Democratic Sentinel, Volume 3, Number 42, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 28 November 1879 — A PLEA FOR THE REPUBLIC. [ARTICLE]

A PLEA FOR THE REPUBLIC.

[From the Cincinnati Enquirer.] The straggle at hand in American politics is a straggle ior the preservation oi the constitutional republic. Shall the American principle remain? Shall the Democratic idea continue? Shall the simple, farmer republic last? All other questions are less than these in the politics of the next twelvemonth. The Democratic principle has a large majority of the people of this country as its adherents. Local self-govern-ment, home rale, exalting the individual, keeping the Government rather than men in subjection—this is the American principle. For this the fight is to be made in the year ahead of us. The peril of a one-man power overhangs the republic. In this great, free nation there is a demand for a “strong man,” a man stronger than tho constitution. When that demand is indorsed by an emphatic majority of the voters of the United States the end of the republic is at hand. The growing power of corporations, the growth of the power of great cities, „he alarming tendency toward the centralization of power in Washington, are dangers to the republic. There must be a union of all its friends to save it from these perils. Men who three or four years fgo were shocked at the suggestion that one man should be President of this republic twelve years now surround the silent man as he marches across the continent, and hail his candidacy for a third term as a lovely thing. There iff a longing for a Government, not within the constitution, but outside of and beyond it — for a man and a Government “stronger” than the constitution. This longing is an enemy of the republic and a foe of free government on this oontinent. It is to this danger, or these dangers, that the efforts of the friends of the republic must be unitedly addressed. The existence of the republic as it was is the great end. And we will not believe that the American devotion to the American principle has been extinguished. The same impulses that sent so many thousands of men into the war for the protection of the Union under the constitution will impel men to cling to the constitutional republic in t ! me of peace. The Democratic party has been the traditional party of discipline. Since the beginning of the century tbe Democratic devotion has been lofty and admirable. That discipline has apparently relaxed somewhat within a few years. For nearly twenty years the Republican parly has held the spoils; and spoils, to a great extent, make discipline. The Democracy no longer have an unorg n'zed or a disorganized foe to contend against; but, on the contrary, a party with all the machinery of Government, with all the patronage; a party audacious, unscrupulous and terribly resolute. The taking of the current Presidency by the Republican party was a wound inflicted upon free government, not so much because one man rather than another was placed in the ] White House, but because the methods by which a party took power were such as to diminish respect for republican or democratic institutions. The purity of the republic was, at least, brought in question. Her chastity was disputed. The virtue of the republic, which, in its early days, was as holy as wifely fidelity or maidenly honor, is become a topic tossed from scoffing lips to lips more disrespectful, and there are men in high places who, like a resplendent harlot, boast of the shame. Ail this is demoralizing. The love for the simple republic is diminishing. The respect for the constitutional powers is growing less. The Democratic principle, the American idea, is weakened in the affections of Americans. The holders of political power have, in order to obtain power, so inflamed sectional passion that there is almost a willingness to abandon the republic. The tendency is certainly and painfully in that direction. The duty of the Democracy in this hour is to preserve the republic. The drift is dangerous. Whigs and Republicans in the South have been driven by Republican misrule, by car-pet-bag rule, by ignorant, negro misgovernment, into the Democratic party. Republican misconduct in the South has consolidated the South, and now the Soutn is blamed for being solid; and not only the South, but the Democratio party North is blamed most outrageously because Republicans have made thh South “ solid.” Out of all this grows the peril to the republic, to the fundamental ideas of free government in this country. Sectional hatred, even after secession and slavery are forever buried, may crush out the devotion to the republic. The Southern States would divide politically, as they were divided throughout our history till 1860, with the removal of the temporary causes of their solidity. The Southern representation in Congress is made up chiefly of Whigs, not of original Democrats. When the spoil-holders of the Republican party will permit the sentiment of union to rise above the spirit of sectionalism one-third of tbe Southern States will be debatable ground between the Democratic and Republican parties. The Republican fear seems to be that the Northern States can only be carried. for the Republican party by perpetuating sectionalism. They must continue to fight the late war. The duty of the Democracy from this day till the next Presidency is determined, and thereafter, will be to secure, united effort for the maintenance of the republic. There have been divisions in the Democratic ranks; they must end. Personal ambitions mnst sink. The East and West must join. There must be concessions, harmony, The treatment of the black men in the South must be fair and equal. The representatives of the South, by silence or by temperate expression, must earn the confidence of the independent Northern vote. They must make special effort to do this, because they know that a Republican microscope is fixed npon everything they say and do. The .tendency of the Republican party is become anti republican, perilously so. The unjust cry is, “Better a* monarchy than a solid Sonth;” and the silent soldier walks stately from the Pacific to the Atlantic while the name of a third term is sweet in the mouths of men and a third nomination for the Presidency only waits his acceptance. The Democraticduty is prudent, united effort. The Democratic Congress must be moderate, and mnst not demand what the world now knows it can not get. The extra session fixed

the boundary lines. The Republican President can not refuse to grant again what he has granted once; the Congress should not demand again what it has been once, or more than once, refi s:d. The prime mission is the salvation of the republic from the tendencies that mean its destruction. The future of the Democracy thus lies in the path of the maintenance of free government, of Democracy. Let not sectionalism or centralism rise above republicanism.