New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1878-01-24
THE INVESTIGATION.

1t was perfectly proper that the House COM
miftee on Expenditures in the Treasury De-
partment should ask the cooperation OF the
President in the proposed Investigations; nor
do We see how he could have well denied
the request. If it be true, as asserted by Mr.
Glover the chairman, that witnesses may be
afraid of losing their places for telling the whole
truth, even under oath, the assurance OF the
President that no such persecution shall follow
their full and Outspoken testimony, can
not be regarded as untimely or OificiOus.
Still, 1t is notifying to degree. that any
circumstances should have rendered such an
assurance necessary. Mr.. Glover says that
men are now walking the streets of Washing
ton whose families are in danger OF hunger
through the persecution which they have sui
fered for exposing wrong. Others, it is claimed,
possessed of full knowledge of various abuses.
fOrbear to speak frankly for fear OF encOun-
tering like penalty. If this be so, the coun-
try ought to know it; if it be not
so, the very suspicion of it should be
set at rest. 1t is quite frightful, too,
to read in Mr.. Glover's letter of the
mutilatiOn, alteration, cOncealment, withhold
ing or destruction of books, papers and docu-
ments of record. These are bold statements
for the chairman of House committee to
make to the President of the United States;
if they can be shown to be true, no apology
is necessary for making them. Mr.. Glover has
drawn his Indictment with so much minute
circumstance, even in his generalities, that the
country will anxiOusly await the result of
his inquistiOI. To call a state of things
such as he describes terrible" is to Use
= IU
be found that he has protested too much, and
that his letter, which is not little like
speech in Committee of the Whole, says
more than can be shown. To hope so, is only
to be dccently patriotic. Nobody wishes to be
convinced that any department of the Govern
ment is or has been cOrruptly administered,
unless he chances to be a furious partisan,
whose personal interest it is to make out his
opponents thieves or worse.
There is a remarkable contrast between the
letter of Mr.. Glover to the President and the
reply which it elected. About the first there
is nothing judicial. Mr.. Glover has evidently
made up his mind before beginning the inyes-
tigation, or ut any rate before concluding it.
A prosecuting officer in opening his case, ifhe
have good one, usually contents himself
WIN Stdtl1k NHdl lio cAptCto W Pio'V, anu IL
serves the thunders of his denunciation until
he shall have proved it. Mr.. GlOvers indig-
nation is too hot to permit him to wait until
the evidence is all IN; and this haste and heat
are all the more to be disapproved, because 1t
would have been only civil to take it for granted
that the President likes official dishonesty
quite as little as Mr.. Glover docs or can. But
when man speaks for 40,O0O,OOO OF people,
AS Mr.. Glover proclaims that lie does, he is
apt to speak loudly and little figuratiyely.
Tho Presidents reply is, comparatively, GOODNESS
itself 1t says in very few words, that subor-
dinate officers who fear that they may be re-
moved for tcstifying to misdeeds in the Treas
ury may possess their souls in peace-unless,
perchance, we suppose, they may be forced to
testify to miSdeeds of their own.
A real investigation, conducted with judicial
camness and fairness, of the doings of any
department of the Government is good thing,
especially when party has for a long time
been IN power. But it will be as bad at least
rs no inquiry at all, unless it is entered into
in a proper spirit We have reason enough for
doubling the cxpcdicncy or probable usefulness
of Investigations undertaken mainly for the
purpose of amassing party capital to be used
III some coming political campaign. Let Mr..
Glover dive as deeply as he plcascs into the
pool of corruption which he processes to have
discovered Let him, to change the figure,
cal! n spade spade only when he is sure
that he has that implement in hand In such
an undertaking as that which he has been
charged with, he can, if he be fair and honest,
if he set down nothing in malice, if he be not
SO eager to make out a case as to lose sight
of that presumption of innocence to which the
yilcst criminal is entitled, he may lie assured
of the cooperation of all honest citizens. In
yestigations to be valuable, should not be un
drrtakcn, carried on, nor concluded III pas
sion.
Whenever n thrifty monarch in the Dark Ages