Democratic Sentinel, Volume 7, Number 1, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 2 February 1883 — HORATIO SEYMOUR. [ARTICLE]

HORATIO SEYMOUR.

Views of the Retired Statesman Upon the Present Political Situation—The Progress of Centralization Sinee the Close* of the War Revalaion of PahUc Opinion in 1888. In an article upon the political situation published in the North American Revieic, ex-Gov. Horatio Seymour, of New York, says: The results of this year’s election have excited much comment. At first view they seemed to be due to the dissensions in the Republican ranks, but on closer study their explanation i» found to lie deeper; it is a “ground swell, ” of which all surface disturbances are effects, not causes. To get an understanding of this subject it is necessary that we dismiss from our minds all partisan prejudices, for it concerns the organic principles of our Government, and demands a thoughtful consideration. The American people are divided into two parties; these grow out of the form of our Government; each is needed for its preservation. All agree that there is a division line between the powers of the General and the State Governments. To enlarge unduly the power of the States, endangers our Union. To extend unduly the jurisdiction of Congress leads to corruption. For a long time the Democratic party had the direction of affairs. The division of our country into free and slave States led the latter, out of fear of Federal interference, to carry the doetrino of State rights too far. Civil war was the result. After the contest was over there was a reaction against the doctrine of State rights. A feeling grew up that the stability of the General Government might be insured by giving to it larger powers. Jurisdiction was mistaken for strength. The sentiment was carried too far, for, while State rights have been ujidulv magnified, they still exist, and are as sacred as the rights of the General Government.

Our oldest political organisms are those needed by local communities, and which are designed for the preservation of the rights of the respective localities. These organizations have different names, but they are substantially what we now call towns. Notwithstanding the diversities of language and lineage in our country the people gave like powers and forms to their local governments. Our Union and constitution grew out of these facts. Their existence depends upon preserving the boundaries between the different governmental functions thus established. At the close of the civil w ar public feeling was so excited that a prejudice grew up against the term “rights of States.”

At the last Presidential election the Republican party’selected,as its candidate one who went very far in favor of “centralization.” He expressed his joy that power gravitated more and more toward the national capital. A member of the Cabinet in 1880, speaking of our Government in an address which was circulated by the Republican organization, said: “It must not be forgotten that this Government is no longer the simple machinery it was in the early days of the republic. The bucolic age of America is over. * * * They are the interests of nearly 50,000,000 of people, spread over an immense surface, with occupations of endless variety and great magnitude, producing interests so pushing, powerful and so constantly appealing to the Government, rightfully or wrongfully, that the requirements of statesmanship demanded in this age are fa/different from those which sufficed a century ago.” To show how far recent administrations have drifted from the positions held by the patriots who formed the constitution, it will only be necessary to refer to the warnings uttered by Washington in his farewell address. It is remarkable not only for its wisdom and foresight, but from the fact that it aptly describes the condition into which we' have been drawn by the influence of destructive currents: “The spirit of encroachment tends to consolidate the powers of all the departments in one, and thus to create, whatever the form of Government, a real despotism. A just estimate of that love of power and proneness to abuse it which predominates in the human heart is sufficient to satisfy us of the truth of this position. The necessity of reciprocal checks in the exercise of “political power by dividing and distributing it into different depositories and constituting each the guardian of the public weal against invasion by the others has been evinced by experiments, ancient and modern, some of them in our own country and under our own eyes. To preserve them must be as necessary as to institute them.” The words uttered by Washington and by Gen. Garfield respectively show the difference between the policy now most favored by the Republican party and that advocated by the patriots of the Revolution.

I have no intention tojmpeach the patriotism of those who Iwld opinions which grew out of the excitements of civil war. But, in their eagerness to extend the jurisdiction of the General Government, they went too far, and exposed the country to unforeseen dangers. A review of the events of a few years past, as set forth by Republican journals, will make this clear. The capital of our country is on one side of this continent, at a great distance from most parts of the Union, without commerce or manufactures, and ordinarily no one has occasion to visit it except for business with officials. Lavish expenditures are as necessary for its citizens as good harvests are for the farmers. Every appropriation in favor of points however remote is in some degree a benefit to its citizens; it makes a clerkship or some employment for a resident. Hence Washington has rapidly grown from a small -place to a city of 150,000 inhabitants. It cannot be denied that the views of its people regarding expenditures arg affected by their interests, and that they make the local atmosphere which members of the Governmeut breathe when they reach the capital. It is not necessary to repeat the history of the corruptions which have brought dishonor upon the American people, and which have occasioned demands for reform from all parts of the Union. Those who have lived under these baleful influences, when they return to their homes, find they have been misled by the local ideas of the capital. The increase in the revenues of tho Government has given to Congressmen vast sums of money to vote away for various purposes. Much is used for the payment of the public debt, much

is voted away for the benefit of those who have schemes which they wish to have executed at the public cost. This draws from all parts of the Unidn shrewd and unscrupulous men, who seek a share of the lands or money given away. Within a few years our Government has assumed a new aspect. It is now made np of a President, who holds for four years, and whose energies are absorbed by the distribution of places: of Senators, whose terms are six years, and who are engrossed by legislation touching our domestic affairs or our relations to other countries —they, too, are pressed with the labor of attending to the personal interests of their constituents seeking place or legislation; of members of the House, who .hold for two years, in which time they cannot attend to all the calls made upon them antUnt the same time' learn the details of ottr Government, or of the abuses which are growing up. The fourth body is the “lobby,” rapidly increasing in numbers, who hold tlieir places for life. Many of them make their homes in Washington; they alone are familiar with affairs, and acquainted with the clerks and other’s who fill the departments. These are the men who. in the language of the late member of the Cabinet already quoted, are “producing aspirations and interests so powerful and complicated in their nature and so constantlv appealing to the Government, riglitfully or wrongfully, that the requirements of statesmanship are far different from those which sufficed a century ago.” Republican journals have made it known throughout the land that this last-named organization is so potent that it defies the Government itself in its own courts, by the aid of its own agents. These facts liave aroused the attention of patriotic Republicans, who find that they are the results of their own doctrines of centralization. The fruit of centralization is found to be a system of temptations which will grow worse as our populatioif inoreases in number and wealth. In dess than thirty years this country will contain 100,-’ 000,000 of souls. Its income will grow still more rapidly. The amount of money in the hands of Congress to be given away for all sorts of objects will, as past experience shows, increase in a fourfold ratio. Congress is now overburdened with duties, and it tfsually adjourns more in consequence of the weariness of members than because its task has been done. All thoughtful men in each pai*ty see that this state of things must be corrected; that we must go back to the teaching of the constitution, and .that a strict construction of the powers of Congress will leave less opportunity for corruption.

It is this feeling which has produced the political results of the j*ear 18S2. It has burst the strong bonds which held together the Republican organization. A party which has doubts about the correctness of its views loses the power to adjust its controversies. Should they be adjusted, the tap of the drum will not call back citizens to its ranks. I say this, not because I would throw discredit upon the Republican party; on the contrary, the sentiments which govern large numbers of it 3 members are patriotic and honorable, as are their efforts to check abuses which have grown out of mistaken views of policy. It would be an insult to say that they were governed by their passions or personal interest. No; the results of the election of 1882 were not due to local causes or» controversies. They were the product of a general belief that the doctrines of centralization have fostered serpents’ eggs where they were expected to give strength to our Union. "We have reports of corruptions not only in the postoffice, in the signal service and in the police force to protect the property of the public from wrongs and robberies, but also in the collection and use of political assessments, which Congressmen claim they have a right to make, while they punish as crimes such acts by other officials. Other departments, where there are greater temptations, are yet to be looked into.

The circumstances of the elections differed in the several States. -The character of the nominations had the usual influence. Whatever difference there may have been as to harmony or strife in the ranks of parties, all were overborne by the feeling in the minds of thoughtful, calm and patriotic Republicans that they had drifted into errors under the influence of passions inflamed by civil war. And this has been confirmed by every day’s reports of judicial proceedings where the Government lias been bafflecTin its effort to punish wrong-doers, in many instances by the corruption of its own agents. All feel that in the near future, when our population shall be 100,000,000, our Government cannot go on unless it returns to the constitutional policy of our fathers. *ln view of the evils growing out of vague constructions of file constitution, and of usurpations of indefinite powers, the public is inclined to heed this warning of Washington: “If, in the opinion of the people, the distribution or modification of the constitutional powers be, in any particular, wrong, let it be corrected by an amendment in the way the constitution designates. But let there be no change by usurpation; for though this, in one instance, may be the instrument of good, it is the customary weapon by- which free governments are destroyed. The precedent must always greatly overbalance in permanent evil any partial or transient benefit which the use can at any time yield.”