The New Orleans daily Democrat. [volume] (New Orleans, La.) 1877-1880, 1879-05-14
POLITICS AND MACHINERY.

WHICH we are HGCuSbOued W hSSOCidte Will
the princeIy virtues OF courage, honor and
holiness OF sentiment, and there is an imper
Thence OF speech and insolence OF manner
which liz inseparable from the prevarieator,
the braggart or the upstart The first Is
always impressive and seldom offensive; the
latter is always contemplate, and always
provokes resentment and deserves rebuke
Our contemporary, the Times, has never been
inspired with the higher sentiment, but 1t
reyels and riots In the impertinence Of the
upstart and the insolenee Of the bully. 1t
has perhaps mistaken strutting insolence
for that loftiness Of manner which every
where and at all times commands respect
It does not hesitate upon any occasion to de-
nounce and insult, because, like the average
braggart, 1t is as prompt to apologize as 1t Is
to outrage, and we scarcely know to what 1t
most owes what circulation 1t possessesAits
brutal insults or It's ready and abject apollo
giles.
We have seen more rude and unmannerly
assaults In It's columns. but we have never
seen anything there 50 marked by Its charac-
terlstic and upstart impertinence as the
article which 1t printed yesterday morning
headed Politics and Machinery In that
article the Times assumes a supercilious and
patronzing tone toward the DEMOCRAT
which is extremely offensive, and to justify
which it flagrantly and unblushingly mis-
quotes our utterance. The subject matter
is not of sufficient consequence to justify
such a controversy as this. But impudence
and falsehood, however Insignificant the pro-
vocation, should always be resented and re-
huked.
A day or two since an article appeared In
the DEMOCRAT on Modern Machinery for
Sugar." In which the following language was
used
We propose at an early date to publish the
cost OF every part OF the complete machinery
o e vs. so Il e @
this machinery can be manufactured as cheaDly
In New Orleans as In New York or anywhere at
the North.
This language is plain and unmistakable;
we meant to say, and no other construction
can be placed on our words, that improved
sugar machinery was manufactured here as
cheap as anywhere In the North and that we
hoped to obtain full and specific statistics to
prove this fact. With characteristic men
dacity the Times brazenly misrepresents our
language and quotes us as expressing the
hope that such machinery will ultimately be
manufactured as cheaply In New Orleans as
anywhere at the North" The simplest intel
Iigence will Immediately comprehend the diff
ference between what we said and what the
Times represented us as saying. and that
must be an obtuse intelligence which does
not Immediately perceive that the Times
has invented q glazing falsehood for
the purpose OF misrepresenting the DEMO-
ORAT and indulglngits own supercilious tenn
per. We submit that this Is not honorable
journalism, and that vicious twaddle can In
no manner or measure subserve either our
sugar, commercial or manufacturing indus
tries.
The DEMOCRAT is well aware Of the fact
that some OF the largest manufactures OF
sugar machinery In the country we're In exis-
tenee here some time previous to the natal
day of this paper or Of that Of the New Or
leans Times. It is also known to us that some
OF these foundries and factories have for more
than fifty years supplied our planters with
machinery, such as sugar mills, steam boilers,
evaporators CHARTERS, full steam trains, with
vacuum pans, centrifugal machines, ETC., at
later date, which work has been unexcelled
for finish, durability and efficiency. In fact
80 much work has been pressed upon our
leading foundries by the planters Of this
State, that they have frequently been put up
on strain night and day to execute it. Thus
In the summer Of 1877, about the time that
starving mechanics were burning machine
shops and numbering militia men in the
North, our leading foundrles were working
full quotas Of men, and one OF these foundries
was forced to refuse more than fifty thou
sand dollars worth Of work In three weeks.
So much for the superciliOusness of the
Times In its effort to misrepresent us.
As to the congratulations it offers the DEM
OCRAT on the latter's abandonment of
politics for material questions, we have here
to say that the DEMOCRAT has not abandoned,
and does not intend to abandon, the field OF
politics. The preachments Of the Times on
this point remind us very much OF the utter
ances of the old Republican and Of the Radical
leaders In the days Of Warmoth and Kellogg
Had the people and their press abandoned
politics for material issues exclusively the
State would never have been rescued from
the hands Of the spectators; and should the
people or their press In this great crisis o.
their destiny when all the elements of society
adverse to economical government; when til.
money power. the corporations and the cen
tralizationists are seeking to build upon thei
necks an everlasting despotism Of rings nov
abandon politics. the State would speedily b
remitted to the control Of the same men from
whom the great canvass Of 1876 reclaimed ii
But perhaps this is what the Times desires
The DEMOCRAT holds that upon the soun'
and just political governm ent OF State
rests all the material interests OF this or Q
any other Sta,e Without politics we coul'
have no safe, honest and responsible govern
ment, and without such government, neithe
our sugar industry, our trade nor other ma
terial interests could survive, and the coun
try would be left to the control OF its wors
men and finally reduced to such poverty an,
disorded that all capital and enterprise woul
fly its borders.