The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1899-02-01
THE REAL ALGER PERIL
[From the New York Evening Post,
Monday, January 30.]

from the New York Evening POST,
Monday, January S0.]
Some people profess not to understand
the heat with which the Alger ada
are discussed. Why should distinguish
ed officers of the army grow white with
rage as they talk of the Secretary OF
War? Why should officers of the navy
take so deep an interest in the affairs of
a department not their own and speak,
as they do, with mingled contempt and
dread of Mr.. Alger? He is but one ex-
ample more of incompetence in office.
Maladministration and the smirch of po-
litics on public business are not such
startling novelties. A country that has
seen Simon Cameron in the War Depart
ment need not start and gasp at Russell
A. Alger in that office. If Mckinley
would turn him out, as Lincoln turned
out Cameron, the whole thing would be
over. Why such excitement, such fury,
about one poor laundering Secretary
smeared with politics?
The answer is that there is far more
thar a question of personality involved.
Alger and his methods and his hackers
stand for an assault upon the army more
deadly than any armed enemy could ever
deliver. They are for breaking down its
prestige and morale. For their W per-
sonal and partisan ends, they would pros
titute the one trained service the country
has. That is why regular army officers
are reused to indignation at the mention
of the name of Alger. He has trampled
on the most cherished traditions of their
profession. For merit he has substituted
favoritism. He has stuffed the service
with civilians. Boys he has put over
gray-haired veterans, just as used to be
the case when commissions in the army
were openly sold. Assignments to duty
are made, under the Alger system, or
ders are given, not to get the work done
in the best military manner, but to make
places for dependents, to pay political
debts and create political obligations. AL
gers is the dirty hand of politics fouling
a profession that has been peculiarly the
home of educated gentlemen. No wonder
the gentlemen display some heat when
speaking of one who is their official SUI
perior, but whose intrigues and tricks
and receptions and base uses of the army
fill them with loathing for the man and
with fears for the future of the service.
The very judicial processes of the
army, the attempts of it's officers to keep
the honor of their ranks unsullied and to
punish and expel black sheep, are med
died with and thwarted by the political
bias and motives of the head of the
War Office. The Secretary allows a
court-martial, but the verdicts he hangs
up or reverses, according to the under
---1 3 - xrr1;aI, Tho n
cused can bring to bear upon him. We
say nothing of the pending Eagan court
martial; when we see an honest verdict
in that case enforced without fear or
favor, we shall believe in it. But the
court-martial of Capt. Carter has already
become a public scandal, SO outrageously
have the President and Secretary Alger,
in connection with 1t, interfered with the
regular course of military justice. That
officer was tried by court-martial in De-
cember, 1887; he was found guilty of cor
ruption in engineering contracts, was sem
fenced to dismissal from the army, the
court also recommending that criminal
proceedings be brought against him.
What has been the result? The Presi-
dent and Secretary of War have kept
the papers III tHelF pOSSeSSlOH ali tuSSc
months, and nave been straining every
nerve to find some way of letting the
inculpated officer escape full punishment.
Reason? Political and social pull"
Capt. Carter is an Ohio man to start
with; he is rich and has rich relatives;
he has powerful political friends, includ-
ing Senator Platt. In a desperate hope
to save so well-connected an offender, the
President employed Mr.. Edmunds to re-
view the proceedings, to see IL some legal
flaws might not be found. Mr.. Edmunds'
bill Of 5,400 the President then had the
effrontery to order paid out of the Ma
tional Defence Fund.- This was too much
| even for a friendly Comptroller of the
Treasury, who said he was unable to see
what Capt. Carter's case had to do with
the war with Spain. Yet people wonder
| that under such a President and such a
| Secretary and such debauching and dis
honoring methods, regular army officers
| should not think everything for the best
in the best possible of worlds.
Why navy officers should also make
| forcible remarks about Alger is now get
ting to be plain. They fear hat his
Shiny methods will soon invade the navy.
| Already the first step has been taken or
attempted. The Senate has amended the
navy personnel bill so as to permit the
| Secretary to appoint civilians direct. Of
| fcers of the navy are frantic at the pro-
posal. They would rather see the whole
bill fail. 1t is a plan to Algerize the
navy. This is the sort of thing which
makes the real Alger peril apparent.
Nothing is too fine, no traditions or sys-
tenn too sacred, for his sprawling ham to
seize upon and subdue to partisan
| schemes. He is ready to take the last
| step in poA..cal degradation and corrup-
tion, and make Of both army and navy q