The intelligencer., 1889-04-27

find the flaw when he may have for
gotten its cause"
MR.. HARRISON'S VIOLATION OF HIS
PLEDGES.
We rint on the outside of this issue
an article from Harper's Weekly upon
Mr.. Harrison's civil service reform rec.
ord so far, which will be read with in
terest by persons of all parties who
advocate the enforcement of the civil
service from partisan politics.
The force of the article will be better
appreciated when the conservative
tone of the paper printing it, toward
the administration, is considered. 1t
was evident for some time after the
election that Mr.. Geo William Curtis
desired TO support the president, and
to return entirely to his old love, the
republican party, but the flagrant viola
ton, upon MIR. Harrison's part, OF the
promises of his letter of acceptance,
has proven too much for the Richmond
county statesman.
Naturally, MIR. Curtis cites the most
fragrant case of the violation of reform
ideas in the removal of Mr.. Pearson :,
postmaster at New York, republican,
who, in Difference to the reform prin-
ciple, Mr.. Cleveland retained in office.
The same demand from the business
men of New York was made upon MIR.
Harrison that had been made upon Mr..
Cleveland, with the added advantage
that Mr.. Pearson was a member of Mr..
Harrison's party, but the fact was
plain that Mr.. Pearson would attend
first to the business of the Office. and
that was enough to secure his decapita
ton by the Blaine administration
which requires that the interests of the
republican party shall be paramount.
We would respectfully call the atten:
ton of Prof. Swift and other reformers
who abandoned Mr.. Cleveland because
ITO Wouiu hOt auopt tuOh CAtlChCnt
views to the contrast between that
gentleman and Mr.. Harrison.
But the Weekly does not make out
half as strong case as it might. 1t is
no doubt true that Mr.. Pearson's case
is conspicuous example. but how
much more fagraut of all sense of pro-
priety and decency is the conduct of
Mr.. Clarkson. If in the postal depart
ment, as between Messrs. Wanamaker
and Clarkson, the country is not fur
nished with an example of bold faced
hypocrisy then we have never seen one.
The homilies OF Mr.. Wanamaker from
day to day about business principles,
and retaining men undisturbed while
their commissions last, in the interest
of the efficiency of the service, are but
tinkIing cymbals and sounding brass
in the face of the fact that his subordi-
nate, Mr.. Clarkson, is decapitating
postmasters at the rate of scores and
hundreds in day, and that the little
word removed stands opposite the
names OF seventy-five per cent. of them.
II Mr.. Wanamaker is not a Pecksuiff
and humbus he should boldly avow
himself in favor of the maxim "to the
victors belong the spoils," or he should
sit upon his man Friday, who every
evening gives the lie to the morning
professions of his chief.
Many mugwumps were deceived
into voting for Mr.. Harrison. The ap
pointment OF Mr.. Blaine was their first
"eye- opener" so to speak. The oust-
ing of Mr. Pearson is another. If they
exercise very little diligence during
the next year or two they will find
that in opposing Mr.. Cleveland they
made great mistake. They will
ascertain, further, that the republican
party Is so stepped with Blaineism,
which is simply another name for inor-
dinate greed and rapacity, that it can
never be separated from it and live.
They will, beyond this, learn, however
much they may have differed from it
in the past, that the democratic party
of to. day, is liye, active and wide
awake, free from the monopolistic influ
ences which control the republican or.
ganization; that it is of the people, and
for their best interests, including a
genuine, progressive reform of the
civil service.
We like the mugwumps. They are
men of principle, who, loving the pur-
poses OF the republican party and
glorying in it's splendid achievements
in the past, yet hate its evils, aud can
see when it becomes so gangrcnous
with avarice and blind selfshness, that
it ought to be rebuked and punished.
If they ever again support it at the
polls il will be simply and alone be.
cause the democratic conventions iai
to record the democratic sentiment OF
the country and to name the true rep
resentatives of democracy as leaders.