Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1880-09-11
THE FUNDAMENTAL ISSUE.

There is now before the American people
an issue far deeper and more vital than
any question growing out Of passing gov
measures can be. 1t is an issue
which must be decided before it will be III
order to discuss any of those questions.
Il is. the maintenance of republican insti-
tutions in the United States. There can
be no question so necessary to determine
as this. 1t is useless to contend about
secondary matters when we are not agreed
as to the methods by which the results OF
such contention shall be ascertained.
When men arrange for race between
horses the first thing they do is to settle
the conditions of the contest. At present
in this republic we haze the singular spec
taele of a strife between parties which Is
conducted on different conditions in differ
ent parts of the country. The funda-
mental conception of our government Is
that the majority shall rule. The impliea-
ton of this conception is that the ruling
shall be done by the real majority. 1t
1naiorities are to be fabricated the whole
system falls to the ground and becomes a
meaningless sham. If the honesty Of the
electoral system is so destroyed at any
part of the republic that that part is con-
trolled by fraud, the whole scheme of gov
ernment ceases to be what it was meant
to be; is no longer a government
by the majority; but is thenceforth a
haphazard, unrepresentative scramble, and
contest of cheating and lying. The first
necessity of such government as ours is
that it shall be genuine. The real majority
must have sway, and at all points. This
is Indispensable to the proper working OF
the system. A republican form of govern
ment substitutes for the dictum OF the mon
arch the dictum Of the majority but the
majority is the only legitimate substitute
for the monarch. A minority has no
claims 60 allegiance under this system.
There can be no advantage in government
by minority. 1t is not the democratic
principle, but it has all the dangers and
objections of an oligarchy. And, which is
the conclusive point, it is not provided for
nor contemplated nor allowed by our the
orv of government. If, then, minority
government obtains anywhere in this union
of States. it amounts to defeat of the
original governmental scheme. And be-
cause the several parts OF this republic are
interdependent, it follows that minority
government in one State alone must serve
to throw the whole system out OF gear,
and to change, in effect, the form of gov
eminent which prevails in all the other
States. Thus if in South Carolina a mi
nority, by force or fraud, usurp the SOW
ereignty which belongs to thu majority,
the result Is not only to overthrow repub-
lican institutions in that particular State.
but to deprive them of their force in all
the other States. The voter in Cali
fornia or Maine or Illinois is robbed
of a part of the scope OF his franchise
whenever a minority in Sonth Carolina
usurps the authority appertaining to the
majority. Let this usurpation be ex-
tended over the States of the Union, and
the original scheme of government ia de-
stroyed, and it is no longer possible for the
political contests which take place to pro-
duce results which are significant or con-
elusive. Every contest under such con
ditions resembles one between a player
VINO acts fairly, and a player who cheats,
To such contention there can come NJ
satisfactory or righteous conclusion. 1t is
not an honest test Of power it is &
vexatious pitting Of righteous convic.
tions against unrighteous fraud. At the
point where such frand begins the govern
mental system has broken down, and all
attempts to act as though both sides were
still controlled by the same conditions
must fail. In the present case the EN-.
barrassment of the Republican party is
due to its initial mistake in the policy
of reconstruction. That policy failed ut
terly, but it left the South with a SEM
blance of republican institutions, and it has
unfortunately been deemed necessary ever
since to pretend that they meant the same
as similar institutions at the North. But
the South long since ceased to be repnb.
lean, and this is the secret OF the present
confusion.