National Republican., 1882-12-29

retirement of Gen. GRANT an effort is being
made to prevent his reelection to the senate.
/ This is a petty and petulant excuse for op-
position, but is in keeping with the marked
characteristics of bourbOnism. The REPUB-
L1CAN would be better pleased if North Caro-
| lima were to send republican to the senate;
but if that state must be represented by
democrat, it would be pleasure to recognize
Senator RANSOM us that representative He
is unGucstonably an honest and capable man.
|
The Custom House and the Smugglers.
The "moonshine" distillcr5 in certain
states, notably in Kentucky, Georgia, and
North Carolina, are pursued, as they should
be, by energetic revenue agents, and when
found are made to suffer the penalties i'm
posed by the laws they violate. 1t is not
their good fortune to be able to defy the law
by showing, through subsidized newspapers,
that the revenue agents are very bad charac-
ters bent upon prosecuting and heccing the
"better class Of society" to wit, the moon
sinners aforesaid, nor are they able to carry
| through congress measure for their viudica-
tion and convenience. The moonshncrs
small scale that they cannot afford to pay
for artificial clamor against the officers Of the
law who Interfere with them. In this they
are differently situated from those who have
reduced Smuggling to II fine art, and whose
false oatIls at the custom house tally with the
false invoices which, side by sido with the
true ones, have been discovered in their count
ing rooms.
In 1874 the moioty law was repealed. This
law provided heavy penalties FOR smuggling,
and gave heavy rewards to those officers who
were alert enough to discover the crimes and
seize the smugglcd goods The congress was
laborinG under nervous exhaustion, caused by
tho terrorism which succeeded the great in
vestigation period, covering the credit mo-
bilicr, Pacific mail and other matters. The
increase of compensation of senators and
members had been followed by so much de-
nunciation in the papers that some who had
received it flung it behind them as they fed
from the hue and cry. IL was a time
when many were ready to do any
thing to escape thl unlricndly mention
of certain newspaper. The time was oppor-
tune for any merconary scheme which could
he offered in the interest of reform. The
snugglers got up an outcry against the GUS
toms revenue officers. \ great firm in New
York, caught in the criminal act of swind-
ling the government out ofdutic' imposed by
law upon goods imported by them. confessed
and sought and obtained compromise at the
Treasury department.. The law bore heavily
upon them, for it declared con tiscatc all of
a very large invoice a portion of which only
had been falsely valued. They were naked
criminals, but were dealt with very leniently.
Tho customs officers were entitled un-
der the law to receive u moiety of
the value of the coniiscated goods. 1t
occurred to them and their advisers
to divert attention from their own ofienses of
perjury and smuggling by raising a cry
against the moiety system. They found in
| congress many who thought the reward to
| officials for making seizures too liberal, and
others who opposed it altogether. They had
Il din made in the New York papers, pitched
to the very highest key Of morality and re-
form The enormities of the moiety system
We're shown by the fact that when high
toned gentlemen, engaged in importing com
mitted perjury by swearing to false invoices,
and swindled the government by smuggling
in goods at lower rates of duty than the law
required the penalty extended not only to
the goods in question, but to the remainder of
Uho invoice in which they were included.
To cOniiscate Il thousand dollars worth OF
goods when the smugglcr had, perhaps, fore
sworn himself with regard to only two hun
drcd dollars worth seemed monstrous tyranny
The false and true invoices of a great firm
We're exhibited side by side in the senate
chamber by New England senator in proof
of the systematic false swearing of that firm,
one invoice being the actual one, showing the
prices paid, the other being the false one,
giving the underyaluation, and sworn to as
the basis for paying duties, The millions
kept back from the treasury by these close
imitators Of ANANIAs were to star route frauds
as a mountain to a mole hill in amount. Pig
lead run into great rough molds i'll
the shape of statues were imported free of
! duty under the law which placed works of
art" Oh the free list, and when the perpetra-
tor of such outrageous rascality was held up
| to public scOrn by member of the house, the
smuggers rolled up their eyes and groaned,
while their organs declared that never had
congress been so scandalized as when listen
ing to such attacks upon such nice people as
these confessed swindlers were, by their
church-going, proven to be. The wrong pre-
vailed. The anti-moiety law was enacted.
The quick-wittcd thief, who was being closely
pursued by constable, bethought him of
/ trick that would secure him the sympathy of
the crowd, which would else close in
upon and stop him. He cried out
y race race; he in shoes and | in
boots " The crowd saw the truth of the
latter part of the statement, and so doubted
not the former They opened ranks for the
thief and closed in and stopped the constable.
The hard pressed smugglers cried out against
/ the reward paid for their detection, and the
unthinking public forgot their crimes. The
supervising special agent of the Treasury de-
partmcnt, in his report for the last fiscal year,
bears the following testimony to the effect of
the victory won by the external revenue
moomshiuerS at the time referred to. Under
the head of V differentiation Nh. MARTIN
says
Since the passage OF the act of June %, 1874,
commonly called the anti MoiCty act the
uudcrya ,uution Of all kinds OF imported merchan-
disc has steadily increNsed from year to year, until