ISLAM

136 ISLAM VERSUS CHRISTIANITY
in those lands. Some newspapers circulate it, some
idle people gossip over it, and is again sent back to
oblivion. Viscount Bryce says :
"The palpable consequence of the recurring
scandals in city Government has been to lower
the standard of political morality. Sins frequent
and patent which go unpunished cease to
excite reprobation. The "boodling alderman",
and the aspiring young lawyer who coming
from a pious home, succumbs to temptation and
become "grafters" are familiar figures on the
American stage and arouse more amusement
than blame. Since nobody expects virtue in
a city politician nobody is disappointed when
he fails to show it, and many live down to the
level expected from them."*
In November, 1920, Governor Horace F. Graham
of Vermont was sentenced to from five to eight years'
imprisonment for the larceny of state funds. In 1921,
Governor Small and Lieutenant Governor Sterling of
Illinois were indicted for robbing the State of
$ 535,080.
The prosecution story related that the accused
were parties to a scheme whereby large sums of
public money were placed on
deposit in a "safe fund"
with an institution calling itself the "Great Park
Bank". It was alleged that the "Great Park Bank"
was not a bank at all, but merely a name under
which Small, Sterling and their confederates made
Modern Democracies, Vol. II, p. 117.