The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1883-09-15
TWO FEDERAL OFFICES.

successors to two federal officers of
this Territory whose terms have
expired. These are the Chief JUS
tice and the District Attorney, per-
haps the two most important
positions to be filed by executive
appointment. The governorship is
little more than a sinecure. 1t
amounts to something during the
week or ten days of the close Of the
legislative session, after which, for
two years the executive is purely
ornamental, unless the consenting
to the commission oe a notary pub
lie occasionally may be regarded as
useful. Hence it matters not much
who is Governor, SO long as the
occupant of the place has enough
self-respect to keep himself clean,
and not bring the appointing power
into disgrace by bad associations or
the giving loose rein to personal
vices, All the administers
ton expects from the Governor
i that he will be a respectable
nonentity. But it is not SO as re-
CARDS either the District Attorney
or the Chief Justice, both of whom
have to do with the dearest rights
OF the citizen, and upon whose Off
ciaI course largely depends the
safety of the individual in the
matters of property and personal
freedom. A vicious or prejudiced
District Attorney can keep the cons
munity in a state of perpetual tur-
MOL, and make it unpleasant, I'M
profitable and unsafe to live here.
There have been such attorneys for
Utah, and their trail may yet be
traced. The main object of some Of
them was money, and of others to
create disturbance and cause trouble.
There has rarely been one whose
sole purpose was the simple enforce
ment of the law for the punishment
of the wicked and the protection Of
the innocent. We would now like a
District Attorney who knew his
plain duty and who in his official
capacity would go neither to the
right nor left of it. Such prosecu-
tor would be a phenomenon, we
admit, but having been so long
afflicted with the thrifty or the
partisan kinds, it is no more than
fair that the Territory should be &C
corded temporary relief. Neither of
the gentlemen who have been men
toned as the probable successors to
Van Zile, and who are understood
to be working for the Office, is a fit
man for the position. Either of
them would be a positive injury to
the best interests of the country in
at once becoming a disturbing ele-
ment and neither possesses the
ability or legal attainments that the
District Attorney should have. It
Is not known that any Utah man
has the slightest chance for the
appointment indeed, if Mr..
Arthur shall follow the course of
his immediate predecessors and OBJ
serve the Republican custom, the
appointment will fall elsewhere,
and we hope it will. The ADLER and
better lawyers of Utah do not want
the Office, and the others ought
not to have it.
As to the Chief Justiceship, 1t is
noticed that some of our esteemed
contemporaries are anxious in the
matter and seem DESTROYS for the
displacement of the incum-
bent whose term has expired.
They have failed to show any good
reason why Judge Hunter should
go. On the contrary everything
alleged against him is a reason for
retaining him, provided he
wants to continue on the
bench, matter concerning which
we know nothing. The most serious
charge against the gentleman is
that he persists in being independ-
ent, refusing to train with the
bigoted and preJudiced and persist
ing in being self-directing, inter-
preting the law as he understa ads
it, regardless Of how or when or
against whom his decisions fall.
In our humble way of thinking
this is highly proper position for a
Judge to assume, contrary as it is to
the opinions ahd IDEAS of others
THE HERALD has never been an
ardent admirer % Judge Hunter,