New-York tribune., 1905-07-20
NO CAUSE FOR DIScoURAGEMENT.


It is getting to be too much the custom 10 de-
nounce the present era as one of unexampled
corruption in business and politics. The public
has invented some new tags for old offences
and old offenders. Stealing is graft and
thieves are 'grafters" and the new terms have
so captiVated the general fancy that people
have almost come to think that in using them
they are describing some new developments in
criminology. In this they deceive themselves
for, as the Preacher says. there is nothing new
under the sun-not even the methods of the
up-to-date ''grafters'
II may be admitted that the last two or three
years have seen an enormous mass of evil
doing and scandal uncovered. In the govern
ment service postal and land frauds have been
exposed. and now fresh breach of trust has
been unearthed in the statistical bureau of the
Department of Agriculture. We have had in
private business the star,Ing revelations Of
the Equitable Life Assurance Society eSt-
cation and of the Shipping Trust collapse. We
have seen wholesale municipal corruption ex-
posed in ST. Louis, and Philadelphia rescued
by a popular revolt from the clutch of a band
of criminal politicians. In this State a justice
Of the Supreme Court has been brought to trial
by the legislature for acts which, as his prose
cutors hold. unfit him to wear the judicial er-
mine. This record is a sombre one, and at firsr
EldlCS Il uIlSLL dlllOSI SeeLl 10 JUSTLY the pes
simist in lamenting that corruption is rampant
ana honesty is lost virtue.
But is such a lamentation really justified?
Sincerely, We do not think so. The present era
may be one Of sensational and scandalous dis
closures. But that results from the fact that it
Is also one of exceptional moral ferment and of
exceptional zeal in hunting down and punish
ing corruption. Our standards of honesty Gin
public and private life have risen, and we are
developing a sensitiveness toward evil prac-
tees of all sorts which to an earlier genera
ton might have seemed little finical. Graft
and "grafters' we have had always with US
In the days of the Revolution army contract
scandals were. perhaps. more frequent and
odious than they have been at any subsequent
period in our history. The development of the
spoils system corrupted and demoralized the
public service, and when that system reached
its heyday in the years after the Civil War
acts were done day in and day out by politi-
clans which we have come to look upon as
quite beyond the pale of personal honesty
Charges such as are now brought against JUS
tice Hooker would have been laughed out of
court thirty forty years ago, when practi-
cally every politician was-and thought he had
TO be-a spokesman So long as the spoils sys-
TEN lasted and partisanship remained intense
scandals in the public service were hushed up
the good of the party" serving as the excuse
for their suppression.
Now we have an administration in power
which believes that the good of the party"
and Of the country can be best served by turn
ing the rascals out-no matter what their po-
litical associations or Influence, and which
does not hesitate TO lay bare facts which
lead directly TO the indictment of Republican
Senators and Republican Representatives If
graft is unduly in evidence nowadays, it Is
because both in public life and in private life
the "grafters" are being driven relentlessly
from cover. This is the feature Of the situa-
ton which the pessimists overlook and which
70 any impartial mind must demonstrate that
this is not so much the pre-eminently of
fraud as the era pre-eminently of the fraud
hunter and fraud punisher.