The Telegraph-courier. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1888-1946, 1924-01-17
AN INVITATION TO INEFFIcIENCY.

AN INVITATION TO INEFFIC1ENCY.
penny wise and pound foolish and glaring-
ly inconsistent is the only Interpretation which
can be put upon the action of the county board
in reducing the salary of the district attorney
and making this office a part-time office
The action of the board is an open invitation
to inefficiency and crookedness, and 1t slams
the door on the hopes of Kenosha county peo-
pie for better and more intelligent enforcement
of law 1t is a distinct step backward for
county which usually steps forward. 1t should
come as a great comfort to men who would
evade and violate the law and the crooks, garnb-
lers, bootleggers and other associated crlml-
nails should get ''kick" out of it.
It should hang up the Office of district at
torney as a dummy office to be Stunned by
every honest attorney, and should make OF 1t
an open haven for the ne'er-do-Well IN the law,
and the man who wants to compromise his con-
science to get little easy money. The carry
ing out of the policy outlined by the board
should make of Kenosha county the happy
hunting grounds of the bootlegger and the
crook 1t comes as near as anything could
come to putting official sanction on inefficiency
and crookedness in office.
The members of the board are evidently OPP
timistic and believe that in 1924 Kenosha
county is not going to need rigid enforcement
of the law. The inconsistency or the board is
shown in the fact that at the same session IN
which it reduced the salary OF the, new dis
trict attorney and put his office on part-time
basis, it provided for the election of an assist
ant to the present district attorney at a salary
as great as is to be paid the fellow who is to
hold the Job after the present officer gets
through
Certainly, if an assistant is needed now to
+l,o IF G not
going to be possible for a man to give part of
his time to the work and efficiently operate the
office year from now.
Efficiency in Office can never be secured by
reducing salaries and cutting the time given
TO the office A part-time district attorney is
Joke He at once becomes the happy haven
of every crook who wants to do business unmo-
Tested Within an hour after the 'part-tlme
official is elected he will be retained by most of
the crooks in the county as their attorney and
his work appearing for the state and the county
will either be hopelessly handicapped or the
county will be forced to employ scores of depu-
ties to appear in cases where the district at
torney must appear on the other side as the at
torney for the defense.
1t is difficult to divorce the interest of an at
torney from the interests of his client and it
does not matter how that client happened to
employ nlm A state attorney III ASHOSIld
county should be fearless and unfettered Off
cial He should have no entangling alliances
which must necessarily come along with part
time service. The work of the Office in this
county should take all the time of the best
man to be secured.
Thirty-fve hundred dollars would not make
the Office appeal to the poorest lawyer in ke-
nosha There is not lawyer in the city worthy
of holding this important office for the city, but
is able to make double the amount the county
offers. Cheap men in Office are expensive at
any salary. The county must compete with the
rest of the world for services worth while and
this competition can never be successfully car
ried on with reduced salary for officials. The
county board would have done much better had
they doubled the salary of the Office of district
attorney and thus invited men worth while to
seek the office.
We do not believe that single member of
the county board would be so short-sighted as
to follow this same idea in working out their
private affairs. 1t is to be hoped that at the
next meeting of the board some serious consid-
Grafton will be given to the resembling of the
action taken and that the board will withdraw,
as soon as possible, this open and official invita-
tion to incompetency and crookedness.
THE BRANCH LIBRARIES.