sep 4, 1872 - The New York Sun Exposé

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Following a disagreement with Ames, Henry Simpson McComb leaked compromising letters to The New York Sun newspaper.

"It is the most damaging exhibition of official and private villainy and corruption ever laid bare to the gaze of the world. The Vice-President of the United States, the Speaker of the House of Representatives, the chosen candidate of a great party for the second highest office in the gift of the people, the chairman of almost every important committee in the House of Representatives - all of them are proven, by irrefutable evidence, to have been bribed. Surely, after this exposure, no man who has any respect for the honor of his country - any love for our institutions - will by his vote aid to maintain these men in place and power... it is almost beyond belief that our public men could have fallen so low. But there is no escaping the conclusion that they are guilty."

"The subsidies in bonds alone given it by the Government were sufficient to build and equip the road. Yet, in addition to this, Congress passed an act allowing the company to issue first mortgage bonds, and compelling the Government to accept a second mortgage as security for the millions of bonds guaranteed by it. Nor was this all. Tens of millions of acres of the public domain were thrown in as another nice bequest to this corporation."

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