Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1904-05-14
The Bruised Scandal Viper.

The candal-promotion clique. dazed by
the stunning blow administered by the Dis
trict Commissioners. now mumbies that 1t
has never. never accused any one of i'm
morality. that ii has ro--er more than init
mated that somebody back in 1893 may
have been 1ndiscreet that 1t has never fos-
teied innuendoes which were naturally
col strueC and repeated as imputations
rejecting upon the teachers collectively.
and that, in short, it is as innocuous
and inoffensive a scandal promotion
clique II is possible for the mind of
man to conceive. 1t denies that its poison
fangs have ever been really envenomed.
and 1t insists that its hissngs ceilings and
strikings during all these years have been
no, only impotent but have lacked even an
evil venomous intent.
The mountain of "disgraceful scandal"
widespread Generalization. notorious
conditions" shame Haunting Itself, protect
ed not punished''-which was to startle
Congress and the President, the community,
the republic and the world with the de-
veIopments of its eruptions-having Ia
bored brings forth the mouse of alleged
thoughtess indiscretion; and the thorough.
sweeping and minute vindication of the
Commissioners kills even the mouse
Whether the scandal fostered by the
promotion clique was in truth merely the
intimation of some indiscreet but not i'm
moral action on the part of one teacher in
1898, the people of Washington into whose
the scandal has been whispered will
be the best judges Whatever was said by
the scandalmongers. it was acted upon i'm
many cases by those who heard it as if it
conveyed a startling charge of disgraceful
infamy. And this infamy was understood
IN involve in no ccho
system in general. and was so construed
as to cast a cloud upon all the teachers.
AS late as last month. for instance the
Boston Advertiser. receiving its inspiration
from the Islander clique in Washington in
an article. which was reprinted with APP
parent approval by the scandalmongers'
organ in this city. referred to the notorious
scandal in the public schools" 1.-The mall
odorous state of things there" people in
the schools who are not disturbed cal
though their offense open and shame
full. and declared that it was "unfortu-
nate that the shame which was daily
Haunted in the eyes of the elder school
children by those responsible for the teach
ing of those children should have gone so
long-not merely unpunished-but even pro-
tected." For such infamous defamation
of the teachers and the schools, 1t Is i'm
possible to see how the scandal clique
can avoid responsibility. Just as all the
teachers are DETAINED by these general ac-
cusations of shameful conditions, so ali the
witnesses before the Commissioners are re-
Elected upon by the clique's charge that
there is a perjurer among them, whose
name is not disclosed.
But the SANDER clique shows an indis-
position to discuss the issues raised by it's
defamatory innuendoes and avoids the
question: whether immoral persons per-
jurersE slanderers or llbellers infest the
community 1t takes, however a lively pres
ent interest in such abstract academic ques-
tions as the culpablity of friend who ad-
yises an innocent man not to yield to but
to fight malignant defamation. whose ad-
vice Is indicated by the full exoneration of
the DETAINED. and who has the satisfaction
of seeing the unjustly assaied triumphant
in the end with his foot on the neck of a
wriggling, squrming. Kissing enemy.
The scandal viper is doubtless as fangless
and impotent now as it claims to have al
ways been; but this condition is due to the
fact that the club of truth has recently
bruised and broken its venomous head.