printing of money; the administration of the Revenue-Cutter branch of
the public service, and furnishes generally such information as may be
required by either branch of Congress on all matters pertaining to the
foregoing.
The routine work of the Secretary’s office is transacted in the
offices of the Supervising Architect, Director of the Mint, Director
of Engraving and Printing, and in the following divisions: Bookkeeping
and Warrants; Appointments; Customs; Public Moneys; Loans and
Currency; Revenue-Cutter; Stationery, Printing, and Blanks; Mails and
Files; Special Agents, and Miscellaneous.
A few minutes’ thought on the above will show that this is the very
heart of the government of our country. Its pulsations send the currency
through all the avenues of commerce; if it became bankrupt, disaster
would follow in every other department of the government, and the
prosperity of other nations would be unfavorably affected.
The Treasury building was completed in 1841. It has undergone
considerable enlargement and many modifications since that time. It is
460 feet on Fifteenth Street, and has a frontage of 264 feet on
Pennsylvania Avenue. It is Grecian in architecture. On each of the four
sides are large porticoes with most graceful yet massive Ionic columns.
The flower gardens about the Treasury are among the most beautiful in
the city.
It would greatly surprise Alexander Hamilton, our first Secretary of the
Treasury, if he could see every day at 4 P.M. the 3,000 workers pour out
of the 300 rooms of the great building at Fifteenth Street and
Pennsylvania Avenue, and be told that this is only the central office of
the Secretary of the Treasury. The salary list of this building alone is
about half a million dollars annually.
The Secretary is a member of the Cabinet, and receives $8,000 a year for
his services. He has two Assistant Secretaries, who each receive $4,500,
and a Chief Clerk, who has a salary of $2,700. The Chiefs of Divisions
receive about $2,500 each.
There are subtreasuries in most of the large cities of the Union; also
assay offices in Boise City, Idaho, Charlotte, N. C., and St. Louis,
Mo., to see that the money is kept pure and up to the standard.
The scales upon which the United States coin is weighed are said to be
so accurate that if two pieces of paper, in all respects the same except
that one has writing upon it, be laid one on either scale, the
difference in weight of the one bearing writing upon it will show in the
scale.
The cost of maintaining these subdivisions of the Treasury is nearly one
and a half million dollars annually.
The First Comptroller seems to be the important man of the Treasury.
Every claim is submitted to him. Not even the President’s salary can be
paid unless he signs the warrant and vouchers for its correctness. His
salary is $5,000 per annum, but it takes $83,000 to maintain all the
appointments of his office.
The Treasurer of the United States receives $6,000 per year. He gives a
bond for $150,000. He receives and disburses all the money of the
country and has charge of the money vaults. He has an army of
assistants.
The Treasurer’s report for 1901 says that the condition of the Treasury
as to the volume and character of assets was never better, and, in spite
of the unusual expense of the army in the Philippines and the raid on
the Pension Bureau, nearly $78,000,000 surplus remained in the Treasury.
On June 30, 1902, at the end of the fiscal year, the surplus was over
$92,000,000. What a magnificent showing as to the prosperity of our
country, and what an occasion for national thanksgiving!
No robbery of the Treasury vaults has ever been attempted. When one sees
the solid walls of masonry and the patrol of soldiers, on duty night or
day, with every spot bright with electric light, no such attempt seems
likely to occur. The entire vaults inside are a network of electric
wires. If, for instance, a tunnel were made under the building, and a
robber should reach the vaults, the wires would ring up the Chief of
Police, who has telephone connexion with Fort Meyer and the navy-yard,
so that within twenty minutes a detachment of troops could be on the
ground.
A few years ago a negro charwoman, in doing her cleaning, found a
package of bonds of more than a million dollars in value. That faithful
woman sat by the package all night guarding it, knowing that it must be
of great value. Her faithfulness was rewarded with a life position.
Bowed and broken, she was an historic figure in the building until last
year, when she died.
In this building all money from the Printing Bureau and the mints is
counted and verified. Here worn money, that which has been buried,
rotted by water or charred by fire, is identified by the skilled eyes
and hands of women. Of the charred money received from the great fire in
Chicago, eighty per cent. was identified, and new money issued in its
place. Sometimes money taken from bodies long drowned or buried has to
be handled. In such cases these women have the entire room to
themselves, as their usual neighbors find that business in other
quarters needs immediate attention.
[Illustration:
MACERATING $10,000,000 OF MONEY
]
The banks of large cities send in their soiled money weekly or monthly
and receive fresh notes in exchange, the government paying
transportation both ways. This soiled money is made into pulp, which is
sold to paper-makers at about $40 a ton.
It is only the old money that is counterfeited. Counterfeiters rumple
and muss their money to give it the appearance of being long in use.
Women are especially skilled in detecting counterfeit money. If among
the returned coins or notes one single piece proves to be counterfeit,
the amount is deducted from the salary of the examiner. Yet this great
government pays these women less than two-thirds what it would pay to
men for the same service, if men could do it at all.
From the government of the United States it would seem that the world
had a right to expect that ideal justice which each soul shall receive
when it stands in the presence of Eternal Justice.
The United States Treasury has charge of the Bureau of Printing and
Engraving, where all the paper money, postage, revenue stamps, and bonds
are made.
Bills, when sent from the Bureau of Printing and Engraving, require the
signatures of officials of the bank from which they are to be issued
before becoming legal tender.
Secretary Shaw has at the Bureau of Printing and Engraving his personal
representative, who locks up the plates, sees to the minutiæ of things,
so that even the smallest scrap of paper bearing government printing
must be shown, or the house is closed and search made till it is found.
The custom officers who insult and browbeat you at the port are of this
department. Once on arriving at New York, after being very ill all the
way from Antwerp, I had declared I had nothing dutiable, yet in spite of
that every article in my trunk was laid out on the dirty floor of the
custom-house. When I saw the bottom of the trunk, I said: “Well, you
have only proved what I told you. I believe you think because I am
trembling from weakness that I am frightened?” “Yes, that is about the
size of it; there is your trunk, you may put the things back.” “No,” I
said, “my baggage is checked through, and I am not able to pack it.” I
saw with some satisfaction the custom-house officer do the packing. It
had required my best efforts to get the stuff into the trunk, but he did
it.
This country has very silly custom-house rules on personal clothing and
small articles of art and vertu, and the average artistic standard of
dress and home ornamentation of the country is lowered by these
ridiculous embargoes.
In 1895 I was abroad with a company of Presbyterians; among them was
Professor G., of the Presbyterian Theological Seminary of California. He
happened to fall in with a little coterie of friends of whom I was one.
The most of us bought photos and souvenirs in almost every city. The
professor bought nothing. One day he said: “I would so like to have
brought my wife with me, but I was not able to do so. I shall be very
saving, so I can take her back a nice present.” When we were in Italy
some fool woman suggested a cameo pin as a suitable and beautiful
present for his wife. Cameo pins have been out of fashion for twenty
years. He purchased one of great beauty for $30. As we came into port, a
friend said: “Professor, you had better let some woman wear that pin for
you or you will have trouble.” “Thank you, no; I expect to pay the
required duty to my country.” “Oh, you do not know your country yet;
you’ll get a dose!” He paid $27 duty, and had not money enough left to
get home. I felt that this duty was an outrage. Things of beauty which
are not for sale should surely be admitted free.
The Treasury is the heart of the whole machine that we call the “United
States Government.”
XVI
SECRET SERVICE DEPARTMENT OF THE TREASURY OF THE UNITED STATES
Every one is interested in what is called the Secret Service of the
government. The name covers many things, altho we usually associate it
with the government’s protection of the coin and greenback currency of
the country.
The detectives of this department are often employed in assisting to
find out or run down robbers of banks, railroad trains, express offices,
etc. They are also used in detecting frauds at the custom-houses, frauds
in the departments of justice, pertaining to naturalization papers,
post-office robberies, and attacks on the Mint. In the Pension Bureau
they unearth fraudulent attempts to represent dead pensioners, etc. For
work outside of their own departments they are paid by their employers.
In the last report of the Secret Service, dated July 1, 1902, the chief
enumerates 253 persons convicted of attempt of counterfeiting currency,
and 106 yet awaiting action of the Court. The arrests for the current
year have numbered 573; of these, 413 were born in the United States; of
the 106 remaining, Italy furnished 65 counterfeiters; Germany, 25;
Ireland, 15; the others, except 6 Mexicans, are of the different
countries of Europe. Of the different States, New York produced 85
counterfeiters (including those who make false representations of any
kind in passing currency); Missouri, 47; Pennsylvania, 45; while almost
every State has one or more. Altered and counterfeit notes to the value
of $46,004.95 have been captured, and counterfeit coins to the value of
$19,828.47.
The Chief of the Secret Service says that the year has been fruitful in
that class of criminals who alter bills of small denomination to one of
higher value. Any change in a bill renders the maker liable to a fine of
$5,000, or fifteen years in prison, or both.
The walls of the Secret Service office are covered with samples of
counterfeiters’ work. The history of each would sound like a dime novel,
but the government is certain to catch any one who persists in
demoralizing the currency. Chief John E. Wilkie, a first-class Chicago
newspaper man, was brought East by Secretary Gage. He has called to his
assistance, as Chief Clerk, Mr. W. H. Moran, who learned his business
from Mr. Brooks, one of the best detectives any country has yet
produced. Other officials tell me the office has never been more ably
conducted than it is at present.
This bureau is urging that for persistent crime a longer penal sentence
shall be given. To illustrate the persistence of two of these criminals,
the following extracts from the Secret Service records are, by courtesy
of the bureau, submitted:
JOHN MULVEY, _alias_ JAMES CLARK, arrested October 16, 1883, at New
York, N. Y., for having in possession and passing counterfeit coin.
Sentenced, October 22, 1883, to _three years_ in Auburn, N. Y.,
penitentiary and fined $1.
WILLIAM STEVENS, _alias_ JOHN W. MURRAY, _alias_ JACK MULVEY, was
again arrested June 14, 1886, at Baltimore, for passing counterfeit
25c. silver coins, and was sentenced, September 7, 1886, to serve _one
year_ in Maryland penitentiary and fined $100.
Was again arrested under the same name October 5, 1887, at
Philadelphia, Pa., for passing and having in possession 25c. coins,
and sentenced, December 1, 1887, to _eighteen months_ in the Eastern
Penitentiary of Pennsylvania and fined.
JOHN W. MURRAY, _alias_ WILLIAM STEVENS, _alias_ JACK MULVEY, was
again arrested, July 10, 1889, at Hoboken, N. J., for passing
counterfeit standard $1, 25c., and 10c. coins, and sentenced, January
22, 1890, to _six months_ in State Prison at Trenton, N. J., and pay
costs.
JACK MULVEY, _alias_ JAMES W., _alias_ JOHN CLARK, _alias_ JOHN W.
MURRAY, _alias_ “PANTS,” _alias_ STEVENS, etc., was again arrested
January 12, 1891, at Pittsburg, Pa., for having in possession and
attempting to pass counterfeit 50c. coins, and was sentenced, March 5,
1891, to _two years_ in Western Penitentiary at Allegheny, Pa., and
fined $25.
JOHN MURRAY, _alias_ JACK MULVEY, was again arrested, January 25,
1894, at Chicago, Ill., for manufacturing counterfeit 25c. and 10c.
coins and having same in possession, and was sentenced, March 12.
1894, to _three years and six months_ at hard labor in the
penitentiary at Joliet, Ill., and to pay a fine of $1.
JAMES FOLEY, _alias_ JACK MURRAY, _alias_ JACK MULVEY, was again
arrested, February 24, 1897, at Chicago, Ill., for having in
possession and passing counterfeit silver dimes, and escaped March 22,
1897, but was rearrested, under the name of JOHN O’KEEFE, in New York,
N. Y., April 6, 1897, for passing counterfeit 10c. pieces, and
sentenced. May 12, 1897, to _seven years_ in Clinton Prison and fined
$1. Released from this prison February 27, 1902.
Another case from the records of the Secret Service would read as
follows:
One day the doors of the Moundsville, W. Va., prison opened on a tall,
slender, mild-eyed man, upon whose face and form time and confinement
had left their impress, and he passed out to take up again the broken
thread of his life.
This was John Ogle’s first day of freedom for more than three years. On
July 4, 1898, he was sentenced to four years’ imprisonment for trying to
increase the negotiable value of one-dollar bills by altering their
denominational characteristics.
Little more than a year before his brother, Miles, was released from the
Ohio penitentiary, where he had paid the extreme penalty imposed by law
for spurious money making, only to die two days later of paralysis, with
which he had been hopelessly stricken over a year before.
The Ogles, father and sons, during the past fifty years have had much to
do with the making of the criminal history of this country. George Ogle,
the father, was a river pirate and farmhouse plunderer, the Ohio River
and its tributaries being the scene of his operations. The sons, bred in
an atmosphere of crime, early embarked in independent unlawful
enterprises. Miles displayed pugnacity, intrepidity, and skill, while
John was shrewd, plausible, and cunning.
After serving five years for killing an officer who attempted to arrest
the family, and when but twenty-six years old, Miles allied himself with
the notorious “Reno” gang of bandits, and became the pupil and
confederate of Peter McCartney, that past master of the counterfeiter’s
art. How well he applied himself the records of the Secret Service will
testify. An even dozen skilfully executed spurious note issues were
directly traceable to him, despite the fact that two-thirds of his
manhood were spent behind prison walls.
John Ogle, while not possessed of the dangerous skill of his brother,
was his equal in hardihood, and, in his way, quite as detrimental to
society. For cool daring, ingenuity, and resourcefulness he was without
a peer in his chosen profession, and some of his escapes from the
officers of the law bordered on the miraculous. He was introduced to
prison life in 1864, being sentenced in the fall of that year to five
years in the Jeffersonville, Ind., penitentiary for burglary. Shortly
after his release he was traced to Cairo, Ill., with twenty-eight
hundred dollars of counterfeit money intended for one of Miles’
customers, and, after a desperate fight, was placed in jail. He managed
in some way to effect his escape, but was soon recaptured at Pittsburg.
This time he told the officers that he knew of a big “plant” of spurious
bills and tools near Oyster Point, Md., which he was willing to turn up
if it would benefit him. Being assured of leniency, he started with a
marshal for the hiding-place. _En route_ he managed to elude the
watchfulness of his guard, and jumped from the car-window while the
train was at full speed. At Bolivar, Tenn., Ogle was arrested, January
8, 1872, with five hundred dollars of counterfeit money in his pocket. A
sentence of ten years was imposed; but John had a reputation to sustain,
so he broke from the jail where he was temporarily confined awaiting
transportation to the penitentiary. Several months later he was arrested
and indicted at Cincinnati for passing bad five-dollar bills. Pending
trial, he was released on five thousand dollars bail, which he promptly
forfeited, and was again a fugitive.
February 18, 1873, one Tom Hayes was detected passing counterfeit money
at Cairo, Ill., but it was not discovered that “Tom Hayes” was none
other than the much-wanted John Ogle until after he had made good his
escape. So chagrined were the officers over this second break that all
the resources of the department were employed to effect his capture, and
but a week had passed before he was found in Pittsburg and taken to
Springfield, Ill., for trial. This time there was no escape, and he
served five years in Joliet. As he stepped from the prison door Marshal
Thrall, of Cincinnati, confronted him with an order for his removal to
answer the indictment of May, 1872. The Cincinnati jail was undergoing
repairs. A painter had left his overalls and hickory shirt in the
corridor near the cage where Ogle was placed. Adroitly picking the lock
of his cell with his penknife, he donned the painter’s clothes, took up
a paint-bucket, and coolly walked down-stairs, past the gate (which the
guard obligingly opened for him), through the jailer’s office, and into
the street. Proceeding leisurely until out of sight of the prison, the
daring criminal made his way to the river, which he crossed at
Lawrenceburg, and, discarding his borrowed apparel, struck across the
country, finally bringing up at Brandenburg, Ky., where he obtained
employment as a stonecutter. Respectability was, however, inconsistent
with Ogle’s early training; so about a week after his arrival he broke
into a shoe-house of the town, stole $200 worth of goods, and was
arrested three days later while trying to dispose of his plunder in
Louisville. Fearing a term in the Frankfort prison for some reason, he
informed the Kentucky officers that a large reward was offered for his
return to Cincinnati. This had the desired effect, and he was sent to
the Ohio penitentiary to serve five years.
Returning to Cincinnati at the expiration of this enforced confinement,
he met his brother, who had just been released from an eight-year
“trick” in the Western Pennsylvania penitentiary, and, altho no real
affection existed in the breast of either for the other, John needed
money, and Miles had money and required assistance in a contemplated
enterprise. An understanding was soon reached, and these two dangerous
lawbreakers joined forces in another scheme to debase their country’s
currency. Using the same conveyance employed by their father in his
plundering expedition (a house-boat), they started from Cincinnati and
drifted down the Ohio River, John steering and keeping watch while Miles
plied the graver. When the plates for a twenty-dollar silver note and a
ten-dollar issue of the Third National Bank of Cincinnati were complete,
Miles took the helm and John went below to do the printing. $150,000 of
the “coney” had been run off by the time they reached the mouth of the
Wolf River, and here the trip ended. Disposing of the boat, the brothers
started back to Cincinnati. _En route_ they quarreled over the division
of the notes, and separated with the understanding that John was to
receive $500 of the proceeds of the first sales.
Miles did not keep faith, and John subsequently assisted the government
officers in locating and securing his brother, who was arrested in
Memphis, Tenn., on Christmas day, 1884, with $6,000 of the counterfeits
in his pockets.
For a number of years thereafter John steered clear of offenses
penalized by the federal statutes, and successfully feigned insanity
when he could not escape punishment for crimes against the State by any
other means.
This is what happened to one town marshal who caught Ogle in the act of
burglarizing a store and failed to appreciate the character of his
prisoner. It was between two and three o’clock in the morning when the
capture was made, and as the lockup was located about a mile from the
scene of the crime, the officer decided to keep the rogue in his room
until morning. Carefully locking the room door and handcuffing John, he
lit his pipe and made himself as comfortable as possible—so comfortable,
in fact, that he was soon fast asleep. When he awoke his bird had flown,
and the officer’s watch and purse were missing.
XVII
POST-OFFICE DEPARTMENT
Every man and woman in the republic has a personal interest in this
department of the government. You pay two cents for a stamp, throw a
missive into a box, and start the machinery which requires 100,000
persons to run it. If your letter is for the Philippines, you use the
railroad and the ocean steamer, with many relays of men and engines to
perform your bidding. If your letter is for Alaska, you use the
railroad, the steamship, and the reindeer team to deliver it. Not an
hour, day or night, the entire year through, but men are toiling to
hurry your mail to its destination If your letter is for one of the
large cities, skilful men board the train, and as it approaches its
destination distribute the mail for each district, so that your letter
will not lie for hours in the central office. If your letter is to a
busy farmer who may be in the midst of his harvest and has no time to go
for his mail, one of the government’s faithful servants takes that
letter to him. Yet we are much more likely, withal, to growl at Uncle
Sam than to remember the faithful service we receive for so little
money.
The Post-office Department is one which is not yet self-supporting. The
last annual report of the Postmaster-General shows that the receipts
from ordinary postal revenue amounted to $146,531,778.67; the receipts
from money-order business, including for post-office orders which were
uncalled for, added to the usual revenues, amounted to $111,631,193.39.
The government expended $3,923,727.48 more than it received. This
deficit is occasioned by the second-class matter, which includes
newspapers and magazines paying less than cost of transportation. It is
also due partly to the glaring abuse of the franking privilege by
members of the Senate and House. If a description of what some of these
men commit to Uncle Sam to carry for them free of charge were published
they would hide their heads in shame. While this abuse continues we are
not likely to get a one-cent rate on letters, a rate which would greatly
benefit the entire country. Poor people are paying the postage for these
Congressmen.
The United States Post-office Department and the post-office for the
City of Washington are in a building on Pennsylvania Avenue, which
extends over an entire square from Twelfth to Thirteenth Streets, N. W.
The Postmaster-General is a member of the President’s Cabinet. He
receives $8,000 per annum for giving to his country services which a
railroad or great newspaper would consider cheap at $25,000 per annum.
There are four Assistant Postmaster-Generals who receive each about half
as much as their chief. These are appointed by the President and
confirmed by the Senate.