Rensselaer Republican, Volume 27, Number 27, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 28 February 1895 — What Constitutes Republican Strength [ARTICLE]

What Constitutes Republican Strength

The only hope the Republican party has for its continued control of public affairs rests in its pat- , riotic effort to promote the highest and best interests of the whole country. The smaller politicians who advise this or that scheme, for the promotion of mere party ends, must not be put in the lead, nor gaust their advice be for a moment heeded. They must be promptly sent to the rear and reduced to the ranks. If the Republican party will take good care of the country, it need have no concern in regard to itself. The country will take good care of it. The strength of the Republican party is its patriotism and not its partisanship—in even-handed and impartial justice to all men, and not in party plotting and partisan juggling. This fact ought to be kept constantly in the minds of the leaders, as it is in the hearts of the masses who compose its strength and voting force. The history of the Democratic party in the past, its present pitiable condition is a good object lesson for the Republicans, Its purely partisan character has brought it to its present ruin. No other education has besn given their Senators and Representatives but that of looking after the welfare of the party. They have been kept all the time in the kindergarden of party, and never reached the high school of the country’s welfare. Now that they have the control of the Nation’s interest, they concede that they have no qualification for the work. In all matters of statesmanship they are helpless and powerless. In the past they have given all their thought to constructing gerrymander laws in the North, and

devising wicked schemes to suppress the vote of the colored man in the South. ; . • They have not sought to find the higher level of patriotism and , intelligence of the people and sub- ! mit their cause to them, but have careful’y gauged the ignorance, •prejudices and vices of the more ; ignorant classes, and made -their a ppeal to them.—To secure their votes and influence they have encouraged the Anarchist and patted the liquor seller patronizingly - on the back. The Democratic party stood by slavery only tor the reason that it ■helped the party by making the South solid for Democracy. It sympathized with treason and rebellion, with the hope that in doing so they might crush the Republicans and thus again secure power. It recently pandered tothe free trade heresies of the south to keep it united forthe party.

In all this it has shown that the permanence of the Government, and the welfare of the Nation was not its principal concern. Party! party! and only party has been its supreme and selfish purpose, until the country has rejected it with a condemnation most emphatic. Patriotic Democrats, disgusted with the narrow and unpatriotic partisanship of their party, abandoned it and helped the Republicans bury out of sight the remnant of the organization that had b£en so unfaithful to the interests of the Nation. They .ought to have done so long ago. They have come to us with the hope and expectation of better things. Shall they be disappointed? Not if the same patriotism that called the Republican party into existence, and organized, and has guided its counsels in all its past history, still holds the leadership. Not if the honest masses of the party will attend the primaries and break up the rings, and scatter the cliques of the peanut politicians, and secure the nomination of honest, capable men for places of trust. j ' ~ Not if the greed and avarice of corporations are not allowed to control legislation in their interest, and against the welfare of the people. Not if the tariff is so adjusted that good wsges can be paid the laborer, and will yield sufficient revenue, to paywall the expenses of the Government and something oVer for the extinction of the pub-

lic debt. Not if the finances are so manned by Congress that gold, and silver, and paper money will be at all times, and places, of the same value. i Not if the Republican party will be as jealous of the honor and credit of the Nation as an honest citizen is of his own character and standing among his fellow men. Will Cumback.