The Madisonian. [volume] (Washington City [i.e. Washington, D.C.]) 1837-1845, 1842-04-05
From the Boston Times.
GOVERNMENT WITHOUT PARTIES.

From, the Boston Times
GOVERNMENT WITHOUT PARTIES.
The present Federal Executive is trying great
experiment; that of conducting the Federal Gov
eminent without the aid of partisan organization
discipline. To predict the result with accuracy may
not be IN our power, though whoever recollects the
invariable course of the Times, and of the leading
penny presses in the four great Atlantic Cities
easily divine the result that is within Wishes and
those of our independent contemporaries The
pertinent deserves success and if the result depended
on efforts, 1t would be successful To define the
experiment. we say ii is an attempt to administer the
Government for the benefit of the whole country, and
not for that of few who may constitute themselves
the leaders of portion of that country Reasoning
upon abstract principles, might be unable to inn
agne how honest men would conduct government
for any other purpose But abstract principles, how
sound not always carried out in Details and
honest politicians have often been led into the
Of believing that party was the only instrument of
an honest government.
Several political writers have said that parties
necessary to free governments, and especially to
republics, and the remark has been often repeated
by superficial thinkers and the crowds who do not
think at ALL and the other crowds who know not what
they think, to have become political axiom
Yet the remark has solid foundation. Parties
hare existed in all free governments. This is not
because free governments cannot be conducted
without them but because the people and their
wants did not sufficiently understand or would not
sufficiently practice the principles of all just gov
eminent to dispense with them Parties incident
al to free governments, but not necessary and they
are incidental only through human ignorance per-
versity. The most favorable defnition which parti-
san government will admit, is the application of evil
to produce good, because human nature is not suf-
ciently enlightened to reach the good directly; and
history fully proves that the ascendancy of
party has never been much more than the choice Of
the people between two evils.
In governments partially free, like that of England,
parties have always existed and from this fact
percia reasoners deduce the necessity OF parties to
free government. But we must remember that parti-
san conflicts in England under the most favorable
circumstances have been conflicts between right and
wrong, between sound and unsound principles, be-
tween the champions and the vioators Of human
rights. Yet the English parties have not always
borne this favorable character; and may add, that
from the days Of Cromwell to those of the American
Revolution, English party has been the advocate
of human rights in their broadcast extent. The re-
pubIcans in the time of Charles did contend for hui
man rights without limitation, and under the belief
that capable of sefgovernment; and they
opposed by two parties, the absolute monarchists,
who contended for the divine right of kings and the
limited monarchsts, who conended for the govern
ment of the few and the qualified freedom of the ma
ny. Here indeed was contest between good prin-
cipc side, and two bad principles the other
and they prove not that parties necessary to free
government, but that the advocates of freedom should
unite in self defence, when the advocates of arbitrary
power unite against them. The conflicts which have
ragged IN England since, between w hgS and lorleS,
have been mere contests for the power and emolu-
ments of government; contests to crafty human am
bon, and not to maintain human rights; and the on
ly difference between these parties is that of them
| accords to the people few more of their natural
| rights than the other. Thus under such partially
free governments that of England, parties have al
ways been incidental or we may add, necessary, and
eminently useful; they have been merely because
they were conflicts between good and bad principles
upon theatre where human rights neither fully
| tod full 'hn,v
| for principles in government, and they useful
because bad principles carried into practice, and
good principles were not fully understood.
If, in the reign of Charles |, every Englshman had
been Pyn, Hampden, Sydney, Vane, or
those of opposite character had been too few in
Der influence to give the slightest tone to any de-
partment OF the Government or exert the least inu
ence public opinion, parties, instead of being
useful would have been eminenty mischievous. But
because such men were minority or opposed by a
powerful minority, with the means of becoming a
majority, partisan organization became incidental and
emnenty useful. AS the principles of these men
were opposed they had some ground on which to in
trench themselves under partisan organization.
At the close of our Revolution, and before the
adoption of the Federal Constitution the people
divided upon measures, not upon principles-one por-
| ton, among whom were Mr.. Madison and General
Hamilton, names sacred to liberty, coAtending for
consolidated Republic and the other for league of
States Each party contended for the largest iberty
the utmost extent of natural rights and they merely
disagreed about the means OF security for such rights
But as all agreed about principles the Federal Con-
sttution was adopted and in most of the States, with
very little opposition and that little prompted by
concern for liberty After the Presidency Of Gene
raj Washington, and during that of Mr. Adams, poll
ticans, not the people, became divided into two par
ties the contending for strong federal Govern
ment, the principle of consolidation, and the other
for the supremacy of the State Governments, on the
principle of confederacy; and strayed about
far from the proper balance between the two prnci
Piles, the other But the people were less divided
upon this point than their leaders for majority, in
the election of Mr.. Jefferson, declared in favor of
confederacy, and this principle has ever since main
tanned its ascendancy. Since that election all of our
partisan conflicts have been merely for men mea-
sures, and not for principles and they have inflicted
various and severe evils upon the country.
During the administration of General w ashington,
the government of the country was not much embar-
raised by partisan conflicts, and the few that occurred
were contests for measures, and not for prnci-
pies. AS the institutions of the country had not been
tried, all seemed disposed to give them fair trial and
as the principles which they were founded were
understood and supposed to be well settled nobody
was disposed to dispute about them. This admins
tration emnently wise and patriotic and eminent
y satisfactory to the majority and it was thus ses-
factory, because the whole country fully confded in
the sincere patriotism and integrity of the President
| the Cabinet and Congress. All the great
who had carried the country successfully through the
revolution and, SUCH they inspired general conf
dence. Here, then, was period when parties
isted would hardly pretend to organization and
the fact proves that parties not necessary to
public and that when the people and their servants
| sufficiently wise and honest it is governed much
better without them.
At present, the principles of our Government
thoroughly understood and settled, that all three
of the political parties in the field profess the
same political creed. All call themselves democrats,
and any three Representatives of these parties at all
versed in constitutional law, will give precisely the
same definition of democracy, and of its securities
and each will insist, doubtless with justice, that he
and his party seek the honor prosperity and safety Of
| the whole country in all political movements. Where,
then is the necessity for parties None in