Show THE FACT that the President members of the Cabinet and their families as well as others connected with the administration are on pleasure and junketing trips about the country some of them in government gov-ernment ships and all at the expense ex-pense of the nation has given rise to severe criticism of the practice into which modern administrations have fallen of making the public pay for their fun as well as their work In striking contrast is an incident in-cident that transpired during the term of Buchanan the last Demo cratic President The Presidents niece Miss Harriet Lane was the lady at the White House and a revenue cutter having been named her in honor she was inclined to use it as her private property The first time she employed It as a yacht Buchanan reprimanded her and her second offense caused him to write her this letter I am sorry to find that your excursion to West Point on the Harriet Lane has been made the subject of newspaper criticism on yourself The practice however of employing national vessels on pleasure excursions to gratify any class af people is a fair subject of public criticism You know how much I condemned your former trip on the same vessel and I did not expect you would fall into a second error The thing however is past and gone and let it pass After a fair time shall have elapsed it is my purpose to cause general orders to he issued by the Treasury and Navy departments de-partments to stop the practice President Buchanan carried out his purpose and thereafter public property prop-erty was not used for private purposes pur-poses until Grant inaugurated the abuse since which the Presidents and the department chiefs have acted as if the nation were providing provid-ing them the means for a perpetual picnic The country needs a return to Democratic honesty and economy econo-my to make citizens rand officials remember that this is really a republic re-public |