The sun., 1906-02-02
Pitching Into Congress.

The dash of personal compliment in
the following letter cannot reconcile lis to
its vague reference to vague charges:
To TIE EDITOR or THE SuS-.Str: Your edl-
torIal, Pitching Into Congress- fills me with an
unutterablc feeling OF lamcntaton and mourning
and woe. That tho ahlest newspaper In the tnited
States and might Just as well say In the world,
cannot make stronger defence Of our traduced
and lmpugned national Legislature shows the case
TO be far more hopeless than had I'm ag'ned
"As long as the yiliGers confined themselves 10
coarse, vague, wholesale denunclation. Congress
was In no danger and THR SUNS defence was per.
fectly good. But these ealumnlators make par.
ticular statements about particular men and par
t'cular measures. Ever since SHAKEsrEABEs time
It has been open secret tha, the law is an ass.
Now a cloud OF witnesses has arisen, who are ac-
lively establishing By the indnctlve method that
tac law maker Is a knAve fear that 1t Is not a
sufficient answer TO these mcn 10 cry out with Sir
Lci-tasr Dedio't, the foodzates are opened, and
they arc obieratlns the landmarks OF the cohesion
by which the social fabric Is held together
"WApswoRTB. Mass. Jan. 81 VIC. RosB."
Pitching into public men is now a
regular and lucrative branch of maga-
zine literature. Certain great exposers
and reformers have undertaken person
ally to conduct the Government. The
other day the Hon. LINCOLN STEFrENs,
an ardent itinerant exposer, really "elec-
trfied the country by informing it that
he was in Washington as a private cti-
zen. 1t must have been the general
belief that he was there to take charge.
We say this, of course, without any re-
Election upon the industry and talents of
one of the most eminent and successful
of exposers. He magnies his office.
In the zeal of discovery he often discov-
ers, and with an engaging innocence,
things perfectly familiar; or he makes
assertions that an Office boy in news
paper shop would be kicked out for not
knowing the absurdity of.
Exposure" grows by what it feeds on; ;
and the habit of brooding solemnly and
cackling stridently over glass eggs seems
easily acquired. just as many of the
anti-slavery reformers couldn't go out
of the reforming business when slavery
had ceased, but took up Greenbacksm
and various other crankisms. so the
chronic exposer must keep on exposing.
1t is his brandy and his morphine, Our
correspondent doesn't say who the par
ticular men are who are now making
particular statements about particu-
lar men and measures. Just at present
making statements, and making them
hot, is good business. A distinguished
young Hoosier novelist has lately taken
the Senate in hand. Doubtless that
body will feel like abolishing itself when
the romantic Indiana method has done
its worst against the conscript fathers.
1t is not curious how much more pro-
fessional exposers can learn about Con-
gress in day or two at Washington
than Washington correspondents can
find out in twenty years of intimate
association with public men and knowl-
edge of the outside and inside of public
policies.
particular statements" made by con-
vinced and overheated persons about
politicians are not as new to most of us
as they seem to be to Mr.. ROSE. Surely
he remembers the Infamous bargain"
between JOHN QUINCY ADAMS and HENRY
CLAY, ~Bhfl and Black George, where
by the former became President and
the latter the Secretary of State. "Par-
tcular statements" about that imagin-
ary agreement were put forth and were
eagerly swallowed. Another "particu-
lar statement about Mr.. ADAMS is found
in the title of pamphlet described in an
old book catalogue of last month:
ApAMs,--tn exposition OF the political conduc,
and principles OF JOIN QuIScY ADAMS, showing by
historical documents and incontestable facts that
he was educated Il monarchls,; hns always hocn
hostile 10 popular government. &c"
WASHINGTON, the elder ADAMS, JET
PERSON, HAMILTON, with particularly
were they and every public man of i'm