Human corruption

“ The many is hurt by the few. The economy is skewed and economic outcomes are distorted. This kind of corruption should be uprooted on utilitarian grounds as well as on moral ones. (d) Subversive Outcomes Some corrupt collusions lead to the subversion of the flow of information within a society or an economic unit. Wrong information often leads to disastrous outcomes. Consider a medical doctor or an civil engineer who bribed their way into obtaining a professional diploma. Human lives are at stake. ”

“ So long as there shall exist, by virtue of law and custom, decrees of damnation pronounced by society, artificially creating hells amid the civilization of earth, and adding the element of human fate to divine destiny; so long as the three great problems of the century—the degradation of man through pauperism, the corruption of woman through hunger, the crippling of children through lack of light—are unsolved; ”

“ As soon as the State recognizes the right of existence of this dung-heap, by its toleration and organization, corruption hitherto hidden and ashamed raises its head and becomes more and more bold, even dragging public organs into its sink. ”

“ Every thing around us is fathered by corruption, battened by corruption, and into corruption returns at last. Corruption is at once the womb and grave of Nature, and the very beauty on which we gaze and hang,—the cloud, and the tree, and the swarming waters,—all are one vast panorama of death! ”

“ Thus the strength of the moral condemnation visited by our society upon offences of a certain sort may become the most potent weapon in the hands of an unscrupulous boss or clique. The question remains whether the neglect or misperformance of duty procured by threats or injuries comes properly under the definition of corruption. ”

“ In these reflections, it has been the object not to ascertain a precise measure to which corruption has risen in any of the nations that have attained to eminence, or that have gone to decay; but to describe that remissness of spirit, that weakness of soul, that state of national debility, which is likely to end in political slavery; an evil which remains to be considered as the last object of caution, and beyond which there is no subject of disquisition, in the perishing fortunes of nations. ”

“ Without undertaking a summary of the argument on the various forms of business and political corruption the same point may be made with regard to them that was made with reference to the corruption in the professions, journalism, and the higher education,—namely that the major forms of evil are recognised and savagely criticised. ”

“ There will probably always be some attempt at corrupt practices, more or less, as there will always be some highway robbery. But the extent of those corrupt practices, the more or less, and, therefore, the damage and danger arising from them, will depend upon the popular maintenance of that moral standard according to which corruption is branded as a dishonorable thing, condemned as a crime and treated as such. ”

“ In the halls of legislation, corruption is unmasked, intrigue is exposed, and tyranny overthrown. Where is its matchless excellence inapplicable? The rich and the poor experience its effects. The guilty are living monuments of its exertion, and the innocent hail it as the vindicator of its violated rights and the preserver of its sacred reputation. In the cause of mercy it is ever omnipotent; bold in the consciousness of its superiority, and fearless and unyielding in the purity of its motives, it destroys all opposition and defies all power. ”

“ Is any one inclined to dispute the possibility of a happy change in society? Do they say that the nature of man is corrupt, and that he was made for misery and wickedness? Be it so. Certain as are opposite conclusions, I will concede the truth of his, for a moment.—What are the means which I take for melioration? Violence, corruption, rapine, crime? Do I do evil, that good may come? ”

“ You can not but know that we live in a period of chastisement and ruin; the enemy of mankind has caused the breath of corruption to fly over all regions; we behold nothing but unpunished wickedness. The laws of men or the laws of religion have no longer sufficient power to check depravity of manners and the triumph of the wicked. ”

“ The corruption complained of is but too universal, and it's to be feared too deep-rooted to be cured; it is the constant attendant of peace and wealth; and such is the depravity of our natures, that these blessings cannot be enjoyed without having this plague, the most sordid and detestable of all vices, accompanying them. ”

“ Corruption in some, and in others a perversion of correct feelings and principles, divert government from its legitimate ends and make it an engine for the support of the few at the expense of the many. ”

“ That those abuses and corruptions, which in time destroy a government, are sown along with the very seeds of it, and both grow up together; and that rust eats away iron, and worms devour wood, and both are a sort of plagues born and bred along with the substance they destroy; so with every form and scheme of government that man can invent, some vice or corruption creeps in with the very institution, which grows up along with, and at last destroys it. ”

“ The mouth full of cursing and bitterness, the throat an open sepulcher, the poison of asps under the tongue, the feet swift to shed blood, destruction and misery in their paths, and the way of peace unknown to them, are the clearest and amplest demonstration that men "have gone out of the way," "have together become unprofitable." We see the bitter fruit of the same corruption in robbery, adultery, gluttony, drunkenness, extortion, intolerance, persecution, apostasy, and every evil work—in all false religions ”

“ But I ask you in all candor and entreat you to consider it well: what will the effect be if corruption not only ceases to be branded with dishonor, but if men tainted with it are held up, not merely by some individuals, but by the people, as men to be admired and honored, as models for the emulation of the ambitious? There will, I admit, always be some highway robbery. ”

“ Thus, among us, property of various sorts and property in general, government in certain forms or in all forms, marriage, the church, medicine, and law, and those who represent them, are all denounced by small or large groups as graft and grafters. And indeed one need not be a thoroughgoing radical to observe that in some instances narrow and selfish interests have crept into these institutions, warped their highest ideals and crippled their efficiency. There seems to be little justification, however, for the employment of the word corruption in such sweeping fashion. ”

“ Ready to put up thousands or any unlimited amount when it came to a question of bribery or the corruption of public officials, they were too deeply impregnated with the germs of covetousness, too much the slaves of greed, to chance the loss of a picayune, even though well aware that by reason of their complicity in his fraudulent operations they were completely at his mercy, and that their indifference to his fate was planting in his breast those seeds of hate and revenge whose harvest must be their own dishonor and downfall. ”

“ But it is not any general or vague declamation on the progress of corruption, and the growing evils of society, which he has brought forward; he has given a close and cogent chain of reasoning, supported by a formidable array of historical facts, and shown how it is that the evils have arisen—how they bear upon the condition of the great bulk of the people, how they degrade their character, how their habits corrupt their morals and destroy their happiness; and how irremediable, under the prevailing ideas of the influential classes in society, these evils have become. ”

“ If in such cases we excuse and forget, why not also excuse and forget corrupt transactions that have been more than repaid by general brilliant conduct of affairs of state? No answer to this second question, however, can avoid the distinction that while certain kinds of personal immorality may affect the value of a man’s public service to an infinitesimal degree only, corruption in any part of his political career strikes directly at whatever efficiency he may possess as a public servant. ”

“ There is good evidence that the amount of immorality among what are known as the higher classes is every year increasing. Every now and then a scandal in high life comes to the surface; but the great mass of corruption is effectually hidden from the general public. ”

“ Is there no means of counteracting this growing and perilous mass of living, active evil? Is it ever to be in our midst the prolific seed of corruption? Is this gangrene for ever to eat into the vitals of our metropolitan population? ”

“ As a necessary and direct result of such disorder in the intellectual region, we see corruption erected into a recognized and indispensable means of carrying on government. So powerless have general ideas become, into such discredit have they fallen, that they no longer avail to prompt any course of action ”

“ Where men in corruption so rapidly tending, In morals and wealth in bankruptcy ending. That forging and stealing and breaches of trust, And ten thousand arts of the confidence game, And follies uncounted of men “on a bust,” Are follies and crimes of this age to our shame, Till angels who witness the folly so wide Extended from palace to farm-house and cot, Might wonder if mortals life's objects forgot, Or Merdle's position is man's common lot? ”

“ But far in excess of this is the evil which corruption inflicts by destroying the confidence of men in their social institutions. In the field of politics this evil is particularly great because of the wide extension of governmental functions in recent times and the great possibilities which might be realised by further extensions. ”

“ Even this remote prospect of redemption is confined to a select few; not only is the earth destined to be [Pg 61] burned with fire on account of its utter corruption, but the great majority of its inhabitants are doomed to eternal torments in the abode of evil spirits. ”

“ The worst scandals of the eighteenth century were relatively harmless by the side of this, which smirched executive, judiciary, banks, corporate systems, professions, and people, all the great active forces of society, in one dirty cess-pool of vulgar corruption. ”

“ A country covered with schoolhouses, where the children of the poor are put upon an exact equality with those of the rich, is not distinguished for corruption. And yet in the name of this universal corruption you are appealed to to become also corrupt. This nation is substantially a hundred years old, and to-day the assessed property of the United States is valued at $50,000,000,000. Is that the result of corruption, or is it the result of labor, of integrity and of virtue? I deny that my country is distinguished for corruption. ”

“ Corrupt practices may begin in, and at first be limited to, the business world, but, as we have just seen, they are likely to overstep economic boundaries and become a menace to the integrity of the state. As such they must also be recognised and discussed as derivative forms of political corruption. ”

“ Had that corruption availed so as to extinguish in them the sensibility to pleasure, passion, and natural scenery, which is imputed to them as an imperfection, the last triumph of evil would have been achieved. For the end of social corruption is to destroy all sensibility to pleasure; and, therefore, it is corruption. It begins at the imagination and the intellect as at the core, and distributes itself thence as a paralysing venom, through the affections into the very appetites, until all become a torpid mass in which hardly sense survives. ”

“ This cave within its womb confines The last result of all designs: Here lie deposited the spoils Of busy mortals' endless toils: Here, with an easy search, we find The foul corruptions of mankind. The wretched purchase here behold Of traitors, who their country sold. This gulf insatiate imbibes The lawyer's fees, the statesman's bribes. Here, in their proper shape and mien, Fraud, perjury, and guilt are seen. Necessity, the tyrant's law, All human race must hither draw; All prompted by the same desire, The vigorous youth and aged sire. ”

“ That the great body of our people are corrupt, or that they at heart approve of corruption, no one will be mad enough to maintain. But they are responsible before Heaven and to posterity for the criminal apathy they manifest in their silent sanction of the corruption and crime which are fast making the American name a synonyme for theft, for brazen impudence and unblushing rascality. ”

“ As these unfavourable conditions were and are being overcome it is safe to conclude, in spite of all superficial appearances to the contrary, that the relative extent and harmfulness of corruption are decreasing in the more progressive modern countries. ”

“ When it goes corrupt, when instead of protecting its members from every form of evil and disorder, it becomes an instrument of the forces of darkness, a tool of corruption, citizens have it as their inalienable right to demand a change in the existing order. ”

“ It also bears witness to the fact that many gross and threatening forms of corruption that were once prevalent have been eliminated from the life of civilised nations. Those which remain to afflict us are the object of vigorous corrective measures which are constantly being extended and strengthened. ”

“ Corruption in civic or national government, inhumanity in the treatment of the criminal and the unfortunate, the oppression of the poor, the brutal disregard of the rights of the weak and the defenceless, any one of these will draw out our souls in the hot and aggressive indignation which is the imparted fire of the Holy Ghost. ”