The Daily state journal. [volume] (Alexandria, Va.) 1868-1874, 1873-09-20
THE BOURBON CONSERVATIVE DE
MOCRACY

- ''' 'SNSh WIN Sdltt3 ttiouSu tIC ulbCI-
ance has become somewhat trte and hack
neyed, that "eternal vigilance is the price
of liberty" Another saying of more
recent date, if not more directly applca-
BILE to liberty in free government, is that
the "sober second thought Of the people is
the surest guarantee of institutional free
DOM" A brave, manly, and chivalrous
people may, and they too often do, be-
come the mere tools Of designing, selfish,
and cunning politicians. And generally,
the Drawer and more unselfsh people are,
the more easily are they beguiled by the
arts and designs of the demagogue.
The history of the Southern people in
the last ten or fifteen years-indeed we
may say for the last twenty years-is a
complete demonstration of the truth of
this statement. The non-slaveholder Of
the Southern states was before the war,
and to a considerable extent still
Is. the mere dancing jack Of
the Democratic party. Slavery was made
the keynote Of that party for indoctrina-
ting the people with every other fallacy.
however wild or extreme, and it was some
times amusing to see how these dancing
jacks would bob up and down, under the
more adroit manipulation of their political
masters. The old Wing party of the
South was first denounced as abolitionized,
and exposed to the bitterest taunts of
every. brainless demagogue who desired
political office. Slavery was made the
stepping-stone to power by Jack Polk,
while Henry Cay, Daniel Webster, and
their peers, were sacrificed to the popular
clamor. 1t (slayery) was the ambush from
behind which Stephen A. Douglas and the
Democratic party of the Northwest were
surprised and cut down in 1860, and Brock
enridge made the "man of straw to be
hypocritically strengthened by his own adj
herents, in order to precipitate and make
certain the then threatened war. 1t was
made the spring board from which, under
every defeat during the war, the non-slave-
holder was conscripted and forced into the
jaws Of death.
Nor is this the worst. Since the war the
poor black man has been made the stalking
horse of the old Democratic party, under
its present alias, in order to revive the
slumbering fires of secession, or the hates
and animosities out of which it grew.
This very stalking-horse is even now, in
this very canvass, made the chief instru.
ment not only for galyanizing their party
into life, but for duping the humble, poor.
Woodworking white men of Virginia into
the support of the very men who "fired
the southern heart" enforced secession,
and reduced to abject poverty every non
stakeholder who survived the war. Every
industrial pursuit, every avocation of
manual labor, every honorable effort, in |
fact, to dignity labor and advance the inter-
ests OF the laborng man, is shamelessly |
thrust aside and lost sight of in the sense |
less cry of the white man against the |
black man. The darkest passions of the |
human heart, the most malignant |
heartburnings of envenomed natures. the
most untuored and wild preudices of cast
hatred, are all appealed to by these Bour.
bons, (the men who learn no lessons from
the past,) in order to blind the reason. en-
rage the senses, and thoroughly poison the
feelings of the white laborer against the
c)ored laborer. "The black mans party',
Is the isolated, cold-hearted, unreasoning
by which it is endeavorcd to
regain political power. 1t came from
party which for the last thirty years ALSO
sMetg enstaoed aclite labor IN Virginia.
Let not the white laborers-the hard
listed, honest, toiling white men of the
'tate-forget that these same men, at
Baltimore, in the Greeley nominating con-
'ention, no longer ago than last year. sang I
With a wild gusto " John Browns soul
S marching on" Such a scene heu q
with what is now being !
'hactea by the Kemper-Daniel party.
'eggars description. 1t is the acme Of !
'razen impudence, stupid double-dealing.
'nnging hnesse, and political hypocrisy !
played out. !"
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