The Sauk Centre herald., 1924-07-03
NOW FOR THE TRUTH,
PURGED OF POLITICS

A federal grand jury operating
under court of justice has now re-
turned true bills against Albert B !.
Fall, formerly secretary of the inter
ior, and Harry F. Sinclair and E. L.
Doneny, oil operators, on charges of
conspiracy to defraud the govern
ment in connection with leasing, OF
federal oil reserves. Civil suits had
been instituted previously by counsel
representing the two old parties to
safeguard or reinstate the govern
-ment's interests in the oil properties.
Thus we are well on the way to
an orderly, judicial inquiry into all
the pertinent facts having a bearing
on the charges made in the indict-
ments. cit is a consummation de-
voutly to be wished" Every right
minded American citizen is for bring
ing into the light of the public gaze
the truth and the whole truth about
the oil leases. Every right-ninded
citizen is for punishment of the gull
ty and for vindication of the innocent.
1t goes without saying that that is
what President Coolidge stands for.
1t is what the Republican party
stands for as avowed in its platform.
In the report of Senator Pat Har-
rison's speech at the New York con-
vention distributed to the press of
the country the Mississippian made
himself at once judge and jury and
convicted Fall of corruption and
thievery. That part of the keynote
was expunged, we are told, when Sen
ator Pat Harrison declaimed to the
convention. Somebody had dis
cerned the impropriety of this kind
of pillory an advance of a judicial in
vestigation and trial. The Senate re-
port on the oil investigation, which
was drafted by Senator Walsh, now
permanent chairman of the Demo-
cratic convention, roundly scored
Fall ct al. bat it did not contain a
verdict of Guilty"
When the case for conspiracy is
on for hearing the presiding jurist
will see to it that the husks of par
tisan politics are stripped off. So
far as bench and jury box are con-
cerned, the theory of the law is that
the defendants will have in court
neither friends nor enemies, but only
impartial citizens intent on arriving
at the truth and in duty bound to act
as the evidence and the law bid them
to act. Witnesses will be confined in
their testimony to what they know or
think they know Hearsay and rumor
will be placed where they belong. 1t
will not be permitted to counsel to
60 afeld in a wholesale attempt to
blacken reputation and to confuse
the innocent with the guilty for par
tisan ends.
AS one writer has observed: "The
congressional Investigations of cor
ruption in the executive depart
ments were partly discredited and
lost much of their force, not because
charges of corruption were false, but
because the Investigations that should
have been judicial and nonpartisan,
gradually tended to become political
and partisan. So we have a great ma
tional service, great national duty,
that should have resulted in a clean
up calculated to restore public conf
dence, regarded little obviously by
the people because of the suspicion of
partisan politics that clings to it. !"
The criminal and civil suits will
fall short, first, if they do not give
the defendants their dues, and, sec
ond, if they do not go to re-establish
a firm faith of the public in the gen.
eral conduct of the government as
clean and honest. On this score the
oil case and the Veterans bureau
case are on the same footing of inn
Minneapolis Tribune.