The Columbia herald. [volume] (Columbia, Tenn.) 1850-1873, 1873-11-14
Friday, November Isth. Is1s.
5upp1ement.

A WASHINGTON correspondent O
the New York Sun thus speaks o.
President Grants grand scheme fol
building palatial residences for the
members of his cabinet and Senators
at the governments expense:
"At a time when millionaires are
topping to their fall and business i:
at Standardization banks have sus
pended the payment of paper money
even, and want of confidence ha,
spread throughout the community
It seems very inopportune for the
President to avow it the chief object
OF his desire, the one great measure
OF his Administration, to secure the
building of palatial residences for
such gentlemen as Secor Robson,
Chorpenning Creswell, and Richard
son, to say nothing of the refined and
elegant Ohio family in the Interior
Department and the stunning VIII
hamses of the Law Department.
These people, the President tells
US, care expected to entertain a good
deal" And some of them are enter
tanning enough in their style of doing
1t. Not that they lack means-oh,
no. The jobs in which several Cabi-
net Ministers and even some of their
wives have pecuniary interests have
prevented that. A true description
of the characters which compose the
political society of this capital, male
and female, would astonish the ma
tives and make them very unwilling
to pay taxes to keep it up.
The expenses of the White House
before the Presidents salary was
doubled, as shown by Congressman
Willard, amounted to about S127,-
900 a year. 1t has really required
the expenditure of only small por-
ton of their salaries by Presidents of
late years to live in the Executive
Mansion with all the addenda of gar
dens and help supplied out of the
public purse. Mr.. Lincoln, who had
nothing but his home in Illinois, saw
ed SIS, 1000, and Mr.. johnson has
just lost his savings of S73, 900 bv
Cookies failure. Polk, Fillmore and
buchanan made money on S25, 900 a
year. Pierce was less provident.
Grant will not spend any more money
than he can help, and with gifts and
other accumulations he will go out rich.
Many patriotic statesman and cit
liens think that 1t was a mistake TO
build an Executive mansion at all, to
give rise to the idea Of Presidential |
palace. An Executive office was all |
that the republic required for its bus
mess, and the President should have |
lived, during the short period of his
public service, in a plain house ike
any other citizen. The President of
Switzerland does this. President
Theirs of France did it. and il Is
more in conformity with the theory
Of our Government and that simplici- J
ty of style inculcated by the fop-
a. essential to integrity ar d,,z
Nov, however, it I;bo ~tn'
the White Houa- -. - ny =
ior the Pres - I o,l,I 5,', IL.I,
y .uent. 4 new palace has
.olermined on in the minds of
( Ring, and location agreed upon
by Grant and Babcock two years
ago, which has since been purchased
by Delegate Chapman, Attorney-Gen-
eral Williams, Chipman's partner,
Hosmer, contractor Vandenburg, and
others, TO be sold to the Government,
of course, at q speculative advance.
There was a time when the coun-
try was served by such men as Clay,
Webster, Calhoun, Benton, Cas-,
Douglass, Buchanan, Van Buren,,
Silas Wright, Adams, and their like
for 38 day during the term, which
lasted about three months, making
their pay less than $1,000 a year
Even the great Henry Clay came
near being sacrificed because he had
voted to increase his pay from 81 per
day to this sum. Now salary grabbers
and back-pay thieves take about S25
an hour and still they are not happy,
and the President wants them housed
and furnished besides.
"What do the broken merchants
and suffering workingmen think of
this programme"