The Louisiana Democrat. [volume] (Alexandria, La.) 1845-1918, 1886-10-27
Mr.. BENEDlcT's REFORMS.

Mr.. BENEDlCT's REFORMS.
The Public Printer Cutting OF Needless
Expenses and Struggling to Remedy Re-
publican Abuses.
The new Public Printer, on taking
charge Of his Office. was confronted by
the unpleasant fact that his predeces-
sor, for the first two months of the
present fiscal year, expended sum
which, if the same ratio should he
kept up, would result in a deficiency
of several hundred thousand doll
lars. Mr.. Benedict says the Office is SO
oyercrowded that the employees are in
each other way, and the result is that,
after a fortnight's examination of the
business, he has found he could get
along with a much smaller force. The
meager remainder of the appropria-
ton left him by Mr.. Rounds compels
him to be very circumspect with ex-
penditures, and wholesale dismissals of
employees are the consequence. He
understands what is required of every
head of a bureau under the present
Administration, to bring every thing
down to hard pan and business prin-
ciples. The Government printing
office was very convenient for Con-.
gressmen TO pay off some of their POI
litical debts to their constituents, and
Mr.. Rounds was too obliging to refuse
their applications. The new Public
Printer is of sterner stuff, a thorough
business man, trained in an excel
lent school, and only intent upon full
filling his duty to the letter, letting the
results of his work speak for them.
selves He appreciates the golden rule
of the Democratic Administration, that
an officer of the Government who has
charge of bureau holds the money of
the people in his hands, to be used for
their purposes. and to further their in
terests, and when any part of the
funds which the taxpayers have en-
trusted to him are diverted to other
purposes, or when. by design or neg
lect, he allows sum to be applied to
the salaries of unnecessary employees,
merely to please some member Of Con-
gress, or some personal or political
friends, he violates his duty.
In the printing Office, as in all other
Departments of the Government, there
is no different rule of fidelity, under
the present regime, between the office
holder and the taxpayer than that
which should regulate the conduct of
the former when, as an individual, he
holds the money of his neighbor.
Under the Republican Administration
such rule would be laughed at, and
it was only made respected under the
present regime by the employment Of
stern measures. 1t took some time to
convince Republican otficeholders that
the reform policy of President Cleve-
land was genuine one and had come
to stay. Those who refused to sub
scribe to it were compelled to walk the
plank, and the spoils party raise a
| piteous howl at each manifestation
| of this golden principle of honest
government. 1t was high time for a
change in the management of the
Government printing Office. Had
Mr.. Rounds been permitted to 60 on
his way siuandering the appropria-
ton, by the time Congress met there
would have been no funds left and a
demand would have been made for a
large deficiency appropriation. Mr..
Benedict, handicapped though he is
by his predecessors extravaganza, has
applied himself earnestly to devise
means of outstanding the slender
resources at his command and to
make them suffice until the end of the
fiscal year. He will be obliged to make
further reductions of the force before
he can see his way clear. The Wash
ington correspondent of the St Louis
Republican thus explains the situation:
"Mr. Rounds crammed the office as
full of Republican partlsans as it was
possible for him to do, and he used as
much Of the appropriation as the law
would allow. Indeed, it is charged
that he stretched the law as far as it
would stretch and got all the good out
of the Office for the grand old party
that he could get. Rounds IS sharp
one. and he has left the office in shape
to give Benedict a great deal of trouble.
! -Albnnu Ar0Ms.