and corrupt the government. The road-builders of Oregon, first the "military road" makers, then the steam promoters, corrupted Oregon, just as the same kind of men have corrupted every other state we have seen. And Heney, unwilling to see Oregon with his Arizona Territory eyes, was able to look back and see Arizona with his Oregon eyes. He had fought the vice interest in Tucson. In Portland the vice interest was powerful, and he saw men who saw it there as he had seen it in Tucson—as the cause of all their woe. But Heney was to fight the land-graft in Oregon and he saw that the liquor interest was only a junior partner of the land and the railroad interest. No wonder then that he, having beaten vice in Tucson, was beaten in Arizona: incidents and men that he could recall vividly showed that he was beaten in the territory by the railroad, mining and land interests, which were working with the vice interest, as agent, to corrupt and possess the territory. Oregon, the young state, was only one stage higher, or lower, in the development of the System: a system of corruption, by vice and the railroads, of the people and the government for all businesses that want grafts out of the government.
A Vista of Graft
Puter, McKinley et al. were nothing but the land thieves who stole for big land grafters; and Heney heard that the railroads and land grafters, not only in Oregon but all over the Northwest and as far east as Michigan, used them. And protected them. For Burns's contribution to the picture was the thieves' jargon about the Puter gang's connection with, for example, Franklin Pierce Mays, a law partner of Charles H. Carey, the counsel for the Northern Pacific who had nodded approval when Fenton, the counsel for the Southern Pacific, explained to Heney at their little dinner the Oregon view of Oregon land grafting. And this connection ran on up, they both heard, to Hall, who had as an assistant in his office Ed Mays, the brother of Pierce. And Pierce Mays had a pull with Binger Herrman, the Land Commissioner at Washington; and Hall was in with Herrman and, above him, with the United States Senators and one or two Congressmen. The government, state and (so far as Oregon was concerned) Federal, represented, not the people, but the grafters! Heney heard, but he would not believe; he saw, but he could not imagine. Burns smiled. This meant, to Heney, that the United States Attorney, appointed presumably to represent the United States government and defend it from land frauds, represented the thieves! Impossible. Wasn't Hall prosecuting Puter, McKinley et al.?
"Let's get Hall in and sound him," Burns suggested. "If the Puter gang are in the business, they must have put through other deals, and if Hall knows one case, he must know others."
Burns had learned in the under-world that one George Sorensen, a member of the Puter gang, was Hall's source of information and that that was why Hall did not indict him. Heney called Hall into conference and, with Burns and Rittenhouse, his stenographer, present, examined him. Hall looks like a big, honest countryman, all candor and honesty; and he was able-minded. But he gave himself away that day. He said that he had been approached with an offer of a bribe of $5000. Heney's sudden interest recalled him to himself and he explained that the offer came not from Puter et al., but from a certain dentist in town who was one of the many citizens that had sworn, for $150 each, that they had lived upon and improved homesteads. Heney demanded all the facts, and when Hall said he must treat the matter as confidential because the witness was a source of evidence in the cases, Heney flew into a passion. He wanted to know why the Attorney-General could not be trusted. Hall flushed and Burns, seeing his embarrassment, made one of his shrewd bluffs.
Examining a United States Attorney
"Ah, say," he shot in, "we know who your man is. We are beginning to find out a few facts ourselves and we know where you get yours. You got this from George Sorensen."
Hall, convinced that they knew more, admitted that Sorensen was the man, and Heney followed up the attack.
"What case does the dentist come in on?" he asked. And Hall disclosed the other cases; better cases; cases easier to win; cases involving men higher up.
"What did I tell you?" said Burns, the suspecting." Was Hall a crook?"
