The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1897-01-17

service is permitted to play the greatest
role. 1t many be said to owe its origin
to Councillor Won Stieber, who managed
to secure the confidence of King Frederick
William " to such an extent that the cab
met ministers of the day were just as
powerleSs against him as the late and the
present chancellor of the empire, as well
as the past and present ministers of the
interior and the present minister of for
eign affairs have been until now impotent
to counteract the influence of and in
trigues of his successor, Maj. Won Tausch.
Stieber first achieved distinction by helping
Baron Won Mohrenheim (now Russian am
bassador at Paris) to recover from noble
men some compromising correspondence
of a near relative of the car, and the
means which he employed while success
full in their results, were scarcely those
that would commend themselves to an or
binary guardian of the law, comprising
as they did kidnapping, the breaking open
of a desk and the writing of fictitious let
tiers. Stieber was succeeded by Kruger,
and Kruger in turn by Mai. Won Tausch,
and the legal proceedings that have just
resulted in the latter's arrest on charge
of forgery, have shown that the methods
of action of the secret service employed
since the accession to the throne of the
present emperor have been every whit as
questionable and unsavory as those of
Herr Won Stieber.
The only redeeming point in the present
situa ton at Berlin (Which is so grave
that the emperor has preferred for the
first time to spend Christmas at Potsdam,
instead of in his capitaD is that his maj
esty has been compelled by the stress of
public opinion to consent to the impris-
onment and suspension from office of Maj.
Won Tausch for making use of the same
dishOnorable maneuvers which twelve
Of in
the imperial parliament by the Bismarck
ian government For, in response to a
memorable speech by the liberal leader,
Richter in the Reichstag, exposing the
unscrupulousness of Secret Agent Won
Rumpf, his role as a proVoker and insti-
gator of crime, and his employment, not
only of criminal methods, but even of
criminals in order to succeed in the po-
litical intrigues in which he was engag-
ed, the minister of the interior Won Putt
hammer proclaimed the doctrine that the
executive and his government have a
right to make use of eXtra-legal-that is
to say, NEUTRALITY-SUSPICIOUS. for attaining
it's aims when the ordinary legal meth
DDS are inadequate and unavailing. This
bear in mind in connection with the forg-
cries, the perjurers and the Indictment to
crime of one kind and another now laid
at the door of the chief of secret serV-
ice, Won Tausch, was delivered in the
Reichstag on May 9, 1884, and will doubt
less figure in the majors defense, as a
plea for his justification.
Strangely enough. the most powerful ar
gument that has ever been brought for
ward against this secret service, which.
being, so to speak, beyond the pale of
the law is contrary to all notions of what
is straightforward. honorable and manly,
comes from Prince Bismarck himself, who,
however, devoted more attention and re-
lied more upon this system than any other
statesman of the present century, except,
perhaps, Fouche, the evil genius Of the
first Napoleon.