The Sunday herald. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1866-1887, 1882-05-21
pnErENTARLE .SC1NNALS.


AS the devil is said sometimes to quote
Scripture for his purposes so our dstin-
guished friend, Newton Martin Curtis, when
hauled up in a criminal court in New York
for blackmailing his w-clerks out Of
political assessments, Haunted the Consttu-
ton in the face of his prosecutors. In other
words, his counsel argued that as the United
States can only legislate over its employees
as such, therefore a statute to prevent one
employ6 from mulcting another employt of
part of his wages, to get up a corruption fund
to influence elections, in unconstitutional and
void. Judge Benedict very properly over
ruled this absurd pretrnse, though he took
a day to do it in, thereby prolonging the
trial to that extent.
We take it for granted that every good
citizen wants to see this inonstrosity of po-
| litical assessments, this Pretorian Guard Of
otiice-hOlders controlling elections in the
midst OF free people, done away with.
There are more than fifty millions of us out
side the sixty thousand or so who receive
Government pap" or who expect ever to
do go, who nevertheless have an important
interest in this Government and claim the
right TO voice in its personnel and policy.
We are baiiled and deirauded when our ser
wants, the hired men in public business
constitute one mammoth ring OF conspiracy to
substitute their own wishes and will for ours.
| This they DO, not only by their personal
work, but by peryerting money from the
public Treasury TO partisan ends, the two
conduits for that purpose being well repre-
blackmailers like Curtis.
| Another form of the protean evil, less nOX-
| ipus but as nauseOus, is office brokerage,
| typiied by the advertisements which so CON
+" cent on salary, " 4" $2j per month, "$lO0
- cash, " aud 30 on " will be paid " tor place
in this or that Department. 1t ID impossible to
believe that this advertising is so steadily
kept up without representing real under
| current OF business flowing all the time, be- il
of greater or less extent. And indeed there
| il no reason why there should not be, wher-
ever " appointments " are given not on ac
count Of the qualities OF the appointee, bat
solely for strength OF influence" A" lnhu'
"ence," then, becomes a valuable and ap
praisable piece Of property, and there Is nl
reason why it should not be sold for money
az we'll as for votes, caresses, or the othel
things which an average Statesman" ooyets
aud which likewise have their cash, purchas
able quality
There are two terrible drlusions abUu
these evils gone abroad-one, that they ar,
not worth correcting; the other, that they
cannot be corrected. These are favored BY
the Mephistopheean sneers at "rciorm " o
newspapers and politicians who profit by o.
! rather subaist upon the prevailing corrup
3 tion. These cariou hies are, or pretend L
7 be ignorant that the e,il of partisan oiyi
service is OF very late introduction amonl
Us, that We only share it with decaying .
embryo States like Turkey, Morocco, o
Z Greece, aud that We are led in the path 0
reform not merely by Great Britain but b.
Governments we are apt 10 look down upon
. such as that OF struggling Italy. The ioI
mula for partial or total cure Is just now eX
trenely simple: Let Congress pass the bill
reported by Senator Pendleton, or make TIA
: small appropriation OF S2j 900 50 repeatedl
: asked for by successive Presidents.