Evening journal., 1915-01-28

was the ultimate working Of that spite We sub
NIT that if she he'd entertained spefu and reYengeful
feeling toward Gibbons It most naturally would have
asserted itself in the letter she Miss Malone We
challenge any Gibbons partisan to find in the lines or
between the lines of that missye any trace of that al
legged spiteiuncss II it shows anything at all 1t Is
that Miss Bsse doing her utmos' to put the best
face possible upon the situation and TO help Gibbons
rather than TO embarass antagonize him. In short
her disposition was to help and to uphold him as long
as he deserved TO be helped and upheld. Her
helpful spirit was emphasized by the fact that she
gave TO Gibbons the of her own private secretary
for three weeks, at her expense that she might
working under his direction, assist him in getting his
office affairs in order
With the work of the commission and its inspector
Just cleycry begun when Miss Bisse wrote her letter
TO Miss Malone it must be clear any intelligent per-
son that when il written it was more in the nature
OF an expression of hope than one Of weseted con-
vction. The last paragraph Shows that quite clearly
"Tho commission is just beginning Miss Bjssell wrote
~ therefore. report opy beginnings 1t welcomes
any advice or suggestion gladly" by process of
distortion can any friend OF Gibbons find in the letter
any evidence of over-hangng spite or any unqualified
endorsement of the efficiency of Gibbons 1t was
communication that left the door Of the future vide
open and I'm no sentence paragraph is It shown hat
Miss Bisso her bridges behind her or shackled
her future judgment either with respect to her associ-
ates on the commission or the work Of the inspector
The Morning News experienced much pleasure IN
printing tile following extract from her letter IN an
effort TO show Il euogy Of Gibbons and his work
! "ln two months the law went into operation only
in January-he inspector has registered and examined
more children than any previous man has done In the
! whole two-year term More significant STILL the public
schools Of Wilmington have had larger number OF
pupils especially in the last month, than at any time
I'm their history showing that the children of school
/ age have been put back into school"
Th News could not. however, be fair enough either
to Miss Bsse or to the public school teachers of this
city. embody i'm its pro-Gibbons editorial TINS sue
ceeding paragraph;
'rhe school teachers furnish the inspector (by their
own suggestion with list of every child in the
schools known to be any work outside school hours
These lists are value In rounding up children
under age who are serving milk at $50 in the morning
| or paper routes at night
In other words the News views it, the school
teachers should do the work ou their own nitiatiy,
and Gibbons should get the credit Such attitude
viii not appeal the fairness mind the people
of this city and State.
it be in mind that after the school teachers
had in the names, it only necessary for In
spector Gibbons TO send for the children Nor SHOULD
the be lost sight of that after the Child Labor
Commission into power all OF the old certih
Gates were called in. Therefore. there an extra
ordinary influx of certificates during the first thrc
months and large amount Of work was done in reg
isering the old certificates and issuing new ones. III
offset the value of that activity however. it ap
pears that most those certificates were issue
in an invalid manner and that much data that shoul
be in the inspectors Office in proper form is eithe
wholly lacking in improper form In additions man
irreconcilable discrepancies have been found in hi
weekly, monthly and quarterly reports.
Inspector Gibbons had ample opportunity to max
good. He had full warning that his work nc
satisfactory Finally by an overwhelming majority, tn
commission decided that he was not suitable ma
for the place He removed, and the very delicac
of the way in which he removed resulted in tn
commissioners being subjected to broadside OF crit
csm. lf there had been more openness in the matte
and less studous effort avoid, for the sake of "a
concerned the publicity that unquestionaby woul
have attended public trial, there would have bee
less criticism thousands of the critics based the
Judgment upon pro-Gibbons information and misiniol
nation. The Morning News has been one of the wor'
Offenders in the promotion OF the pro-Gbbons prop'
e ganda.