Buchanan County bulletin. [volume] (Independence, Iowa) 1869-1891, 1878-06-28
How It Looks from the Outside.

- 80 S--O
The New York Times, the leading Re-
publican paper of the country. has
powerful and incisive article upon the
platform adopted by the Iowa Republi-
can State Convention last week, which
affords fair idea of the estimation in
which that magnificent stump speech is
held by sensible Republicans in other
sections of the Union. It holds up
glass to the crazy and sore-headed "stal-
warts who were responsible for that
ringing" document, in which they may
view themselves in all their assinine
stupidity; and the significance of the re-
buke lies in the fact that the Times is
not "policy" paper, but has at all
times combated the Presidents ideas,
though always in dignifed and argu
mentative manner. 1t says:
The Republicans of Iowa are so sure
of victory that they can afford to dis
pense with considerations which weigh
heavily upon the party in more evenly
balanced States; while in these latter
States conventions recognize the neces-
sity of adapting their declarations to the
temper and circumstances of the time.
The topics touched have a direct bear
ing upon current discussions; states
menship is displayed, not by series of
fine phrases relating to subjects that
are no longer before the country, but
sagacious adoption of principles to the
settlement OF questions still in dispute.
There are some church members who
are dissatisfied with sermon which
does not embody the whole body of di
vinity. Every Sunday they would have
the preacher retrace the ground from
the fall Of Adam to the'work of the
Savior. An allusion to things of the
moment shocks them as heretical. The
managers of the convention at Des
Meixex-pply the same mental processes
to politics.
But political campaign is supposed
to have some immediate practical con-
nection with extant questions and ten
denotes, and the stereotyped PROPOSE
tions which compose one-half Of the
Iowa platform have none. Probably
they sound sonorous and grand in Des
Moines, but to the Republicans of other
States they give no more aid and com
fort that would be derived from the
literal Haunting of bloody shirt.
Had Mr.. Harlan or Mr.. Wilson climbed
the capitol and gone through this per-
Torrance, it might have been accepted
as sign Of readiness to reconstruct the
reconstructed States at the point of the
bayonet. But what meaning attaches
to series of declarations which imply
that the work of the war has not been
finished satisfactorily, or to a succession
of demands which presuppose a power
somewhere to enforce them. 1t the in
tention was thus to express dissapprOval
Of the Presidents Southern action, a d.
rect statement to that effect would have
been better. Are we to understand,
then, that the Iowa Republicans would
have Congress disregard constitutional
limitations with the view OF adjusting
matters in the Southern States, or that
they would have the President enforce
the objects of reconstruction by exer-
cising powers he does not possess? 1t
not, the demands" amount to nothing.
This essential fact which Iowa seems
not to comprehend, is plainly under
stood in most of the other States. For
the time, at any rate, the Southern
question is dead. 1t may arise from the
grave some day, and decisive treatment
will then be necessary. Meanwhile, in
all it's old aspects, it is removed from
the partisan arena, and the candidate
who goes about shouting himself hoarse
with cries which are no longer applica-
BILE, is more likely to lose votes than to
gain them. People generally are tired
Of these things. They may not like Mr..
Hayes method of settlement, but they
are rather thankful that the question is
out OF the way, The feeling is not in
dicative of GOODNESS or infdelity toward
the cause with which the Republican
party is identified. 1t means simply
that men are not willing to waste time
in bandying epithets, asserting what ev-
erybody knows, and demanding what
the Executive cannot enforce; and that
they are more disposed to seek practi-
cal reforms, to resist proposals which
the Iowa Republicans have overlooked,
to cultivate national interests, and to
rely upon ordinary influences for the de-
velopment of independent political ac
ton in the Southern States.
The Philadelphia Times, an indepen-
dent paper that has criticized President
Hayes severely, says:
The Republicans of Iowa are implac-
able to the last, and those who want a
good old bloody shirt campaign, with all
that the phrase implies, can be literally
accommodated in the State that gave
Hayes the largest majority. The party
there has raised fraud cry Of it's own,
settled the result in at least five South
ern States by large majorities, and Civ
en- Hayes raking over for some re-
marks he once made about a conflict be-
tween Greeks, all in one day.. 1t agrees
with the Democratic House of Repre-
sentatives that the Presidents title
can't be questioned, and that is about
the only thing that saves the platform
from actual absurdity. The Republi-
can party of Iowa is large enough to say
anything with absolute safety, and be-
cause it has never been threatened with
loss of power it declines to learn any
thing or to keep pace with the advanc-
ing and more conservative and decent
thought Of the time. 1t can live in the
dark past, make itself as ridiculous as
1t pleases, and marshal it's thirty or for
ty thousand majority with unfailing
regularity.