The Montgomery advertiser., 1901-07-14
A suPERLATIvE LEGISLATURE.

would be in danger Of meeting the rate to which pirates are subjected.
 A SUPERLATIVE LEGISLATURE.
 It is seriously to be doubted if, at any time and in any civilized govern ment there has ever been such open and damnable rascslity and corruption, and so much of 1t, as was exhibited in and in conjunction with the late ses- sion of the Legislature of Pennsylvania. There was time in the history of our own State when bribery and corruption were rampant and regnant In the halls of legislation, and when the purchase of members was as common and al- most as open as roll-calls. The era of reconstruction in Alabama forms dark page in our history. but we can feel thankful to God that the writing of that page was not done by our own people. It was the work of alien ene- mics and ignorant negroes and the real people of Alabama were not part ners or beneficiaries.
 No such excuse can be put up by the participants in the late Pennsylvania saturnalia of crime. It was all the work of their own people and embraced in its clientel United States Senators and Congressmen, Governors. Mayors and other high officials, as well as the more humble and bargain counter members of the General Assembly. It was like one of the great slave marts of the Orient, where buyer and seller meet and haggle and bargain in open day, except that in this case the set tiers sold themselves as well as bar gained for the sale of others.
 It was a Republican Legislature, and so far as appears, the bribegivers and bribe-t takers were Republicans. If we had no evidence on the subject except from Democrats. it might be charged that the testimony was partisan, but the most complete and damning chain of evidence we have seen comes from The Philadelphia Press, d Republican organ which sets out the facts and gives names and figures so plainly and definitely that no one can have cause to doubt the truth of the charges or the extent of villainy disclosed.
 Some of the venality was in connec- ton with the election of a Speaker of the House, as much as $20,000 having been promised for one vote, and other sums of $1O,OOO for d vote being of fered and accepted, but the main ava lanche of corruption was in connection with the passage of corporation bills of various kinds. For votes of this kind. the bidding was not so high, some of the bargain counter members letting themselves go at $1,000 each, while some of the high-steppers are reputed to have received as much as $35,000 for vote. The honor of some men dies hard and the man who buys it often has to pay a. fancy price for it. but any price they receive is more than they are worth except to the person or corporation benefited by the transac- ton. All of them had valuation and received it.
 If all this corruption had been con fined to members of the Legislature,' 1t would have been a little less deplor- TUT lHdl 0ldIcJ Ol LdlS years, iS in the habit of electing legislators of purchasable quality, but much higher officials than they were among the boodlers. Mir. Wananaker one Thurs day wrote a letter to the Mayor of Philadelphia asking him not to ap- prove the bills giving the use of the streets to the street railway corpora tions. offering him $20O0.OO0 for the franchises, and the Mayor approved the bills the same night. That is only a single instance of the corruption in high places. .
 But it is useless to pursue the sub ject, and we close as we began, with the remark that nowhere in any civil ized government has there been known such unblushing villainy, such open and avowed corruption, and such almost universal bargain and sale among pub lie men as was witnessed in the Penn sylvania Legislature, and In towns and cities concerned in the acts of that body. Some future body may equal it., but we think none can surpass 1t, for it would seem impossible to get into one body in any Christian land a more corrupt company than that one.
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