The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1873-03-28
The Dissolution or RECONSIDERATION O
the Democratic Party.

Governor Hendricks, of Indiana, it appears
has made visit to Washington for the pur-
pose of a reconnaissance in reference to the
future course of the democratic party. his pro-
gramme being the abandonment and dissolu-
ton of the democratic organization, name and
all, and the substitution of q new liberal party,
with new name con the living issues OF the
day." It further appears that Senator Thur
man, of Ohio; Mr. Beck, of Kentucky, and
other democratic notables in Congress decline
as vet to support this movement while others,
again, are in favor of it. The argument said
to be advanced by Governor Hendricks in
favor of the proposed new departure is this:-
That new party which shall have for its
platform such conservative and conciliatory
declarations of principles as will attract to its
| support all classes who are opposed to the
dominant party may easily secure victory in
the next Congress, the elections for which will
occur in that low-water interval of public ex-
element when the opponents of the party in
power are always more or less successful.
He thinks, too, that their success in these
elections will SO encourage the opposition
elements that, by the year 1876, they may
form party sufficiently strong to dispossess
the republicans and to secure possession of
the government. But the essential PROPOSE
ton of Governor Hendricks, in this connec-
ton, is the abandonment of the old name of
democracy, or the democratic party, for the
reason that 'the masses of the people of both
sections of the country are distrustful of any
fhino which bears that name -
In support Of this movement the Chicago
Tribune, leading liberal republican supporter
of TIE Cincinnati and Baltimore coalition in
the late Presidential campaign, contends that
the democratic party is defunct-that it no
longer offers any inducements to the people
that they have no confidence in it; that its
record is bad; that it is in that stage of dry
every advantage in its favor it can do nothing
that the recent election in New Hampshire has
shown this old party to be mere shell whose
kernel long ago had shrivelled away, and that
such being the helpless condition of the party
in New Hampshire, with all the advantages for
success offered it in the late contest in that State,
there can be no hope for its resuscitation /; that
they who are attempting to revive this party,
which is incapable of motion or effort of any
kind, ''are only galvanizing dead body into
an artificial show of life" Of course the
ultimatum of our Chicago liberal republican
contemporary embraces the abandonment and
dissolution of the democratic party and the
fusion of all the opposition elements into a
new liberal party against the corruptions of
the party in power. 1t is worthy of notice,
too, that the Chicago Times, one of those
democratic Bourbon organs which could not
swallow the democratic departure to Greeley
and Brown, thinks now that the time has come
for the organization of a new party.
What then, is the prospect? We can judge
of the future only from the teachings of the
past, and the bleaching bones of our dead
parties of the past mark the route upon which
the democratic party has been lost to view in
the desert. The old federal party, which
came into power with Washington and which
was dislodged by Jefferson, was broken up,
dispersed and finally disbanded from its
opposition to the war of 1912. In like
manner the old democratic party has been
brought to the point of dissolution from its
opposition to the late war for the Union. But,
again, the old wing party, from its drifting
and temporizing policy on the slavery ques-
ton, passed from its great victory of 1910 to
its ignominious defeat of 1874 and from its
hopeful triumph of 1S4S to its inglorious rout,
dispersion and dissolution with its defeat of
1852; and such, too, have been the vicssi-
tudes of the democratic party since the time
when it assumed definite shape as the party
of the late powerful King Cotton and the de-
fender of his sovereign rights as STAKEHOLDER
under the constitution. From the rise, decline
and fail, then, of the old federal party and of
the old whig party and from the heightened
chain of heavy disasters suffered by the demo-
cratic party, it may be logically pronounced
to be passing through the processes of disso-
luton, though its sadly diminished and de-
moralized forces still cling to the shadow OF
its once all-powerful name.
Governor Hendricks, however, we apprehend,
is too early in the field with his proposition
for new liberal party. He is charged, more
over, with design upon the White House on
this new departure; and the bare suspicion OF
such design is always fatal to the political
reformer initiating a new departure, great OF
small. This new departure is proposed toe
soon, because there is no power behind it, and
because none of the conditions exist necessary
to give it vitality. No immediate rewards and
no attractive prospects of office, spoils or in
fuence in high quarters, are offered to mer
disposed to join this new party. No grea
idea is advanced challenging the support o.
large body Of the people; no immediate ref
ormations are proposed calculated to disturb
the present sluggish current of our politica
affairs. The democratic party was strong
until it presumed too much upon its strength