The Portland daily press., 1880-09-08
Hartford Courant.
The Shortest WAY Out,

1t is not true that the Republican party is
sectional, or that it has sectional aims, or that
its success in this election will tend to keep
alive misunderstanding between the North
and the South. 1t is the true Union party,
and its success is the shortest road to sound
and lasting national harmony. This will ap-
pear from two considerations.
The South is made solid now, solidly Demo-
cratic, solely on the expectation that by this
method the South, by alliance with the De-
mocracy North, can get control of the general
government. 1t needs only few Northern
electoral votes to accomplish this. Brought
into power in this way, it must be sectiona
party in its aims. 1t is not reasonable to sup
pose that the Southerners, controlling Con-
gress, should be anxious about much else than
the welfare of their own section. The action
of the present Democratic Congress demon
strates this With all its bitter memories and
its wasted resources, the South cares only for
itself. 1t neither estimates nor cares
for the great interests of the North
the Northwest, interests that have vastly
grown in magnitude since the war. 1t has
none of the feeling that we have about the
sacredness of the war debt or the epensions paid
to the defenders of the Union. 1t has not the
interest we have in the national credit, nor in
Northern commerce and production.
Hancock's su cess would still more COM
pactly consolidate the South and solidify the
sectional feeling. The means used in Alabama
to continue the party in power would be still
used, and the Republican vote in the South
would be permanently disfranchised. On the
contrary, if the South fails to seat itself in
power by aid of North ern Democrats this time,
1t will not continue its present tactics. "If we
fall this time we cannot ever succeed" i" is a
common exclamation of Northern Democrats;
II we cannot elect Hancock we cannot elect
anybody in twenty years." And at the South
there is this feeling, often expressed, that if
the Democrats North do not help us out this
Gratis.
The result, therefore, of Hancock's defent,
as we view it, would be more hearty accep-
tance of the situation by the South, an aban-
donment of the attempt to invalidate the late
settlement, and new distribution of the po-
Htical forces, that would be greatly to the ad-
vantage of the whole country. We do not inn
aglne that the Democracy would drop its party
name or wholly disintegrate. But it would re-
form on lines not sectional. The Republican
party would have its free action and its due
weight in the South, and the Democratic party
in the North. The distribution would be what
it was in the old days of Wings and Democrats
before slavery disrupted the parties. The
South would divide onllocal issues ''let up'' ON
the freedmen, and enter into national politics
as it does not now.
There is another reason, equally strong, for
not letting the solid South seize the Govern
ment at this time. Nothing is ever well set
tied that is not settled right. Seventeen years
is good while to wait, but we had better wait
forty years than make permanent in our poll
tics the condition of voting disclosed by the
Alabama election. No republic can live with
a 70 nf r.