Year: 1870

On Wednesday night several men were
arrested in the lower part of Broadway in the
very act of committing what, in the simple
light of common sense, appeared to the
lockers on as ''dat burglary" They were
forcing the door of the Office of the Atlantic
and Great Western Railway Company. There
were dozen of them. Considering the hour,
character of their actions, the private watch
man on duty prudently appealed to the police,
and the whole party was conducted to the
nearest station, and subsequently to Police
Headquarters. There the transaction soon
appeared as one of the Erie Railway eccen-
tricties-merely one Of the little liberties which
the present management of that organization
seems privileged to take with the public peace
and private property, and for which it always
has ample legal warrant. Looking at the
transaction through the legal gauze thus
cast around it, he who had appeared as the
leader of burglars Stood forth as ''receiver,"
and whether such receiver is any better than
the receiver in the proverb remains to be seen.
They who had appeared as first burglar,
second burglar, third burglar, and so on, up
to the round dozen, suddenly became ''Erie
detectives" and lest it should be thought by
an obtuse guardian Of the night that such a
grand Transformation of character from mid
night burglars to simple railroad officials was
too startling for credence, behind these
worthless came as vouchers for their honesty
of purpose the voluble Fisk and Judge of
the Supreme Court of the State of New York.


Here was scene to illustrate that indie
riority to the irksomeness of routine and the
established way of doing things that dis
tinguishes choice spirits Of all times. These
things were well illustrated in the act of the
detectives" aforesaid, who chose to appear
as robbers when they were such excellent,
honest men; but how much more in the Judge
who, never fearing any accidents to his ermine,
rushed with such noble haste to see justice
done Some men would have waited for the day
light-as if that could make any difference to
Justice, with bandage on her poor old eyes.
Some men, careful Of their character, feeling a
necessity to seem honest as well as to be
honest, would have shielded themselves
behind the laws delay, and let the case take
its own time, and the actions of the parties
stand meanwhile on their merits as viewed
by the police authorities. Nay, there are
Judges, perhaps, SO pitiful in spirit that they
would have hesitated to 60 in the following Of
litigant lest it might give rise to some
whisper or suspicion of partialty and undue
leaning. Many judges, we say, would have
stood on these tri1es. But how happy ought
we to be in the possession of a Judge superior
to such prejudices-one whose regard to JUS
tice is such that he has no care in her cause
for the purity Of the ermine, and for his per-
sonal character cares not button


But what was the origin Of all this trouble !?
Erie, with an ambition to overstep State limits
and to reach out to the great West, desired to
extend her line by the length of the Atlantic
and Great Western, which, running from Sala-
manca, in this State, to Dayton, Ohio, consti-
tutes or leads to a line of travel to
every great Western city from Chicago
to st. Louis and Cincinnati. Such an
elongation of the Erie line would be a
grand affair; but how was the Atlantic and
Great Western road to be secured? It was
too big to steal outright and with open force,
and it lay in three States. Three State govern
ments, and the Judges to boot, make too much
of team for one company to drive so the
transaction had to be covered up with some
papers. Erie, therefore, leased the line, and
agreed to pay rent; but when rent day came it
did not pay, neither would it give up the
property. If the Atlantic and Great Western
men should endeavor by any active measures
to enforce their rights they would only destroy
their own property; and in the meantime they
were at liberty to take any expensive and
tedious litigation they chose, while the men
with whom they had bargained, standing
intrenched in legal technicalities, were col
lecting and pocketing the income of their
property. But the Erie men began to per-
ceive that their tenure under lease would not
answer all purposes 30 they started their
legal mill and ground out receivership,
having their man appointed by the Judge to
take possession under the law. He was taking
possession, more or less, on Wednesday night,
and it looked so much like burglary as to de-
ceive the police.


And the sanction Of our courts is given to
such transactions Our judges are as much
a part of the machinery used in the violation
Of law as the housebreaker's jimmy Is
our society and the whole fabric of law,
politics and morality rotten through and
through that these things can happen, or are
all the hitherto received ideas of right and
justice mere idle, ridiculous, nonsensical
uotiouss We do not believe that the world