If we were threatened with the continuance of the power which has administered this government, the conflagration of Chicago would not be more desolating than the effect of the continuance of this legislation would be upon the city of New Orleans; and the reason of it is this: when the city of Chicago was burned to the ground the people had at least the ground left, and northern and eastern capitalists have come there to rebuild it, while with us, capital is flying from the state, commerce is decreasing, and everybody who can is trying to get away.[336]
The cost of collecting the tax was excessive. Ten per cent of the amount was allowed for assessment and collection in all but portions of New Orleans where five per cent was deducted. The mere cost to the State of gathering in the taxes in 1871 was close to $500,000 out of a total of $6,500,000.[337] This made the cost of collection over twelve per cent.[338] The poll-tax in the second district of New Orleans for 10,146 persons amounted to but $1911, and of this sum, after the cost of assessment and collection was deducted, only $800.85 was left to the treasury.[339]
The legislative session of 1871 cost $958,956.50, although the Assembly appropriated only $641,400, the average cost of each Senator amounting to about $5300, of each Representative, $7300, making the average cost of a member $113.50 per day.[340] With this statement should be compared the cost before the war, when the largest amount ever appropriated for an ordinary session was $100,000.[341] The explanation of the enormous difference is to be found in the governor’s comment[342]:
It was squandered in paying extra mileage and per diem of members for services never rendered[343]; for an enormous corps of useless clerks and pages,[344] for publishing the journals of each house in fifteen obscure parish newspapers, some of which never existed, while some never did the work[345]; in paying extra committees authorized to sit during the vacation and to travel throughout the State and into Texas[346]; and in an elegant stationery bill which included ham, champagne, etc.[347]
The official reporter in the Senate drew the munificent salary of twenty dollars per day,[348] while each representative of a newspaper received a generous gratuity.
The enormous printing bills were, of course, a result of corruption. The public printing had cost the State in three years $1,500,000,[349] a goodly share of which Warmoth was accused of obtaining because of his fourth interest in the State paper.[350] Under the law the three commissioners named a State printer for the journals, laws, and debates, but they were also authorized to have the printing done by certain country papers. In addition the House and Senate claimed the right to select other country papers to publish these documents officially, to be paid from the contingent funds, so that thirty-five or forty more were so selected. The sum of $180,000 was paid to papers in New Orleans in 1871, outside of the official organ.[351] Many of the papers were sustained only by these contracts.[352] It was generally believed that men were sent over the country to edit these papers in order to build up the interests of the governor, while Carter, on the other hand, openly admitted that he gave his patronage to papers which would support the reform movement.[353]
The entire lack of conscience of the men who were administering the government came to light during the close of this year and early in 1872 with appalling vividness, until one turns away simply sickened by the tale of corruption.[354] Neither party nor class lines regulated integrity,[355] for reputable men of both sides were among the persons who offered bribes. As Carter put it, “There seems to be something in the climate here that affects both parties.”[356] Under oath one man declared that it was generally understood all round that any one who wanted to get a bill through had to pay for it. He thought there was a regular office opened down on Royal Street for that purpose where there was an agent for members. He had seen money paid right on the floor of the House. After the passage of the Chattanooga bill he saw a man with his hands full of money paying it out to members with little attempt at concealment.[357] Senators under false names were incorporators of many of the companies chartered and got their shares of stock after the bills were passed.[358] So wide-spread was the knowledge of their dishonesty that the story was current that the members had not even time to write their promises to vote the passage of such and such a bill, but had to resort to printed blanks.[359]
One of the dishonest measures, not mentioned elsewhere, should not be passed without brief mention, at least. In 1870[360] the legislature authorized the improvement of the old city park, a piece of ground which had been held for the purpose for many years. During the following year two politicians, Southworth and Bloomer, got a written agreement from the owners of a large vacant piece of land—the only large tract near the city—to sell it to them at a fixed price, six hundred thousand dollars. The legislature of 1871 amended the park law so as to allow the commissioners to buy land for the new park and made an appropriation for it. The governor now appointed as park commissioners, Pinchback, West, and Southworth. They next acquired title to the property, but paid only sixty-five thousand dollars, the remainder being left on mortgage. August 15 they sold one-half their purchase to the city for eighty thousand dollars, receiving sixty-five thousand dollars in cash, and one hundred ninety-five thousand in bonds. It was common street talk that Antoine complained that Pinchback had cheated him out of forty thousand dollars, which he in some way expected out of the deal.[361]
The evidence fails of proof that the governor ever received a bribe for his action on any bill,[362] but it is difficult to escape the suspicion of his complicity in corrupt transactions, if it be true, as was alleged, that no bill which the governor favored could fail and none that he opposed could pass. He admitted his use of his patronage to remove personal enemies and appoint friends “as a custom of governors”[363] and that the government had been guilty of some abuses created by his connivance, but emphatically denied the perpetration of any frauds,[364] declaring on oath that he stood before the Congressional committee with “clean hands.”[365] But his duplicity in other ways seems clear, while the fact stands out that with a salary of eight thousand dollars a year he testified that he had made far more than one hundred thousand dollars the first year of his administration[366] and by 1872 was reported worth a million dollars. He was surely willfully deluding himself when he uttered this boast:
I believe I have since I have been governor of the State, under circumstances and embarrassments of the gravest character, and under difficulties that I am surprised myself that I have been able to overcome, administered the State government in the best interests of the people of the State, and have produced as much harmony, good feeling, and prosperity as it was possible for me or any one else to produce under the circumstances.[367]