Ashtabula telegraph. (Ashtabula, Ohio) 1874-1880, 1874-10-10
The Two Parties.

hang on the decisions the people are hastenlng
to make in the pending State elections The
best business men in the country are watching
these results with an eye to the financial effects
they are to have upon our diversified internal
and commercial interests. Statesmen are re-
garding them with anxious reference to the
life, the complexion, and working OF the Ma
tional Constitution, now practically on trial Tor
the great future OF our country. Our commerce,
our credit, our financial relations to the nations
now looking from ali lands upon us, are con-
cerned. The interests of the emancipated mill
ions, Just ushered into the body polite, hang
anxiously quivering in the scale. The repose Of
the sections, East and West North and South,
the security of home and property and citizen
ship, the social order, in a word, the whole di-
Tersifed interests Of society, as now existing,
are deeply concerned.
The parties engaged are the Republican, on
the one side, and the Democratic on the other.
The Republican proffers a continuance OF its ad-
ministration Of the Government. 1t does not
come with new overtures of policy. Its record
is before the people. 1t has guided the ship Of
State for the fourteen years past, and the man
ner, of it is known and read of all. These years
have been the great historic years OF the nation.
Well or i'll, the work that has been done speaks
for itself 1t must stand or fall BY the testl-
mony it gives. 1t certainly has been tried with
all the severity necessary. both in war and in
peace. No party ever had such tests Of its moral
and physical capabilities its fidelity its courage
its energy, its endurance, its wisdom, Its mag
nanimity, and its devotion, not only to the ma
tional life, but to humanity, as those precipi-
tated upon it by the war of the shareholders rebel
lion. Nor had party ever such trial of its firm
ness. its discretion, its moderation its compre-
hension of the national the sectional, and indus
trial interests concerned that furnished by the
peace that followed Fourteen years have
passed, and the record made is before the coun-
try.
The Democratic party was tried by the same
fires. It made its record under the ordeal of
war and under the peace that succeeded. Stand
ing upon its record, the Republican party pro-
poses to continue its work. Wrapped in its
mantle OF history, the Democratic party steps
forward and demands the removal of the Repub-
lican rule, and reaches forth its hands to take
the Government and the national interests, and
administer them in its stead. We are called
upon TO make an immediate decision between
the two That decision is not to be based upon
what either party proposes to do, but on a sober,
intelligent conviction of what is best, not for
one or the other of the parties concerned-but
for the country, for its institutions for society,"
for humanity. To decide wisely, the
people are compelled to consider. not
so much party professions and profers of
policy, as the life, the history, the animus of
the two. Not so much their words as their
WOrhS. II bu6 IlepuDuCdu party udS DCCu uL-
faithful to its trust, If the country has suffered,
has retrograded under its rule if social interests
have been imperiled or unprotected, if humanity
has lifted its hands in vain for help and
amelioration, if the industrial and financial in
terests OF the nation have been neglected or re-
tarded and ii anarchy instead of peace, social
order, and prosperity has prevailed, it should
not be continued in power. Considerations of
gratitude should not weigh; hopes for reforma-
ton, pruffered or promised, should not beguile
the people into prolonging its lease of power.
If on the other hand the Democratic organ
ization has been faithful through all its displace
ment and adversely; if it has stood for the right
and cattled for the right while its rival has been
false and faithless if it has held out the Balm
of Gilead" to the wounds of society, while dis
tracted and desolated by war; if it has hastened
with oil and wine to bleeding and PROSTATE hu-
manity, while its pampered rival, flushed with
pleuty and with power, has passed heartlessly
BY on the other side the country soould rise at
once and consult its safety and its veal by TAX
ing the sacred trusts from the hands Of the un-
faithful stewards, and committing them, without
delay, to the party found SO true, so faithful and
still so willing 10 accept them.
But, what says the record of each2 We shall
not recount them. The public memory is fresh
and strong. All can look back to the terrible
days of the war, and all know who stood at the
gates when the citadel was assailed. The ma
tional life was the objective point. To dis
rupt the Union was the war cry.
To tear down the national fabric was the senti-
meut that stirred the surging waves of the re-
bellion. Surge met surge, and wave met wave,
but which the party that drove the pillows on
until the ocean slept? Was it the Democratic
party2 In the dark hours that came with the
shock Of war, the agency that counterworked
the deeds and designs of treason was not Demo-
cratic. The Republican party was the nations
bulwark. When the clouds grew black, and re-
verses in battle sent woe and weeping to our
homes and alarm and doubt to the hearts of the
bravest, did the Republican party laugh at the
nations woe and rejoice at the success of rebel
arms2 Did they fight in Congress against army
appropriations2 Did they discourage enlist
ments2 Did they organize as Sous of Liberty"
as knights of the Golden Circle" to retard
action, prevent recruits, instigate iusurrection
in the divided North, plot the burning of North
ern cities, WELD the pulpit, the rostrum, and
press to incite disaffection ana paralyZe the
energies of loyal men in the North, in Congress-
and in the army?
"When freedom in the battle storm
Her weary head reclined,"
did she 20 and lay it on the bosom of the Demo-
cratic party; or did she find refuge and sympa-
thy, and succor in the Republican sentiment of
the country2 Had the Republican party stood
where its present opponent has all along stood,
where now would have been the glorious fabric
of our Union2 Where would have been the
national life and the sacred trusts the Demo-
cratic party now asks to have committed to its
carer
We should inquire, too, what has been the
animus, the spirit of these two parties under
the reign of peGce2 The Republican party pro-
poses as already stated, to continue its work,
profering no material change of course or modi-
hcation of policy. We are bound in duty to
ourselves, to our State, to the country, TO in
quire what its course has been in peace as
well as in war. If when the
clangor Of arms was hushed and the horrors Of
the battlefield had passed away and the showers
comprehend the diversified necessities Of the
situation; or, comprehending them, had not the
wisdom and the courage to meet them, 1t would
be hazardous to continue its administration. or
trust the countrys present interests to its keep
ing
Il.