The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1900-07-15

Their Jobs - Cuban Scandal Not
Confined to the POstOfice-HOw the
Boer ENJOYS Were Received by
Mr.. Bryan-Suggestion For a Joint
Debate-COncerning the Open Door
In China-The Democratic Leaders.
Especial Washington letter.
"Stand and deliverr was the ominous
command which Paul Clifford and his
robber crew used to thunder into the
ears of travellers on HounsloW heath
and in the pleasant lanes of England.
"Stand and deliverv' are the dreadful
words whispered in the ears Of govern.
ment employees at Washington and,
as for that matter, all over the country,
for there is no Republican officeholder
big enough or small enough to escape
the modern highwaymen-the Repub-
lican campaign managers. Rathbone,
Nicely 81 Co. steal on a. huge scale in
Cuba; the Republican campaign man.
ayers hold up and sandbag the defense
less employees here at home. Civil
service rules don't count when cam
paign is on-no, not on your life, they
don't!
Blackmailers appear to grow with
what they feed on. In 1880 one Jay
Hubbell made his name loathed until
it became hiss and byword by black
mailing employees out of 10 and 20 per
cent Of their wages in order to raise
the slush with which to buy Garfield's
election. The hatred of the American
people drove Hubbell into private life,
but Hubbell was timid at the business
compared with latter day Republican
managers. who demand and get so per
cent! "'Ts true. and pity it's it's
truew-that is. if the Washington Post
is to be believed. and remember that it
is stanch friend to Mckinley.
Robbery and DIackmail.
Here is Il short extract from a two
column expose which The Post makes
of transaction which involved both
robbery of the public and blackmail of
the employees:
Congress took $4,000 out of the treasury just
before adjournment and presented it to the en-
ployees of the senate and house This was IN
pursuance of an old established custom--a custom
more generous than creditable-of voting an ex-
ira months salary to each man on the capitol
pay roll. Nobody has ever seriously contended
that there is any real justification for this giving
away Of the peoples money. but both political
parties do it, and it has been done so often and
SO long that the big annual gift-lt is clear
gift--has ceased to provoke more than feeble
and passing protest from even, the watchdogs OF
the treasury.
But this years presentation to the force of cap
itol employees has had sequel more scandalcus
than the presentation itself. Congress having lib
-, fba cl,nr arfa yfr RE
the Republican congressional committee has step
ped in and asked the benefciaries on the house
roll to give up one-half of the sum they received
for use in the campaign. In other words, an ef-
fort has been made to utilize 90 per cent OF
large appropriation of public money as nucleus
of a fund needed by the congressional committee
to aid in the election OF Republicans to the Fifty
seventh congress. A failure to respond freely by
the employees has prevented the complete con-
summation of this remarkable project, but it is
no fault of the congressional committee that it
failed to get hold of considerable share of the
$50, 900 SO generously donated There was belief
that $4,000 at least would be voluntarily sur
rendered but it is understood that less than half
OF this amount will be realized
Give Up or Get Out.
How do the taxpayers of the land
like to have $4,000 of their money pre-
scented in one COB to a job lot Of Repub-
lican officeholders and then have the
officeholders plundered Of one-half of
it to hold the freebooting administra-
ton in power for four years more? It's
q pity that a resolute- prosecuting at
torney does not get hold of the black
mailers and send them to the peniten-
tiary We had to pass new extradi-
tion law in order to get Rathbone and
Nicely back here from Cuba, but these
blackmailers are carrying on their ne
farious operations in the full light of
day at the Raleigh hotel on Pennsyl-
vania avenue, in the nations capital
We are told that f. II. Schrader, who
is doing this precious business for the
Republican congressional committee,
assures a startled public that no coer-
cion is used. Oh, no! Perish the
thought! But there is not an employee
who responds to Schrader's invitation
to walk into his parlor at the Raleigh
who does not know that if he refuses
to come down with the dust to the
tune of so per cent of his salary he will
lose his official head. So rather than
give up his job he whacks up.
Schrader has been caught in the act
and in history will join Jay Hubbell,
of odoriferous memory, but no doubt
there are others at work in every de-
partment of the government, busy as
bees bleeding the employees in order
to re-elect this administration of puri-
ty, sweetness and light. Assassination
in Kentucky, blackmail in Washing
ton. plain but colossal stealing in Cuba.
are the starters in a campaign destin-
ed to be the corruptest in the history
of the republic. All decent folk will be
compelled to hold their noses long be-
fore the frost of November nips the
Republicans on election day.
Like Banquo's Ghost.
The Cuban scandals. like the ghost
of the late lamented Barquo, will not
down. The stencil is SO strong that even
some of the Mckinley organs are COM
PEELED to give lusty and far resound-
ing snort occasionally to keep from
bursting. For example. that perfervid