TAMMANY TWEEDS

The Seabury investigation of the government of the city of New York has already shown one thing, that Tammany Hall has not reformed to the extent the public was led to believe in 1928. Perhaps Tammany was more "humanized" at the time of the last Presidential election. But since it failed to place one of its sons in the White House, it has returned to its old practices with a vengeance.

Investigations seldom get at the worst of a matter, but they usually bring to light enough to suggest what is going on. In this case Seabury may never find out how certain policemen were able to bank two hundred thousand dollars or how various judges became enormously wealthy on ten thousand dollars a year salaries. The public may never know why Mayor Walker and an obscure accountant, now in "voluntary exile" in Mexico, should have rented a safe deposit box together, or why in 1930 they found it necessary to change it for one four times as large. But anyone can draw the logical inferences from such evidence.

It might be noted, however, that with all its corruption and fraud, Tammany has given New York a very efficient government. The complete failure of the "reform" administration not many years ago, or a comparison with the civil organization of Chicago would prove this fact. But at any rate New York can no longer point to Chicago's corrupt government with an air of superiorty.