Year: 1873

wa vere told day after day shat Fed
eral interference in those States was mace
necessary by Ku-Klux disturbances and the
rekinding embers of disloyalty. Have there
been any Ku-Klux disturbances since the time
passed when the bugaboo could influence
votes Has the Administration been arDl-
trary in its interference in those states
Mr.. George f. Spencer sneaking INTO
the United States Senate under
pretended election by a Legislature chosen by
the Federal Administration, and not elected
by the people, answers the question. Was all
this of mischievous tendency Two State
Governments in Louisiana, one without any
pretense of legality being backed by FED
eral bayonets; a usurpation with no Color
of law about it, except that given by the lile-
gal assumption of power by drunken Judge,
being sustained by the army and navy-are
| sufficient answer. These facts illustrate
pretty clearly the tendency and direction OF
the policy we opposed.
| THE TRIBUNE condemned the theory and
practice of carpet-baggery, and was Kissed al
as a dsorganizer on that account. Ihe vague
talk Just now beginning to be formulated ana
shortly to develop into lobby WIFI
definite aim and purpose, about the General
Governments assuming the State debts In
Cured by thieves, is comment sufficient on
that head. If not, enter Senator Patterson Oh
South Carolina with the story of his purchase
of a seat in the United States Senate.


THE TRIBUNE had decided views upon the
| general subject of political corruption, the
need of reform in the civil service and in the
Administration, and the crying necessity for
lifting our politics out of the debasing and
materalistc tendencies of the party in power
II expressed those convictions publicly; it cen
sured the party and the imen under whose
direction affairs seemed going from bad to
worse. and it demanded on behalf and i'll the
name of the people that certain transactions
reputed to be disgraceful and dishonest should
be uncovered and investigated For this es-
pecialy it received the abuse of the politicians
and presses most interested in cOncealing the
facts and sitting inquiry. How truly its posi-
| ton was taken and how well founded were It's
charges of maladministraton and corruption,
let the story of the closing session OF the ALlld
Congress, with its half-hearted Investigations
its unwilling exposures, its drivel of "abso-
lutte condemnation that it made a weak
Autter to pronounce and failed in, its white
washing of bribery, its hating and stammer-
ing afiectatiOns of virtue, and its brazen theft
by which it put $1,000 of unearned money
into the pockets of every man who voted for
it, and 100000 into the pocket of the Execu-
tive who signed it-let these plain facts OF
shameful history tell.


What could the Congress that has just
skunk away with s1,46O0O0 of the peoples
money have done to vindicate more thoroughly
the position of THE TRIBUNE How could
it have more deliberately and completely sus-
tanned the allegations, for making which The
TRIBUNE was q few months ago denounced as
disorganizer and slanderer Which was right
THE TRIBUNE, that characterized in plain
terms tho conduct of the party, or the party
leaders and presses that denounced it for tell
ing the truth


1t is the hope OF all good citizens, and THE
TRIBUNE Joins in it with all heartiness and
not the slightest reservation, that the new
term of the present Administration may be
marked by wisdom, prudence. and honesty,
and that the party which supports it may be
able to purify ITSELF and make good its claim
to the confidence of the people. But we sub
nit that it enter upon its work at once,
and with something of modesty in its be-
havior. For the fact is that President, Con-
gress, and party are in power by means OF
successful false pretenses. Had the history of
the closing session Of the XLIId Congress
been written last October, President
Grant would not have been reelected,
nor would there have been Repub-
lican majority in Congress. The States
whose seats in the Senate have been bought
and sold would have voted differently; the
people who believed Schuyler Colfax and
Henry Wilson and the implicated Congress
men, would have had larger knowl-
edge of the facts connected with the
Credit MObier disgrace, and the honest
voters who could not then have been made
to believe that the representatives of the Re-
publican party would take a million and
half of money out of the Treasury by voting
it to themselves, or that the President would
sanction it and double his salary at the same
time, would have gone to the polls with
clearer understanding of the situation. No one
can doubt that with these things laid before
the people last September the result would
have been entirely different in November.


1t is well enough, perhaps, to recall the con-
ditions under which the dominant party came
into its success, and to remind its leaders in
all kindness that the people look now for
something beside promises. And it is only
justice to the honest Republicans who at the
polls last November entered their protest
against the tendencies of the party to say that
events have vindicated their action in the
most striking and significant manner.


THE ENTERPRISES OF AGASSLZ


The fgnre OF q nale student wasting the