The Morristown gazette. [volume] (Morristown, Tenn.) 1867-1920, 1879-01-15


and truly moral statesman is now
planted on the floor of the capitol
who looks upon retrenchment not as
ga id barren idea," but IS thing
of beauty and joy forever.
John E. Helms was Principal Clerk
of the Senate Of the Fortieth GEN
eral Assembly of the State of Ten
nessee. The law made it his duty.
to attend and open and call to order.
the Senate upon the meeting Of the
Forty First General Assembly, and
provided the sum of six dollars per
diem as his compensation for this
service. He had travelled the dis
lance Of three hundred miles to dis
charge this duty; and while the poor
devil sat with starring eyes and
chattering teeths trembling in the
presence of this august assemblage,
awaiting the passage of a resolution
authorizing him TO draw pay forsone
days service, which would in part
defray his expenses home, that truly
moral statesman and guileless re-
trencher, the Honorable Z. w.
Ewing, of the Pulaski Senatorial
district, arose in his place and
moved, in order to save the State
from bankruptcy, that this innocent
and impecunious East Tennessean
be paid four dollars for his labors,
instead Of six, to which he was hon
estly and constitutionally entitled.
The discussion provoked by this
pitiful, spiteful, picayunish amend
ment consumed three quarters of an
hour of public time, at cost to the
people of $50 or SIS; when finally,
in reply to a remark from the Hon
orable John H. Savage, another good
man, thoughnot so pretentiouly moral
as Mr.. Ewing, Mr. Helms proposed
to donate the six dollars justly due
him to the Treasury of the State if
the Senate would appropriate it to
the payment of its helpless creditors.
This was q settler for the Hon. John
H., and thereuponr the original reso-
luton offered by Senator Roberts
was adopted.
|. A word by way Of inference and
explanation Four years since, the
Hon. Mr.. Ewing was a candidate for
Clerk of the Senate against Helms,
but by one of those accidents of for
tune which sometimes occur in the
lives of all truly great men he was
defeated and Helms was elected.
The fact that another, and not him
self, was the Clerk, certainly did
not in any n amer influence his
views as regarded the compensation
that official should receive, and had
he occupied the position we doubt
not that his liberalily to the people
Of the State would have utterly pre-
Guided him from receiving any pay
whatever for his services, either dur
ing the Fortieth or for opening the
Forty-First session. We are the
more firmly persuaded in this view
by the consistent record the Honor
able Mr.. Ewing has already made
for himself in matters of this charac-
ter. Indeed, so great was his gen.
erous feelings for the public veal
that when Railroad Tax Assessor, a
year since, he only charged the peo-
pie One Hundred Dollars more for
his invaluable services than did eth.
er of his associate Assessors. And,
as a further illustration of The prac-
tice of that strict morality which he
processes, he only collected from his
dearly beloved people the pitiful
sum of $29205 for his expenses
while travelling over the State on
that kind of documents valgarly de-
nominated "dead head" tickets. And
it is at thought of the effect of the
development of such questionable
virtues in the character OF a great
christian Retrencher and Reformer
like Mr.. Ewing, when brought to the
heads and hearts of the virtuous aud
good little Sunday school children
he so delights to instruct in morals,
that brings tears to our eyes AM
Grape to our arm.