The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1886-12-22
THE CRIME OF CRIMES.


We do not feel called upon to apologize for
referring from day to day to the developments
in the investigation of the election frauds now
going on. The importance of the issues and
gravity of the interests involved are sufficient
apology. These are not merely local in their
scope, and they involve something far higher
than temporary party success or the brief pos
session of an office by one individual or an
other. These are matters of comparatively
little public concern. The country can get
along and the government will still live, no
matter who holds the Offices. That is merely
question of official patronage and salaries.
But far above this. and infinitely more i'm
portant, is the question Of the honesty and
fairness of elections, and whether the will of
the people is to stand as recorded or is to be
subject to manipulation and reversal in the
interest of particular candidates by the act of
any man. There is no greater question than
this before the American people, and
there can be no higher interests involved.
Beside it all other questions sink into insig-
nifcance. In popular government honest
elections and an honest count lie at the basis.
They are the corner stone, and without them
there can be no superstructure s'Vox populi
vox Del is not mere slang phrase. In re-
publican government popular election is the
highest tribunal known, and the voice of the
people should be, for all political purposes, the
very voice Of God. How unspeakably in
famous then, and what an outrage on the
rights of the people, is the altering of tally
sheet, the forging of an election return so as
to change the result and substitute a
candidate whom the people did not
choose for one they did? Compared
with this all other crimes are slight
and venial. 1t is not crime against an indi-
vidual, but against society not an attack on
personal or private rights, but a deadly assault
upon popular government in its most vital
part The tariff question, the currency ques-
ton. the civil-service reform question and
others, are more or less important, but they
are inconsequential compared with thequestion
Of the purity Of elections. He who violates
the provisions of the tariff law is merely a
smuggler or defrauder of the revenue; the
counterfeiter is an ordinary criminal; the mail
robber only inflicts injury on a few, yet all
these crimes are justly visited with severe
punishment The alteration Of election re-
monwealth and a stab at the fun
damental principles of popular gov
ernnent This crime has been COM
mitted right here in this community, and
the facts and circumstances of its commission
are now undergoing investigation. In COM
munity of freemen no higher question can be
raised than that of deadly assault on popular
rights. 1t is literally question Of universal
interest In this case the evidence shows con-
clusively the commission Of the crime the
time and manner of its commission, and points
almost unerringly at the perpetrators. Men
VINO are Dold enough TO plan sucn CRIME are
generally very cunning, and it is not an easy
thing to track them; but when the tracks all
point one way moral conviction is inevitable.
When there is cumulative proof that the tally
sheets were for considerable time in the
hands of persons who had no right to them
persons known as INSCRIPTIONS partisans-
and that when they returned the tally-sheets
they had been changed, the public will draw
it's own conclusion.
SAMUEL E. PERKINS was yesterday SEN
fenced to jail for three months. Acting on