The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1885-10-13
HE "REsIGNs, +"


District Attorney Dickson has done
for this Territory grand and invaluable
service. He has sent to the President
his resignation. We can imagine moth
ing else that the gentleman could have
done which would have gone so far IN
the direction of uudoing the harm that
he has done as this retirement. He has
placed every man interested in the de-
velopment and progress of Utah under
lasting obligations to him. So grateful
will the people be, that many who have
held him in contempt as one OF the worst
enemies the Territory ever knew, will
feel that they can almost take off their
hats to him. 1t is true, his resignation
cannot overcome and destroy the evil
that ne has brought upon Utah; so in
iurious has his incumbency of the office
been that it is impossible for him,
in all his remaining years, to undo the
wrong which he has inflicted; time and
not he must restore things; the progress
which he checked and retarded cannot
he regained by his retirement; the
thousands of dollars that he has cost
the country and individuals will not be
repaid by his going out of Office, and the
needless suffering which he has inflicted
upen men, women and children cannot
be softened and alleviated by his re-
signation; but now that he goes much
can be forgiven, though some of it will
never be forgotten.
It is amusing to note the effort that
is being made to have it appear that
Mr. Dickson goes out voluntarily, and
that he is glad TO retire; it is even said
that he has long wanted to surrender
the Office. Do some of our esteemed
contemporaries believe these stories, or
do they think their readers are fools?
There hasneze been a day, or, following
the instruction of Chief Justice Zane
in the matter Of dividing time into
periods for the Spurposes OF in
die :ment, there has never been
a minute since Dickson received
his commission when he might not have
resigned with quite as good grace as
now. Indeed. it was indecent for him
to hold on after the 4th day of last
March. IL the face of this protracted
eagerness TO get out, this protested IN
willingness to longer continue in an
Office that paid him so niggardly that
he could not make ends meet, we may
consistently ask when We have been
afflicted by Federal officer, and who
was he, who tried harder to hold his
place and fasten himself upon the adj
ministration, than Mr. Dickson? His
whole effort has been to cling, and for
a year past il has been common talk
that he and his friends were operating
in a way TO make it dangerous
for his party for the President
to remove him. The threat has
been held ever the head Of
the administration, that Dickson's
removal would be made the basis for a
charge that the Democracy was friendly
to the Mcrmons. In the light of what
the gentleman has done in the directly
opposite direction, it is the thinnest of
bosh. the Yeriest twaddle, to say that
he has wanted to retire, or that he goes
cut now voluntarily. Until there is
better evidence than the gentIeman's
declarations to the contrary, We are
going 70 believe that ne has been made
to understand that his resignation was
the only thing that weuld prevent him
from being turned out. Just how
ridiculous is the suggestion that he goes
willingly and Of his own accord is shown
by his resignation, which is not to take
effect until the end of the year; this is
like Dickson; it is a trick, cunninglv
devised to give him little longer lease
Of the Office which be has worked with
so much profit to himself and so much
disaster to the Territory. If the truth
were known, in ell probability it would
be found that Mr.. Decisions resignation
give him fully two months longer term
OF the District Attorneyship than he
would have enjoyed had he not sent In
the paper naming the date for his sur
render If he is so anxious to retire,
why not get out now?
However, be is going, and that fact is
good enough, though the departure is
delayed ten weeks longer than every
body wishes it was. He may feel as
sured that there will be no half-masting
Of flags over his resignation.