The Ottawa free trader. [volume] (Ottawa, Ill.) 1843-1916, 1885-06-13
w Washington Letter.

Washington Letter.
(From our Regular Correspondent)
The tug of war still comes on and goes
on between the administration and the Of
flee seekers. The Juggling is to a great ex.
tent among the office seekers, that is, they
tug against each other; but the President
has to bear the brunt and suffer the wear
and tear He is, no doubt, becoming very
weary of the delegations that pursue him
relative to comparatively unimportant Off.
ces. Perhaps no minor office has made
greater demands upon his time and pa
tience than the Charleston, South Carolina.
collectorship. The rival delegations have
been persistent in their claims upon his at
tention. He told them last week that they
must agree to settle this matter between
themselves, and if they aid not do so soon,
he would be compelled to settle il in way
that would not suit any of the contending
| factions.
The work of turning out the idle, the in.
competent, and the otherwise offensive par.
tisans goes on slowly but surely. The term
offensive partisan" is in the mouth OF
every one here, and it is in danger of being
not only abused but misunderstood. 1t
should be known that these discharged
employees were not cast out merely because
they were Jealous republicans, but because
their zeal in politics wholly interfered with
their duties as Government employees.
They are those who have been drawing pay
from the public treasury but performing
no public service, because their time has
been entirely taken up with partisan work.
While they were doubtless very important
factors in the republican organization, col
Letting campaign money, classifying stats
| tics, skilled in the art of making the worse
appear the better part" upon the stump,
and through the press, they were the YAM
pires of our political system, sucking It's
blood, and lulling it with lies. Many of
them have been discharged and many more
will be discharged No matter what their
d" influence and backing may be, the time
has come for them to go into scandulous
retirement, and they will go.
1t is not alone in the discharge of idle
and worthless partisans that this admins
tration is making itself memorable. There
are other and perhaps more important re-
forms going on. These reforms are not
palpable and visible to the unskilleo eye
of the public at large, but their cumu-
lated weight will be seen in the reports
Of the cabinet officers when Congress as
sembles next fall, in the message of the
President; and especially in the greatlyre-
duced appropriations that will be asked
for the public service for the next fiscal
year.
1t is we'll known that frauds upon the
revenue have long been practised by i'm
porters in connivance with custom house
officials So great had this evil becomes
few years ago that it was found necessary
for Congress to appropriate 100000 to aid
in the detection and exposure of these
frauds. But even this fund, designed as 1t
was for the prevention of evasions and IT.
Irregularities, was soon prevented 10 as fraud
ulent uses as those which it was appropria-
ted to correct; and it is a matter of noto-
rious history that the greater part of this
hundred thousand dollars year went into
the hands OF a disreputable gang of polNi-
cal bummers in New York, Philadelphia,
and other cities as a reward for their parti-
san services. Here was one attempted re-
form, but the misfortune of it was, like that
of most republican reforms, that is was
backward rather than forward step.
Such is but one of the greater rascalities
in the custom service which Secretary
Manning, as practical business man, set
to work to eliminate upon his taking charge
of the Treasury Department; and how he
has succeeded is best told in the language
of prominent republican of this city to
correspondent of the New York Herald:
"Ihave occasion, by the nature OF my work
to know what is being done in the Treas
ury and by the Administration in the way
of reforming long standing and very grave
abuses; and say to you that, in the impor-
tant matters which AIN necessarily famil-
lar with, this democratic Administration
has done more In three months than has
been done in fifteen years before"
->.~--
Streator Nonitor: 1T appears DIR. LIE
Roy interviewed President Cleveland,
while in Washington, in the interests OF
his old friend, Judge T. Lyle Dickey,
whose eyes are looking longingly towards
the Italian mission. Also paid his re-
spects to the pension Office, but gave the
post office the go-by. If We had the Doc
tors avoirdupois and political persuasion,
we should have tapped Postmaster Villas
for Streator's best gift-politically-the
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