The St. Charles herald. [volume] (Hahnville, La.) 1873-1993, 1884-03-15
The Government Blae.BOsk.


tiers, mail-carriel 8, contractors, etc. 1t
begins with a list of the Senators, then
all of the employees Of the Senate, and
follows with that of the House and its
employees 1t Is curious thing that the
Secretary OF the Senate gets more than
a Senator himself. yet such is the fact.
The Secretary of the Senate gets $9,096
per .annum, while the Senators them
selves get only $1,000 year each. The
Chaplain who does the praying for the
Senate gets only $900a year for it, while
the very pages get 1920 per year, and
the stable boss" gets precisely the same
sum for his work that the Chaplain
does. As for the messengers they are
very princes in salary comparvdswith the
Chaplain, for they get vi, 440 per year
to his $500. Indeed some OF them get
81 800 per annum, or twice what the
Chaplain is paid.
In the House the Official stenograph-
ers get the same salary as the members,
but they are required TO employ their
| own assistants, and therefore do not net
over SO, 800 per year. They are won
derful men, though. How any pan can
sit or stand and take perfect report of
the proceedings of this bear garden at
the times when it is at its worst is inn
possible to understand With half
dozen MN shouting at once, couple
of hundred talking and the Speaker
hammering his desk just above the head
of the reporter, the only wonder is that
he can catch half what is said. Yet
there are seldom complaints. The re-
porters are having pretty hard times
4 now, because of the large number of
new faces and voices to learn
for they must know the voices
of the men who do the most
talking, so that they need not look up
at every interruption. The Clerk Of the
House also gets more than the members.
The Ministers to the leading countries,
England, France, Germany and Russia,
get $17, 800 each, while the Cabinet oiii-
GERS only get $4,000 apiece. So when
the Secretary Of the Navy was requested
a couple of years ago to exchange his
Cabinet portfolio for the position Of
Minister to Russia, it meant instead of
a tumble salary more than double
i that which he received for his services
in the Ca met. 1t must be pretty
tough, though, for man born in South
Carolina and accustomed to the gentle
climate of Louis ana, rs is the case with
4 Minister Hunt, TO lie condemned to the
long, cold winters of Russia, even at
the generous salary of $l7, 800, which
salary by the way is the largest paid to
an officer of the Government except the
Pres dent and the other theoe Ministers
named. There are thousands of the
plomatic offices, Ministers, Consuls,
Vice and Deputy Consuls, agents, ETC.,
and their pay probably amounts to a
million dollars year, perhaps million
and half. Some of them are depend
ent altogether on fees. though most OF
them get salaries ranging all the way
from $4,000 to $1,000.
In this country, the largest salary
drawn from Government, emitting the
President, is $4,000. The General OF
the Army and the Admiral of the Navy
get each that sum annually The Lieu-
tenant-General of the Army and the
Vice Admiral of the Navy $4,000. The
Major Generals get $500, and the
Brigadier-Generals $500. In the civil
list the Collector of the New York Gus.
tom-house gets the largest salary Of any
of the employees, his salary being $l2,.
900 per annum. The Postmaster al
New York and the Collector of Customs
at Boston get as much as Cabinet Off
Ger, while there are more than dozer
whose salaries are greater than those b
Cabinet officials. On the other hand
there are several whose salaries run yer,
low. Among the Postmasters whose com
compensation runs by the number o
stamps cancelled the compensation i
exceedingly small, more than a dozel
} of them receiving less than q dolla
apiece per year for their services. q
curse, their object in keeping tho ofiic
can scarcely be the salary, and it usu
ally happens that those offices which
pay SO small salary 0 ther fall int
the hands of some public-spirited citi
zen who is willing to take the troubl
simply for the sake of having a Post
| office in his neighborhood, or else ar
manipulated by some grocery or conntlr
store-keeper who thinks thus to draw
some more people tohisstore than unde
other circumstances.
The entire list, when completed
second volume is not yet out-will Civ
about 1870, 200 men and women In. til
Government service. They are not a
, usually supposed, mostly TO be found /
Washington. They are scattered a
over the world--the very large propol
ton, of course, in this country. OF til
100, 900 in the Government service, onl
: about 10000 are employed in Washing
! ton. The Customs and Internal Rev
= nue. Bureaus have their employees /
! every State, and the Post-office Depar
! ment has alone more than $4,000 en-
4 ployes scattered all over the countrl
Z in every State and county and townshl
and community. The possibilities
the Post Office and Treasury and Int
. rior departments as political machine
with their tens of thousands of en-
u ployes all over the country each col
. versant with the affairs, personal, D.
5, litical and otherwise Of his entire neiel
! borhood---are almost beyond caIcul
= ton. Nobody knows so much of Il
% affairs of those ABOUT him as the Pos
master, the Collector Of Customs al
the Collector of Internal Revenue, al
70 when you get thousands of the
n trained men and women scatter,
% through every community, and assist,
D. by equally skilled subordinates, there
- no measuring their power. Wnshi'sYt
Cor, Chicago Trlba4ns