How little things change. In The Gilded Age, by Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner, a member of the Senate, Abner Dilworthy, is caught bribing a state legislator to ensure his reelection. Dilworthy knows how to respond:

Yes, the nation was excited, but Senator Dilworthy was calm--what was left of him after the explosion of the shell. Calm, and up and doing. What did he do first? What would you do first, after you had tomahawked your mother at the breakfast table for putting too much sugar in your coffee? You would "ask for a suspension of public opinion." That ...