The morning star and Catholic messenger. [volume] (New Orleans [La.]) 1868-1881, 1873-07-27
The Catholic Vote.

| sent strongly in favor of asserting at the
polls, all Catholic rights 80 far as Influenced
by the action of the government. This
feeling is particularly strong in England
and Catholics are there daily urged In the
paper editorials, by personal solicitation,
by the formations Of clubs. and by activity
in every shape, to register and vote with a
united voice for those men who are willing
to do them justice. The same sentiment has
foand voice in this country, through our
most eminent men, both Of the clergy and
laity, and taken shape in " Catholic
Unions"
In our last issue we published an article
from Brownson's last number, reviewing a
pastoral of the Bishop of Cleveland, prin-
cipally on the superiority of the church
over the State, but incidentally touching
the question above alluded to.
In the Bishops pastoral he says:
cat present we have nothing to hope from
the State. Yet we must not therefore cease to
insist upon our rights, and, if needs be, at the
polls demand then. Were Catholics alive and
united on the school question were they to
demand from every man who asks their vote,
q pledge that he would vote for our just share
of the school fund, Legislators would learn to
respect the Catholic vote, and give us our just
rights. Catholics are too timid they seem to
ed, they are doing we'll. This is q mistake if
we let our rights 90 by default we should not
wonder if we lose them. We must be decided in
our demands, aud present holder front to
enemies. 1t is unjust to so organize the pub
lie schools that we cannot in conscience send
our children to them, and then tax us for their
support. AS we'll create State Church, and
tax us for its support"
prn FOL, 4ba s1>
op on this point as follows:
The Bishop of Cleveland calls upon the Ca
tholics of his diocese to be united and to insist
on their rights at the polls, and, far is
in their power, to defend them by their votes
Nothing is more just than that Catholics
should do so.
But whether we can do anything to redress
the wrong by our votes, is another question.
Catholics outnumber any one of the sects in
the Union, but they feeble minority
against all combined. If we enter as a Catho-
Ollie party into the elections, we can effect any
thing only where parties are 80 equally divided
that we hold the balance between them, and it
| becomes an object of Importance with each to
| secure our votes. Such q state of parties
| lists at present in no State of the Union and
| if it did, on political questions, the two lead
| ing parties would unite to oppose and defeat
! Catholics on the school question. The right
| reverend Bishop will permit Us to doubt the
efficacy, at present, of the policy he recon-
mends. The old party, founded by Jefferson,
| Madison and Monroe, and which had some
spect for equal rights and religious liberty, al
though it had not much religion, is virtually
defunct; and we know no party at present in
] the country that has in it's principles or it's
| measures the slightest regard for equal rights
or the faintest conception of what liberty in
any proper sense of the word really means. 1t
is useless to shut our eyes to this fact. We
count for less in elections than did dozen
years ago, when our numbers were fewer.
With all Difference, then, we must say that
We do not see any chance to obtain, through
any possible political action, the rights guar
anteed to us in nearly every State in the
Union We are, in fact, politically null, and
cannot help ourselves. 1t is enough to know
that we, as Catholics, oppose measure or pol
icy, to fasten it on the country.
We may be too faint-hearted, but we confess
that we see little for to do but to insist on
our rights in the most energetic terms we can
use TO study to keep our religion, as far as
possible, out of the political arena, and to be
careful to provoke no political contest in which
parties will divide as Catholics and Protest
ants,-submit to the wrongs We unable to
redress, and wait patiently till, in Gods own
time, the people turn once more to the Church,
and beg and implore her to save them from
themselv YES, from the anarchy and deepotism to
which in their blind folly they are fastening. |
DR.. Brownson is undoubtedly at home
in discussing questions of right, an in
stance of which is at hand il the splendid |
article to which we now refer, but it |
does not follow that his great powers adapt |
them selves with as4much facility to ques-
tions of policy. In the case before US he
makes a direct issue not only with the very |
able Bishop of Cleveland, but with the
Archbishop of Westminster and all the
prominent clergy and laity of England. 1t
is true that the Catholics of the United
States are only eight millions out of nearly
forty millions, that is one fifth, but then
the Catholics of London are only two hun
dred thousand out of three millions, that
is one fifteenth of the population.
Our English brethren are not afraid to
assert their rights in the face of such over
whelming odds and in q country whose
not only has the protection
IF the State but has a much stronger pop
llar hold than in this country.
DR.. Brownson thinks that the moral
strength of the American public in the
lays of jefferson is gone forever and, with