Year: 1871

The greatest danger which threatens all
revolutions is the impatience of their ill-ad-
vised friends. The hope of deliverance from
the wrongs and the outrages of bad govern
ments begets feverish excitement not favor
able to calmness of judgment. People who
just before the uprising had never dreamed of
change for the better in their condition,
grow strangely petulaDt and querulous If
the work of a month is not done in
/ a day. OF course the privilege and
duty Of criticism ought never to be abdicated
by sincere and honest men; and the best of
leaders will bear watching. But there is nc
excuse for iudiscriminate grumbling and for i'm
patient attacks upon those who are doing their
work as rapidly as is reasonable and whole
some. There has been rather too much of this
causeless fault-fnding directed against the
Committee of Seventy, during the last
few days. There are many in the community.
it is true, who would be pleased to see the
gentlemen composing this Committee lay down
their pens, pretermit their resolutions, and,
taking the concrete halter in their hands, go
to the City Hall for the chief offenders, and
make an end of them. But this is not the
line of conduct indicated by the professions
of regard for law and order these grave Com
mitteemen 30 often indulge in. Others, with
more show of reason, insist that all four
of the best known Ring leaders should be
at once arrested and committed to jail.
| No one doubts that these worthless deserve
immediate and exemplary punishment. 1t is
to be hoped that they will some day be made
acquainted with the inside of some penal and
refornlatory establishment But the public in
terest would gain nothing and might lose
| heavily by premature and Intellectual effort
to force the execution of justice upon Them
| When the crimes of these men come finally up
for judicial cOgnizance, the case should be fully
prepared and the evidence overwhelming. For
this preparation, and the decision as to the
proper time for the movement which shall
crown the work, we may safely grant reason
able time to the eminent and vigilant citizens
who compose the Committee of Seventy.


1t only requires q moments retrospect to see
that the progress which has been already made
in the campaign of Reform has been of the
most important character. Just three weeks
have elapsed since the meeting of Citizens in
the Cooper Institute first indicated the true
depth and force of the popular feeling. At that
meeting, the honest men of New-York, of
every political communion. came together and





truce of faction, until this necessary work
of the hour should be done. The speech of
the Hon. Robert B. Roosevelt was the
first and most hopeful symptom that
in this momentous contest the friends of hon
esty and good government were not to lack
for powerful and efficient cooperation from
within the Democratic ranks. The promise
thus suggested has been perfectly borne out
in the composition and the work of the Citi-
zens' Committee. While 1t is true that the
original impulse and initiative came from the
Republicans 1t is equally undeniable that
every step Of our progress has been facilitated
by the frank and hearty help of Democrats
who feel that the only hope for the future
of their party lies in Its publication,
by fire il necessary, from the poisonous
elements that threaten to destroy it. Strong
and confident in this truce Of faction, the
Committee of Seventy and the great body of
citizens behind them have gone On from one
step to another, until the achievements of the
last three weeks would seem enormous If
viewed in the light of what seemed possible
month ago. The mere enumeration of the
successive steps in this steady progress toward
Justice and reform would be the best answer
to the assaults of well intentioned but injudi-
cious persons who insist upon it that nothing
has been done. First came the temporary in
junction of Judge Barnard; then the trial
hotly contested on both sides and
ending by making the injunction
permanent, and thus tying the hands
of the men who were robbing the treas
ury The Ring was thrown into CONSERVATION.
The majority agreed to sacrifice the Controller
as a scape- goat, which did not at all meet his
views. The Committee made use of this quar-
rel and the situation created by the burglary
of the vouchers, with admirable skill and
promptness, putting an honest man in the
Controllers office, and completely blocking the
desperate game of the remnant of the Ring
to secure themselves by a manipulation Of the
accounts The arrest of Haggerty was unques-
tionably due TO the efforts of the Committee,
and greater results are still expected to flow
from the judicial inquiry into this mon
strous official crime The mere lapse of