The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1869-08-31
THE REPUBLICAN PARTY-SIGNS OF
IT'S DECAY.
From the ". y. World.

From, the NJ Y. World.
The elements of party success are ca1lye
which either appeals strongly to the interests
or acts powerfully upon the feelings and sym
pathies of the country; and te0dorS whose
credit, sagacity, VigOr, and eloquence enable
them to keep the popular mind in blaze in
behalf of the cause. The Republican party
is ceasing to have either taking cause or ac-
credited leaders.
OF the original leaders by whom the Repub-
lcan party was built up and guided, almost
every one has fallen into discredit, and lost
either his influence with the party or his inte-
rest in its success. William II. Seward, vino
supplied the party with ideas and watchwords.
and was long its recognized chief, is as help
less an old man as was poor king Lear after
being stripped Of his hundred knights by his
unthankful daughters.
John 2. Hale is returning in disgrace from
a second-class foreign mission Salmon p.
Chase, accounted by many Republicans their
ablest statesman, has more sympathy with
the Democratic than with the Republican
party; and it is surmised that Charles Francis
Adams, the strongest American diplomatist
of this generation, is leaning the same way.
These two statesmen-Chase and Adams
contributed more than any other two to the
success of our civil war; the one by prevent
ing a collapse of the finances, the other by
preventing foreign intervention in aid of the
Confederates. When men like these grow
cold towards the party and desert it, they cause
others to believe that it has accomplished its
mission and that its days are numbered.
! John G. Fremont, the first Republican candi-
| date for President is quite out of politics.
| The Blair family have all gone over to the
| other side. Ben Wade is still in the party
but he has been superseded by Democratic
Senator, and no place is found for him in the
new administration. Thurlow Weed has with
| drawn from politics and is writing his auto
| biography. Horace Greeley is coming to
| regard negro politics as obsolete, and is doing
| his best to revive the old Wing issue of q
| protective tariff. Even Charles Sumner feels
that the negro hobby has been ridden down;
and as Sumner is nothing if not malignant
and sensational, his last ''great speech" was a
venomous TRADE against England.
We have gone through the list of promi-
nent leaders of the Republican party, and find
that even of the few who still act with it.
none is giving the strength of his mind to the
old issues. The present head of the party is
a recent proselyte who has taken none of the
old Republican chiefs into his Cabinet or his
confidence. What would become of the I6be
raj cause in England if Bright, and Glad
stone, and Lowe, and Mill and Forster. anG
all its recognized leaders, should either retire
like Achilles, to sulk in their tents. or devote
their zeal and eloquence to other subjects?
The Republican cause is as obsolete anG
superannuated as are the Republican leaders
The only ''excuse for being' which the part,
l now gives is that it is necessary for presery
ing the fruits of the war But nobody be
- lieves that there is now any danger of seces
Y sion or of the re-establishment of slavery
. and where there is no further ground fo
t either hope or fear, it is impossible t.
l keep up any interest Negro suffrage is tn
= only fruit Of the war" about which Repuh
a licans can feel any concern; and as the
i assume the most complete confidence in tn
a ratification of the fifteenth amendment, the,
stultify themselves when they pretend tina
= there is any further place for their party i
4 the politics of the country. The only real Oh
h ect of keeping up the organization is t
/ ''nuzzle twfxt the breasts of the Federf
= Treasury. But party waich has no longe