The Hattiesburg news. (Hattiesburg, Miss.) 1908-1917, 1911-04-06
CRAFT IN PERSIA.
Officials Pay For the Privilege Of
Fleeing the Public.
A LAND WITHOUT LAWYERS.
And Yet That Extraordinary Exemp-
ton Does Not Help the Unfortunate
Who Gets Into TroubIe-coaxing the
Accused to Confess.

ton Does Not Help the Unfortunate
Who Gets Into TroubIe-coaxina the
Accused to Confess.
1t would be difficult for a Persian
who has not Travelled to understand
American excitement over what the
newspapers here call graft" My
motherland, Persia, is not yet quite
awake to the possibility of mans
serving the public for a certain fixed
salary and taking nothing more. In
Persia they take it for granted that
every oficeholder will ''gouge" people
whenever he gets a chance.
There are no lawyers In Persia, so
there are no jokes about lawyers ap- |
petite for gold and silver. If you have |
ever had a costly lawsuit on your
hands you may think that makes mat |
tiers simpler, but getting into trouble
means being squeezed for money,
wrung for money, as II you were a
piece of wet cloth in washerwoman's
strong grip.
you see, the governor of a city or Of a
province never has definite salary
from the state-not at all. On the con-
trary, he pays the state treasury sew
eral thousand dollars more or less for
the privilege of being governor and of
making what he can out Of the enter
prise. He is not an elected officer; he
lis more like "concessionaire" at one
of your big expositions. who offers a
large sum for q chance to run n res
taurant or to provide ice cream soda or
candy.
/ The governor Tor mayor of a large
Persian town may have perhaps 100 to
$50 employees under him. OF these
only a few house servants Cook,
Icoachman and the like have fixed
wages. The incomes of the others de-
pend upon the amount of money which
they can help turn into the great
mans hands in the form of fines and
taxes. You can guess whether the
neighbors are fond of them!
J Suppose now you live in Persia. You
have leased piece of ground or you
have sold some goods and the other
man does not pay. You dun him,
Then you threaten him. Then you go
no lnb BONcTnOT anu Iluht u
An officer arrests your debtor and
: takes him before the governors Sec
Iretary for examination. Possibly he
AN convince that important parsonage
that IL Is not Just debt. If he can
not do that he would better put all his
. wits to work to convince the secretary
Il that poverty makes 1t quite impossi-
S bic to pay up.
This Is where many of the $50 under
Employees get their chance. A large
. part OF their occupation is hunting up
facts about everybody's property
leverybody's business, eyerybody's In
come. They know an amazing num-
j. Der of things which your debtor sup
iposea were safely secret. They pro
+ duce information whenever informa
. ion is wanted.
s Your mans pretense that business Is
S had and that he is all but bankrupt Is
n brushed aside, and he is made to pro
4 wee an amount of money consider
n bly, larger than the original debt
& Made" to produce it? Yes. There
d re shocking things that can be done
him If he hesitates too long, and he
l. lows it. SO, like a child aware thai
a ere is an ugly stick waiting in thu
8 -rner, he usually does not hesitate
It o long lie saves his skin and hands
/ yer the money. You get maybe 81
!, > 90 per cent to satisfy your claim.
l. Mt is, the officer Of justice practi
o lily collects from you something fo
e own servi ICES. The rest goes to tn
5, oyerG6r and such of the employees
IL : may he considered in the case.
erhaps you have n shop in the tow
d Zanr or market place and some poo
IS 1d-for-nothing steals chicken tina
d g hanging on the wall. IF woman
o : the thief she is most likely fined
e 3shly whipped if she has no none,
% pay a fine. If the culprit is mar
d y punch n hole through the car
II :ge of the lower end of his nose, pu
?; re through the hole and lead hin
S lis painful disgrace all around thu
!. . :, ar. The officer collects as he goei
II ClOng few cents from this shopkeep
r Ter and few cents from that one a:
q ian acknowledgment of the officers
f service in publicly exposing a thief.
q Naturally it often happens that som,
d Outrageous robbery occurs or some
@ body Is brutally murdered, and thu
J. guilty one is unknown. Then the gov
ernor's detective agents set to work
Il Anybody may be arrested on suspicion
|. and examined either as the probable
q offender or as n witness. If the sus
$ pect has plenty of money he can al
n WAYS prove his innocence or his igno
f rance by paying cash to the examining
O officers, though, since there is no regu
II Hated tariff in such matters, the pro
s ceeding may be quite expensive.
8 If the suspect is too poor to max
J. things right with the examiners or to-
stubborn to tell what he knows-ant
sometimes, l am afraid, If he reall,
does not know anything to tell-the!
have some third degree" methods