The Aberdeen examiner. [volume] (Aberdeen, Miss.) 1866-current, 1883-01-11
Senator George on the eleventh
Hour RefOrfneps.

During the debate upon the civil Ser
vice Reform Bill" i'll the Senate, Gen.
George, of Mississippi III the course of his
able speech upon the measure, thus elo-
quently scored its new found friends and
advocates on the Radical side OF the
Chamber:
81 am glad sir, that from some cause
Il change has come over the spirit of the
dreams OF many in refernce to this sub
ipct. Whatever may be the cause, the
change is salutary to the last degree. /
rejoice hat now the race seems to be us
TO who shall go ahead, who shall go
furthest in the deuunciation of the polit-
ical practices and methods which this
bill seeks to eradicate. Less than year
ago civil-service reform was jest and
by-word among statesman and politi-
clans, and assessments Of Federal Office
holders to raise the means of controlling
elections WAS, if not openly defended as
the right and proper thing TO do, yet mt
least apologiZed for as a harmless and
venal peccadilla, Il justiiiable means to
get and retain office. The bill of the
Senator from Ohio slept on the table. 1t
had but few friends, and it was not re-
garded rs formidable enough, either in
the vigOr of its provisions or III tho sup
port 1t was supposed to have from the
country to excite even active opposition.
l am not sure, sir. but that my honorable
friend, the Senator from Ohio Mr. PEN
DLEToNl, the author OF the bill, was not
regarded either rs insincere in his advo-
caCy of the measure or as u visionary
schcmer, or perhaps both. To-day, sir,
all is changed. The levy of political as
sessmeut is regarded, if not as Il great
crime, at all events it is looked on rs even
worse in the politicians creed, namely,
us u serious blunder. And more, sir, we
seem ut last to have arrived, with singu-
lar unaninity, Mt the conclusion that
monopoly of office by the party by right
of conquest at the polls, as Mr.. Webst T.
called it, is not the safest and surest
means of retaining power.
AT the beginning of my service i'll
this body / placed myself fully and I'M
equivocally by the side of the honorable
Senator from Ohio LMr. PENDLEToNl in
advocacy of this measure, and | gave
him the assurance of my earnest sympa-
thy and support in many anxious con-
ferences on this subject. So, sir, | have
no newborn 2eai in my present support
of this measure. | have only more hope,
more faith in its success. more faith in
our in"ttutionS, more confidence that
whatever may be wrong in our political
methods, however strongly intrenched,
will, before ii is too late, be corrected by
American people.
1.-THE Republican party ON this floor
seem TO have caught something OF the
meaning of the recent elections. The
President has not been unmindful of
their grand lessons. Whether the con
version be genuine or not leave to the
determination of time. | must say, sir,
the conversion was rather sudden. /
know nothing like it in all history, sacred
or profane, except the conversion Of
Saint Paul
Like him, they were stricken down
when they were in the very act of com
hitting the crime, now so much con-
demned by them. Sir. in the very midst
of the treasures which they had gathered
by political assessments, and from the
use of which they had fondly hoped to
retain power, Willie yet the signs and
groans of the poor women and lHborers
whose properly, whose livelihood even
had been taken to swell the corruption
fund while yet was dripping from the
political gullOtine the blood of the inno-
cents who had been slaughtered to make
vacancies TO be filled by their favorites
and fOllowdrs, the blow fell and the CON
version came. We see now this eXtraor-
binary spectacle, that the President and
the Republican leaders have been so
thoroughly convicted of the sin of polit-
zeal prescription and the levy of political
assessments that they come to Congress
on the very first day of the session and
demand the speedy passage of Il law TO
prevent them from again lasping into
the crimes in the commission of which
they have revelled for so many long and
joyous years of thei prosperity and
power.
"The demand, admit, is little extra
ordinary. 1t is very much like a crimi-
nal, in the daily practice of committing
wrong, asking that law be passed to
arrest him in his course. He admits the
wrong he does he denounces it; yet pro-
fesses his inability to reform without the
sanction of statute. That is their posi-
ton, sir, singular rs il may be. We have
the spectacle of II great party suddenly
seized with remorSe for its errors and its
crimes, confessing its sins, yet also pro-
Tossing its inability to reform without the
aid of a penal statute and the wholesome
fear of the penitentiary. | propose to
give this aid and to produce this fear, not
only in them, but in all others who may
be tempted to do the same wrong"