Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1882-11-13
TEE RISE AND FALL OF PARTIES.

OF the application OF natural laws which
has not been thus far needed sufficiently to
produce the reforms the need of which ia
indicated by these phenomena. All partie,
are pure and earnest when they arise.
They owe their origin to their superior
fitness, as contrasted with that of their
predecessors. They attract the best ele-
ments by the patriotism and wisdom Of
their principles, and they begin by bring
ing strong men to the front. In their
earlier years these strong men establish
their reputation. Bat the higher that
reputation is the lower will be the in.
evitable subsequent descent of the party.
For when the great and noble aims which
inspired its youth have been accomplished,
the fire of enthusiasm which wrought upon
| it dies out, and the men who made it
glorious retire, conscious that their
mission is fulfilled. Then commences party
decline. To the unselfsh patriots who
| guided it and maintained the elevation Of
itspurposes, succeeds very different class.
The new men are selfish, scheming ad-
venturers, whose highest ambition is to
traffic successfully upon the past reputation
of the party. The first step taken by these
new managers is to utilize the party dis
cipline. The organization which enthu.
siasm made easy is forthwith cemented
by sordid agencies Gradually blight
steals over the party. 1t may go on for
many years, shouting the same war-cries,
| rallying the same hosts, achieving the
same successes. But during all this sec.
ondary period it is undergoing steady
deterioration, and when the process is
completed all resemblance save that of
name. to the original organization, has
ceased to exist.
Philosophical men have little by little
been ousted from its management, either
by trickery. or from sheer inability to
tolerate the methods which are employed.
Principles have been abandoned. Plat.
forms have become as perfunctory as the
petitions which are inscribed on the prayer.
wheels of Tibet By degrees the entire
personnel OF the management has been
changed. What was originally uppermost
has disappeared. What was originally at
the bottom has come to the surface. Party
politics has become a profession. It is
carried on by chicanery of the most
elaborate kind. 1t involves the constant
use of long series of methods every one
of which has been specially devised to
cheat the public out of the suffrage, and to
force upon them candidates whom they
would never choose ii left to themselves.
In this stage of party activity the Govern
ment becomes merely an agency whereby
friends can be rewarded. The public ser.
vice is degraded into military chest. The
right Of the people to the full and faithful
service Of the servants they pay, is ignored,
The dominant party uses the offices on the
theory that thez/are partisan accessories
and perluisites. This audacious and adroit
system. coupled with the hypocritical
repetition of the old Shibboleths. sufices
for long perio9 to buoy up the decadent
organization. Meantime, by the operation
of inexorable laws, it is becoming more cor.
rupt Cd ,tinually.> Year after year its bet.
ter elef ents are eliminated. and year after
year it attracts to itself more of the dema.
gogue I'D CORFU tionist elements.
Hav pg once entered upon the stage of
decom Position II cannot be reformed For
it mus rely moro and more upop1dishonest
methofs as its ever growing. want of prin.
c;ples steadily become understood by
larger 6ircles of yes former adherenss. And
the edigercies &biis force it to depend
i6ofe Entirely ~ery year upon the baser
Hnathdds of politics, exclude all hope of re.
form within the party. Nothing could
brints about such reform save reorgan-
izati,n of the party, which would involve
the recreation of it. But parties never
are u created. The same mysterious laws
which bring to decay and death every liv.
ing organism, and which in the fullness of
time turn the life-giving machinery to the
task of disintegration, govern politics.
The nobler and more brilliant the youth
and vitality of party, the more certain.
is it1 age to be corrupt. The very strength
and tenacity of the popular faith, inspired
by its early deeds, and kept alive by their
memory, only afford further time for the
establishment and dissemination of those
| destroying agencies which are destined to
reverse all its glories, and to substitute for
the living light of patriotism and principle
the Dead Sea ashes of its bitter and cor.
rupt senescence. The longer the posses.
sion of power the more disastrous the final
fall, because then the cup of the peoples
anger must be 80 much the fuller.
If there is any one point in American
political institutions where amendment
seems specially needed, it is in regard to
the spurious and artificial secondary exist
ence of parties which have accomplished
| their initial purposes. For it is during
this secondary period that corruption is
always developed. Out of the good which
great parties do in their youth, springs the
evil which naturally belongs to popular
confidence no longer warranted. How many
pitiful knaves have sheltered their sordid
abuses under the mantle of the martyr.
statesman, Abraham Lincoln How many
shameless iomsgogues have fqisted them
selves upon the people thiSrgh adroit
reference to the suppression the Rebel.
lion. Has not the blood of Il hosts who
died to save the Union been + coined for
drachmas and iavished in Support. of
horde of greedy adventurers} not one oft,
whom possessed single sparl If the Aelf.
sacrificing patriotism upon lie imen3ories
of which they traded? AMI yeti il re.
quires many years of stoliel endurance,
many years of declining inte fE in poll.
tics, many and many illustrate bns of fraud,
imposture, dishonesty, rapsk, ~, to rally
the people for their own lprN tection and
vindicatiou.
When at last the long-gatta ring storm
breaks, there follows refresltng clearing
of the air for time. But It 5 impossible
to estimates the losses which The country
suffers while slowly sccumulS Ting dissst.
isfsction ard indignation. these losses
are of many kinds. They ID hide dis.
tinct deteripration of public lnorals, the
growth OF a,tendency TO ccndohe political
crime, playing fast and loose; with prin.
ciples, the enormous increase of dema.