if these developments of fraud in the
T1easurer's Office justify our past denuncia
tons, how much more strongly do they
enforce the present demand for further and
full examination. Mr.. Warren, the accom-
plished accountant, who has proved with
figures that do not lie that which we have
unequivocally charged for months, had just
touched the threshold of the Rings corruption
when instantly and unceremOniously the door
was shut in his face 1t must be forced open
again. The city officials who have clean hands
must insist that it be opened wide; the
Department officials who are suspected must
not object to the removal of every barrier
The Committee of Fifty which exposed so
much corruption in the past must reOrganize
to compel reform in the future; the Committee
of One Hundred which has concealed so many ir-
Irregularities for the past year and helped with
its corrupted Charter to make others possible,
must accept the situation and no longer play
the mask for Whiting and his associates.
The death of Mr.. Mills and the suspen sion
of the Trust Company have exposed fully the
corruption of the Treasurer's office. 1t will
not do to insist that it is Rodman's swindles
only that have appeared. The half million of
dollars deficiency which existed when Con-
troler Schroeder entered office was never in
Rodman's hands. 1t formed the capital for
Ring contractors it was the basis of large
speculations in Wall Street; 1t was used to
shave notes ; it was fund for illegal election
purposes; it was used at Albany in emergen-
cies; in brief, the Treasurer's Office, through
the Trust Company, was to the Brooklyn Ring
what the Controllers office here was to
Tweed and the Ring drew freely on it, Agi-
tation in Citizens Committees and in this
| journal, a new system of bookkeeping insti-
| tuted by Controller Schroeder which stopped
leaks, and wholesome fear excited by the
fate of the Tammany Ring compelled partial
| restoration of this stolen half million and
| but for the accidental death of Mills it would
have been wholly repaid quietly, as it has
since been made good. Now who refunded
this half million dollarsf Not Mr.. Rodman,
we know. Who paid the balance of $4,000
discovered by Mr.. Warren 1t was not the
bondsmen of either Sprague or Rodman; and
in spite of the effort to show that Mr.. Sprague
has beggared himself to return Rodman's
stealings, it will be eventually found that Mr..
Sprague alone did not repay it. 1t will not
be difficult to show where all this money went
to. who used it and for what, and who of the
Ring combined 10 restore it,
Investigation should show all the clTcum-