Evening star., 1924-05-16
BY CLIFFORD PINCHOT,
Governor of Pennsylvania.


Teapot Dome is symptom. A
symptom is an indication Of disease.
Teapot Dome is the outward and
visible sign that something is wrong
in Washington. And what is wrong,
as we all know, is that certain good
old-fashioned rules of official conduct
have ceased to be fashionable among
a few men near the top.
I am not speaking of the great
our government itself. That is as
essentially sound as ever it was.
But we might as well face the facts
first as last that treachery to the
public welfare has crept in. The
country has no more pressing task
than to see slackness and vcnality
and betrayal replaced by public serv-
ice of the kind we used to know in
the days when to question the per-
sonal honor of a cabinet officer was
simply unthinkable.
Honesty is the best policy" may
not be an exciting statement. We
have all heard it before. There is
nothing of the get-rich-quick spirit
about the Ten Commandments.
spirit among the public servants
upon whom rests the tremendous re-
sponsibility of guarding the property
and the interests of the people of
the United States.
The common virtues of loyalty, in
| tegrity and persistence in well-doing
command no headlines on the front
page. Their fruit is of different
character and more enduring. But if
honesty commands no headlines dis
| honesty does, and the whole country
| is we'll aware of what has been TAX
| ing place. Because Ii is aware, the
| whole country is ashamed, indignant
and sick at heart.
This is no time either to hide the
| facts or gloss over the offense. What
| is needed is neither whitewash nor
concealment, but a frank, open and
clear-eyed acknowledgment of the
| truth, acceptance of responsibility
where responsibility properly lies
and an unfiinching determination to
clean up the mess.
| Some people hold that the washing
of dirty linen is an ofrense, that the
| thing to do with dirty linen is to
| hide il and never hang it on the line.
wash it than to wear it. 1t looks that
way to me.
4
| There is no American whose hair
is gray but has seen this government
of ours administered on the highest
plane OF personal and official integ-
rity and honor. 1t was done by the
simple expedient of putting in high
Office men whose previous records
made misdoing on their part clearly
| impossible There are such men in
| America in plenty. and they can do
| again what men of the same type
| have done before.
| There is no Indictment against
| Americans in general in the oil scan
| dals, but an Indictment will lie if we
| fail to insist on clean sweep of the
| guilty, whether in the first, second or
| third degree, and on such house
| cleaning as Will carry with it beyond
| question the complete restoration of
public confidence.
| This much is sure, that one of the
greatest of all issues before the
American people is honesty in gov
| eminent.
| Teapot Dome is the glaring scandal
| of the moment. but in the weight of
| its influence on the daily welfare of
| the American people it falls far be-
| hind that wider, deeper and more alb
| horrent scandal which flows out of
! the failure to enforce the eighteenth
amendment. For that failure the
| Treasury Department at Washington
| is directly responsible.
| Under the law the United States,
and the United States only, has con-
| troll Of the breweries and alcohol dis
| tiileries, which are the chief sources