New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1874-07-01

course that IL had done good stroke OF
business for itself, vindlcated its principles
and selected a servant who would have no
choice but to carry out its policy. 1t never
imagined that it was giving the party or the
country q master. But Grant, from the very
first, understood his own powers. he showed
that when be made up his Cabinet precisely
as q general in the field would make
no bis personal staff He showed it
again when he sent his lieutenants into the
Southern States to regulate those communities
in the personal interest of the reigning dynasty
He showed il in his treatment of Mr.. Sumner
and every other public man who opposed, now
ever decOrOusly, the projects upon winch ne
had set his heart. He showed 1t above all In
his stubborn support of Mr.. Richardson ana
Mr.. Shepherd. During the past year he has
exercised q control over private busf'
ness enterprises to which the most
absolute sovereign in Europe would not
dream of pretending. He has assumed the
right to change at will the standard of values
all through the United States. A hint from
him has been enough to make or unmake
thousand fortunes in an hour. lie has exercised
secretly the astonishing privilege OF expanding
the currency by millions of dollars and tho
scarcely less important power OF ferbiddlng
expansion after it had been resolved upon by
a majority of both Houses OF Congress. III
he could do all this it was surely not
unnatural for him to think that he might
please himself in the selection OF
Secretary of the Treasury, just as
merchant chooses his own clerks and book
keepers. He liked Mr.. Richardson, and it was
sheer impertinence, he thought, to ask him to
discharge an employee whom he liked. lie
also liked Mr.. Shepherd. The prosperous con-
dition, the lavish habits, the social tastes, and
we suppose the political views OF that eminent
plumber, were just what Gen. Grant partlcu-
larly admired. 1t is not necessary to believe
that the President was in partnership with
the Boss Probably Grant never took the
trouble to make up his mind whether the
charges of corruption in the Board of Works,
extravaganza in the expenditures, robbery OF
the taxpayers and conspiracy to procure the
Imprisonment of innocent men, were true or
false. They did not touch him. The Governor
ship of the District of Columbia was his to
give away at pleasure and in dispensing what
was his own he did not choose to be governed
by any outside considerations
The view which Gen, Grant takes of the
Treasury and the District Government is
almost exactly that wniicn Mayor Havemeyer
takes of the Police Board. The Mayor has
such q warm regard for the two disgraced
Commissioners that he wishes to reappoint
them after they have been convicted on one
Indictment and are likely to be convicted on
several others. He processes to be satisfied
that Mr.. Charlick and Mr. Gardner are very
nice men and though the courts of law and
the public have expressed different opinion
about them, what is that to the Mayorf Shall
he not do what he likes with his Ownf The
idea that the power Of appointment is public
trust instead of personal privilege does not
seem to have dawned upon his mind any more
than it has upon the mind of Gen. Grant.
For this dangerous miscOnceptiOn of the
nature of one of the most important executive
functions the people themselves are chiefly to
blame When has any chief magistrate been
taught by the party which elected him that it
was his duty to fill the offices at his disposal
with an eye to the public INTEREST," We hear
sound doctrine of this sort sometimes from the
opposition, but never from the politicians in
power Presidents and Mayors are expected
only to distribute the spOls, and when they
keep the lions share for themselves, they are
only improving upon the lessons neir in
structors. AS soon as the Executive begins
to ELL the offices with view rather to his
private and pecuniary interests than to parti-
san advantage, we have. personal government
in its most OdiOus form. How near democrat
lied system of politics has already brought us
to it, the people can see for themselves.