Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1885-06-18
THE CHARMS OF OFFICE.
Ex-Legfslators Who Can Find No Happia
ness Out of Official Life.

Ex-Legislators Who Can Find No Happia
ness Out of Official Life.
President Lincoln once said that the
two things in this world which most
resemble each other in attractions and
in effects are whisky and Office. No
truer comparison was ever made. A
man who knows not the delights of of
fee, like one who has never felt the in
fuence of liquor, finds no fault with
an obscure, sober existence; but let him
once taste the sweets OF official life,
and, like the youth who for the first
time experiences the hilarious sensa-
tons of the cup. he will regard his
former mode of living as insipid and
unbearable. This fact explains the
strange tenacity with which men who
have been in the public service cling
to government employment, even when
their interests are in other directions.
They prefer salary of two or three
thousand dollars a year, with a petty
Office, to five times that amount in the
obscurity of private life. There are
now on file at the Post-office Depart
ment a number of applications for
meager-salaried Postmasterships by ex-
Congressman, who can not rest content
out of Office, though their business or
professions yield them large in
comes. Some of these papers are
couched in pitiful terms, which would
not ill become the petition of an exile
who yearns for his native soil. 1t would
be impossible to irfflict a greater injury
on rising young lawyer or merchant
than to send him to Congress and then
not keep him there for life. He can
never resume his occupation with sue
cess. The Office instinct, once implant-
ed in his m nd, will crop out every time
an Office is to be filled and will render
him incapable of serious attention to
his business. He will probably become
in the end a chronic office-seeker, q
ward politician or even member of
the Legislature. Constituencies should
ponder well the responsibility they as
sumo when they select new representa-
tives in Congress. They should bear in
mind that they are transplanting ten
der plants into a richer soil and that
when these plants have taken root in
the tropical climate of the capital they
can not without damage redistribution,
be removed to the less genial cline
whence they came. Better leave them
in their native earth or make their re-
moval permanent.
During the last session of Congress
there was considerable comment about
the number of eN-members who were
seen on the floor of the House. These
were for the most part those who were
knocked Oft their feet by the tidal wave
of 1882 and who were still quite dazed
by the suddenness of the thing. 1t was
pitiful to watch their features as they
wandered from seat to seat, receiving
condolences and affecting jollity they
were far from feeling. One would think
that revisiting the scenes of past glory
only adds pain to misfortune, but these
eX-statesmen seemed to find melan-
choly happiness in viewing the field of
their wordy exploits and even contem-
plating the chairs which they once oc-
cupied. Several ex-Congressmen have
settled permanently in Washington,
after vain attempts at reelection in
their districts, and are seemingly happy
to be near the gates of the official para
disc which they are not permitted to
enter. Others spend the greater part
of the Congressional year at the capital,
drifting about the public buildings in
the hope that something may turn up,
all the while neglecting their private
business and perhaps running into
debt. A few of these quondam legis-
lators are ever begging clerkships on
the Committees of Congress or places
in the departments-anything. in fact,
that savors of public office. Can
whisky show any sadder effects? Could
a temperance speaker demonstrate the
evil results of drinking in a. more
striking way than by comparing them
with the baneful influence of office? In
what glowing colors could he paint the
picture of a bright young man, yield
ing at first to the temptations of local
office-a trusteeship, or perhaps the
Mayoralty of his little town; then the
gradual descent down the ladder of
degradation from municipal office to
the State Legislature and from Legis-
lature to Congress at each
stage the corresponding effects of in
temperance on mans career. Any
intelligent audience would not fail to
register pledge immediately.-Wo WASH
sngto'a Cor. Philadelphia Times.