Of alleged abuses in the trial justice system the Governor stated his ideas thus:

Owing to the existing prejudices and to the difficulties of obtaining impartial decisions in litigated cases, the Executive has unfortunately been thrown almost exclusively upon the members of one political party for his choice of trial justices, and in many cases persons without the requisite qualifications have been recommended. It is very important that this evil be corrected. Complaints are preva

lent that in many cases a spirit of litigation is promoted and stimulated with a view solely to personal acquisition, and it is asserted that not only individuals appearing before these magistrates are charged extravagant fees, but there is too much reason to believe that in many cases the costs have not only been charged to the parties, but in addition have been charged to and collected from the State. I must necessarily depend very much upon the members of the Legislature for the character and fitness of trial justices, and I am disposed to consider education as an essential element among them. This would not only be proper in itself, but would afford an additional stimulus to its acquisition. By making a knowledge of the elementary branches an indispensable requisite to appointment for office a higher grade of service would be secured, as well as a more efficient performance of it.

The Governor's statements, thus given in his own words, confirmed the charge made by the white people that many of the trial justices then holding office were incompetent and venal. Governor Scott's own standard of qualification for this judicial office may be gathered from his acknowledgment that appointees should at least possess a "knowledge of the elementary branches." The efficiency and the influence of a judicial officer illiterate or, at the best, ignorant of the "elementary branches" may well be imagined. The respect for law and order, for the State government as its exponent, and for the judicial office in particular, was not much increased by the selections which the Governor or his advisers were pleased to make.

The Governor, whilst declaring that it was "highly important that the jury box should be placed beyond the reach of political influence or prostituted to the purposes of men who are themselves guilty of crime, and should be filled with our best and most reliable citizens," yet recommended the appointment of "commissioners of juries." The office of jury commissioner in each county was created and in more than one instance during the Republican regime it was plain that under the manipulation of that officer the jury lists had been corruptly tampered with.

Of this message the Senate ordered the printing of 2,000 extra copies, and the House 3,000.

ELECTIONS IN JOINT ASSEMBLY.

The term of Thomas J. Robertson as Senator of the United States expiring March 3, 1871, it became the duty of the General Assembly at this session to elect a successor.

The first apparent aspirant in opposition to Robertson was Niles G. Parker, the incumbent Treasurer of the State, who, according to the newspaper accounts, declared his readiness to put something like $50,000 into the contest. Whether Parker concluded that the sum named would not suffice or deemed the senatorship which should be bought at that price not worth the money cannot be said; but he did not enter the race.

The candidates voted for in joint assembly were, besides the incumbent, Gen. M. C. Butler, Franklin J. Moses, Sr., and F. L. Cardozo. Robertson was easily elected on the first ballot, the vote standing-Robertson, 87; Butler, 30; Moses, 23; Cardozo, 8. General Butler received the vote of all the "Reformers," and of one Republican-Frank Arnim, senator from Edgefield.

Mr. Robertson was nominated by Whittemore, who worked actively for his friend-the newspaper story being that Whittemore's devotion arose out of his gratitude for the assistance and support given him by Robertson at the time of the trouble growing out of the unlawful and corrupt sale of a West Point cadetship, for which, as already told, Whittemore was expelled from the House and was afterwards denied admittance, though reelected by the voters of his district.

Judge Moses, manifestly the superior of Mr. Robertson in intellect, experience and general equipment, was handicapped from the start by the circulation of the account of his action, in 1868, when it was reported that he had received some prominent negro at his house in a social way. Moses had promptly published a statement showing that he had received the negro in his study, really his office-which happened to be a room in the front part of his residence-and very flatly denied any imputation that he had intended to receive the negro either as a guest or as a visitor.

It was also stated that Moses had no money to spend in the contest. On the other hand the free use of money was, in more than

one quarter, expressly attributed to Robertson. The Columbia correspondent of the Charleston News wrote, Deecmber 7:

"It is understood that $25,000 have been used by Robertson's friends since last night."

After the election the same correspondent wrote: "We hear, in the knowing circles, that $40,000 was used by Robertson in securing his election. The price of votes was $500 apiece for the rank and file, and for some of the more influential as high as $2,000 was paid. Every one is 'flush' today, and money can be borrowed easily. Mr. Robertson, with the aid of Governor Scott, has inaugurated this year the reign of bribery."

Some months later the Washington Chronicle, an organ of the extreme wing of the Republican party, having been called to account by the Columbia Union (the Radical paper edited by L. Cass Carpenter, a carpetbagger, who was afterwards convicted of forgery), for criticising certain things in the Scott administration, retorted thus: "But Governor Scott is not the sole pivot on which turn our comments on South Carolina. Defiant as it [theUnion] is, we meet it in the same spirit. Will it explain the action of the South Carolina Legislature in electing T. J. Robertson United States Senator, when we know that he paid $40,000 for such election?"

To fill the vacancy in the judgeship of the First circuit, occasioned by the resignation of Judge Carpenter, the Legislature elected Robert F. Graham, of Marion. Judge Graham had been colonel of infantry in the Confederate army, had acted with coolness and gallantry in the defense of Battery Wagner, in Charleston harbor, had borne a good name among his own people, had been honorably dismissed from the South Carolina College in 1854, and had stood well at the bar of his own county. He was elected district judge by the Legislature in 1865. He had declared his adhesion to the Republican party in the summer of 1870-and to that declaration he owed his elevation to the bench. He died in 1874.

Montgomery Moses, of Sumter, a brother of the chief justice, was elected to succeed Judge Vernon in the Seventh circuit-the latter having previously resigned under the circumstances already related. Judge Moses had never declared himself a Republican. He had been for many years before the war engaged in law practice with his brother above mentioned.

NOTABLE LEGISLATION.

By an "act to provide a salary for the office of Lieutenant-Governor of this State" such salary was fixed at $2,500 per annum—the same to be exclusive of the pay ($10 a day) already provided for that officer while acting as President of the Senate. The actual sum received was thus about $3,500 a year.

The Clerk of the Senate and the Clerk of the House were authorized (subject to the approval of the two bodies) to provide by contract for the publication, in such newspapers of the State as might by them be deemed necessary, of the acts and joint resolutions of the General Assembly, and also to provide by contract for the permanent and the current printing of that body. Under this act was made the contract with the Republican Printing Company, hereafter mentioned, out of whose transactions grew the numerous and extensive frauds practiced in connection with the public printing.

An "act to promote consolidation of the Greenville and Columbia Railroad Company and the Blue Ridge Railroad Company" was a companion-piece to the act (already mentioned) to authorize additional aid to the Blue Ridge Railroad Company. Out of these two acts grew the schemes of robbery formulated by John J. Patterson and his associates-which will be duly noticed in the chapter on frauds. Both measures were passed by means of bribery-Speaker Moses, in the first instance, receiving a large sum for appointing certain men on the House Committee of Ways and Means and that on Railroads, and later for a like packing of committees and for working through the desired bill. State officials and members of the Legislature were likewise freely bought-bought with actual money.

By the act to create the "Sterling Funded Debt" to be used in retiring existing bonds the Governor was authorized to borrow a sum not exceeding £1,200,000, said debt to be represented by coupon bonds, bearing interest at 6 per cent. per annum, maturing in twenty years, the principal and interest payable in gold in the city of London. The execution of the scheme embodied in this act was placed in the hands of the financial board, composed of the Governor, the Attorney-General, the Treasurer, the Comptroller-General and the Secretary of State, who were required to place all bonds issued. in pursuance of the act in the hands of a financial agent, to be appointed by the board, resident in London—the act further providing

that the "financial agency" thereby created should not be placed in the hands of any one person, but should "be entrusted to the management of a responsible banking house of first-class reputation in the new and old world." This act, notable simply because it was one of the several schemes of the corrupt ring to make money by the manipulation of State securities, never became actually operative, and it was repealed March 13, 1872.

The tax levy for the fiscal year 1870 for State purposes was fixed at nine mills—an increase of four mills over the rate for the previous year-and the county tax was fixed at three mills, with extra levies in Beaufort, Georgetown, Barnwell, Newberry, Pickens, Edgefield and Laurens, in each of which the levy was four mills, and Clarendon, Darlington, Horry and Richland, in each of which the levy was five mills.

The State levy for 1871 was seven mills, with county levies about the same as those of the previous year.

The taxable property of the State amounting to $183,000, the State levy for 1870 was $1,647,000, and for 1871 $1,281,000. The county levies for 1870 aggregated $618,047, and for 1871 $549,000. The entire tax, due and payable during the year 1871 was $4,085,047 -this not including the poll tax amounting to $300,000. The rate of the property tax due and payable in a single year was, therefore, 22 per cent. The taxes levied for the support of the State Government in 1860 (on a taxable basis of $489,000,000) was a little over $400,000.

The aggregate appropriations for the support of the Government, including interest on the State debt, was $1,180,544, but the expenditures exceeded that sum. The appropriation for the public schools, included in the sum above stated, was $150,000.

The session lasted 106 days, and there were passed 110 acts and sixteen joint resolutions. The legislative expenses were distributed as follows: Pay of members, $103,000; pay of 349 clerks, $80,665; 14 laborers, $1,075; 21 doorkeepers, $2,997.98; 3 firemen, $532; 3 chaplains, $1,182; 2 janitors, $386; 144 messengers, $22,340.50; 2 mail carriers, $456; 170 reporters, $13,995; 124 pages, $6,004; 17 sergeants-at-arms, $2,830; 22 solicitors, $9,515; 17 stenographers, $4,636; claims and accounts, $13,358; sundries (wines, cigars, liquors, groceries, dry goods, etc.), $157,800.03; fuel, $22; stationery, $20,199; newspapers, $3,895; postage stamps, $650.87;