Democratic Sentinel, Volume 9, Number 33, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 11 September 1885 — A Miserable Business. [ARTICLE]

A Miserable Business.

Atlanta (Ga.) Constitution: The speec i of Senator Sherman and the platform of the lowa Republicans leave no doubt that the Republican politicians of the North have determined to fight the next campaign on the sectional issue. As a Democratic newsr r.per the Constitution is glad to see this issue made piominent am 1 the bloody shirt once more waved above the Republican camp. As an American newspaper the Constitution regrets it. This country will never again be carried by appeals to sectional prejudice. The war is over and the embers of war are dead. The people of this great republic, long estranged, are now united in a union that, cemented with the blood of its best ;nd bravest sons, is indissoluble forever. Neither fools, or fanatics, or demagogues can rekindle the passions that burned themselves out amid the terrible scenes of the war. Those who attempt it are doomed to defeat and disgrace. Mr. Blaine was beaten for the Presidency jwhen he yielded to fools’ advice, and in Ohio furled the bar nor that waved above his flushed and victorious army and ran up the wretched rag of crimson which he himself despised.— When ha made that bitter speech in Augusta, after the election, he re. unciled to his defeat half a million voters who, until then, sere unreconcilable. If anything is settled it is that the masses of the people, North and South, are tired of strife. They w ant peace. They have so declared over and over again, and the thunders of their declaration have drowned again and again the vicious outcries of the politicians.- - Whatever party pledges itself to the reopening of wounds, but lately healed, and the relighting of consuming fires that were extinguished twenty years ago, will be repudiated at the polls. If the Republican party commits itself to this narrow and insane policy, the Democratic party will remain in power until new parties and new issues arise.

The duty of the South is plain. The manliness and sincerity of her course, so long plain to observers, must be maintained. She was brave enough to meet the shock of war without quailing,and was brave enough to accept its results without reservation. Instead of sulking amid the ashes and ruins of her homes, she set earnestly to work to repair the desolations of war, and fashion her fortunes anew out of such piiiful resources as was left her. From first to last she has been earnest, sincere and honest in her re-established relations with the North. By slow but sure process this simple truth has cut its way through the sophistries of the politicians, and carried conviction to the people of all sections. The election of Mr. Cleveland was proclamation that at last the real purpose of the South was understood by the North, and confidence restored. The sensible and conservative course of the South, since Mr Cleveland’s election has confirmed this confidence. Policy, then, as well as patriotism, will hold the Southern people to the large-minded and abiding love of th j Union, the manly and

candid desire for peace and b~ ciherbood, the deep and inspumg sympathy with American institutions and American glory, that lives in the hearts of her people and makes itself manifest on eve - ry proper occasion. Far above the mere triumph of party or the petty plunder of office, the election of Mr. Cleveland was precious to her] in that it closed the chasm into which she had cast her blood and her treasure, and it reunited in heart as in hand the Union ‘she had honestly sought to divide. It is her concern chiefly that the Presidency won chiefly by her votes has been so administered as to strengthen mutual confidence, dispel suspicion and doubt, and bring to the deathbed of the illustrious American whose taking away tin country still mournp, the full real ization of his immortal appeal,V'Lot us have peace.” The Republican politicians may 'rave the bloody shirt, the Republican party may plant itself on the platform of sectional hate. So lx H. Neither will avail against the inevitable. The St'nth cannot be shaken from her consciousness of honeyt and patriotic purport nor diverted from the straight and simple way she has marked out. The North can not be again misled by prejudice or deceived by misrepresentation. The people have-come together and have shaken hands and made up. The politicians can not again divide them.