, 1872-01-22
Party Spirit.


In the prophetic warnings of the Fa-
ther of his Country. in his Farewell Adj
aress to his countrymen. as to those
causes which were the most to be dread
ed and avoided as the most likely to un-
dermine and ultimately destroy the grand
political heritage upon which they had
then Just entered, none were deprecated
more earnestly and forcibly than, lst,
party divisions founded upon geograph-
ical distinctions; and I'd, party spirit.
How Just were those forebodings and
how true to the spirit of prophesy were
those warnings in regard to the first
proposition, has been made manifest by
the terrible sectional civil war through
which we have lately passed and the
consequences of which the country is
still smarting under. That any thing
valuable in our institutions was saved
from destruction was owing to the open
ness of the assault and the inherent pat
riotism and public spirit of our people.
The second is more dangerous because
more insidious; it accomplshes its worst
purposes under the most plausible pre-
tences, making devotion to party the
test of devotion to country, when the
truth is apparent to every disinterested
thinking man that the time has come
when party and patriotism are not sy-
nonymous terms. All the bad legisla-
ton; all the corruptions of admiristra-
ton; all the jobs and special grants by
which public functioraries have enrich
ed themselves at the expense of the peo-
pie; all the official peculations, now be-
come so common as to excite no surprise
and but slight comment, and amounting
in the aggregate to larger sum annual
IL than the entire annual expenses OF the
Government in former years, are direct
ly traceable to party management, and
the natural result Of party devotion.
The people vainly imagine that they
are the rulers and that it is possible and
practicable to correct these abuses. Not
under the present system of party man
agement. So long as they make adher-
ence to party and obedience to party
dictation primary rule, they are as
much the creatures of arbitrary power
as the subjects of the Czar of Russia,
and the mere instruments Of the un-
scrupulous and designing professional
politicians who subsidize rabble hordes
to control primary meetings and manage
conventions by ring combinations. They
hold to the theory that the majority
rules by this system. Nothing of the
kind. The rule of party as at present
organized Is the rule of an oigarchy; a
combination of the few to control the
many-to defeat, not to express the
popular will. No nominating conven-
ton of either party is now anything
more than q mart for huckstering poll
ticians to trade for the offices; delegates
who are there ostensibly to represent
the people-though perhaps elected in
the back room of some corner grocery
are traded upon and transferred by their
leaders like cattle in the market; and
yet honest men, perfectly cognizant OF
the corruptions by which the result is
reached; knowing perhaps that the can
didate is unworthy of trust or confidence
in any private capacity, feel bound to
vote for him because he was regularly
nominated according to party usages.
Thus are the halls of legislation and the
highest official positions of the land fill
ed by unscrupulous men-not by the
free choice of an enlightened constitu-
ency, but by the slavery of party, which
is sapping the foundations of republi-
can institutions, which can only rest in
security upon the virtue and intelligence
of the people.
But this is not all: the political sche-
mer, nominated by fraud and corrup-
ton, elected by party discipline, goes
perhaps to the general Congress by a
bare majority of the popular vote of
his district, in sentiment representing
nobody but himself and the few active
partisans who packed the convention by
which he is nominated; he finds there
many other political adventurers elected
by like means, each intent upon some
personal scheme for his own aggrand-
izement, to reward his supporters, or to
maintain or achieve party ascendancy
with special reference to the division of
the spoils, and they make common
cause to control legislation through the
caucus system-another party scheme to
defeat or defy the popular will. For
years Caucus has been King in Con-
gress, and all who hesitated or refused
to submit to its dictation have been
promptly read out of the party. By
this system bare majority of the DOM
inant party in Congress, representing
less than third of the districts and on
ly a popular majority of that third, COM
pei the votes of their dissenting party
colleagues, and thus control legislation
by less than one-sixth of the popular
vote. No system could be better devised
to serve the purposes of corrapt legisla-
Tors and unscrupulous lobbyists seeking