The Washington union. [volume] (City of Washington [D.C.]) 1857-1859, 1858-06-17


where none acknowledge superior, and each as
serts capacity for command where reverence Is
stranger, and mediocrity plays the tyrant
Considered with reference to party politics, the
session has been an anomaly in partisan history The
experience of free government all the world over
has shown, that wherever maorities govern party
Organization is necessity. The people OF our own
country, probably the most honest, virtuous, and
patriotic that have ever undertaken the experiment
of popular government acknowledge the necessity OF
this species of organization in all then elections and
do not scruple to enter with alacry into all the par
tsan contests that arise in the management OF their
public affairs In none of these contests have they
ever entered with energy and zeal than in the
one which resulted in the election Of handsome
democratic majority to the present House Of kePse
sentatiyes and in no victory have the majority OF
the people Of the Union ever taken more pride and
felt liveer satisfaction of honest patriotism than
in the one which produced q democratic majority OF
members in the House which was TO DO the first to
meet Mr. Buchanan's administration.
Unfortunately however, there has been at no
period of the session just expired q majority de-
voted to the cordial support Of the measures OF tho
administration or of the democratic party. Many
Of tile men who claim to be leaders of the party
and who resent any complaint against their way
wardness with vindctive and implacable anger,
will be found, on examination of the Journals to
have voted almost uniformly with the blackTepub-
lican and know-nothing opponents OF the party 10
which they profess allegiance. Instead OF receiving
cordial support administration has ever had to
Withstand so many assaults from an opposition
House than the present democratic administration
has had to Withstand from democratic House );
and it is remarkable fact, that every assault that
has been made upon the administration by the
present Congress-, though seconded, OF course, by
the opposition, has been instigated, directed, and
stimulated by democratic members. 4.
We believe it is fact that no measure OF the
democratic party administration has passed the
present Congress by majority of democratic votes
| but that every measure that has become law has
become SO by the liberality Of members belonging
TO one branch or other Of the opposition. Not that
the great majority Of members whom the people
elected az democrats to the present Congress have
not supported the party organization and its meas
| ures with a zeal which has done them honor, and
which the people will never forget; not that these
true men have not resented the factious conduct Of
the unaithful with indignation but yet that all the
efforts TO embarrass the action Of the party on public
measures, and to discredit the administration with
the country have been originated by ncendiary dem
ocrats and merely seconded by the oppositon.
These matters not alluded to here in the spirit
| of complaint or censure, but simply as matter of
historical fact. They mentioned as striking and
anomalous characteristics of the present Congress,
which have had no parallel in the previous partisan
| history of Congress or the country. n Iba.l .uS
| With reference to public affairs, we believe that
no great measure Of policy has distinguished the &C
ton Of the present Congress- The Kansas measure was
only prodigious effort to compose exhausted
| and spent quarrel Congress- met under circumstan-
cos that admitted Of the speedy settlement Of that
question. This Gordian knot of our political policy
might have been cut in the first month of the SEES
sion and the coup de grace given to spectre that had
haunted our politics for several years butdefecon
| in the democratic ranks prevented the blow; and
nearly the whole session was spent in fruitess
and cxasporatng discussion of foregone and vanished
issue. The refusal of the democratic majority to dis
pose OF this issue at the beginning imposed upon
tho necessity of the prolonged struggle that ensued
| in the sequel, and the session wasted upon a
matter that might have been settled at the start al
most without debate sae a.,tsasyisele
1 4. ~. .