The Man Who Exposed the Bribe: Metcalfe’s Stand Against Olympia’s ‘Boodle’ Gang
In a rare display of moral courage in Washington's early political history, Representative Metcalfe turned a bribe into evidence, sparking a war with corruptionists that the paper defends as necessary for good government.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
THE CRY OF THE BOODLERS.
The whole boodle gang, in and out of public life, are earnestly and persistently endeavoring to work up a public sentiment against Representative Metcalfe. They assail him through the columns of their papers and attack him through their many-mouthed lobby at Olympia. They are making every effort to prejudice him in the eyes of his brother members of the legislature. They are determined to crush him and they will succeed unless the honest public sentiment of Washington makes itself felt.
It is needless to say that the rage of the boodlers and corruptionists is directed against Metcalfe, not because he accepted a bribe, but because he accepted it with the purpose of exposing the briber, because he made the nefarious transaction known. When he arose in the House of Representatives and declared before his colleagues and before the people of this state the manner in which his vote had been sought, he occupied an honorable and manly position. It is not strange that he should arouse the resentment of the hoodler and the briber, for his exposure put an end to their nefarious work.
It will be passing strange, however, if the people of this state permit those whom he had thus braved to wreak their vengeance upon him.
Metcalfe's hands are clean. The motives which prompted his act were pure and honorable. He possesses moral courage. He towers above those who so savagely criticize him as the innocent tower above the guilty.
This 1890s account of Representative Metcalfe’s confrontation with political corruption in Olympia mirrors modern struggles against lobbying influence and 'dark money' in state legislatures. Just as Metcalfe faced a coordinated media and lobby backlash for exposing bribery, today's whistleblowers often face intense professional and social retaliation for revealing unethical practices by powerful interests.
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