Rensselaer Union, Volume 6, Number 22, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 19 February 1874 — The Republican Party and the People. [ARTICLE]

The Republican Party and the People.

The strength of the Republican party has always consisted in its amenability lo just popular government. It came into being as the organic expression of the convictions of the people against the iniquity of slavery. It con* tinued in power through the war as the embodiment of their devotion to the integrity of the Union. It has retained the control of the Government as the representative of their determination that the fruits of the war shall not be sacrificed. On all these commanding and Overtowering questions it has stood for the popular will. But not on these alone. Within and under these decisive questions a hundred others of one kind and another have pressed for action. The practical administration of government produces constant issue a and divisions in its progress. To meet and respond to these in accordance with the popular expectations is more difficult than to act upon the great controversies of the political arena, for public sentiment is less sharply defined. It may also l»e more suddenly developed and"more capricious in its expression. To-day it may blaze and tomorrow blow over. Besides, from the very nature of the case - the expression

may not come until the actiob is taken. A question is often precipitated upon the Administration or upon Congress and necessarily carried to decision before it has been fairly presented to the public mind. A party in power is required to act in emergencies as they arise, and it cannot always wait for the indication of public opinion. It must proceed upon its own best judgment and sense of right, and if it makes a mistake must be ready to correct it. Upon this whole class of questions, as well as upon those great cardinal principles and commanding issues which define the divisions between the parties, the Republican organization has shown itself amenable to the public judgment. A striking illustration is furnished in its repeal of the salary increase. The passage of that measure was the work of no party. The representatives of both shared in it, but not as party agents. It Was not a party question. As a matter of fact, the majority of the Democrats voted for it and the majority of the Republicans against it, but all upon their own individual responsibility. The action was hasty, and before its consummation there was little public discussion one way or the other. But when the measure became a law, the peculiar sentiment found expression, and in obedience to the plain will of the people the Republican party in Congress has wiped out the odious statute. So far as the party was involved in its enactment, it has corrected the mistake. The President acted in the same spirit in the matter of the Chief Justiceship. When he found that public sentiment did not approve his choice, and that he had committed an error, he withdrew his nomination and made another, until a satisfactory result was reached. If we cannot have a party which will make no mistakes—an idea! that is impossible of realization in this world—the next best thing is to have one which, is disposed to correct mistakes when it makes them. And this is just what the Republican party is. The trouble with the Democratic organization is that it is not only wrong upon almost every important question, but remains wrong. Its tendency is vicious. It has gone on year after year repeating its old blunders jpd crimes. It cannot learn anything from the expression of the popular judgment. The Republican party, un the. other, hand, has shown in the cases we have named, and many others, -that it ljstens to the will of the people. If it falls short of public expectation at any time, it only needs a clear expression to bring it back to its true position Far from perfect as it may be, it thus shows that the country is safer in its hands, and that it is more worthy of trust than a party which learns nothing and forgets nothing. —Albany Evening Journal.