The New York herald., 1878-11-09
A Good Time to "ssop Fooiing."

negroes, mdut TepeHtaHt uuiihb iSiAoAoS
revival, came down to the banks of the
Pedee to be baptized by immersion. One
after the other was dipped under the waves,
until at last one of the men, in the excite
ment OF the moment, was held under water
q good deal longer than he expected lie
struggled mp into the air, blew the water
out of his mouth and nose, and exclaimed,
Look heyah, et We don't pay more tention
and stop dis foolin' iust ting ye know some
gemman II lose niger
If we were the confidential advisers of
the democratic party we should urge them
to stop fooling" They cannot afford to go
on playing at politics and playing SO badly
as they do. The country would, on the
whole, we believe, like 10 see the democrats
once more in power, for the present election
shows that it does not love the republicans.
1t sees all their faults ; but it is a sensible
country, and it is waiting patiently Tor the
democrats to show that they possess little
common sense before it puts them in pos
session of the federal administration At
the present rate we should think demo-
cratic President probable about the year
1852
The latest returns cut down the demo-
cratic majority in the House of Representa-
tives to point where it is in fact no
majority at all; for no one can foretell how
the Southern Independents will vote; and
of the greenback members, who are in
creased to eleven, five or six are OF republi-
can antecedents. and will on party ques-
tions vote with their former friends. From
present appearances the democrats will
need help to elect Speaker when the next
Congress meets. This is melancholy ex-
hibit for party which confidently expected
a majority Of twenty five or thirty, which
only year ago was SO sure Of the next
Presidency that it had hard work to deter
mine upon whom to bestow the great Office,
and was so confident Of controlling the
next House that it thought almost anybody
good enough to be nominated for Congress.
A year ago the republicans were divided,
and the democrats looked on at their quar-
rels with amusement. To-day the repub-
licans are united, and the democrats are
split into factions whose leaders oppose
each other far more bitterly than they do
the republicans. They are divided not
only by personal differences but on princi-
pies and policies, and it is not too much to
say that the democratic party of the coun-
try is to-day little better than a mob,
which has just now about as much
chance to elect the next President as
it has to bring about the millennium
by strict party vote. 1t is one Of
the marvels Of modern politics that this
should be true of party which has among
its leading men more and abler and more
trusted men than the other. Take the Sen
ate, for instance, and the republicans can
not to-day produce on their side six Sen
ators in whom the general public has as
much confidence as in Bayard, Randolph,
Herman. Lamar, Hill and Carl md. But
the republicans have the wisdom to let
their leaders lead and rule them; in the
democratic party the gentlemen We have
named have been substantially in them
nority. Their advice, sound and able as
it always is, has been despised by
their party, which has preferred the
voices of such men as Voorhees,,
Ewing and other inhationists and dema-
gogues, and was SO ready to cheer this kind
that poor old Senator Thurman thought
they could put him into the Presidency on
what was called the ''Ohio idea"
The republican leaders have no more
definite policy than their opponents, but
they at least keep their eyes open. They
do not go about like men asleep and dream
ing and they have one belief which has
saved them often from shipwreck: they
firmly believe that the people of the United
States, or a majority of them, are honest
and respectable. Now, the men who
have managed to control the dem
ocratic party for the last dozen
or tw enty years, and who are still control
ling it, make the blunder of believing that
the people Of the United States are no bet
ter than a set OF tramps. 1t is not an exag-
geration to say that during the whole of the
last session of Congress the democratic
policy was simply tramp" policy. Un-
able TO see that the country wants above
everything else peace, order, rest, perma-
nence. stability, confidence, the men whom
the democrats permitted to lead them passed
from one attempt to another at disorder.
In the face of the fact that We are on the
very verge Of specie payments, and that all
legitimate interests had already coniormed
themselves to that end, Mr.. Ewing was
allowed to take mp the greater part Of
the session with attempts at unsettling the
currency again. and kept the whole country
in alarm and stsgnation. Then came the
celebrated Potter Committee, with its half
concealed expectation of unsettling the
Presidency, and its utter and ridiculous fail
ure to accomplish anything except the pro-
duction Of set of unmitigated scoundrels
MS its favorite witnesses. When we men,
49,, Il, addition IN thesa tho cilvar foitv ,Ya