New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1877-04-10
d" PUNISHED ENOUGH"

Hare they been punished enouGh"-the
Ring thieves who through a course of years
held the great city by the throat while they
plundercd its treasury, saddled it with cnOr-
nous debts, corrupted every department of
its government installed thieves and highway
men in public Office made of the dangerous
the governing classes, organized robbery
into system, made fraud the rule
and theft Il habit the men who not only
robbed the community themselves and put
their fellow thieves III places OF trust for pur-
poses of plumber, but who added grossest in
suit to deepest injury by Haunting i'll the
public's face the vulgar luxury and brazen vice
for which they made the public pay, and answer
inc all circumstances with, "Wen, what are
"y Won going TO do about it - Hare they re-
ally been punished enOughl The fashion of
saving so seems to be coming III. This
"poor old man" Tweed they say has had
n very hard time of it: has suffered be-
yond all account; has been prisoner, fugi-
tive, wanderer, and prisoner again, and
endured untold priyatOns and hardships;
and under all the circumstances ought
not to be pursued any further; in short,
that he has been punished enough. Let him
he has managed to retain, and go free Mr.
Tweed as we understand it, is a thief A
short, bad word but it defines him. He has
stolen more money than any other one
man on this continent, and done
more mischief with what he stole
No other thief ever dfiused so much
corruption so infected whole communities so
tainted with fOulness, vice, and crime the
whole atmosphere he walked in. His robberies,
vast as they were, were the least of his
oiienscs; he poisoned the fountains OF lcgisla-
ton, defiled the courts and corrupted the
sources of justice, organized all forms of law
lcssness, all phases of vice, and every descrip-
ton of wckedness into political sys-
TEN, and set before the world its
most conspicuous example of success in
the tOpmOst walks of crime. For all this-fOr
doing mischief which restitution of all his
plumber ten times over cannot undo, the blast
ing effects of which will not be eradicated for
generations-they say he has been punished
enough He has been deprived Of his liberty
for wear or two, and has no doubt suffered
some inconvenience among the vicissitudes OF
travel to which he subjected himself In his
efforts to escape. Punishment enough, they say
And the cXilcd thieves they too have been
punished enough let us make compromise
with them, and let them come back and ENJOY
the remnants OF their fortunes in the city they
robbed and fed from. Here is Mr.. Swecny,
ready to make terms and come back to us.
What Tweed was to the morals of the COM
munity, Swceny was also and more, for he
brought to the complex organization of
this system of successful pillaSe the repu-
tati0n of a decent, sef-respecting person, and
the prestige of successful political manage
ment. HIS punishment is understood to have
consisted principally of mental anxiety, and it
is said that lie of sensitive and finely
| strung a nature that the bitterness of his dis
grace and his anguish of mind oyer the loss
of character and position have been a sorer pun
shment than imprisonment and stripes would
nave been to thieves of coarser grain. Mr..
Woodward too has been punished enough"
This worthy, after two OF three years of foreign