Republican Expenditures--Democratic Retrenchment. The Tariff-Does Protection Protect ? Relations of the State to Religion and the Public Schools Mineral Wealth of the United States. ...... Rebel Cotton Claims-Past and Prospective Treasury Raids.. Executive and Department Doings... PAGE 209 216 222 225 231 235 240 244 249 252 259 260 266 270 PUBLISHED BY THE REPUBLIC PUBLISHING COMPANY. WASHINGTON, P. C, $2 PER ANNUM, IN ADVANCE. Vol. 6. PROSPECTUS. Vol. 6. THE REPUBLIC, A Political Science Monthly Magazine. THE REPUBLIC begins its sixth volume with the Centennial year, January, 1876. It has grown in public favor, and has received substantial encouragement from every State and Territory in the Union. Its early promises have been made good. Its pages have been filled with political information, with the suggestions of wisdom growing out of experience, with facts and figures carefully arranged, making a fund of knowledge, of itself, a valuable text-book to all interested in Governmental affairs. In view of the Presidential election, which takes place in 1876, the REPUBLIC desires to increase its field of usefulness by adding to its list of subscribers. its readers, many of the most thoughtful and intelligent citizens of the country. The deep It already numbers among interest expressed by them in the work, is to the publishers, evidence of an appreciation that thousands of others would entertain of the REPUBLIC, could it be brought to their attention. Will not our friends take upon themselves the slight labor of inviting other good citizens to add their names and their influence to a magazine that is published in the interest of public morality and good government. In the future, as in the past, the REPUBLIC will advocate an honest administration of Government, whether municipal, State or National. It will favor loyalty, honesty, economy, and personal ability as pre-requisites for office. It will give credit where credit is due; and impartial criticism whenever required. It will seek to hold up intelligence as the safeguard to National safety, and will defend our free-school system as essential to its preservation. It will advocate improvements, that experience may commend, in the education of the young; but will oppose all efforts to divide the public-school funds, or to introduce into the schools sectarian influences. It will advocate the perpetuation of the Republican party as the best, if not the only means to secure the preservation of the Union, and the impartial execution of the laws. It will labor earnestly to bring about such reforms as the spirit of progress may demand, and in all things seek to present those methods of administration, which the wisdom and experience of a century have confirmed. It will give to its readers a clear insight into the various branches of Government, by a faithful record of their doings. These are among the leading features of the work to which the REPUBLIC is devoted. It pledges anew its best energies to make the Centennial volumes worthy the Nation it serves, and the year it enters upon. To the Republican press of the country, co-laborers in the grand mission of preserving good government, the REPUBLIC sends greeting and thanks. If increased activity can merit a continuation of the good will expressed, our brethren of the press will still extend their hands in generous welcome. The Presidential campaign will bring upon all, increased responsibilities and new demands. The REPUBLIC will bear its share and perform its duty without fear or favor, keeping ever in view, that the highest reward that patriotism can win, is the consciousness that its efforts have advanced civilization and contributed to the cause of good government. TERMS: THE REPUBLIC is a magazine of sixty-four pages, published monthly, at $2 a year, or six copies for $10. The postage, in all cases, will be paid by the publishers. A few copies of the back volumes may yet be obtained, either bound or in numbers. Remittances should be made by postal money-order or registered letter. Address, REPUBLIC PUBLISHING COMPANY, Washington, D. C. 0 0 Deboted to the Dissemination of Political Information. VOL. VI. WASHINGTON, D. C., APRIL, 1876. No. 4. JENKS' BABY. Ginx's baby cried so piteously in England | compare it line by line with this review. For that the English, in a moment of maudlin the author is a man of such exact, extensive, compassion, sent its father to the British and explicit misinformation that an exposure, Parliament. That baby was the ruin of its to be effective, should follow every sentence parent. It turned his head. He is to-day of his essay on "The Transfer of the Pension the butt of the House of Commons, where no Bureau to the War Department." Necesprogenitorial merit is tolerated unless it sarily the answer must be longer than the "hails" from Windsor Castle-or "reigns" charges, for his report is a sort of Leibig's there. Essence of Errors. It is a compact sample of every form of misstatement-by misconception, by direct assertion of what is not correct, and by ingenious indirection and implication. There is another Jenks, who is envious of his namesake's political renown. He is in the House of Representatives. He, too, has been brought to bed of a baby. He calls it a Statement. Appended to it is the "testimony" of the men on whom he relies to prove that, as the Southerners say, he has a "sureenough baby this time." This Jenks, too, has had his head turned. Turned to the rebels-in wooing mood. Will they kindly consent to make him their tool? That is his high ambition. To secure this favor he is ready to throw suspicions of fraud on honest and loyal men, who are honestly, and in a loyal spirit, doing their duty to the honest and loyal men who were wounded in driving back the rebels whose smiles cravenly he craves. Leaving the Confederates, who created our vast pension list, who sent three hundred and sixty thousand of our soldiers into untimely graves, to do as they please with, to use or to abuse this their willing vassal, it becomes a public duty to arraign him as a bearer of false witness against the faithful servants of the Government which they so earnestly sought to destroy. Mr. Jenks' statement is No 93 of the House Miscellaneous Documents. The reader who is in possession of it should carefully I. His first misstatement is by the impli cation that the accounts of the Pension Bureau are not carefuly kept. He says: "$2,885,189 are claimed to be paid on arrears of pensions granted during the year, of which no separate account is kept.' "Claimed to be!" That is, it is probable that this amount is not correct-that the officers of the Bureau misrepresent the sum total, or embezzle it, or so complicate the accounts with others that it is impossible to discover any fraud-if there is fraud. It shows looseness of administration. That is the inference. What are the facts? The truth is that arrears of pensions are not "separate accounts" by the very nature of them. When a pension is granted it dates back to the period prescribed by law. The first payment to the pensioner includes the total amount that he is entitled to from the date of his pension, precisely as if the payments had been regularly made each quarter, during the whole of the time. The payments of these arrearages, that is to say, are made in the same way, the accounts are kept in the same way, and all the business is conducted in the same way-by the same the agencies outside and independent of the offoars, with the same forma and with the business of "mailing vouchers and checks.” sama vonchars girem satharegaiarquarterly The Bureau has the charge of 234101 penpayments of a pensione. To keep a separate, sioners, all of whom, from time to time, have accomnt of arrearages would only involve addi- more or less incidental correspondence with tion clerical work, while no new security, the agencies. The agencies also communicate and no further checks would be given, and regularly with the Commissioner of Penno practical purpose would be served by it. sions, with the Third Auditor, and with the 11. Mr. Janka' second point is ingeniously Second Comptroller. Previous to the repeal involved, and is a jeanitical example of in- of the franking privilege the official corre direction. He says: spondence of the pension agents with the Government Departments passed through the mails free of postage. Now such correspon dence involves a nominal charge for postage. That is, the Treasury is charged, and the Post Office Department is credited with $10,448, and this postal account, it will be seen, is nominal rather than real. It costs the Government very little to carry this correspondence, because all the machinery of the post office must run whether there are many letters or none. 8488,580 is paid to the officers and employes of the Barend proper: 840,000 to the detec tion of frand; 82%,800 to contingencies in the office; 857,291 to examining surgeons; 8427, 257 to fifty sight disbursing agencies; and $24,278 for stationery and postage of the agencies, of which 810,418 is for postage. While by law it is provided that a fee of twenty-five centa on each voucher shall be in full compen mation for all services, including postage. for mailing vouchers and checks, the amount of fees paid annually by the Government for those vouchers to the several agents is $214,528." The postage of the agencies for mailing vouchers and checks is paid by the agencies— not by the Bureau; but exclusively from the fees allowed by law "for mailing vouchers and checks.". Now, it is evident that the im This is masterly both in its indirection and misstatements, both in its sins of omission and commission. Let the reader note the effect of these statements in his own mind before reading the reply. A Democratic pa-pression sought to be created is that the sum per thus translates it: This item (of $10,448) is outrageously large in view of the law which prescribes a fee of 25 cents on each voucher as full compensation for all services, including postages, for making vouchers and chocks. But notwithstanding this provision of the law the agents charge postage, and the Government pays them in fees for these vouchers $214,523 Annually." Now here is the impression left on the mind of any reader not familiar with the facts, that the Government is robbed out of three distinot amounts: 1st, 10,448 for postage; 2d, of $23,278 for stationery; and 3d, of $214,523 for agenotes every year. This was obviously the intention of Mr. Jonks in thus presenting the statements. What is the truth? The items for stationery and postage, "of which $10,448 is for postage," are not on aocount of "vouchers and checks" mailed to pensioners, as Mr. Jenks could easily have ascertained, but are exclusively on account of the general correspondence and work of of $214,523 is paid to the pension agents in excess of the amount authorized by law. The truth is, that it is $67,262.20 less than the amount authorized by law. It would interest the reader to figure out this result-for no such result was ever before possible in America. No Democratic bureau ever spent less or took less than the law allowed. When salaries are due the Democrats are very loyal. They yield ready and full obedience to every statute that authorizes them to take money from the treasury. They are There are 234,821 pensioners. paid quarterly. This involves the posting of four times that number of vouchers annually, and an equal number of checks, or 1,878,568 letters. The Revised Statutes (Sec. 4782) authorize the agents to collect, not 25 cents, but 30 cents for each voucher. Multiply 939,284 by 30 and the result is $281,785.20; while the agencies charge the Government only $214,523, or $67,262.20 less than they are legally entitled to demand! III. Without omitting a single word, the next succeeding sentences of Mr. Jenks' | pension agent amount to $200,000 he does statement are these: "These officers of the pension service are 58 in number, who, by law, are entitled to an annual salary of not exceeding $4,000 each, and by a subsequent enactment 25 cents for each voucher paid by them. Each of these agencies, on an average, costs the Government about $7,700 annually, while several of the agents disburse less than the average salary. The income of many of these agencies exceeds $10,000, and quite a number almost reach $15,000, exclusive of contingencies." not receive $4,000, but only 2 per cent. on the amount actually disbursed-which for $50,000 would be one thousand dollars, with $500.added for clerk-hire, office-rent, and office expenses. If, on the other hand, he disbursed a million of dollars his compensation would be no more than $4,000, with a small allowance for clerk hire and other contingencies. If, therefore, the nominal "income" of any pension agent is $10,000 it represents, not compensation, but the fees allowed by law for preparing and mailing checks and vouchers-which is no more, or but little more, than the cost of postage, additional clerk-hire, and other ex No merchant ever heard of anybody pay- "Several of the agencies disburse less than Does the reader observe how ingeniously IV. Mr. Jenks, after thus raising a spectre by the old and black art of misstatement, thus, with wizard wisdom and face grave as the skull of Mr. Yorick, deceased, proceeds to explain how the dread phantom may be sent back to its sepulchre. constructed this sentence is? One would sible. "By having the pensions paid from the Bureau this whole branch of the service, in dispensed with without material detriment to the service, which, if we may judge by the past history of the Bureau, might easily be done without any increase of force; as since 1866 the force has been increased from 175 to 420 in 1875, exclusive of the disbursing agents, while the labors done by an inverse ratio has diminished in about the same All the money for pensions and salaries Before following the conjunctive Jenks, (who joins error to error as if afraid that each would fall if left unsupported,) into the discussion of the methods needed to secure exactness, which he opens in the last clause of this sentence, let us examine the preliminary error in this extract, and admit that "this whole branch of the service could be dispensed with, and without any great detriment to it." Why? Because the 58 agents and their clerks, or an equal number of officers, could be stationed in Washington, and the pensions could be transmitted through the Washington post office by money orders. But does not Mr. Jenks understand that there are two fatal, or at least Democratic objections to this system? Their dread names "SEC. 4781. Agents for paying pensions shall receive two per centum on all disbursements made by them to pensioners. There shall be allowed, however, over and above such compensation, to every pension agent disbursing fifty thousand dollars annually, not exceeding five hundred dollars a year for clerk-hire, office-rent, and office expenses; to every agent disbursing one hundred thousand dollars annually, not exceeding seven hundred and fifty dollars a year; and for every fifty thousand dollars additional, not exceeding two hundred and fifty dollars a year for like purposes. But in no case shall the aggregate amount of compensation to any one agent, paying both Army and Navy pen-are-Centralization and Benjamin F. Butler ! sions, exceed four thousand dollars a year.' "" General Butler proposed that method, and it Now, unless the disbursements made by a was rejected by Congress. |