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Story
October 5, 1877
Buchanan County Bulletin
Independence, Buchanan County, Iowa
What is this article about?
The BULLETIN defends its challenge on county salaries and assessments against a rival paper's weak rebuttal, accusing it of sophistry and ignoring facts about unchanged expenses and necessary revenue for debt. It dismisses pleas for lower salaries, quoting a Greenbacker dismissing cheap officials.
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The paper across the way feels called upon, by the exigencies of its candidates in this campaign, to make a show of accepting our challenge of last week and attempts to "put up" on the county salary and assessment issue, but it is a sorry "put up."
What purports to be argument in its turgid column-article is the merest sophistry and appeal to class prejudices, and its pretended facts are just the opposite.
Its thin mass of verbiage upon the salary matter amounts to bosh, for the reason that it fails to controvert the fact established by the BULLETIN, that, with all the bluster of the demagogues, the expenses of the county on account of salaries will not be one cent more than last year.
Its splenetic complaint about the raising of the assessments is no better, for it ignores the necessity for raising more revenue to meet the county indebtedness the greater part of which indebtedness the Board was not responsible for.
It does not say how it would have provided for the debt, but leaves it to be inferred that it would have it repudiated outright. How do the people of the county relish that programme?
It cannot refrain, of course, from that pettifogging plea that there are men in the county who would be glad to do the business of the county for less than the salary allowed by law. We have not heard that any of its candidates have made a pledge of that kind, and if they should, and were elected on such a pledge, the courts would prevent them from taking the offices, on the ground that they had secured the election by bribing the electors.
The best answer we have heard to this kind of demagoguism, was the remark made by a shrewd old Greenbacker, the other day, to a knot of his party friends, who were discussing the salary question, in answer to the suggestion that men stood ready to take the offices on a salary of $600 a year. The old man said: "Boys, let's have a rest on that kind of nonsense. I don't want any of your $600 men. It's my experience that officials of that sort are dear at any price."
What purports to be argument in its turgid column-article is the merest sophistry and appeal to class prejudices, and its pretended facts are just the opposite.
Its thin mass of verbiage upon the salary matter amounts to bosh, for the reason that it fails to controvert the fact established by the BULLETIN, that, with all the bluster of the demagogues, the expenses of the county on account of salaries will not be one cent more than last year.
Its splenetic complaint about the raising of the assessments is no better, for it ignores the necessity for raising more revenue to meet the county indebtedness the greater part of which indebtedness the Board was not responsible for.
It does not say how it would have provided for the debt, but leaves it to be inferred that it would have it repudiated outright. How do the people of the county relish that programme?
It cannot refrain, of course, from that pettifogging plea that there are men in the county who would be glad to do the business of the county for less than the salary allowed by law. We have not heard that any of its candidates have made a pledge of that kind, and if they should, and were elected on such a pledge, the courts would prevent them from taking the offices, on the ground that they had secured the election by bribing the electors.
The best answer we have heard to this kind of demagoguism, was the remark made by a shrewd old Greenbacker, the other day, to a knot of his party friends, who were discussing the salary question, in answer to the suggestion that men stood ready to take the offices on a salary of $600 a year. The old man said: "Boys, let's have a rest on that kind of nonsense. I don't want any of your $600 men. It's my experience that officials of that sort are dear at any price."
What sub-type of article is it?
Political Editorial
Campaign Debate
What keywords are associated?
Political Campaign
County Salaries
Assessments
Demagoguery
Greenbacker
Debt Repayment
What entities or persons were involved?
Shrewd Old Greenbacker
Where did it happen?
The County
Story Details
Key Persons
Shrewd Old Greenbacker
Location
The County
Story Details
The BULLETIN criticizes a rival paper's response to its challenge on county salaries and assessments, calling it sophistry that ignores facts about unchanged salary expenses and necessary revenue increases for debt. It rejects ideas of lower salaries and quotes a Greenbacker dismissing cheap officials as unreliable.