A Shameful Situation

INVESTIGATE THE TALL TIMBER. 

Gradually the postoffice department investigations are swinging around toward bigger game. If an investigation of the railway and steamship postal contracts be ordered, bigger game will in all probability be aroused from its hiding place. It has been a matter of general belief for years that these contracts are honey combed with the biggest kind of frauds. The government is generally supposed to be defrauded of millions of dollars a year in the making of these contracts. Not only are the mails said to be enormously stuffed in order to get these contracts way up but the rentals paid for mail cars is entirely disproportionate to the cost of these cars. All this is as familiar to the committees of congress controlling these matters, as they are to the officials of the department who have immediate charge of the business, but the men who profit by this robbery of the public are too high up in party standing and too influential to be brought to justice. President Roosevelt has said that all leads would be followed to their end no matter where they conduct to or who is treed at the end of the trail. It is to be hoped he will be as good as his statement in all this and that no one will be allowed to escape because of his high position or standing in the party counsels. The public wants the facts about these matters and desires that the guilty be brought to book no matter who they are. By all means let the bureau presided over by the second assistant postmaster general be investigated. 

A SHAMEFUL SITUATION.

Again Capt. J. B. Ewen, the man who saw J. B. Marcum assassinated at Jackson, Kentucky, has had to flee for his life, while the man who did the murder most foul, according to the testimony of this eye-witness, lies in jail at Lexington supplied with all the delicacies and whiskey he desires by Judge Hargis, the county judge of Breathitt county, supposed to be the man who instigated the murder of Marcum, at any rate the leader of one faction of the feudests of that notorious county. There is little question but that Capt. Ewen told the exact truth about seeing the murder of Marcum, and there is just as little doubt but that Curtis Jett is the assassin, but there is grave doubt as to whether he will be convicted. One trial has already resulted in a disagreement and what the next will bring forth remains to be seen. While the most important witness for the people, the man who was so unfortunate as to see the murder, the witness who is depended upon to convict on the second trial, if conviction is to be secured, has been burned out of his home and is a wanderer compelled to become such or be shot down like a rabid dog, this man Hargis is banqueted and made much of by those in authority as well as by private citizens. It seems almost incredible that such conditions exist within one of the older states of this union, yet such is the fact. It is a condition of things which cries to authority for correction. Will Kentucky correct it?

Now comes the sensational statement that Commissioners Freeman and Sayre of the state tax commission have furnished the railroads information tending to give the roads aid in the matter of the suit the railroads have brought in the United States court at Grand Rapids to invalidate the assesment made by the taxing commission. Attorney General Blair is reported to be greatly incensed by this action and is said to have placed the matter before the governor and may ask him to remove these commissioners. If the reports of the action of these two tax commissioners are correct, their conduct would appear strange to say the least.  Certainly the state ought to be able to command the services of its officers in a suit like that commenced by the railroads involving millions of dollars. The sworn officials of the state are naturally expected to give their aid to the public and not to the enemies of the state. 

It would look to many as though there might be some advantage to the republican national committee to have a new vice chairman and a new secretary. Postmaster General Payne by his recent course and the developments in the postal scandals can scarcely have added to the strength of the committee before the country and the developments around the name of Secretary Perry Heath cannot have served to give the country and enhanced idea of his statesmanship and worth to the party organization. But possibly under the leadership of Mark Hanna, it may be considered best to "stand pat" and uphold the party rascals. 

The ruling of Attorney General Knox in the case of the United Stated battle ships which had been attached for debt owed by the contractors to concerns which supplied material will appeal to most people as being sound. He holds that states cannot block action where the nation's welfare is concerned. He holds that the work cannot be delayed and that the launchings will be carried out. Of course this ruling will by no means prevent the people to whom the contractors are owing a debt for material getting their money and there is a way for them to get it. The public welfare is paramount to this claim and should in no way be sacrificed for a private claim. 

Apparently President Roosevelt is a philosopher whose philosophy has a strong hold upon the people. Some time since he took occasion to say a word on the question of "race suicide," and lo and behold  the enormous grist of June weddings. Nothing like it is previous years! It was not generally supposed that he had such a hold upon the people, but since the June weddings began the utter uselessness of trying to defeat him for re-election has been made apparent. Nor is there to be any race suicide in this neck of woods. The French republic may offer a bonus for big families but nothing in the way of government aid is needed here since our strenuous president pronounced against race suicide. The Scriptural injunction will continue to be obeyed. 

Governor Bliss having signed. the bill creating a board of auditors for Washtenaw county, it is to be hoped that selections of good men will be made in the interest of the careful handling of all claims against the county. The right kind of a board will be able to do much for the protection of the interests of the public in matters which will come before the board. Every legitimate and proper bill against the county should be promptly met, but in no instance should the county be held up. A board properly selected with due respect to the qualifications of its members should give as careful attention to the business of the county as such citizens give to their own business and if this be done, then the public should and will be satisfied. 

A widow in Kansas City forbade a young man calling on her daughter. He did not go to the parental home any more, but met the girl at the home of a friend. On Saturday the young couple went to a minister and were married. They then went home to receive the usual parental forgiveness and blessing. Instead of giving them her blessing, however, the mother remembered only the Scriptural injunction "Spare the rod and spoil the child" and she proceeded to give the young couple a horsewhipping, driving them into the street. The irate mother-in-law also tore from the groom a portion of the wedding suit. And so while the youngsters are married all right they are still without the mother's blessing. Possibly what they did get they will remember quite as long, however. 

King Peter of Servia is not having prepared for himself a bed of roses. The military clique who murdered King Alexander has forced upon the new king as aide de camp and in other capacities, the assassins of his predecessor, thus ignoring the demands of the foreign powers. But what else could he do? These men are in control, they are upheld by the army and without the support of the army the throne of King Peter would be shaky indeed. While the surrounding nations abhor the manner of the taking off of King Alexander, there is too much jealousy among them probably to permit of bringing any real coercive measures against the assassins who constitute the provisional government, which government made Peter king. And so if King Peter's head does not lie "uneasy" then there is no truth in the old adage.