New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1900-11-17
CRoKER's INDICTMENT or TIuM4NY

! CROKER'S INDICTMENT or T1MHINl.
] Mr. Croker's parting shot makes a loud report
and lot of smoke. but kicks fatally at the
breech. Few thoughtful citizens Of New York
read yesterday the Tammany chiefs declara-
tion of against vice without mingled emo
tions-of amusement at the preposterous abb
surdity of the thing and of a certain resent
ment at It's impudence. The spectacle of Rich
ard Croker standing up in Tammany Hail.,
averring the impeccable righteousness Of all
his and the organizations political revenue,
challenging his subservient followers to contra
diet him and calling upon Tammany to crush
out this awful crime" with which Tammany
has long been in more or less open partner
ship. was spectacle. indeed, for gods and
men. As for the committee which was APP
pointed to wage war on vice, despite the I'M
doubted character of some of its members,
suppose there few verdant as TO credit
it with being anything more, in the BoSs's in
tent. than respectable screen behind which
Tammany vany hopes TO hide itself from the
whirlwind which it's sowing of the wind has
reused.
The most serious feature of the matter is
one which is. we may we'll believe, the last
Mr.. Croker meant to create. but which. in the
blindness of a mailman doomed TO destruction,
he has unwittingly but irretrievably created.
government of Tammany Hall and of the Tam
many Dictator himself which is inevitably i'm
piled in what Mr.. Croker said and in the action
which he took in appointing his purity COM
mttee 1t has been the parrot cry OF Tammany
and of Mr. Croker for months past that this
city is as free from vice as 1t is possible for
a LARGE city to be: that no diSorderly houses
exist 10 the knowledge of the police, and that
all insinuations of official cOilusion with or
federation of vice are wicked libels upon the
purest and best municipal government in the
world Yet here we have Mr.. Croker openly
acknowledging the existence of an appalling
state of immortality bad as 10 call for
special action and the appointment of this
special committee 10 deal with II. We have
him declaring. upon the strength OF his own
observation and knowledge. that some OF the
most offensive forms Of vice do exist, and that
TO the full knowledge and with the tolerance
of the police. And we have another conspicu-
Tammany leader and offcehoder deciar-
ing. in Mr.. Cookers presence. that the police
themselves participate in the extension ana
aggravatOn of vice.
Does anybody suppose for one moment that
all this is a sudden discovery of Mr.. Croker's
and of Tammany Halls. made since November
Is? Credat Judaus Apella. Rational men can
have not shadow of doubt that these things
have been perfectly well known in Tammany
Hall all along. and that they were known to
Mr.. Croker and his cOnfederates. Just fully
as they to-day. at the very time when those
men were vehemently prOclaiming the purity
of the city and its government and so indig-
nantly denying the charges that vice was -four
ishing under police protection. All the sound
and fury of which Mr.. Croker is now capable
serve only either to convict him of base ny
pocrsy or to convict his government of New
York of the grossest ineficiency or iniquity.
Indeed in either case it inevitably does the
latter. Every dive and pOorOom which the
police now, acting under Mr.. Croker's tip. may
close is proof that such places have existed
under Tammany rule The fact that these
places now suppressed at Mr.. Cookers com
mand will convince rational men that they
might have been suppressed before had Mr..
Croker so desired. The whole Tammany crusade
against vice will be merely an Indictment Of
Tammany Hall itself.