Lancaster daily intelligencer. [volume] (Lancaster, Pa.) 1864-1928, 1882-08-22
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TUESDAY EVENING. AUG. AZ, 1852,


The Machine and the Pulpit.
In their desperation the baf1ed Cam
rM machine managers are now reach
lug out their polluted hands to seize and
use in their behalf the sacred desk. They
have deliberately laid siege to the pulpit
and are earnestly seeking to secure the
SPECIAL support of the clergy in aid Of
General Beavers election. Such audac
ily is astounding. The spectacle is al
surd Of Cooper, Quay, KembIe and CON-
pany solemnly appealing to the Chris
tian church, not for atsolution, but for
public vindication of their political
crimes. The originator of the corrurt
Pennsylvania Republican machine
and the most successful conductor it
ever had was prone to boast of
his unbelief in public or private virtues.
lie declared that every man had his
price, and when he could not bully or
buy those whom he desired to use for his
base purposes, he did not hesitate to
seek their personal ruin by any means
attainable, however vile. He secuted
the cOunsels of honorable men and
sneered at the fears of the timid. lie
was open nd defiant in his disrespect of
moral law. He was a public leper that
contaminated the body polite.
And the spirit which governed the
first boss controls the bosses of to day.
Secretly they scOff at political decency,
Cleanliness in management and official
purity, and then boast of their success in
enlisting, under false cries, honest men
and Christian men in their behalf. If
some Of the ministers who are now ap.
pealed to on behalf of the Cameron can
didates could spend All hour i'm disguise
they could not stand the association
for a longer timc-with some of the men
who made Beaver a candidate, and who
are now relied upon to corrupt the bal
lot to secure his election, they would
cry out in alarm at the degradation OF
machine political management. They
would go into their pulpits and wage un.
compromising war against the con-
scienceless creatures whom they are
now SO insolently asked to save in the
hour of their extremity.
One of the greatest stumbling blocks
in the pathway of political reform has
been the moral support blindly given by
men of blameless lives and far-reaching
personal influence to the schemes of un-
scrupulous leaders and managers. And
this is precisely the position of General
Beaver in the present contest. The bat
tie is between the people and their
would.be masters; between political
freedom and bOssism; between machine
misrule and administrative reform. The
people are about to make IA supreme
effort to break the fettcrs of political
tyranny to redeem their long prosti
tuted state government. General Beaver
knows all this. He knows the character
and the purposes of the men whom he
represents. He knows what they have
done and what they will do. Yet, like
Faust, he has deliberately made a GOV.
enant with this spirit of evil to serve il
faithfully in return for its service to
him. And now he is using the cloak OF
his alleged Christian character to secure
the cooperation of Christian men ire
spective of PARTY.
1t will bc strange, indeed, if this last
and worst movement of the machine
managers does not recoil upon them will,
fearful effect. If there is anything made
as clear as the MONDAY sun it is that in
this great contest, sooner or later, all
honest men, without regard to previous
party affiliations must unite in the effort
10 put down forever the deGoralizing
and ruinous band Of public pirates vic
have SO long held possession of the state
government. 1t is not Il question OF
party. IL is a question cf reform against
continued debauchery OF honest gov.
rnment against ring misrule.