The Valley Virginian. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1865-1895, 1878-05-09
State Politics.

past decade, the fruits of which are now be-
ing realized in the complicated debt that is
hanging over the people, and the conse-
quent prostration of industries and depre-
citation Of values /; the burthens that are i'm
posed upon the laboring men in the road
law, and the restriction of the elective fran
chise by reason of the recent Constitutional
amendments, have aroused attention to the
great wrongs that have been inflicted or the
masses in the name Of that party. 1t was
by the orders Of the leaders in the organiza-
ton that men marched to the polls and
voted for the Constitutional amendment
which took from property the road tax and
placed it upon persons-requiripg the poor
man, whose daily labor is essential to the sup
port of his family, to pay as much road tax as
the owner of $4,000 or 100000 farm, for
whom he worked, although the laborQr never
used wagon or horse, while his more pros
porous and fortunate neighbor drove his
teams over it daily. While all the benefit
was secured to the man of property, the
non-property-hol did the labor, taking
from his family the means of omfortabie
living.
By the same arbitrary and lespotic au-
thority, the more.recent amendments were
adopted, which made poverty cause for
practical disfranchisement, and substantial
ly debarred the poor man from participating
in government. In thus restricting his priv
ileges, lie virtually surrendered the only
defence he possessed to the system of school
ing by which his children could learn to
read and write. His labor, his liberty ard the
hope in his children have all been surren-
dered to the Moloch of party, and. that, too,
without his knowing that he was practically
enslaving himself and placing his children
at the mercy of the enemies OF the only in
stitution where their minds could be i'm
proved and enlightened. The whip and spur
applied by the leaders and managers of the
Conservative party have effected these re-
suits, and now when it is too late-when
their defenses have been taken from them,
and their is no way of relieving themselves
of these harrassing and humiliating wrongs,
the people begin to see what their blind sub.
mission to selfish partizan leaders has cost
them. Yl f}-g
We warned them time and again against
the very propositions which embraced the
terms Of their enslavement !; exposed the
methods by which their present abject sla.
very has been fastened upon them, and
urged them as freemen to strike, while they
had the power, for the liberty OF themselves
and their children. But it was in vain. The
mandate went out from headquarters at
Richmond that the Constitutional amend
ments must be adopted, and thoughtless Of
results, they willingly obeyed. ' -'i'1 3
Not only are the men, thus deprived OF
their rights and liberty, hostile in their ill.,
clination to the party that has consumnated
these wrongs, but many OF the taxpayers,
whose hard earnings have been drawn from
them only to be squandered at Richmond,
| dissatisfied with a party that toerates
the abuses inflicted and makes no honest
effort to correct them. This feeling is deep
and earnest; but where is the remedy?
1t is useless to urge them to identify them
selves with the Republican party for them
to do SO would be to encounter storm
of denunciation that few men have the
moral courage and nerve to meet. They
may recognize the principles of that party
as well adapted to the wants Of the country,
and especially to the interests Of the great
mass of the American people-liberal, pro-
gressiye and elevating in their tendency,
and in unison with popular instinct and as
piratioD. But when it comes to adopting
that political designation, there is a local
prejudice, an innate aversion, that no argu-
ment can overcome and no appeal remove.
1t revives all the old sectional feeling and
hate-stimulates fast fading animosities,
and serves as the surest excuse for the rant
and fastian of the demagogue and place
hunter to draw attention from the misdeeds
and impositions under which the people
have suffered and are suffering, through the
instrumentality of this modern Democratic
party.
How this sentiment of antipathy to the
Conservative party will crystalize and de-
yelop we cannot say, nor venture a predic-
ton. 1t exists in great intensity, but not
greater than the animosity entertained for
the Republican party. This is something that
cannot be reasoned away, for the attempt to
do so is met by appeals to passion and
prejudice, and when these are aroused there
is no place for the lodgment of argument.
We can only bide our time In the hope
that review Of the receptions and wrongs
inflicted upon the people from 1869 to the
present time will sooner or later bear their
fruits, and that tue popular consciousness
will revolt against any renewal of the Gree
leyism of 1872. under the specious plea of
"Concil;ation,' or the Tildenism of 1876,
under the cover of Reform" as to national
politics, and that Conservatism as en-
braced in the Funding bill, and the wrongs
imposed upon the great mass of the people
by the amendments to the constitution,
will invite popular judgment and invoke
SelCfdl COiIuclludtlOu Ill icIdLe aHalfS.
These considerations may disintegrate ard
shatter the Conservative party, but they will
give little hope of building up the Republi-
can party, as every effort in that direction
only serves to give vigor and vitality to the
opposition, and cement afresh the incon.
gruous elements which compose it. Men
who appreciate the wants of the State, an d
the Utter failure of the Democrat
ic organization to subserye healthy public
do not hesitate to express a desire
to see the Conservative party destroyed,
but they do not intimate that they will accept
Republican nomenclature as substitute,
ind cooperate with the national organiza-
ion of that name. The necessity for two
ocal parties, divided upon questions of
State policy, and representing the substan-
.ial interests of the Commonwealth, is ad-
nitted by all liberal minds, because the re-
'ressiye and reactionary tendency of the
party is inimical to the best
interests of the people and repelllng in its
fleet upon many who would otherwise cast
heir fortunes among us.
While we can see no sound reason in the