The Bureaucratic Feud Over a Federal Appointment
A bitter letter to the editor exposes a local Seattle political scandal involving broken promises and secret applications for a federal office.
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.
Your item in yesterday's paper, stating that Alex. Montgomery and James B. Metcalfe had filed applications to be appointed Receiver of Public Moneys at Olympia, has caused me a little interviewing, some of my friends being very much surprised to see the name of Mr. Metcalfe in that connection. No one could be more surprised than myself to find this item true. Let me tell you why. Mr. Metcalfe interviewed me in regard to being a candidate for Territorial Secretary; I favored the proposition, he became a candidate for that position, and I gave him my cordial support. He wanted the endorsement of the Democratic Territorial Committee; I helped him to get it, in spite of much competition, and drew up the resolution in his favor. Had he asked the endorsement of the committee for Receiver, he could not have gotten it. He went to Washington an avowed and endorsed candidate for Territorial Secretary. Several months afterwards, without having the slightest intimation from him, or anyone for him, I am suddenly informed that Mr. Metcalfe is a candidate for the office I knew I was an applicant for; and what is more surprising to me still, that his application is filed at Washington before mine. I must say, too, that I was one of the very last persons to say good night to Mr. Metcalfe on the eve of his departure from Tacoma for Washington, and that I then gave him an unsealed letter to Mr. Voorhees, informing that gentleman of my candidacy for the receivership. If all this is not enough to 'astonish' an unsophisticated gentleman like myself, what in the world would be?
“If all this is not enough to 'astonish' an unsophisticated gentleman like myself, what in the world would be?”
This 1885 political spat over a federal appointment mirrors the often opaque and back-channel nature of political alliances in modern Washington. The practice of trading support for positions remains a perennial, if now more digitized, fixture of civic power.
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