In Philadelphia, 1776, the corruption would have been understood at once. The only thing that has changed is how we respond.
There are seasons in the affairs of republics when the greatest peril proceeds not from foreign armies, but from domestic appetite. A tyrant who appears with bayonets may yet awaken resistance. More dangerous is the magistrate who comes draped in patriotism, while quietly converting public office into private estate.
It hath long been understood among free men that public office is a sacred trust. It is not a shop. It is not an inheritance. It is not a counting-house for the enrichment of sons, friends, creditors, courtiers, or foreign adventurers.
Yet what are citizens to conclude when the ruler’s family trafficks in new coin while the ruler governs the laws of that coin? When those who seek favor know the road to influence passes through his properties, his licenses, his foundations, his name? When foreign interests need not bribe in secret because tribute may be offered in forms more elegant than a purse beneath the table?
Whether every such transaction be unlawful is not the first question. More alarming is that they should become expected.
For where access to government may be purchased by hospitality, where influence attends the spending of money at the proprietor’s inns or estates, where kindred receive honors not by distinguished merit but by blood alone, the spirit of republican government is exchanged for that very courtly system against which Americans now rebel.
Nor doth the evil terminate with wealth.
The same hand which distributes favor may likewise distribute fear.