The herald. [microfilm reel] (Los Angeles [Calif.]) 1893-1900, 1898-09-15
THE BRIGADE" REBUKED

The Republican county convention
adopted one plank which The Herald
can commend most heartily. 1t is as
follows:
We believe that public office is
public and sacred trust, and that the
time and energy of every officer, fed
eral, state, county or city, and the dep
uties of such officers, should be devoted
to the performance of their official du-
ties: and we resent as inimical to our
form of government and its free institu-
lions any and every attempt to use pub
lie authority or public place in the ma
nipulating or control of the voter.
whether acting individually or collect
lively. in convention assembled.
And we deprecate as demoralizing to
the public service and as unjust to the
taxpayers who support the government
the growing tendency of public officials
and their deputies to become ac-
tive partisans while in office. and to
spend their time that belongs to the
public. of all parties. In political work
and political management.
We therefore declare, as the sense of
this convention that no public officer,
federal, state, county or city, or his
deputy. should be allowed to sit as a
delegate or act as an officer of any po-
litical convention, or serve on any poit-
ical committee, and that any active par
ticipation Of any such officer, or his dep
uty. In political management should be
treated as a violation of his official du-
ty to serve faithfully the whole pubic,
irrespective Of party.
This Is a direct rebuke to Republican
federal officials in California who have
made themselves offensive partisans to
the scandal of their party and the neg
lect of their official duties. They de-
has been given them by a convention Of
their own party.
The facts as to the distribution of
the federal offices in California, es-
pecially in this end of the state, are in
a fair way to be told before long, and
the responsibility for the bold and de-
fiant attitude assumed by the officials
here will be made plain. 1t will be
shown how much the president had to
do with appointments, and how much he
knows Of the present state of things.
Never since the first serious thought
was given to civil service by any of the
presidents, from President Hayes down,
has anything like the state of things
here been known. The federal officials
have been foremost in promoting clubs,
in forwarding preliminary party work,
and the chief responsibility for the
conduct of the entire campaign is openly
assumed by them-assumed in utter dis
regard of duty, and in ostentatious de-
fiance of all the proprieties of official life
and of the written law. And not only
are our local officials in the control of
party policy and party work, neglectns
for weeks al a time their offices, at
tendng upon the political functions OF
the state, but two of them are doing the
details of party work to the utter ex-
clusion of that impartial high minded
ness that servants of the whole people
are supposed to represent. To this local
exhibition of callousness is added the
spectacle of the head Of the internal
revenue in the state given over to par
tisanship that compels him even to de-
vote a week to this county's affairs
and make him political figure in con-
vention hall and upon the streets. There
Is nothing secret about this thing, and
scorn Of 1t is in all honest men mouths
The question is, Has the Republican
party honor and wisdom enough to deal
with the matter as it deserves?