Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1886-06-21
A FAITHFUL OFFICIAL.
Attorney-General Marshall and the Rail
road Tax Money.
Isan Francisco Alta, June 18TH

road Tax Money.
lSan Francisco Alta, June 19thl
On Thursday Attorney General Marshall
paid over to Controller Dunn nearly $780,
600 of railroad taxes which had been long
| in his personal custody. 1t is not fair that
| the significance of this incident should
pass unnoticed. The controversy which il
concludes was the exciting cause of troubles
| in the party in this State, which lost its
majority and led to an attempt to outlaw
| from its membership thousands OF desery-
| ing men. The Federal Courts have passed
upon the merits of the original issue be-
| tween the corporations and the State and
! the State Supreme Court has empha,ically
adjusted the issue raised against the Attor-
ney- General. 1t is estimated that the cost
to the State of the Controllers refusal to
receive this money when rendered by the
| Attorney General has been $4,000
A review of the question discloses the
fact that until Attorney-General Marshall
took the case in hand no officer of the
| State had found a way to test the sincerity
of the railroad company's avowal that it
| had no desire to evade the payment of its
taxes. All the railroads had been involved
| in the matter, and in many instances coun-
| ties had made their own arrangements,
! and had secured money TO meet their
| obligations by accepting settlement
with the corporations. Sonoma county,
acting under the advice of her very
able District Attorney Mr.. Geary, had so
arranged with the Donohue road, and Ala
media county, by the sensible and business
| like action of her County Clerk and Au-
ditor, Colonel Allen, had receipted for her
share, up to that time due, of the contro-
verted taxes of the Central Pacific. But
| still there had remained the fact that
the charge of intended evasion of their
share of the public burdens stood against
| the corporations. Urged by the States
pressing need of funds, Attorney General
Marshall found way TO accept on &C.
count the face, or large proportions of the
! face, of the railroad taxes. We never
| doubted the propriety of his action, either
| from legal or business standpoint. II
| had the support of countless analogies in
the daily business transactions of individ
uals, and that it preserved and defended
every right OF the State for adjudication
on final appeal to the Federal Supreme
Court was demonstrated by ample citation:
from the rule and practice and decisions o
the Courts. The Attorney General deserved
then and should have had, the applause o
the State, and to his party should have at
tached the credit of delivering, through
him, the State and many localities from
portentious financial endorsements.
But this purely legal and business ques
ton had served some individuals as per
sonal capital in politics, and had proved
such an easy means of teasing the more ex
citable members of the community into ;
fury, in which they acted without referenc,
to reason or right, that 1t was easier t
deny credit due Mr. Marshall and subiec
him to the injustice of aspersion of mo
tives, than it was to generate proper pub
lie opinion and do him justice. Whethe
seen in the beginning or not, the course de
liberately conspired against him finally in
volved the denunciation of all who believed
that be was right, and in that contingen
was every man in the State who desired it
rescue from insolvency, and all who be
lieved it crime to secure political ri
umph for few unworthy individuals b,
the ruin of an honest and faithful publ
officer and the sacrifice of truth. Not ad
monished, however, by these considera
tions. ex parte and unfair statements wer
used to inhame public passion, and tn
situation was strained UP to the Stockton
Convention, where organized wrath sani
its vicious fangs in the Attorney-Genera
and his supporters, who were named an'
denounced and consigned to outer dark
ness, as men -" lost to all sense of honor"
I Looking back at it all, one is astonishet
that such a storm could originate in such
cause. 1t proved to be the flood tide of th
issue. Feeling thereafter declined so rap
idly that in its lapse it swept the party be
yond its depth, and it was lost. Only those
who had appealed for justice and reason
were left on the solid shore to catch tn,
wreck of the organization as the sea gave i
I'D, piece by piece. In the calm that en-
sued the Courts have acted one by one upoI
the points of the controversy. The Attor
nev-General, and those who supported
him, have been vindicated, and his assail
ants in their stronghold, which has beer
the office of the Controller, have taken tn
money he saved to the State, and presented
therefore their apologize receipt There
no case like in the history of any State
The Acknowledgement denounced in tn
platform of his party and by the majorit.
of its press as thoroughly dishonorable
which means that he was q moral outlaw
was for two years the sole custodian of NOR
than million of dollars, for the safety o
which he had taken no oath and given M
bond, and for the conversion of which t
his personal use there was absolutely N
law but his own conscience to punisl
him, and yet every mill of it has beer
faithfully accounted for to the public treas
ury and paid over to the people, to whom
belonged and for whom it had been recov
cred bv his fidelity and address. Nothing
: can add to the force of the bare statement
1t is not necessary to borrow any color from
the style of invective that was employed
against him, nor even from his own eX
haustless treasury of sarcasm to bring int
high relief the contrast between his conduc
and the motives falsely imputed to him b,
the ephemeral leaders, who were the heroe
l 81 l. 10 hlifetar and win show
to end in discontinue so distressing ant
defenseless that pity walks backward t.
cast over its nakedness the mantle of
charity which they refused to those upol
whom they trampled when they were mis-
taking passing passion for a permanen
condition of public opinion. In the cas-
of the Acknowledgement the State has
duty which 1t cannot honorably forget
Had he been what he was made to seem
he could have taken every penny of tn
vast sums which the fiscal officers re
fused to receive from him. and, whel
converted to his own use, we def
the combined legal ingenuity of Cal
fornia to point out a way to have recov
cred it or punished him. Every day III
people are appalled, by the disclosur
of official infidelity to financial trust
which are secured by oath and bond an
| legal obligations. But here was a trus
accepted in behalf of the people, free G
any restraint, and it was discharged S
faithfully that the State cannot afford to lie
the example go unmarked for it signi6e
the difference between honor and dishonol
Yet had physical infirmity assailed tn
Attorney General with fatality while h
rested under the heartless aspersions wit
(which a Convention sought to poison th
people, he would practically have beel
scourged out of the world by the yer
malice of injustice. This bitterness ha
been spared to his home, and it is not pos
sible that his detractors shall escape tn
punishment which is in deliberate reserv
of the judgment they tried to enter agains
, his good name and his official purity
Their action tended to degrade the State
character abroad. His fidelity has re
deemed it, and whitened the stains wit
which they furnished it, and, in the future
when public men are sweepingly con
demned and public virtue is weakened b
ascribing to them all a selfishness that i:
sues in dishonesty, Ned Marshall will stan
| J, Qualities which redaQpa puhIin III