The Wichita city eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1872-1883, 1876-10-26
The Position of the Grange in the Present Pc
litical Contest.

To-day the whole country seems al
most rent in twain by the partizan
prejudices of two opposing political
parties. Nothing kind or fraternal
can be said or published by either
party of the other, and the records of
the past, as well as the acts of the
present, are scrutinized, and construed
and misconstrued, by either or both
parties, until the character of every
public man is ground almost to q pow
der in the crucible Of public opinion.
Words are banded, motives are i'm
pugned, character is assailed, and he
who passes through the ordeal UNI
seathed will surely feel refined, and
all this is the result of party spirit,
perhaps will always occur where free
speech, free thought, and free press
are maintained.
But in the Order of the Patrons Of
Husbandry there can be no such re-
suits. That is fraternity, and it mat
tiers not how men may wrangle over
politics, their wraugling ceases when
they enter the door of the Grange and
every thing becomes fraternal. True
there may arise personal difficulties,
or individual associations may spring
up evincing social preferment, but
there cannot possibly be political or
partizan prejudices as exist now-a-
days in the outside world. This be-
ing the case, there is no power strong
er than the Grange to effect apolitical
union and permanent settlement of
those partizan difficulties that every
four wears shake this Government to
its very centre.
Imbued with no sectional prejudices
and impressed with the fact that this
farmers organization is as extensive
as the confines of the Government it
self. the Patron of Husbandry sees
nothing in just administration of
our affairs to prevent this being
Government by the people and for the
people. To his view there can be no
north, or south, or east, or west, but
there is one Government, and that
Government spreads its agis over its
citizens everywhere, and at all times.
How singularly different then is this
organization from any of the political
parties of the present day. To be a
Republican. one must denounce De-
moefacy. To be Democrat is to ex-
pose all the corruption of the opposite
party. But the Patron of Husbandry
can see something worthy come out
of the Nazareth of either political par
ty, and thus tends very much TO so
unite the inhabitants of this country
as practically to make US what we
seem SO beautifully to be in theory
one people.
There is no vocation in which the
habit, manners, customs, and wants of
its devotees are more varient than
amongst farmers. The New England
farmer scarcely has want or habit in
common with the Texan, nor are the
customs of the northwestern farmers
anv more similar to those of the eX-
IRENE southeast. And yet they are all
farmers. and aiming at the same end,
to wit: the better development of the
science of agriculture, and the in
creased prosperity and happiness of
its votaries
And just so the Patrons of Husband
ry, who properly appreciates the phi
losophy of the Grange organization,
views the politics of the country.
The political interest of the various
sections of the country may be in no
way identical, and perhaps special laws
and legislation are necessary in the
several sections, but in general gov
ermental point of view no sectional
idea is entertained, and the greatest
good to all the people is the goal to be
attained. With this view of the case
in mind, it is apparent that no organiza-
ton exists that has a better and more
powerful tendency to perpetuate this
union than the Order of the Patrons