Evening star., 1936-09-27
Fifty Years Ago
In The Star

FEalSc IdLllcI tfldn DIANE, says 1Hc
Star Of September a, 1886, '"is due to
~ the commissioner of
Nepotism ana patents for his refusal
Civil Service. to retain upon his
clerical force those in
competents whose sole claim to position
consists in a remote relationship to some
historic American hero. The ingrati-
tude of republics Is a phrase notorious
for its misuse. No ingratitude is shown,
surely. to the fathers of this Republic
by refusing to allow the work Of the
Government they founded to be badly
done. On the contrary, such refusal is
an evidence that the present generation
Is not unappreciative of the blessings
handed down to it by its ancestors. The
theory that the Federal departments
are mere charitable institutions for the
subsistence of the progeny of the war
riors or statesmen has not even the virtue
Of sane sentimentalism. 1t is a pre-
posterous idea at the outset.
THE revolutionary era in this country
was one in which large families were
the rule rather than the exception. AL
lowing to each signer Of the Declaration
of Independence. for example, the mod
est average Of five children, the whole
body would furnish total of 275 de-
scendants in the first generation. Null
tiply these again by five and we have
1875 grandchildren. Multiply still again
by flve and We get nearly 1000 as the
number of eat-grandchildren But the
Continental Congress of 1776 contained
a mere handful Of the patriots who made
sacrifices for liberty's sake in those try
ing times. There were thousands of poor
soldiers who tramped barefoot over icy
fields and lived on acorns and raw grain
for the privilege of fighting against the
tyranny OF the King, and plenty of wom-
en- who fired their crops or poisoned
their herds in order that the British in
vaders should be left without subsistence.
The services of these patriots are as de-
serving OF recognition as the services of
the authors of the Declaration and the
men who succeeded them in office; vet
If We were to carry our national graft
tude to the extent of providing places in
the Government employ for the great
grandchildren to each of them, there
would not be work enough to 60 around
The whole basis of the theory is
false. The hero who has done well by
his country should be taken care of, If
such care is necessary to save him from
want. The wife dependent upon him
and robbed by his death or disability of
her chief means Of support should not
be allowed to suffer. So much is die
tated by reason and right feeling. both.
But at that point the Government must
draw line. If citizens remote an
cestry-his relation to persons with whom
he never came in contact and who
never knew of his existence-is to assure
him of especial consideration, we Amer
leans had better give up our professed
democracy altogether and adopt the po-
litico-social system of England, for in
stance, where certain families are today
enjoying titles and estates for no better
cause than that their first ancestors
came over with william the Conqueror
and that no member of the line has done
anything worth speaking of since"
1T was scarcely necessary" says The
Star of September 20. 1886, Ito make q
u.,, formal denial of the
ohAoohueu report sent out of
Scandal. Washington by CORE
spondents in search of
a sensation that the President accepted
his country home as gift from syn
dicate of real estate spectators. In the
first place, Mr.. Cleveland is not in the
habit of accepting gratuities of specu-
lators or anybody else; and in the second
place, certain circumstances attending
the purchase and known at the time to
every one who had occasion to watch
the negotiations preceding it leave no
doubt that the story was made out of
whole cloth-perhaps not by the corre-
spondentS-but by parties interested in
discrediting the genuineness of the re-
ported sale for cash."