Democratic Sentinel, Volume 6, Number 37, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 13 October 1882 — A Roving Lot. [ARTICLE]

A Roving Lot.

Tlie pernicious and costly example of Grant in abandoning tlie seat of government,'and in turning over the great public business to irresponsible clerks for months, lias been adopted by Gen. Arthur as’worthy of imitation. He and liis Cabinet, with temporary exceptions, have been absent from Washington since the adjournment of Congress, and most of them are still wandering in distant parts of the country. According to the President’s own admissions, the Capitol and the White House are both healthy, and the summer has been exceptionally cool and pleasant. Hence there was no good reason for leaving a city where “malavia” is a convenient name for excesses. • The President is paid $50,000 a year, and is furnished with all the equipments of a luxurious household at the public expense, with a contingent fund of SB,OOO per annum, which is practically an addition to the salary. When Abraham Lincoln was President his pay was $25,000 a year and SI,OOO for contingencies. Mark the contrast! The Cabinet receive SB,OOO a year, and enjoy many privileges and perquisites little known to the public. These officials are servants of the people, and nothing more, whatever airs they may put on. Some of them, who went in poor, like Secor Robeson, have come out very rich. John Sherman, Windom, Cameron and others never killed the goose that laid the golden egg. They nourished it, and increased their stores. The President and Secretaries take oaths to perform their duties faithfully. They are supposed to be present to perform them. They draw the pay with punctilious regu arity, whether sporting with fashion at Newport, or cruising in public vessels, or luxuriating at Long Branch, or recruiting in Colorado, or wherever else they may be scattered, for free passes and the palace cars of monopoly carry them to tho extreme 4 points without expense. The great corporations cordially welcome them as chosen guests with a profuse hospitality. Ships of Avar ai - e- ordered for personal convenience by the President and the Secretary of the Navy at tlie cost of appropriations for the service. Meantime the rings, the jobbers and the corruptionists hold high carnival in the departments at Washington. Subordinates have full swing, and they make the most of the annual opportunity. The Governmental machine runs in the ruts of Grantism, Avidened by tlie hypocritical knavery of his fraudulent successsor, who demanded his salary a month in advance of its being due, and avlio stocked the departments with tho thieves, the perjurers, the forgers and tho scoundrels who in any Avay contributed to the theft of the Presidency in 187(5, Avhile Evarts, and Scliurz, and Sherman, and the rest of them Avero shouting for civil-service reform and glorifying their own purity! A sense of public decency was thought to be a sufficient pioiial re-

stra'nt against this culpable absenteeism and criminal neglect of duty. That sentiment has had no foothold since Grant became President. Ho defied it, and inaugurated the license which has been practiced for thirteen successive years, to the great scandal of honest government, and at a loss of many millions to the treasury, to say nothing of the demoralization of the whole public service iu every branch and in every bureau. "Without the least authority of law, the 9,000 or 10,000 clerks in the departments are allowed a month’s vacation in each year, with full pay. They may select their own time for the abseuco, or loiter about the streets and resorts of Washington at pleasuro. This privilege is granted by the Executive, who has no more right to give it than ho has to lake the million of dollars out of the treasury which the taxpayers havo to furnish for this absence from duty. The President and the heads of departments and the chiefs of bureaus do not, however, apply this rule to themselves, They are free to go and to come without restraint, and without loss of salary. They claim to be a privileged class, and they insist on special favors as following this assumed distinction. We propose that Congress shall pass a law at the next session to correct this shameful abuse. The terms of it may ho very simple, and need only a few plain but direct words, forbidding any public officer from receiving pay wliilo absent from duty at his own request or by any recognized practice of vacation. Stop the salary, and reform will follow os naturally ns day succeeds night.— New York Sun.