27 APRIL 1867, Page 9

THE ANGLO-SAXON CANKER-WORM. E VERY race has its own special political

vice, and ours is a particularly dirty one. Envy, the vice of French- men, is, perhaps, morally worse than covetousness, as malig- nity is morally worse than drunkenness, but it does not produce results so visibly degrading. In America, as in England, honest politicians are at this moment confessing to each other that the one dangerous canker in the body politic is pecuniary corruption, and are looking round almost in despair for an effective remedy. The House of Commons laughs cheerily when told that members have bought their seats, the New York Legislature laughs when informed that' members have sold their votes. But for the danger or cer- tainty of corruption, Household Suffrage in England would—. have no terrors for anybody, for the few people of Harwich. or Wallingford might be trusted as fully as the masses of Manchester or Birmingham. They would be more stupid, but they would be quite as honest, quite as national, and less likely to be led away by mere demagogues. It is the fear of a habit of selling votes which impedes every plan for a. thoroughly liberal settlement of Reform. On the other side of the Atlantic the evil has reached further, as was natural, wealth there gratifying two passions instead of one, the passion for distinction, as well as the passion for luxury and - ease. Bribery there, avoiding the polling booths, has invaded' the Legislatures, and from Congress downward is in all de- clared to be the master evil which threatens the country, and must be extirpated. The pressure of the Lobbyers, of the agents, that is, who persuade, menace, and buy individual• votes at Washington, at this moment disorders the whole financial policy of the Union. Every interest combines itself into a corporation, subscribes funds, frequently immense, the Ironmasters' Fund the other day reached millions of dollars, and endeavours to buy for itself a high protective tariff. Newspapers, lecturers, orators, and local authorities are all bought, and ordered to make "public opinion," which, again, gives bought members an excuse for denying their own con- victions, and injuring the true interests of their electors. If taxed with stupidity or ratting, they answer that public. - opinion in their State coerces them, and produce news- papers and speeches in proof. How far the evil has. gone in Congress we have no means of knowing, but the - distrust of it in American society, as to what we call private bill business, as to tariffs, and as to currency questions,. is very deep. Congress, however, is pure, compared with some of the State Legislatures. New Jersey has been governed for years by the Directors of a railroad, and in New York it is now affirmed that two-thirds of the whole Legislature are in the habit of receiving bribes. The Tribune and the Times, two journals absolutely opposed in ideas, tendencies, and political sympathies, the one Radical, the other Whig, the one Socialist in principle, the other a friend to individualism and the determined advocate of capital against labour, unite in denouncing the system which now prevails at Albany. The - statements, which are fully endorsed by opinion, are positively frightful. The Tribune names a railroad which has paid some 10,000/. a year to members for twelve years, merely to " pro- tect " itself from rival schemes ; which on one occasion bought a. whole Committee, and which on another paid 4,000/. to a Senator. for a single vote. On one occasion, out of nineteen Senators whovoted thirteen were bribed. "At no time within the last dozen years have there been ten men in the Senate or thirty in the Assembly who would vote spontaneously, or upon principle, for a city railroad grant, or for any scheme of a per- sonal character, or intended for the benefit of individuals. In every instance where such legislation has been obtained, money in hand has been paid for certain votes, and a contin- gent interest secured a still greater number." The very last stage in degradation has been reached ; members openly sell their votes, boast of their price, and as the Times puts it, the public believe that corruption is the rule, honesty the excep- tion, and "nobody cares."

There is, moreover, apparently no prospect of a cure. The as a rule either do not attend, or do not care. Unless strongly moved by local necessities, they do not, watch their members votes' on private bills, and they are,. moreover, infected with the laxity of feeling about money which always springs up in a community where money makes the difference between man and man. An Englishman par- dons secretly almost any meanness done for the sake of social distinction. He calls it Flunkeyism, but dines with the flunkey. A Frenchman will overlook almost any brutality which helps to extend Equality. He calls it violence, but re-elects the member who has sanctioned it. An American at heart holds the temptation to get money irresistible, pro- nounces a heavy bribe "rather too smart a business," but votes for bribe-giving director, and does not scorn bribe-taking member. It almost seems as if the assault on the iniquity would have to come from men impatient of the drain upon their pockets. At least, the real mover in the demand for purifying Albany is a Railroad which has been savagely amerced, which declares that it can get nothing, not the most reasonable alterations in its laws, without " black-mailing " the representatives of the people. A revision of the Consti- tution is called for, with the single object of checking bribery ; and the papers are crying for the abolition of the law which, by punishing briber and bribee alike, renders legal evidence almost unprocurable, the managers of this very railroad, for example, being liable to imprisonment if they confess the truth. The Tribune, however, seems almost to despair of improvement, looks round in vain for suggestions, and con- cludes by calling on the constituencies, which will respond by sending up men who will promise, and perhaps intend, to be honest, and once in Albany, will yield again to the terrible temptations put before them. They are terrible, mind. There are men who would not feel them, but to an average farmer who makes perhaps his " keep " and 250/. a year in cash, who knows that he must divide his property equally among all his children, and who has been trained from boyhood to regard a bank balance as the test of success, a gift of 5,0001., of a sum equal to the capital of his specie income, to be received for voting in support of one railway rather than another, is a terrible temptation. To under-rate its force is folly—just as great folly as to deny that the little greengrocer in Totnes who refuses 50/. for his vote, exhibits a spirit of self-denial as strong and as commendable as that of the Minister who quits the Cabinet rather than abandon his convictions.

The only final remedy, let the honest third in the Legisla- ture look round as they like, is a change in public sentiment, akin to that which has taken place in England about the receipt of presents by Judges, but we can suggest to our American friends two palliatives. They make their Legisla- tures too small, and they remove them too far from the public eye. Among 500 men there will always be a body of honest persons numerous enough to keep up the standard of morality, to make the corrupt feel their social contempt. Very little poison will spoil a minute spring, and opinion is apt to rot in all little communities. Totnes may be bribed, but Birming- ham is unpurchaseable, and that not only from the numbers of its people. So few can in a large community benefit by a job of any kind, that the interest of the whole overrides them, and envy and honour for once unite to make corruption detestable. This applies to the society in which members move as much as to the Legislature in which they sit, and the larger that society the greater the chance of purity. Our Commons buy, but they are not bought, yet we should be very sorry to see their sittings transferred to an obscure Mid- land town, where society was not strong enough to punish men known to receive private gratifications. If we are not greatly mistaken, the purest legislature in the Union is that of Mas- sachusetts, and it is almost the only one which sits in the social and commercial capital of the State. In Pennsylvania, where the money pressure is said to be nearly as bad as in New York, the legislative capital is a village. These, how- ever, are mere palliatives. The single permanent remedy is the spread of the true belief that a corrupt Member is in character identical with the one man to whom every creed alike refuses pardon,—the Unjust Judge.