Morning journal and courier., 1883-09-08
sourual allb Genritr
EDITED AND PUBLISHED BY
SINGLE COPIES THREE CENTS.
Saturday, septenber 8. 1883.
POLITICAL ENGINEERING.

Our esteemed contemporary the Register says that ''reprehensible partizanship and Republican greed for spoils have closed the department of public works and brought all city improvements to a sudden standEtiI. n This is unadalterated cheek. The engineers were voted out of office with tacis under standing that they should be reappointedA and the Democratic members of the Board of Rnhlic Works have made the most of Che opportunity to get in some Demo erats. The deadlock is the result of the un- expected action of the Democratic part of the board. In view of these facts the Register says the deadlock is the result of Republican greed. The Republican members do not propose to make any changes in the corps of engineers. They have simply voted to retain the assistant engineer who has held of fee for g number of years and faithfully performed his duties.
 What does the Register want ? It does notdeny MT. Ferry's fitness. It does not propose 8 competitive examination. No; it says ttthe Democrats claim right of rep resentation in the reorganization" That is to say, some of the engineers shall be turned out, not because they are not competent en- ginsers, but because they are not Democrats, and in order to give the Democracy repre- sentation in the engineering force. Why does the Register want such representation in the engeneering department? We had always supposed that there could net be any politics in surveying. Is there a new Democratic mode of surveying that our contemporary wishes to have tried? Is there, for instance, new style of Democratic trisngulation? Has 8 new set of Democratic logarithms come in with the thew rules7" We know that un. der the old rules single Democratic voter sometimes counted three or four, but we sup posed the new rules were g return to pure mathematics. Unless the Democratic mem- bers have Democratic system of engineer ing that they wish to introduce, or unless they claim that the Republican politics of the present engineers will prejudice their views about angles and tangents. we are at loss to understand why they want Democratic rep rssentation. If political engineering were what is required we could understand why a Democratic representatioS is demanded, and we should readily acknowledge the fitness and propr1ety of the claim, but as only civil engineering is wanted we fail to understand it. The city does not want Democratic en- gineers or Republican engineers. It wants competent engineers. and 1t makes no differ enee whether it's engineers are all Democrats or all Republicans, or part Democrats and part Republicans, unless their political opin- ions affect their mathematical views.
 Our contemporary proceeds to argue that MT. Sy1vanus Butler should be appointed because he is a competent enginsex In not this somewhat inconsistent with the claim that he should be appointed because heis Demo crat? We recognise the common sense of the claim that MT. Butler should be appoint ed because of his fitness. But the Republi- can members are voting to retain MT. Ferry for the same reason, and this the Register chsracterizes as political greed. Stripped of all disguise, the claim of our contsmpora- ry is that men of ability and experience, with whom no word of fault can be found, should be turned out and others pat in, not because they can do the work in any differ ent or better way than 1t is now done, but because they are Democrats. That is, in or der to create partizan representation in an office that'is entirely without political chur- acter. What is political greed, and where is it to be found? 4 aa.