Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1884-03-20
CHECKS AND BALANCES AGAIN.

CHECKS AND BALANCES AGAIN.
We have said that the system of doing
business in all our State departments where
fees are receivable ID wrong, absurd and an
invitation to corruption and fraud. We
repeat it. It is susceptible Of the clearest
proof There is no check whatever upon
any State official receiving fees except bis
own sense of honesty. To illustrate: the
departments CT the Attorney-General,
Clerk Of the Supreme Court, Surveyor.
General, Secretary of State, Harbor Com
missioners, Prison Commissioners, Insur.
ance Commissioner, and others, receive fees
for services, or money due the State, all of
which are payable to the State. The only
recorded evidences of these fees are the
entries made by the several departments.
From these cash entries the returns are
made to the State. Now it must be clear
that the omission of entry destroys the
recorded evidence. We are rot charging
any such methods upon any officials-that
ia not the question at issue it is the sys-
ten which we now make the subject Ct
business criticism. We resliirm that it is
unbusiness.ike and would not be toler-
ated in any ordinary business house.
But the system invites to fraud, and
has in the past been svailed Of for
fraudulent purposes. It is, therefore,
matter for correction. As remedy for
the obvious evil We have suggested that
when a service is performed for which
fee is ohargeable that payment be made to
another depaItment-as for instance the
auditinz department. Thus if A B desires
a service performed let him make his de-
mand upon the auditing department and
receive therefrom the necessary authority
for it. Or if.,this may not be, let the legal
ity of the transaction be made dependent
upon auditing. To this it is objected,
however, that II would needlessly delay
public business and increase the red tape
entarglements. By no means. Public
business is never needlessly delayed when
the fred tape" is necessary TO correct
business conduct. The trouble is we have
not enough OF red tape, and the fact that
the present System is liable to great abuses
is the evidence of it. d service can be per.
formed as well and speedily by an order
coming through an auditing department as
through say other avenue, It does not
delay public business now to require the
Endorsement OF the Controller az prerequi-
site TO the payment OF money into or the
drawing OF money from the treasury. It
Is also advanced that since the fee
system is devoid Of check, the true remedy
ia to abolish fees. BY 10 means, fer taen
the cost and burden of the service is
thrown upon all taxpayers, for the benefit
Of those only who are sdvantsged by the
service. Litigants IN Court should pay the
costs they make, for instance parties de-
string certified copies under the great zeal
of the State should not expect the whole
people 70 bear the cost. The fee sys-
tenn is right enough. The State sal
aries officials to do her business that
which is transacted for private interests
should be at the cost of the beneficiary,
and hence the State establishes fees for
such service. The trouble ia simply. that
no means is provided Of positively iusuriug
the payment of the fee to the State In
point OF fact it is known that in past yeara
many such fees have not reached the treas
ury. The possibility of such diversion de.
mands a remedy. i. is in the interest of
the men whom the people elect to posi-.
tions of trust, as well as in the interest Of
the State. We repeat that the present .sye.
TEN is loose. subjects the incumbent of the
Office to suspicion, and is wholly unbusi.
nesslike, and therefore no longer tolorable.
It is certain that the next Legislature will
be called upon to provide remedy, and it
is quite as certain that it will be named
and applied. Those who have seen fit to
denouuce the suggestion of reform as silly,
and the recitatio of fact as csptious, but
testify to their own lack OF comprehension
and low estimate of true business methods.
50 long as it is possible, and has happened.
that thousands of dollars in fees have been
collected and not reported and paid in, in
this and other States, in counties aud in
cities also-as notably in New York re-
cently-just that long does the need for
correction exist.