Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1871-05-19

same dozen men, In old times III Boston,
when you only got about a dozen men TO
touch an unpopular idea, a man came up
from the South and wanted to abolish
whipping in the navy, for that was q new |
reform. He called a meeting in fremont |
temple and went down into State street to
one of our millionaires and said, "Now
you come up, you are interested In the
shipping, and from the navy we shall get
into the marine service ! want to abolish
the LASH" "Whats the use in my goingH"
said the conservative millionaire. 81
know who will sit on the platform bald
headed William Garrison, Francis jack
son and all the rest of the baldheads. You
will new err see any one else there. You
may call the meeting for any purpose you
please, but you will have the same men
there" You may go up TO the Senate and
say, want 10 see the man who is making
this body move on the San Domingo ques-
ton. You gravltate up against one man.
You SHIFT your base and say: Now, l
would like to see the man that is thinking
out the kuklux idea, and you shift up a
gainst another. You change your base
again with new question, and go back to
the first, and a still further change brings
you back to the second one. What are the
rest doing? What are the other $40 doing9
Nothing. They get up in the morning and
90 down to the House, hear a few speeches
and clap their hands, look up into the gal
leries, lounge out into the Hobbies, smoke
Il cigar, and go home again.
"satan finds some mischief still
| For idle hands to do
These are he men that the spectator APP
proaches. And the chamber of their
hearts being swept and garnished, seven
devils come worse than the old ones swept
away. What you want is agitation out
side in the constituency of each one Of
tn ese men, that will keep him ut the bayo-
nets point, to the earnest, active interest of
the great problems of Government Don't
let him slide and slacken down into the
suggi sh, idle, corruptible life in Washing
ton. Don't let him lean on the convcn-
lent arms of an editor to whom he has Civ
en- office. Know that he has got something
more TO do. That is the way to make Con-
gress an honester body than it is. The
House of Commons is honester than Con-
gress, md 1 will tell you why. Because
the dozen men there that make politics a
business, the Gadstones, and Disraelis,
and Forsters, are hard at work eleven
hours of the day, but the other $50 men
who make up the House Of Commons go
rs other men do. One has yacht, the 9TH
er the race, the third is in fashion, the
fourth in literature, the fifth in science,
and the sixth has 100000, 600 to take care
OF, and he only drops down there an hour
or two in the day. so that brother congress
of ours ON the other side of the water is
too busy to be corrupted. But we have
got Il new spirit TO deal with, and unless
you are provided in almost every part OF
the country with outside pressure, outside
of parties; unless you have the public eX-
acting of public men that they shall actu-
i ally work ten hours in the day intellectu-
youll have an empty bag, that, as Frank
lin said, won't stand upright. Now this
is the root the actual root, out of which
grows the corruption of American politics.
We have half the American people in the
political arena; thousandth part grow
and the rest rot. If we want to keep them
from rotting, stir them up with agitation
We want to turn the mind of the country
into tn same channel, just as the chem
list turns his agitating element into some
body OF sluggish constituents and leavens
with ii the whole mass. Give us "a little yeast
ladies and gentlemen, for the Standard t.
leayen Congress and make II rise TO purity
and honesty Wendell Phillips.