Henry Charles Lea Quotes
All governments are more or less corrupt.
Henry Charles Lea, 1825–1909, Historian & President, American Historical Association, “The Decadence of Spain”, The Atlantic Monthly, July 1898
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1st Earl of Beaconsfield
Samuel Langhorne Clemens, 1835-1910
The United States had just ousted the popularly elected leader Patrice Lumumba {640611}, and backed Mobuto. Lumumba was an idealist who was not corrupt at all, but were not so sure about our new protégé. Sadly he turned out to be one of the worst kleptocrats of all time, and he stole with more United States money than we gave to many nations in toto. Many believe that one of the reasons, corruption of our “allied” leaders was so bad lies in the wording of this cable. Note that to the State Department writers there was “normal” corruption as opposed to excessive corruption. Once that view is taken there is a constant battle to determine whether each new act of corruption is “normal “ or not, and corruption is simply lessened by pushing back against the most abnormal schemes. These critics advocate a zero tolerance for corruption especially with United States AID money. The State Department has been ambivalent and have often used the corruption system to bribe leaders to obtain national objectives.
He had not committed any felonies, but these charges were laid under the concept of “high crimes and misdemeanors”.
Allen was so audacious about his bribes that he had the CBC initials embroidered on red baseball hats and he, his fellow officers, and many Alaskan politicians actually wore the hats and joked about their bribe taking.
Henry Charles Lea was an American historian, civic reformer, and political activist. Lea was born and lived in Philadelphia.
