The New York herald., 1875-12-24
The American Budget.

the memory Of cultivated people by frequent
occasions for its application to political APP
pointments. The assignment of dancer
to a place requiring the talents Of mathe-
matician is pot more grotesquely absurd than
the appointment Of a small, obscure. wire
pulling politician, like poor Mr.. Morrison, to
the highest position on the floor Of Congress.
Mr.. Morrison is not indeed a dancer,
except on political tight ropes, but he has
none Of the talents of fnancier or of de-
batter requisite for preparing explaining and
defending an annual budget. The selection
of dancer to do the work of mathema-
tician might be defended by asserting that
the function required nothing beyond a
tapster's arithmetic and this is, in effect,
the curious defence offered by Speaker Kerrs
apologists.
The only two Of our morning contempora-
ries that have spoken of the House commit
tees with any patience or indulgence Justify
the selection of Mr.. Morrison by attempting
to lower the Office to the level of the
man. The substance of their argu-
ment is that the Chairman of Ways
and Means does not need to be man of tai.
ents The Tribune makes this defence eau
tiously in its Washington correspondence;
the World boldly in its editorial columns.
They agree, however, in making q virtual
admission Of Mr.. Morrison's imbecility, and
in dwarfng the requirements of the position
to the small size of the man appointed to fill
it, The Tribune says:-"The Ways and
Means Committee of the House will be likely
to have little business to transact during the
present session of Congress. That no i'm
portant reduction of the tariff will be possi-
BILE this year seems to be admitted by the
most enthusiastic revenue reformers" If
nothing is to be done it is of little conse-
quence who is selected to go through the
empty form of doing that nothing, The
Tribune's logic is sound if we admit its prem
ises. But such line of argument
comedies that Mr.. Morrison is incompetent if
any important work were expected to be
done. Save me from my friends" is form
of depreciation for which there is frequent
occasion, and there is no man in whose
mouth it would be more appropriate than
poor Mr.. Morrison's when it is found neces-
pigmy size of the incumbent.
The Worlds unconscious satire on the
dimunitive talents of Mr.. Morrison is still
more damaging, especially as our modest
contemporary speaks in tone of oracular
wisdom. We are diverted by the amusing
airs it puts an, but its grandiose manner
does not blunt its logical perceptions. 1t is
+ba
slaughters poor Mr.. Morrison while it thinks
it is defending him. 1t has discovered that
the chief task of the Committee of Ways and
Means in this Congress is merely to 60 over
the tariff list and drop out such articles as
yield no revenue. How simple, how sub
lime is science The great business of the
Committee of Ways and Means is to nibble
at the excrescenses of the tariff and bite off
such small duties as bring nothing into the
Treasury. If this be all no doubt Mr.. Nor
rison is competent, and it makes little differ
ence whether we have un ddnseur coica-
late,tr at the head of the committee. Does
the World realize what blow it is dealing at
the head of poor Mr.. Morrison? If his du-
ties are shrivelled to the petty dimensions
so oracularly described it truly requires
no ability to discharge them, and
dancer on the political tight rope would be
just as competent for the craftsmanship as
statesman who has given his days and nights
to fiscal studies. But the sagacious World
does not stop even here in its left-handed
iting his function TO the application of ''the
rule thumb" to the list of dutiable articles,
it proceeds to coach" him in the perform
ance of SO simple a function. 1t parades
list of thirty-eight articles which yield
revenue of less than twelve thousand dollars,
and instructs him that he has only to go
through the whole tariff in this spirit, drop
ping the minor articles, to establish his
competency against all cavil. If the
task be indeed so simple the raw
est member of the House should be
equal to it without the elaborate and rather
too pretentious coaching which the World
thinks it necessary to bestow on poor Mr..
Morrison. 1t unwittingly stamps him as an
imbecile by first lowering the requirements
of his place to the capacity of dancer or a
tailor, and then instructing him how to meet
them. A Chairman of Ways and Means who
needs the caution of the World to confne
himself to the mere fringes of finance and
who needs its oracular coaching in clipping
the ends of these fringes, must be very
small pattern indeed But we must in can
dor, admit that Mr.. Morrison or Mr. Any
body is perfectly competent to revise our
revenue system on the plan SO instructively
paraded by the oracle, which correctly per-
ceives that the Office must be dwarfed TO
make it fit the small dimensions of the man.
But is the preparation and defence of the
annual budget Of great nation 50 petty q
matter as poor Mr.. Morrison's apologists
assume? Is it true that any person who can