Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1881-11-02
The November Elections.

The November Elections.
Ten states hold elections next Tuesday,
Maryland, Massachusetts,, Mississippi, Min
nesota, Nebraska, New Jersey, New York,
Pennsylvania, Virginia and Wisconsin. In
five, Massachusetts,, Minnesota, Mississippi,
Virginia and Wisconsin, a governor other
state officers and legislature is to be chosen;
in the others, minor state officers and leg
islature. Only an incidental interest at
taches to the greater Part of the above cleo
tions, as the political status of the states is
well established and there is no expectation
that il will be changed or that the result
will vary materially from that of former off
years in politics-seasons when general poll
tics are apathetic, and when local issues are
discussed and decided with a common dis
regard to national political lines. But in
the states of New York and Virginia ma
tional interest is felt. In the former no
leading state official is to be elected, and it
is not seriously doubted that the state legis-
lature will be republican. No election in
the Empire State can be held which will not
have bearing more or less direct upon ma
tional politics. From the pivotal position
which she held in the late presidential cleo
ton, and from the fact that she may hold
within her control the decision of the next
national contest, lively interest is mani
tested in the outcome of the approaching
election. This natural interest is quickened
on all sides, and especially among republic
cans, by an anxiety growing out of the late
fierce factional fight in the ranks Of the lat
ter party in that state. The contest precip-
itated upon the republican party in that
state by the senatorial designations last
spring was long, and into it were infused
violent and bitter personal and fractional
passions and iealousies. Few organizations
could survive the strain of such contest
ending, as this did, with overwhelming de-
feat to the leader of one of the factions in
which personal humiliation was strongly
mixed with his unlooked-for relegation to
private life after long period of brilliant
and victorious leadership. But personal
republicans in the presence of the common
enemy. In this as in other instances where
individual and rival ambitions have been
powerfully pressed till timid friends and
expectant enemies have proclaimed the dis
ruption of the great party of universal free
dom and national unity, no fatal schism in
the ranks of republicanism may be antici-
pated, and certainly no act or failure to act
on the part of the beaten friends of ex-
Senator Conkling will contribute to dem
ocratic victory in the approaching election
in New York. The responsibility for such
a result must rest with the new leadership,
while victory may be confidently expected
from unhinching loyalty to principle on the
part Of the rank and file, the great nom
partisan element of the party. The repub-
ican press of the state bears confident
tone. The suspicious opening of President
Arthur's administration is source of
strength and inspiration, and it is not be-
lieved that his own state will contribute to
the natural embarrassments of his position
by placing itself in an attitude of political
antagonism towards him.
Public interest in the November elections
centers in Virginia. The relationship of
parties there on the question of the state
debt has been the subject of exposition in
every newspaper in the country, but that
question long ago disappeared from view
in the discussions Of the campaign. The
real issue lies between Bourbonism and
anti-Bourbonism, between an effort, cham
pioned by Malone, on the part of the latter
element to breach the solidity of the south
in its opposition to the ingress of new and
progressive ideas in politics, in education,
and in the means for advancing the mate
rial prosperity and developing the resources
of the south, and on the part of the former
to maintain the ascendancy of the old con-
federate element with its legacy of the men,
cries and traditions of the war. 1t is
contest between progressive and national
south and the south that clings to the polit-
ical ideas and methods of a quarter of a
century ago. 1t is contest between pro-
gressive democracy and the old Bourbon re-
dictionary democracy. The parties to this
contest are the readjusters and the demo-
Gratis. So far as the question of the state
debt is concerned, republicans can have
little active sympathy with either, but of
the two the read busters are the least objec-
tionable. Politically, national republicans
are in active sympathy with the purpose
OF the read usters to break up the So
lidity of the south and divide its vote
intelligently as the vote of the north and
west is divided. To this end the republi-
cans of Virginia have allied their strength
with the readjusters, and each party is repre-
sented on the state ticket. At the last cleo
ton Mahone's party cast thirty-one thousand
votes, the republicans eighty-three thousand
and the Bourbons ninety-six thousand, not
counting the odd hundreds. If the allies
ally, they will on the basis of this vote out
number the Bourbons by eighteen thousand
votes. The Malone party claims that what
ever loss they may sustain by reason OF the
alliance will be more than made up by con-
verts from the Bourbons, while the latter
lay claim to large fraction of the negro
vote, and deny that there will be any deser-
tions to Malone. In the light of all that
any reasonably close observer has seen of
Bourbon politics during the past decade,
Mahone's assumptions seem far more war
rantable, and the assurance he feels of VIC