The weekly register. [volume] (Point Pleasant, Va. [W. Va.]) 1862-1909, 1894-04-11
POINT PIEAsANT MASON COUNTY WEST 7RGNIA WEDNESDAY,
immortality az WASHINGTON.

While is true that many if not
most Of the members of the Nation
al House and Senate lead clean lives
it is also true that some easily fall
victims TO the temptations of the
capital. and in doing so deprive
themselves Of their power of prop
erly repro enting their constituents.
Its sometimes said in defense ol
men who are known to be leading
dissolute ives that Webster was a
drunkard and Clay gambler
that some of the most celebrated
men of America have developed
similar vices during their residence
Mt the capital. While this may be
in part true, it is also true that
such men have destroyed their own
possibiIities Of the highest useful
ness AT be time when America
was in tho direst need ofthe help OF
such men ns Webster and Clay,
they faifsa i because Of habits
which prematnrely weakened their
powers and deprived them of moral
stamina If these two men and
other public men who were affected
by their example had led perfectly
self-controlled lives, who can say
that the power of their genius
might not have been sufficient to
prevent the Civil War, as they
earnestly strove to do?
1t has happened over and over
again in American history that men
of great power, of elevated patriot
ism and of almost unlimited posi-
bilities of usefulness have been de-
graded and crippled by what is
looked on at the capital as venial
vice. And unless the press can find
some means of exercising it's great
restraining influence in the future
better than it has been able to do
in the past, this may grow worse
instead of better.
1t is an open secret at Washing
ton and elsewhere that many things
in the life of the capital are not told
which the public has a right to
know, since they concern the public
life of men who are drawing the pay
of the people. Some of these things
are of such a nature that if they
were known of bank cashier they
would cause his immediate dis
charge, and if bank cashier were
habitually guilty of them any board
of directors which failed to find it
out would be looked upon as mex
cusably negligent.
Certainly the position of Senator
or Representative in Congress is not
second in Importance as place OF
trust in any position in private bust
ness, and certainly the people have
right to know it when their en-
ployes and representatives are lead
ing life calculated to end in inca
pacity if not in crime and disgrace.
IF it were certain that the news
papers would make public all such
matters, public men would live not
less decently and uprightly in Wash
ington than in their own homes,
but it is almost impossible for the
newspapers to do something's which
are certainly within the sphere of
their legitimate work.
In the first place, the work may
easily become that of the scavenger,
and even when this is not the case
there is always the fear of produc-
ing by the frequency of such publi-
cations the wrong and the danger
GUS impression that vice and immor-
atty are the rule rather than the
exception in the lives ofpublic men.
The newspapers are right in keep
ing as far as possible from anything
of that kind, but still it seems that
there is room for taking the Ameri-
can people more fully into the con-
fidence of those who know the in
side life of Washington City
Republic.