Litchfield enquirer., 1877-12-06
Parties in the South.

see no indications of breakup in parties m the South, with the exception that the re- publican party is pretty well broken up and played out In Georgia it is formally disband- ed Likewise in Mississippi. In South Caro- lima most of the leaders have been run off or are lodged in the penifentiary, where more of z them belong than win ever get there ERigtEl here let me say that sympathy for the South , Carolina republican leaders is pretty much wasted. They were rascals and plunderers from top to bottom, with now and then an ex- eepfi0n that made the surrounding darkness only more dark. That fellow Patterson has no business in'the Senate, and should be kick ed out no matter if his vote is. necessary to re- sA pubiiCans supremacy, as I believe it. is He q bought his place, buying the purchasable Gar- des in the Legislature as the slave-driyers did in the old time, only under Patterson's dispen- sati0n the daFkies got the money themselves. Don't sympathize with the sperseeuted South Uafolina republicans more than you would with an ordinary gang of convicts, or mourn that tho eo-called democrats are in power there. The state must either belong to the thieves or the democrats; there is no halfway ground, and it is better to let the democrats have it. We can almost cry out, "Anything Lord, but 2 what has been for the past ten years. 'a4as. ~ In Alabama there is no republican party to speak of. There is Spencer in the Senate, but he soon goes out and won't gc in again, and Willard Warner running an iron furnace, and ex-GOv. Parsons attending courts, and Sam Rice sitting on the fence, and ex-Goy. Lewis down on the other side-and that isI all there is of the republican party of Alabama s <
 In Florida there is a sign of life, growing out of a collection of northern consumptives and native negroes, but they cannot carry the state. In Texas the republican party is 50 re- duced that short string of omnibnses mod erately loaded, could carry 1t all out of the state, and they had as well charter the omni- buses so far as future supremacy is concerned. In Virginia the party is so. dead that it did not kick during the late gubernatorial canvass The ''cOnservatives' quarreled among them- selves like tOm-cats in tow sack, but had the enemy appeared the troubled. waters would have been stilled and the conservatives harmonious. But the enemy did not appear. He is past that performance.
 "a In Arkansas Joe Brooks in dead, and Baxter has turned democrat, and Clayton subsided or shielded, and Dorsey soon goes out of the Sem ate and won't go in again, and. this completes the inventory of the republican party in that party. In North Carolina, Kentucky and Ten nessee only are there signs of substantial re- publican life, but not enough to accomplish results. These states will remain democratic for some time by n1ajorities ranging from thir- ty to seventy thousand. It is question if the party in Tennessee has not more f'git up" than
 
 ahead of Kentucky, the democrats here have never been able to pile up as large majority as in that state. But even here where the con ditions are favorable to republican growth, if anywhere, we find the party making no real pnOgress. If we say that it is holding its, own we say &bout all that the truth of the matter will admit. But it is not retrogfading and playing out as in nearly all of the southern states. Yet it is substantially, reliably demo- cratic, and will remain 30 for some years, more | or less, and likely more than less. i as
 In speculating therefore, upon the future of parties and the like, & good deal of which is now going on in the press, it is well to bundle all the slave states in parcel and label them democratic" At present certainly there is littleroom for speculation here and less room for hope. There are no signs of break in the democratic party in any southern state suf- ficient to give that state tOan opposition party, In 1880 you will see the solid South in solid ar ray for the national democratic nominee who ever he may be. With this and couple of the larger northern states-New York and In- diana, for instance-they have the election. In the face of such encouragement as this, it is useless to look for the solid South to be oth- erwise than solid.-Mr. RedfeLGs ChattanOO- gG Letter Co CIncianGS Commercial.