Martinsburg independent. [volume] (Martinsburg, W. Va.) 1875-1900, 1881-10-29
From the New York Times.

mdlhtJ uIiCc COulb yColCIddgI W
answer to the charge of obtaining
money under false pretenses, man
who has held many flices in his day,
from Judge to Governor Of great
State, and who is now beggar and
penniless vagabond. There WAS a
time when he had control of almost
unlimited wealth, rolled in luxury,
and sported with wantons and liber-
tines with the prOfuseness Of an
Eastern Prince. To-day he has hard
ly a friend in the world, and, broken,
gray and seedy, he ekes out slender
subsistence by his wits. If novel
ist were to weave into romance the
main incidents of the career of
Franklin J. Moses, formerly Gov
ernor of South Carolina, people
would say that his story was "sensa-
tional," but some what improbable.
The life of Moses furnishes a capital
example of the ease with which a
bold and reckless man may seize on
power and pelf in times of political
unsettlement and revolution. The
period Of reconstruction in the South
was Moses opportunity. His fall
was the natural consequence of his
ill-spent life, not of the end of the
era in which he flourished.
1t was said of Moses long ago, by
one who knew him well, that he was
a noble hearted man, with a paraly-
sis on the moral side. Exactly what
constitutes a nc ble-hearted man,
however, is not easily determined.
AS long as Moses had money he
scattered it like chaff. But which
he tossed about him with prodigal
hands was not his own, and the
creatures who lived on his bounty
never gave him credit for genuine
generosity. SO, when the day came
to him, when he, like one of old,
"would fain have filled his belly with
the husks the swine did eat" his
fine-weather friends had all forsaken
him and fed. The man who made
the streets of the capital of South
Carolina respondent with costly
equipages, jewels and gay attire was
at last brought down so low that he
stole an overcoat from an office into
which be had gone on a pretended
errand of business. Where were his
boon companions, the men whom he
had enriched, the favoritcs of his
brief and brilliant career, when he
was so reduced and Inundated
Born of good old Southern fam
lily of Jewish descent, gifted with
many rare personal and mental quail
tiles, Moses might have made for
himself a name of which South Car
lima would have been proud. The
rapidity with which he ran the whole
gamut of ordinary ambition proved
his native genius. at the close of
the war, although he had thrown
himself, heart and soul, into the
Confederate cause, he saw, as but
few others did, that the leader of
the newly enfranchised freedmen
was sure of power; and he took up
their cause with an enthusiasm that
seemed almost real. His sagacity
and audacity were rewarded. Speaker
of the Assembly, he engaged in
career of corruption, bribery and
robbery which has had no parallel in
this country. He "made no bones"
of his rascally intentions. If he
wanted money, horses, or any spe-
cies of property, he demanded these
of the men who sued for his influ-
ence in the passage of bills in which
they were interested. He procured
the enactment of law which gave
him, as speaker, unlimited power to
draw upon the State Treasury, and
from that day his warrants, taking
precedence of all other demands,
were as plentiful AS the leaves of the
forest. He owned money mill.
Heving issued nearly two millions
of dollars in "pay certificates" as
speaker, it was obvious that Gov
ernor Moses wonld rule the State
with all the prohigacy and extrava-
gance that he had shown in his less
Influential position. There was al
most no limit 20 this mans reckless
ness. He seemed utterly devoid Of
moral sense. He levied toll on every
public and private legislative meas
ure with money in it' which re
quired his signature. 1t is a matter
of record, for example, that valid
claim of 100000, held by a banking
company against the State, could
not be paid until $25, 900 was handed
over to Moses. He involved one o.
his underlings, Humbert, in {
scheme by which the State was plum
dered of $4,000, and what seemed
to be grand larceny was attempted
against the State, and when the Off
GERS went to arrest His Excellency