The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1904-10-26
THE AUDITORS PART.

The Advertiser has had occasion be-
fore this to discuss the audit system
of this Territory from the point Of view
OF those who contend that its business
is to nip defalcations in the bud, not
TO verify the work OF those who have
cut them off in their bloom 1t is al
legged that not a single original case OF
o1ficial delinquency, during the past
few years, has been discovered by the
Auditor. He has done his work well
after somebody else had exposed the
wrongdoing; but it has always been
the comment of the public that il he
had worked as assiduously before, there
might have been no wrongdoing.
Take the case of Mossman. His
books were supposed to have been ex-
arnined a little while ago by Deputy
Auditor Meyers, who found nothing
wrong. Shortly afterwards there was
sudden change in police management
and the accounts of Mr.. Mossman APP
peared 10 be short in rather large
amounts. AS a trial balance YVES
struck, leaving him in debt to the pub
lie, he suddenly thought of money that
he had left in a desk in the jail cor
ridor OF the station house, which would
meet the deficit. The investigation
proceeded, another Discrepancy IVES
found and Mossman happened to re-
member that he had left few hun
dreds of dollars in desk of the main
Office. Squaring himself with these
fassds he awaited the next turn of the
wheel, saying, in answer to q question,
that he had no more money concealed.
Soon third deficit doomed up. In
stantiy Mr.. Mossman remembered that
he had left some hundreds of dollars,
which he had forgotten to put in the
safe, as the law required, in a paste
board box and in his trousers pockets
at home. This money was brought to
the station; but the debt of Mr.. Moss
man grew faster than his concealed !
stores of tFeasure, and he now finds /,
himself under arrest for embezzlement. !!
1t is not our purpose here to ask 7
who provided these funds for Mossmari |
to draw upon In a crisis and why they I
were provided, nor to dilate upon the
credulity which would receive the late !
chief Clerks statements at par. The
point is that Mossman's accounts have I
been in bad way for a long time as
The state of the printing bills. for one
thing, go to show. Nobody presumes
last month than they are this month. /
But the Auditors office thought every +
thing aboye-board. It is the sort of
an Office which thinks things are all
right If they are fairly presentable in
thr books and on the stubs; but it is
the matter not in the books and the
money not in the safe which a proper
auditing system should hook out for
It is possible that the Auditors office
has too much to do; there is perhaps
i certain delicacy, even found in bank
ng corporations, about taking a course
,f enquiry that might Insult an honest
man: but if there is to be any auditing
n this TERRITORY as check upon OFF,
cial delinquency. it must proceed in
sxorabiy. thoroughly. frequently and
Without respect of persons. If more
experts are needed the Legislature can
better afford to pay them than to let
this everlasting thieving go on. 1t is
either reform in audit methods or
the triumph of the embezzler and the
Keeper rootage of graft