Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1875-05-12
REPUBLICAN JONAHS.
why Grant is Pisehlux them Ov

why Grant is PitehIRz them over
board.
Washington Correspondence Chicago Times.
The real reason for the shifts and
changes in heads of departments, di.
visions and bureaus is the knowledge
that investigation looms ahead. The
opposition House of Representatives
viii be nothing if not inquisitorial.
Next session viii surely be the era Of
investigation. There is not a returned
member Of the opposition who has not
from one to six mysteries for which he
will demand exploration, land there is
no other water in which the fresh con-
gressional fish viii quicker learn to
swim. Even the Democratic magnates
who come no more to the representa-
| tiYes' hall have their various tasks of
scrutiny which they will turn over to
their scncessors, or engineer In person
from the lobby, 81 have been trying
for six years to find out to whom a
number of ships were sold Just after
the war;" says Beck, of Kentucky, 81
guess l can ascertain next winter, and
if fail, Boyd Winchester won't"
There Is a deal of shrewdness In the
manner In which the Administration is
preparing for It's badgering. The pub
lie is always keen set for scape- goat.
The rottenness which gangrenes all of
Delano's department will be horrible
revelation, but Republicans can claim
with fair grace they found out the evil
first and they eradicated it In eradicat-
ing the noxiOus cause,-fOr Columbus
Delano is certainly doomed to go out
of the Cabinet ere another half year
whirls away. With him and his miser-
able subordinate rOgues away, there
viii be nobody on whom the necessary
abuse can fall The scape-goat Will be
lacking, and interest In the develop
ment of hidden sin falls amazingly
when there is no sinner handy to take
the damning.
OF course this is all wrong in prin-
ciple. Williams should be followed IN
TO private life and punished for his In
citation of Arkansas and Alabama
parodies on the name of justice. De-
lanO should be trotted before a grand
and petit Jury for his participation in
Indian frauds; Creswen should be held
accountable for the stealing of hispost
route confreres and the tricks of asso-
ciates In the patching Of mail bags
swindles. Above all, a public with the
sense of yearling colts should tie the
party and administration under whose
sway this defiant raseality has shrivtd
down to strict responsibility for all
their misdeeds. But the public has al
ways allowed open or implied confes-
sion Of error on the part of its chosen
rulers to atone for the error itself. 1t
is much the same greasy-hearted, mag
unanimous mob it was III Roman days.
The Republican party, like Marc Anto-
ny, can show humility and repentance,
and stand fair chance of being for
given and permitted to tower again In
riotOus insolence.
This willingness to assume the rigid
ly honest and reformatory role is an
evidence that Radicalism still contains
the real essence of political cunning.
Grant may be only the log-headed dolt
his adversaries have been trying to
make themselves believe he is all these
many years, but he and his more quiet
advisers contrive TO do the sharp things
in seasons of vital peril. UncomprO-
missing investigation Is the one great
thing the inner working Of his admin
istratiOn has to fear. Yet he is shrewd
enought to draw even that sting in ad-
vance.