Frostburg mining journal. [volume] (Frostburg, Md.) 1871-1913, 1874-09-19
Political Independence.

already foreshadows warm and
stubborn canvass. Not alone in our
Congressional district, but in others
of this and sister States, several po-
litical issues will pass the judgment
of the-people this fall. These issues
are more or less important, as involv-
ing recent congressional legislation.
Of-these it is not our province to
speak. The political papers Of the
day are exhaustive and bitter enough
in their treatment of them to
enable undecided men, (if any, to
make up and announce their verdict.
Ifsuch do not, it is because they are
welded by false education and train
ing to view only the one side-in very
many instances the side of thought
and prejudice which their fathers
held. "All this is very natural" we
have understood in extenuation of
this. devotion to and perpetuation of
paternal opinions, and should be en-
couraged." We could admit this
with all due respect to childish ven-
Grafton Of ancestral Judgment if our
progenitors were less fallible than 9TH
er good people, or if it were not the
characteristic of many, very many in
heritances to be false and evil because
they are natural" In this enlight-
ened age the excuse cannot hold
good. The mediums Of thought are
far too numerous and luminous for
any to sit in darkness. Yet this pre-
text occasions the great deficiency in
American politi cs-independence.
Men, in whom freedom is otherwise
instinct and habit, 60 shackled for
life with unstudied politics; with
blind adhesion to party, and ignorant
prejudice to all opposition. They
exercise the right of suffrage in the
automatic manner with which parrots
extol their masters and philippine the
dogs The wonder is that our free
institutions can be SO egregiously
misrepresented by their guardians
that their support in any way should
impose the harness and shalves Of par
ty upon the people. Anomalous as
it is, the fact seems to exist in the
confessedly great subserviency Of pop
ular expression to the behests Of party
expediency, party policy and party
success. This baneful sentiment is
shared by thousands of intelligent, re-
ligious people, who denounce the
monarchy of intellectual and sectari-
an bigotry, and pity the slavery of
their adherents, forgetting the species
of both which permeates the political
life of all.
As in other matters Of needed re-
form, the remedy, in great measure
lies in the progress Of thought. At
tempts have already been made, and
are making, to attain a plane above
the narrowness and illiberality Of
mere partisan feeling. But the
mountain-top cannot be cleared at a
bound, and in too many instances the
reformers have gone but little way
before they show need Of reforma-
ton. Many there are, however,
whose eyes are opening to duties
hitherto unseen-to the fact that par
ty support is binding more particu-
larly and surely when that support
involves the parallel choice Of the
best men to carry out the best princi-
Piles in or outside the party. The
growth of this conception into obliga-
ton is the best hope for political NOR
ality in this country-of escape from
the Generalization and danger of
demagoguery which besets us on all
sides. There is not a party which
will not manipulate, intrigue and
cheat, for success which will not lie
in order to steal, and there is scarcely
an. ofiice-seeker who formally invites
the suf,rages Of the people but does
not directly or implicitly advance
the Falstaffian theory that there is
but one virtuous man lief" and God
has placed him before you, and SO on.
These are strong asseverations, but
they are impartial and true, and &C
to show the ofttimes immense diff.
Guilty of bringing an orderly con.
clusion out of chaos o. inconsistent
promises and irrational pretensions.
In the canvass before US, as i'll all
others which succeed, the action O.
every citizen should be adjusted by
aNthe light he can obtain from boil
sides. No matter what his politics
n