ROTTEN APPLES

It is a lamentable fact that no matter whom Boston's voters may choose on November 2 as their new mayor, there seems little definite promise of a respite from the city's recent reign of political squalor. Of the six candidates now left in the running, there is just one who by virtue of apparent honesty and only average ability could not fittingly bear the standard of Tammany Hall.

The most colorful but perhaps the least desirable of the candidates is James Michael Curley, who has been mayor of Boston three times in the past. The demagogic chicanery of this political band-master and his consistent hostility to what is fine and liberal need no recital here. Just how much injury he inflicted on the people of Boston during his last tenure of office will never be accurately known, for immediately following it he became Governor and gained control of the Finance Committee which was just beginning to investigate the Dolan case and one or two other irregularities that the Honorable Mayor had left behind him.

Another Democrat seeking office is William J. Foley, whom Mr. Curley referred to as "the Dumb Dora of Pemberton Square," shortly after making him District Attorney. Since that time Boston has sunk steadily into the mire of corruption until now the town's law-breakers are not infrequently recruited from the police department. And if Foley is tarred with the same brush as his crst-while master, so is the Third Democrat, Maurice J. Tobin, whose election to the School Board Mr. Curley made possible. During Mr. Tobin's term of office one of the gravest scandals in the history of the Board broke out, resulting in prison terms for two and ruined reputations for several others. Mr. Tobin weathered this storm by declaring that he was ignorant of the whole affair.

In the Republican ranks only one entry is left who appears in any way worthy of consideration. For two of the candidates, Manser and Cook, who entered the race merely to split the ticket, were unceremoniously removed from the ballot, a rejection, which, judging from the quality of the other contestants, hardly speaks well for their qualifications. The most promising of the Republicans is Malcolm E. Nichols '99, whose supporters hail him as the new Messiah chiefly because he was able to reduce taxes in the boom years of 1926 to 1929. Indeed his lieutenants are handing out literature to show how low the tax rate was in these years, quite oblivious of the fact that falling property valuations renders this evidence somewhat questionable.

As though to add comic relief, this picaresque collection of individuals is rounded off with the Union Party candidate, Carleton Brett, and the hero of Little Italy, Signor Santosuosso. Although they may well be better suited for office than some of their opponents, the chance of their receiving more than 10,000 votes between them is slight.

So the travesty on Boston's once illustrious government will continue. The Treasury may be raided at will, while protection for life and property stands at a low ebb; offices that once attracted the finest men in the Commonwealth will be doled out to political parasites, barnacles on the Ship of State. The old order changeth not, and if Diogenes should come to Boston he would have a long, weary walk.