National Republican. (Washington City (D.C.)) 1872-1888, 1881-06-01
Our Monopoly Masters.


the party of the people. This was when
Jackson was throttling notification and
the power of the United States Bank. In
later years it contracted disease. 1t fell
under the control of great material in
terest, which, combining its power with
the strength of ambitious and unscrupu-
lous men, made it at last the enemy of
the people. That interest was Slavery
and Cotton. The slavery question
asserted itself in every conven-
ton, Legislature, and Congress con-
trolled by the Democracy, and subordi-
mated all other matters. 1t made
tests of party fidelity, and decided
who should be permitted to pass into the
Sanhedrim, even when accepting the
tests. If man was blindly devoted to
all the schemes and plans of the slave
holders, he was pronounced "sound on
the goose" If he had faltered for an
instant at any one of Slavery's EXTREMIST
demands, he was distrusted forever and
called "fishy." In Democratic national
conventions this insolent power ruled as
long as it could, and when it could no
longer rule it ruined The Demo-
cratic party was rent asunder in 1860
minority, and has for twenty years been
in outer darkness. Only by its divisions
was the party of Freedom able to succeed.
The real thick-and-thin friends ofSlavery
were powerless when no longer aided by
those who yielded to that system its
utmost rights under the law, but refused
to accept it as sovereign.
The Republican party was born in the
struggle of the people to be emancipated
from the rule of King Cotton. 1t was
made up of that great body of citizens
who had determined to circumscribe
slavery and preserve the Territories and
new States to free labor. Itwas met with
insolence and violence. 1t was accused
of disunionism, and was denounced by
nearly all the press and the pulpit. 1t
had to fight its way in the North, and in the
South it was unknown. Freedom of
speech and of the press were resisted by
those who upheld the old order of things,
and freedom of the ballot was doubtless
neutralized by fraud to an extent sufficient
to change the result in the first great en-
counter it had with the cottonocracy in
1856.
The Republican party in its turn has
contracted disease. Again it is great
material interest which allies itself with
those who have been placed in power
and who thirst for the perpetuation of
that power. This disease is fast making
the Republican party appear to be the
enemy of the people. 1t is not Cotton
this time; it is Monopoly. That is the
name by which it is known by the most
people. 1t is the combination of
the rich few against the multitude.
Its main feature now is the high and ex-
tortionate rates of toll extorted from all
who desire to travel or send freight over
the public highways. In vain the farmer
tolls and saves when he cannot travel the
road to market until he has given up all
his profit to the railroad toll-gatherer.
This railroad interest taxes the people to
pay dividends on fictitious valuation of
their property more than double its actual
value. Railroads are as much subject to
public control as are other roads, and,
knowing this to be the law as declared
by the highest court of the land, they
seek to own Congress and the Legislatures,
as slavery did in the past. Let any man
now in politics speak in favor of the pub
subsidized press of that great over
shadowing power will denounce him as if
he were a malefactor. The chief over
seer of this branch of the business is the
New York Tribune, whose writers are
and whose patron and
backer testified as follows before a COM
mittee of the New York Legislature:
do not know how much paid toward helping
friendly men. We had four States to look after,
and we had to suit our politics to circumstances.
In Democratic district 1 was Democrat, in a
Republican district was Republican, and in q
doubtful districtI was doubtful; but in every dis
rict and ct all times have always been an Erie
man.
Said an old Virginia secessionist in
1859 to the writer of this: "Any man
who is for slavery is Democrat, and any
N an who opposes what slavery wants is
a Black Republican" We have now
reached point where the railroad lords
ire as potential in the Republican
party as the cotton lords were
in the Democratic party. The
present Administration is appa-
rently now as much in cahoot with
his railroad power as James Buchanan's
was with the slave power. If the cause of
railroad extortion is not the Republican
cause, let Republicans demand to know
by what strings our puppets are made to
lance at Albany to railroad music. The !
zines are ripe for resistance tothis politi- |
,al dictator-the Railroad Power.
If the Administration has united with !
he Southern Bourbon Senators in oppo-
;ition to negro suffrage for Robertson's |
;ake the negroes will be likely to accept |
he invitation of Wade Hampton to vote |
he Democratic ticket. That statesman
ong ago notified the blacks that they !
could vote only when they voted with |
he Democracy, such avote being deemed |
evidence of intelligence to ad-
nit them into the governing class.
THE Administration organ-grinders be- |
abor their poor weak heads for new |