Memphis daily appeal. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1847-1886, 1870-09-19

GRAFT. if q free trader, than for a Re-
publican, If a protectionist. At this
many sincere men, brought up in the
trammels of political habit, cry out,
You would ruin the party! What
are the interests of free trade COM
pared with the interests OF the party?
Sacrifice all differences of opinion, but
save TIE parg9 What is this mys-
terious party that IS to be saved at
all hazards? On what grounds should
it be saved? What title has it to de-
mand the sacrifice of one single jot OF
principle in its defense?
"A political party is nothing more,
rightly speaking, than the union of a
number of men who are agreed upon
the conditions of national life which
they deem most desirable, and upon
the measures likely to produce the
conditions desired. If men, in sufi-
cient numbers to acquire weight in
the State, agree upon these objects
and the measures TO obtain them, and
seek by united action and legitimate
means to acquire the control of the
national government for the purpose
of carrying out those measures and
obtaining those objects, they become
a political party. To obtain such con-
troll of the national government by
united action requires a certain
amount of organization, Of political
machinery-requires, according to
popular belief, money, promises, the
control of offices, and a variety of
similar appliances. But even granted
that all these paraphernalia are re-
quired, they are and remain para
phernalia only-machinery that a
Jew resolute, industrious men of brain
can replace, for all practical purposes,
in a brief space Of time and with a
very slight expenditure of money.
The substance, the essence of a party
are its men and its ideas, are the OBJ
jects of national welfare that ii aims
at and the men who labor to accomp-
Iish them. To talk of running the
paraphernalia of a party, is inteIIi-
gihle; to talk of running its aims and
its men, is arrogant nonsense. As
soon as the men acting together no
longer aim at the same object, no
longer agree to adopt the same meas
ures to obtain it, they cease 10 be a
party, no matter what paraphernalia
surround them. You may save the
paraphernalia, but it will be useless
machinery. You may save the name,
but it will be an empty sound. You
can not save the union of men, for q
common purpose, when the common
purpose no longer exists.
1.-THE conditions of national life
which seemed desirable ten years ago,
to-day desirable no longer, or
to-day have been obtained. The poll
teal measures upon which men agreed
ten years ago as likely to produce
those conditions, have been tried and
found wanting, or have been put in
execution and have accomplished their
results. In either case, they are
thingsof the past. The great ques-
tiOns Of the last decade are to-day
questions no longer. The objects, the
principles, the measures, upon which
the great parties Of the last ten years
have been built up and restrained,
exist no more. Other questions, other
objects, other principles, other meas
ures to-day divide new men, new
generations. Yet we are asked "to
save'' the men, the ideas, the machin-
eryOfthe past-men, ideas, machinery
alike useless, worn out and obsolete,
and to sacrifice in their defense the
new ideas, new principles, new meas
ures demanded by the new conditions
Of our ever changing national lifei
Nothing but the folly of partisan lead
ers, blinded by the dust they have so
long been scattering, could think such
thought"