The weekly democratic statesman. [volume] (Austin, Tex.) 1871-1883, 1875-01-21
DEsTTNTEs oF TEXAS now SHAPED.

The people Of the United States, more
earnestly than ever before, ask that states
manshiP suppIant ignorance in government.
In cities the people have grown weary Of
ignorance and Of knaves even in boards Of
aldermen, and taxpayers propose to relieve
themselves Of enorn.ities everywhere prac-
tieed BY stupid dolts or unmixed rOguery
now supreme IN most American municipal
governments. New York City, with Tweed
as maysF, Washington City, with its incom-
parable Boss Shepherd, New Orleans, with its
successive masters more ravenous and ruin
Gus than yellow fever or cholera, have been
only prominent among mOb-plundered mu-
inequalities. The latest proposition is to
put Memphis through bankrupt court, or,
repeating laws Incorporating the wretehed
city, let its horrible, ghastly existence have
an end, and the wreck pass into the hands
Of administrators dc boais n0n
Braying, blundering asses have absolutely
been lifted BY the voting rabble OF cities
into school boards, and stupidity and theft
have wrecked the most benencent systems
Of public instruction ever devised. al
came of the subjection of cities to the
domination Of people having no interest in
them save to the extent that they could
rob by governing them. Restriction Of suf-
frage can alone give decent governments to
Southern towns that have felt the breath
ings of poisonous deadly sirocco-like Afri-
can blasts as destructive to municipal as to
individual life.
No State government has yet done its
duty in behalf Of towns and cities. Even
those Southern States that have lapsed into
the embraces of Democracy still suffer in
tolerable evils, begot'en of insane, plunder-
ing black Radicalism. The number of
Offices and siaecures in Georgia remains
the same as when Bullock beloved the
''bull Of the woods" ravaging the State
from the sand bills of the North
to the dreary confines Of ol1fenokee Swamp.
BroWnloW has been abused and villifed till
many believe the rare old parson capa-
BILE of meanness and even of theft. His
personal fame is spotless and he was only
good Datured enough to crafty with posi-
ton every adventurer who pretended to
love the Union. Countless sinecures were
created, courts were multiplied and the
costs of maintenance of corporations were
duplicated again and again. Democracy
promised loudly; but Democracy, in Ten
nessee, SO far as taxpayers are concerned,
constituted that insatiate fresh swarm of
unappeasabls fies' Of which Esop wrote.
Politicians, constituting many State legs
latures, have not the nerve to obey the
plain dictates of duty to towns and cities
which they represent, and State constitu-
tional conventions have not always been
the embodiments of the wisdom. or
courage of the people. Very shall
low-pated, mouthing fellows, not long ago,
produced the organic law for a Southern
State. They legislated on all subjects; and
IN everything were wrong and wise in
nothing. The new Constitution is full
of prejudices of the hour. The hour
is past, and the Constitution stinks in the
nostrils of progressive, thinking people.
There was no reform, and only change, and
subsequent Legislatures have found their
usefulness utterly destroyed by squad of
politicians, who, instead of framing organic
law Tor republic, undertook to shape leg
islation and restrict it through the century.
In doing too much they have done nothing,
and the whole scheme of government must
be reconstructed. A simple, naked frame
work of republican government is all that
the State convention should produce. This
work consummated, its end comes, and
the sooner this final adjournment, the
longer the product of its wisdom VIII shape
the destinies of Texas. There is wanting
moral courage to resist am ephemeral preju-
dice; there is wanting the power to distin-
guish popular prejudice, like that against
a railway corporation, from a popular con-
viction; there is venting that vigorous, in
tellectual manhood which dares do what is
right, even if the rabble roars. Save the
towns and cities of Texas, while it may be
done, and the people win be saved millions
Of money, and prosperity bless the State,
such as is recognized not elsewhere in all
this broad land. sseil5e8
THE Union DTsSrROFRD AND