The Morning News

The latest bank wrecker pardoned by the President is William E. Barr of Missouri, who embezzled $20,000 from a St. Louis bank, and was sentenced to five years in the penitentiary. An application was made to President Cleveland for his pardon. Mr. Cleveland took all the papers in the case, went through them carefully, and refused to interfere with the sentence. And not only that, but he wrote on the back of the papers a scathing denunciation of bank wreckers generally, and of Barr particularly. President McKinley's endorsement on the papers sent him was in the two words, "Pardon granted," followed by his signature. Some one who has kept track of the matter says President McKinley has a record of pardoning one bank wrecker every three weeks since he went into office.