People's Pilot, Volume 5, Number 36, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 March 1896 — STILL THEY COME. [ARTICLE]

STILL THEY COME.

Another Democrat Repudiate!* the Grand Old ra^j. Southern Mercury:' Hardly a day passes that does not record the accession to Populist ranks of some leading Democrat or Republican. We are just in receipt of a letter from Hon. W. a Blanks, of Willis Point, Tex., from which we make the following extract: “At one time or ahother in a man’s life he is confronted by a dilemma which calls him to a halt and serious contemplation of which horn he will take. Just such a dilemma is presented for the consideration of every thinking free-silverite in Democratic ranks to-day. The Democratic party is a house divided against itself, a union of dissenting elements, a combination of faiths so politically incompatible that it will be an utter impossibility to harmonize them. The larger faction proclaims with a flourish of trumpets the fidelity to the peculiar doctrine that we may increase our prosperity by adherance to a principle that fair practice has clearly demonstrated is ruinous to our financial success—the gold standard. The other faction is as unyielding, apparently, in its allegiance to the doctrine of the free coinage of silver at the ratio of 16 to 1. It is a practically demonstrated truism that discrimination against the money of the people deleteriously affects the price of the products of farm and daily labor. Believing in such a doctrine, should I continue with either wing of the Democratic party, or should I turn my back upon them and seek the companionship of the Populist hosts, who are now, and have been since the organization of their party, staunch and unequivocal advocates of that favorite theory of the money-making classes. The majority of the big guns in the Democratic party announce themselves and their party favorable to gold-buggism. If I continue with them and vote their ticket, I implicitly proclaim my belief In that idea, which, believing as I do, would make me a political hypocrite of the first water. It is no more excusable to be a hypocrite in politics than it is to be a hypocrite in religion. On the other hapd, why should I go with the silver wing of Democracy ? What hope have the members of that faction? Frowned upon by the majority of Democratic leaders, hopelessly disorganized, they have, under the name of Democracy, less prospect than any set of wanderers on the political desert. The only reason advanced to me by Democrats that T should remain with them is that they retain the name “Democrats.” The most hopelessly befuddled brain in the lunatic asylum should be enabled to bury that argument beneath an ocean of logic. An examination of the record of the Democratic party, and a dispassionate review of its boasted achievements, but leads us to the conclusion that it can be depended upon to always do the wrong thing at (he critical moment. The result of its labors is but ‘a comedy of errors.’ “I see no reason why I should continue in the stranded ship of Democracy, and so I part company with it and announce myself with the Populist party hereafter, ‘teeth and toenail.’ Yours very truly,.

“W. C. BLANKS.”