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370 MARK TWAIN SPEAKING· 115 · At a dinner of the City Club, the talk was mostly about the scandalous state of New York politics. Mark Twain, Bishop Potter, St. Clair McKelway, Charles Sprague Smith, and others proposed correctives. The Causes of Our Present Municipal Corruption City Club Dinner, New York, January 4, 1901 The Bishop hasjust spoken ofa condition ofthings which none ofus can deny, and which ought not to exist; that is, the lust of gain-a lust which does not stop short of the penitentiary or the jail to accomplish its ends. But we may be sure of one thing, and that is that this sort of thing is not universal. If it were, this country would not be. You may put this down as a fact: that out ofevery fifty men, forty-nine are clean. Then why is it, you may ask, that the forty-nine don't have things the way they want them? I'll tell you why it is. A good deal has been said here tonight about what is to be accomplished by organization. That's just the thing. It's because the fiftieth fellow and his pals are organized and the other forty-nine are not that the dirty one rubs it into the clean fellows every time. You may say organize, organize, organize; but there may be so much organization that it will interfere with the work to be done. The Bishop here had an experience of that sort, and told all about it downtown the other night. He was painting a barn-it was his own barn-and yet he was informed that his work must stop; he was a nonunion painter, and couldn't continue at that sort ofjob. Now, all these conditions of which you complain should be remedied , and I am here with the utmost seriousness of manner to tell you what's to be done, and how to do it. I've been a statesman without salary for many years, and I have accomplished great and widespread good. I don't know that it has benefited anybody very much, even if it was good; but I do know that it hasn't harmed me very much, and it hasn't made me any richer. I am a statesman not for reward, bUl for MARK TWAIN SPEAKING 371 the peace of mind it brings me. I am too old to learn, but I am not too old to teach. We hold the balance of power. Put up your best men for office, and we shall support the better one. With the election of the best man for Mayor would follow the selection of the best man for Police Commissioner and Chief of Police. Now, to set this whole thing right is very simple. I know all about it. It has been said by somebody, and ifit hasn't it will be now, that we must learn wisdom out of the mouths of babes and sucklings or something ofthat sort. The whole solution ofthe question rests just there. My first lesson in the craft ofstatesmanship was taken at an early age. Fifty-one years ago I was fourteen years old, and we had a society in the town I lived in, patterned after the Freemasons, or the Ancient Order of United Farmers, or some such thing-just what it was patterned after doesn't matter. It had an inside guard and an outside guard, and a past grand warden, and a lot of other things, so as to give dignity to the organization and offices to the members. The party was called the Cadets of Temperance. Its members wore red merino scarfs and walked in church parades and picnics. On entering it a boy had to promise not to smoke, never to drink or gamble, to keep the Sabbath, and not to steal watermelons. In fact, you promised to leave behind all the liberties that were of any value, and pursue a career of virtue that was irksome to yourself and a reproach to all other people. There were thirty-four members of the party, and they were divided into two factions, the reds and the blues. Five of the members were purchasable, and they had to be purchased every month, when there was an election. They got to be an infernal nuisance. Every time we had an election the candidates had to go around and see the purchasable members. The price per vote was paid in doughnuts...

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