ence of actual abuses in the railway system of the country there is little room for dispute," it were not impossible to substitute for the term "railway system of the country" the term "everything human"—let us pass to the counts of the indictment:
I. Land-Grants.—Of these Mr. Hudson says: "We might even make allowance for the men who, having received a gift of an empire of lands and money for the construction of a transcontinental railway, proceed to bribe legislators and buy up public officials to prevent adverse action as to the ratification of past donations...." (page 6). "If the Government has secured the settlement of the Western Territories, the pacification of the Indians, and quick transit to the Pacific coast, by giving the men who built the transcontinental railways the money to build the roads, and an empire of land in addition, it is still permissible to ask whether it will not suffice to present the projectors of the next enterprise with the completed railroad, without adding the millions of acres of territory to induce them to take the gift" (page 8). This is hardly in what might be termed "the scientific spirit." But let that pass. The point is, does Mr. Hudson know what a land-grant is? In the free and buoyant West, where language is as bounding and breezy as its own prairies, a land-grant is often spoken of as a "land-grab." Mr. Hudson is more choice in his phrase, and calls it simply and grandly, a gift—a "gift of empire"—but his idea appears to be much the same. If the Government makes one a gift of land, that ought to be the end of it, by every principle of morality and justice, if not of politics. The Government is just as much bound by its gifts (barring the rule of construction to be noted) as any other giver. But Mr. Hudson says it is not a gift, exactly; but "a gift... for the construction of a transcontinental railway." Those who have tried it have been heard to affirm that "the construction of a transcontinental railway" is a matter of some considerable magnitude, requiring time, perseverance, and even labor. The Government, then, makes men a gift to build a transcontinental railway much as Mr. Hudson would make a builder a gift to build Mr. Hudson a house; and Mr. Hudson will even "make allowance for" men who will bribe legislators to prevent adverse action as to ratification of such a gift as that! Bribery is an intolerable crime; of all crimes most subversive of the public weal. But if bribery were ever, or ever by any possibility could be, justifiable as a last resort, it seems to me it would be justifiable to prevent adverse action by legislators who were determined to prevent the Government from ratifying a gift of land to men who had relied upon its honor and good faith even to such a trifling extent as to build a mere transcontinental railway! If the Government gives Mr. Hudson land, surely it ought not to take it away again, ratified or unratified. But, if it it gives him land in consideration of labor and services rendered and material furnished, and he deliver the material and perform the labor and services, surely he ought not
