Lancaster daily intelligencer. [volume] (Lancaster, Pa.) 1864-1928, 1881-11-21
lancastRt f11telliQellrer.
MONDAY EVENING, NOV. q. 1881.
Citizen Republicans

Citizen Republicans.
Some of the simple-minded gentlemen
who attended the sore head Republican
conference in Philadelphia the other
day seem 10th to have their position
stated in the way Congressman Bayne
put it. viz. opposition to the machine
within the party line and graceful sub
mission to it when beaten. The editor
of the New Era, who was one of them,
says Bayne never said it. He ought to
know but if he didn't, manifestly the
reporter who thus translated and con-
densed what he did say had a good deal
better knowledge of the English language
than the congressman. 1t is a very curl
Gus thing indeed that any man of in
telligence in this movement should fail
to see that his position is exactly What it
ssententiously stated to he in the expires.
sion attributed to Mr.. Bayne. The editor
of the New Era is a veritable ostrich in
self.deception if he does not understand
that fight within the party lines means
submission when beaten. OF course
great many men fight within the party
and don't submit when they are beaten !;
just as Wolfe did in this campaign; but
then they cannot do this, obviously,
while proclaiming that they do not be-
lieve in contending outside the party.
The Nem Era editor can only protest his
intelligence at the cost of his honesty;
for if he intends to fight outside the
party lines, after being defeated inside.
then he makes false pretense in main
tanning that the trouble in his party can
only he properly corrected within its
lines.
If these men have any distinctive idea
in their 6 Citizens Republican AssOcia-
ton" it is the. purpose they declare
to contend only within their party.
Otherwise they have nothing to dis
ringuish them from Mr.. WOlfe's Inde-
pendent Republican party. Wolfe an
nounces his purpose to be to fight the
machine leaders of his party outside of
it, and protests his disbelief in the
efficacy of any other method of getting
them out of its control. He purposes
maintaining his organization, giving his
"moral and material aid -" to the 'Citi-
zen Republicans" in their proposed con-
test within the party, and taking up the
fight where they leave it off. Plainly the
parties of Republican malcontents expect
to assist each other, the Wolfe men
voting at the primaries with the "Citi-
zen Republicans and the latter with
Wolfe at the polls. This nice-lOoking,
double-barreled arrangement will hard
ly work. The two parties opposed to
the regular Republican army will not he
as strong as though they were one, and
will be beaten in detail. There is too
much tomfoolery" and hypocrisy
about the Citizens Republican movement
to make its appearance in the political
field grateful and gracious to the public
eye. Since there is such an important
body of Republicans as that behind
Wolfe, determined to beat the machine
Republican organization by fighting the
party along with it, it is obviously neces-
sary for all Republicans who do not like
their present leadership to act with their
positive associates in their resolute effort
to put them out. if they hope to get
them out. The policy of submission
won't do il, when fifty thousand RepuD-
licans reject it, whether it is done
gracefully . or otherwise and to cX-
press such policy, while denouncing
the offensive leaders as unfit for popular
trust, simply exposes the Citizen Re-
publicans . to ridicule and contempt,
under which they will be weak enough
to be knocked down with feather.