Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1880-07-17
A DiStinguished Democrats Rea-
sons for Supporting Generai
Garfield.

sons for supporting General
Garfield.
From the Cincinnati Commercially
Mr.. Alexander Fergusons announcement
that he regarded the action of the CINCINNATI
convention as virtually disbanding the demo-
cratic party. and would support Garfield and
Arthur in preference to Hancock and Eng
lish. has caused good deal of curious COM
mentarv. as Mr.. Ferguson has long been
known As a radical democrat. Mr.. Ferguson
heinz asked for an expression of his views in
detail. declined 10 be interviewed, but re-
marked that he had seen his opinions well
stated in the Nation newspaper. and that he
woulI in iorse the article as substantially
stating III. case. We copy from the article.
as ;rio";
General ,Iancock's utterances in Louisiana
in 1857. crcditahie as they were to him. bore
Oh a state of things which has wholly passed
away. and were made in a controversy which
has absolutely ceased. and indicate nothing
whatever Is to his attitude toward the prob
lens b. which the country Is now beset. Ills
nomination comes. too. just AS the republic
]
and military methods, and has nominated a
man whose fame is almost wholly based on
his career AS an economist and legislator
And vet the republican party has not hitherto
stood for administrative reform and leglsla-
tive enterprise. 1t has been essentially
war party. 1t has to no small extent
thrown discredit on peaceful agencies in the
work of renovation and pacificaton. 1t Is
the party which one would naturally expect
TO cling to soldier government and strong
man government. 1t is. therefore. more
than surprising to find that no sooner has it
returned to the paths of peace and produced
candidate whose triumphs have heen al
most all legislative, than the democrats. the
great friends of government hv discussion
and persuasion, and of policemen as against
soldiers. the great enemies of attempts to
work on opinion through the revival of war
memories and passions. should throw all
their civilians aside, their lawyers, their
statesmen. their financiers aNl appear on the
scene with Encouragement in full uniform,
| and begin to tell US of the battles he had
| fought the guns and prisoners he took, and
of the mildness and good sense with which
| he exercised the powers of military dicta-
tor over large bodies of the American peo-
pie half generation ago. OF course the
object of this is well known. 1t is meant to
meet the suspicion of democratic sympathy
with the rebellious South but it must be ad
mitted that a great political party is in a bad
way when it has no better mode than this of
commencing itself, in time of profound
peace to public much sobered by unhappy
experience of administrative and financial
disorder and reasonably anxious for care
full adaptation of the governmental machine to
the needs of rapidly increasing population
and to growing completely of interests and
responsibilities, both material and moral.
The Grant movement. happily defeated at
| Chicago, showed what powerful Judgment
Bonapartism had made in our politics. for the
passion fof putting successful soldiers in high
| position is the essence of Comparison. 1t
| is based on the assumption either that high
office ought to be used as reward for mill
tary service without regard to the candidates
fitness. or that the govern nent may have to
rest on military force instead of discussion.
1t has gone far enough among us. 1t is now
| high time to have an end of it. The repub-
lcan party has discarded it, the adoption of
it by the democrats does not put any better
| face on it. 1t is needless to say to most of
| our readers that the few precedents we have
| had say nothing for it. The Union over
which Washington and Jackson and Harri-
son were called to rule was a very differ
ent community from that which is to elect
the next President. 1t has changed from
simple and small agricultural population,
strung across the eastern coast. and manag-
ing almost all its affairs through local self
government, into an immense nation. cover
ing continent, and competing with the
world in all the industrial arts, with vast
civil service, vast accumulated wealth. pow
erful corporations, thousand conflicting in
terests,' and with momentum in its progress
which makes the slightest error in direction
capable of tremendous mischief Taking the
very narrowest view of the functions of the
executive. the President of such a republic
needs to be not simply an able or an honest
man. but one of the master politicians of the
time. There is not so much likelihood of
such politicians finding election to the Pres
| idency easy in our day but we do sincerity
believe strong move in that direction has
been made in the nomination of General Gar
| field that he belongs to an order of men
whom the people have to be persuaded to IA
vor and elevate and that the selection of
another soldier now would be distinct step
backward toward somewhat barbaric theory
| of government Is it not time ''the war
drum throbbed no longer and the battle
| flags were furled," even though the ''Parlia-
ment of Man. be still some ages distant?