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Newspaper Page Text
, ' cfci v -? fc V , & .. v .. J c. . x v 4mL?f .- "n. v i 'w?.y; is rC2 .-' 4 - soMw' --" M - - SNMk r&-V77 X - A N Cfw VOL. 9. No. 14. LINCOLN, NEB., SATURDAY, MARCH 17. IS94. PRICE FIVE CENTS 5 -E V sr"ti'C. w.-t jfr&sa llfMEfi lZ'&A b?JSf&r fflarvm 43" 9 a . -' &w Mayor Weir's crusade has been going on now for over two weeks, and those persons who always oppose movements of this sort, on the ground that it is better for business to have everything run "wide open," can hardlv contend that Lincoln has suffered in any way by the campaign against crime and vice that has recently been waged. Whether the cause of purity has been appreciably advanced, we are unable to say. But certain it is that no harm has been done. Perhaps the principal objection that has been made to the mayor's course is that a closing up of the dives means a scattering of infec tion into the residence portions of the city. There is some truth in this; but the police are well acquainted with the offenders, and they can, ifthe proper effort is put forth, reduce this danger to a minimum. The Omaha aveIsior is informed that The Coukiki: has no in tention of making Bank Examiner Griffith the "scapegoat for all the trouble brought on those poor people by the Capital National bank." We merely take the position that Mr. Griffith is a tremend ous scoundrel or a hopeless ninny, and that inasmuch as he was and is paid to protect the interests of the public, and yet allowed Mosher to gut the bank, he ought to be summarily removed from office in the interest of the public. The Excelsior says: "The bank examiner was surely not allowed to see the true condition of the bank. The figures were falsified out and out." Such statements as this furnish no palliation for Mr Griffith's dereliction. The law contemplates that a national bank examiner shall be something more than a wooden man or dummy. Our contemporary remarks that Governor Crounse, before accepting the bond signed by Mosher and Outcalt for state money on deposit in the Capital National bank, made inquiry of three of the leading bank presidents in this city, Mr. E. E. Brown and Mr. S. H. Burn ham being among the number, and that these gentlemen assured the governor that the bond was good. "If three bank presidents in Lincoln, who would have good reason to suggest caution in such a case had they known of anything wrong, did not only not know, but actually recommended their brother bankers, what miht v pected of the national bank examiner who visited that institution but twice a year?" says the Excelsior. We do not know whether Governor Crcunse sought and obtained this counsel; but admitting that he did, there is nothing in this cir cumstance to lighten the enormity of Mr. Griffith's offense. The three "bank presidents" did not have access to the books of Mosher's bank, and it was impossible for them to know anything about the condition of that institution. All they had to go by was the reputa tion of the bank, which at that timo was good. But, by his own ad mission, the Capital National had for a long timo been one of Mr. Griffith's "hospital cases," and ho made very frequent examinations or the concern. For years he had been oi. the inside of the Capital Nationals operations, and with perhaps two exceptions, he know more about the bank's condition and its rottenness than anybody. Ho could not help knowing. He did know. That is what makeshim so inexcusably culpable. :. There can bo no satisfactory excuse for Griffith's remissness. He is a glittering example of official incompetency or a rascally accessor' in a tremendous steal, and he ought to be turned out. In referring to some of Mr. Griffith's other experiences with "hos pita cases," we said a few weeks ago that E. M. Morsman. of Omaha, upon the advice or Griffith, purchased Judgo Gaslin's stock in tho defunct City National bank of Hastings, and that he advanced money to put the bank on its feet again, all of which he lost. The Excelsior says this is true, and that Mr. Morsman also lost 8H.00O more in assessments. Our Omaha contemporary adds: "But Mr. Morsman informs us that he does not blame Mr. Griffith at all in the matter, nor does he attach any blame to him in the Tact that he also lost heavily in the failure of the Grand Island bank," another "hos pital case" where Mr. Morsman took Griffith's advice. Mr. Griffith is certainly to be congratulated on having such steadfast friends, who will lose money by him and yet grin and bear it, and continue to defend him. Some discussion that must be more or less annoying to innocent persons having been caused by our series or "Character Sketches," the author, "Teyn," desires us to say that the sketches are not writ ten for local application. The characters briefly outlined are merely superficial sketches of types that exist in nearly every community It must be a source or unalloyed gratification to the readers of the stolid Sunday Journal to note the attempt of the management to leaven the heavy mass with a rrappe of excruciatingly funny cuts or cartoons. Anything of this kind in our contemporary is a relief. Then humor appears to such excellent advantage in the Journal. It has a most effective bas relief in the practically unvarying dullness that exploits itseff in a measured and deliberate manner in that paper's columns. The unhappy editor of the Lincoln Herald, whose naturally sunny disposition has been appreciably clouded by certain un toward political circumstances that we need not mention, ob jects to our position on the income tax, and is pleased to make some very unkind remarks concerning the editor of this paper who, Major Calhoun says, would never be reached by the provisions of the in come tax bill, which it will be remembered, effects only incomes of 84,000 or over. For years the editor of this paper has made a studied endeavor to convey the impression that he is a man of wealth, with large estates and country houses and ships on the high seas, and it is cruel in the major, whom we have always regarded as our friend, to dispel the illusion which had become so effective. Humiliating