The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1881-10-14
A CORRUPT AGE.
Official AMI Legislative Profits Under the
Georges OF England.

Official and Legislative Profits Under I'll,
Georges OF England.
| From Trevalyan's Life of Fox
| Ii was worth mans while to DE Secre
| tary OF State under the Georges. At Il tim.
when trade was on SO small Il scale that /
| Lancashire manufacturer considered him
self fairly well off on the income which hi,
great grandson now gives To his cashier,
Cabinet Minister, over and above the am.
pie salary of his Office, might reckon conf
IDENTITY upon securing for himself and fol
all who belonged to him and who cam,
after him, permanent maintenance not de-
pendent upon the yicissitudes of party
which would be regarded as handsome, and
even splendid, in these days of visible and
all-pervading opulence. One noblemal
had eight Thousand Il year in sinecules, and
the colonelcies of three regiments. Another
as auditor of the exchequer inside which
he never looked, had eight thousand pounds
III years of peace, and twenty
thousand i'll Years of war. A third, with
nothing to recommend him except his out
ward graces, bowed and whispered himself
into four great emplOyments, from which
thirteen or fourteen hundred British gllineas
| flowed month by month into the lap of his
Parisian mistress. And the lucrative places
which Il statesman held in his own name
formed but part, of the advantages that he
derived from his position.
When every desirable Office WAS filled too
deep, there still remained the resource Of a
pension, II resource elastic, and almost un =
limited, and Monarch who WAS never afraid
of appearing before his Parliament in the
| character of an insolvent debtor.
The English pension list grew steadily and
silently, with occasional periods OF sudden
and Very perceptible expansion. 1t was reck-
oned that every change of Government
land changes of Government were far more
frequent then than now cost the country
from nine to fifteen thousand year. A
Minister, who was true To his order, new
er allowed himself to he shelved. or
shifted, or degraded, or even pro-
NOTED without getting something for
himself or his wife, or his sen in
law. Whenever the political cards were
shuffied, the people paid the stakes; and q
dozen pensions had generally been dstrib-
uted, and half dozen increased, before the
Seals, the Key, and the Sticks had got into
the hands where they We're To remain for
the next twelyemonth. As were
the leaders So were the followers. IF any
noble lord challenged me to assert that
there is much corruption in both Houses,
would laugh i'll his face. aud tell him that
he knows it as well rs l." So said Lord
Catham, plainly and openly, in his place
among the Peers; and there We're few noble
Lords, and not many honorable gentlemen,
whose personal experience was such that
they would have had the right or the face
to contradict him. Parliament, chosen by
corrupt constituencies, was correctly infu-
cnced by corrupt Ministers, of whom Jul
MUS told the literal truth when he said that
they addressed themselves neither to the
passions nor to the understanding, but sim
ply to the touch. The arguments by which
Granville and Grafton persuaded their sup
porters were bank bills for 200 pounds and
upwards, so generously dealt about at II
Premier's leyce that sometimes they We're
shipped into II hand which were ashamed to
close upon them; tickets for State lotteries,
sold TO members of Parliament in parcels Of
five hundred, and resold by them ut profit
of two pounds Il ticket: Government loans
subscribed for by the friends of the Gov
eminent mt par, and then thrown on the city
ut premium of seven and even eleven
per cent. Lord Butte and his adherents, by
one such transaction, robbed the country of
nearly four hundred thousand pounds, an
ample share of which ,as was roundly as
anu lItN Win VI
be believedJ found its way into Henry Fox's
capacious pocket. Then there were fayorn-
BILE contracts for honorable members con-
nected with commerce, or who We're willing
to be connected with commerce when they
had chance of supplying the fleet with
sailcloth and salt pork at exorbitant
rates, and of quality which was
left pretty much to their own sense of pa
toritic obligation, And gentleman who
liked to get his price without sacrificing his
ease might have his choice of pensions. Sc
cret and acknowledged; and of highly en-
dowed posts in every climate of the globe,
whose functions could he performed while
seated ut the whist table of Brooks. by any
one who had proved his fitness for public
employment by buying a borough, bribing
n corporation, or swapping country with
fictitious votes. George Selwin, who re-
turned two members, and had something to
say in the election of third, was ut one and
the same time surveyor general of crown
lands, which he never surveyed. registrar
in chancely at Barbados, which he never
visited, and surveyor of the MEETINGS and
clerk of the irons i'm the mint. where he
showed himself once a week in order TO eat
a dinner which he ordered, but for which
the nation paid.