The Portland daily press., 1878-06-25
TUESDAY MORNING, JUNE rs.

lVEoDAI MVhNkNU. JUNE 20.
when it is alleged that men can be hired for
81 day. Now, assuming the charge to be
Well founded, as dare say it is, does it justify
sne inhiction of penalty as severe as would
Hollow conviction under an indictment for
misdemeanor? That involves disfranchise-
ment, disgrace and in the discretion of the
curt, imprisonment. 1t isn't pretended that
the commissioners have been guilty of any dis
honesty. They have simply paid what they
deemed fair price for days work. The
chances are, ii the question were submitted to
the test of popular vote whether or no the
scale should be reduced, it would be decided in
the negative 1t may be an error of Judgment
to pay the higher rate when the lower one will
command the service Putting the thing on
the basis OF political economy it undoubtedly is,
and yet, am inclined to think that if any one
OF the worthy gentlemen who are melting this
raid upon the commissioners was employing
man at ST. 80 a day, and some rival should
come along and offer to take his place and do
his work for 81, he would say to himself, the
SLIGO is little enough certainly for man to
live upon in this expensive city, and will not
make the Change; competition has forced labor
down to an unnaturally low point here. do
not want to take advantage of such state of
things SO far as to keep person who works for
me ragged and hungry. 1 will let him remain.
That would be simply following the instincts
OF common humanity. don't mean to say
that parties charged with hiring help in their
Official capacity are warranted in exercising
any such discrimination. Strictly speaking it
Is PROFESSIONALLY incumbent on them to get
the most they can all the time for every dollar
that is entrusted to them for disbursement.
But If they do happen to err little on the side
OF kindness the extenuatng circumstances
ought to count in their favor sufficiently to pro-
teot them from the extreme iudiguity of being
branded as criminals.
III this movement should prove successful
we shall presently have mob Of indictments
rushing to the Grand Jury and asking them to
find bills against everybody in respect of whom
the complainants may have or fancy they have
grievance. The thing is catching and the
best way for the Grand Jury to stop the spread
of it is-if L may borrow the phrase from the
current arqot of the street-to ''sit down upon
it, heavily. There are other and better meth.
DDS of compelling fidelity to official trusts
besides invoking the interposition of tribunal
organized to promote justice and not to serve
the purpose of local inqusition If the
Grand Jurymen are wise they will make short
work of this accusation by dsmissng the COM
plant. The proper place to try it is before the
Mayor. LII the Police Commissioners are at
fault the charter provides the mode of dealing
with them. The idea of arraigning them at the
bar where malefactors are daily paraded to
answer for the commission of all sorts of in
famous crimes is one of those outrages against
decency which is none the less reprehensible
because it is prompted by good intentions and
prosecuted BY persons Of high character.
1t Is high time these methods of reforming
municipal affairs were freely and fally venti-
lated. We have great deal too much decla-
nation about local abuses and by far too little
earnest, practical and quiet effort to make
things better. 1t is the chronic habit nova
days, for every willing who enters upon the
self-imposed task of amending the faults of
society to rush to the newspapers with a fam
ing dlatribe setting forth in exaggerated
phrase every defect discovered instead of going
hrst, as any person of ordinary intelligence Ger.
w ShO PaAeLCS WuO COulQ mOSG
speedily and effectua.ly remedy the imperfec-
tions complained Of The exclusive idea of this
class OF pretended reformers seems to be to make
as much noise as they possibly can about every
thing that goes wrong according to their notion,
but to put all the hindrances they can in the
way OF improvement. They act precisely as If
they were anxious not to part with any of their
causes OF lamentatlon for fear their impors-
ance as chroniclers might be diminished. New
York abounds with charlatans of this sort and
see SO many of them that 1 lose sight some
times of the fact that Chadband was merely
the creature of noyelist's invention, and
Mrs. Jellyby an exaggerated type of the sort
OF woman who makes it the rule of her life
never to mind her own business.
About the worst specimen of newspaper
blackguardism that has fallen under my OBJ
servation since the disgraeefal Presidential
campaign of 1872, was the publication of an
imputed answer of the proprietors of the
Evening Express to the complaint in the pros
ecution for libel brought against it by Louis j.
Jennings, formerly editor of the New York
Times, now resident of London. The docu-
ment in question alleges that Mr.. Jennings is
gambler and wife beater; charges so ridicu-
lous that it is not reasonable to suppose that
the parties who originally put them in circula-
ton were not perfectly aware of their falsity.
They were manufactured originally by sti-
pendiary of the Tweed ring at the time when
Mr.. Jennings was waging an almost solitary
contest through the columns of the Times with
that villainous cabal. The reiteration of them
aggravates the libel SO grossly that the perpe-
traitors OF it deserve exemplary punishment
1t is not at all creditable to modern journalism
that so indecent document should have been
accorded place in the columns of any news
paper, but there are too many people who have
presses and types under their control that are
not in the least squeamish about what they
admit, provided lit promises to be sensational
and appetizing. The temptation to pander, to
morbid tastes for tattle and scandal for the
SAKE OF gain is one that it requires spirit of
thorough conscientiousness to resist. The in
huence OF this restraining grace does not seem
to be sufficiently potent to protect the metro
poltan reader from having set before his eyes
almost every day of his life, matter that never
should have been printed and which he feels
1t is compromise of his self.respect to read.
YARMOUTH.
News and Other Items.
The late William Cullen Bryant left nearly