, 1879-03-09
CANDIDATES FOR OFFICE.

The City of Chicago is about to pass
through the annual peril Of clecting new
officers. 4 Mayor. Attorney, Treasurer, and
CITY Clerk, and eighteen Aldermen, are to be
elected. Upon the result Of this election de-
pends the character of the Government, its
efficiency, its integrity, and its economy.
during the next two, and perhaps four,
years. In 1876, under the alarming crisis of
bankruptcy and suspension by the city,
with IN immense and i1egany-issued float
ing debt unprovided for, and total collapse
of credit. there vas q popular uprising to
meet the emergency, the result Of which was
the election of complete City Council, of
which "four-ffths were men of integrity,
business habits, and practical usefulness
Haying administered the knife freely on
various abuses, having dismissed scores of
useless and expensive officers and abolished
their Offices, having reduced the annual ex-
penditures from one to two millions OF
dollnrs, and Instituted q financial system
which has re-established the city credit,
taken up and extinguished the floating
debt, and placed the city in fair
way Of e1uication from its fnancial
difficulties, and with q policy which, if sd
hered to, will prevent any recurrence Of
such emDarrassments, these persons have
one after tile other retired from the Council.
They offered their services in the hour Of the
city's peril, and, having performed their
duty faithfully and well, they have left the
public service. Of the thirty-si1 Aldermen
elected in that new Council there will remain
III Office after the expiration of the present
term Messrs. Cu1LEnroS, LAwLEE, THRooP,
RAw1E1an, and WALDO. Not more than two
of the others will be candidates for re-elec-
ton.
It must be horne in mind that no Mayor
can govern the city with economy and credit
unless he have the support Of all equally
patriotic and respectable City Council, and
therefore it is that the post of honor-that
is, the post where IN honest and intelligent
citizen can render the greatest service to the
city. and best protect its credit and promote
the public interests III the City Council.
Merchants, business men, professional men
OF ability, and all other honest, intelligent
citizens intent only on protecting the public
from frauds, abuses, wastefulness, and ex-
ccssive taxation, can find in the City Council
the fullest opportunity of serving the public
in the very place where all the danger is
threatened, and where, of necessity, the city
can alone be betrayed.
TIE citizen will look almost in vain among
the lists Of candidates for Office at the COM
a. fnr 4o ~. .f
the City Council. Above all other places to
be filed, the city needs wise, respectable,
honest, practical men for the City Council,
and it makes no serious difference what the
politics of these men may be. Better for
the Republicans that the whole thirty-si1
members of the Council were Democrats
like PEARsoSs, PHELPS, and Tu1Ex than
Republican majority made up Of such men
as have disgraced the Council in past years
and the Democrats Of the cit would have
more reason to rejoice if the Council we're
unanimously Republican than hnve Demo-
cratic majority made up of the class of men
who were expelled by the popular uprising in
1876. The misfortune of the city is not that
respectable men will not take Office, but that
they Will not accept elections to the City
Council. An illustration of this is furnished
By the list of worthy citizens, Democrats
and Republicans, merchants, professional
men, and persons Of various occupations, who
are candidates for the Office Of City Treasurer.
So fur as our observation and knowledge
extends, each aud every one of the gentle
men seeking to be Civ Treasurer is lust the
kind Of man that the city specially needs at
this time in the City Council.
The Office of Alderman yields no le9n1 COM