Lancaster daily intelligencer. [volume] (Lancaster, Pa.) 1864-1928, 1882-08-12
TsaE TRUE WAY.


what - t. 1nteFooe Of ne W0sklngmo0c
Harrisburg Patrio& y d
Mayor nowderley tells the readers of tAe
Nostx Amsricos ReoieD, in the courss Of
a very able article, that the knights of
Labor were organized to take the place of
the labor unions, which had not answered
all purposes as they should have done.
But we should like to ask Mr.. Powderly
or any other equally sincere and intelli-
gent friend of labor what they can hope to
gain by any political action outside the
Democratic party. That party has always
supported the just demands and defended
the legal rights of labor. That was the
leading purpose of its formation. Under
Jefferson, jackson, and their successors, 1t
fulfilled that mission until it was split on
the slavery question and minority party
came into federal power. But there is not
q principle or rule or maxim laid down
anywhere by Thomas Jefferson which
does not make for the protection of the
plain common man against the cunning
devices of legislation, by which combined
capital and centralized power arc always
seeking to appropriate the earnings of Ia
Dor. Let Mr.. POwderly and his friends
look all through this much-talked.0f but
little-understOOd system of Jefferson, which
is after all so simple and so easily summed
up in few great principles, and tell US
whether the labOring man can ever make
for himself q party or platform better
calculated for the protection of his rights
than the Democratic.
Let Mayor POwderley and those who
honestly cooperate with him discOunte-
nance any separate political action of
manual labOrers, and instead advise the
wOrkingmen everywhere to organize JEFF
fersOn associations, and enforce Jefferson 8
doctrine upon the party which he formed
and vitalized to serve the common people.
Such associations which, in the language
of Senator Wallace, 'shall reach into
every election district, and there teach the
gospel of individual right, local gov
ernment and pure administration, are
among the best means that can be devised
to produce that harmony of counsel
which is necessary to cope with such a
foe. Community of interests begets unity
of opinion, and hence we must prac-
tice what VIC teach. Such an organization
of thinkers, speakers and writer's striking
everywhere at centralized power and cor
rupt rule, and acting with and for the
masses, will speedily place US upon fight
ing equality with the party of the admin
istration, and give us an even chance in
tho great struggle for popular rights
Unity and successful progress can come
to our organization only through closer
following of Jcfferson's own practice. We
must err, if we err at all, on the side of the
masses of the people. We must incur,
as he did, the charge of sans culoitism,
rather than bear the faint of aristo-
tso %n,> nj
must dcnounce, as he did, every ''contriv-
ance for corruption" and strip ourselves
of responsibility for a system that enables
men SO to manipulate franchises granted
by the people as to amass princely for
tunes in decade at the expense of their
rights and privileges, and we must attack
with unbought pen and the wondrous
power of honest poverty, the use of those
fortunes to corrupt the sources and chan
ncls of public opinion and to pollute the
ballot box.
Hamilton is the political saint of the Re-
publican party. He was an ayOwed mOn-
archist.- He said in the constitutional con-
vcntiOn: "All communities divide them
selves into the few and the many. The
first are the rich and the we'll born, the
"other the mass of the people. The peo-
"ple are turbulent and changing; they
"seldom judge or determine right. Give
therefore, to the first class a distinct,
"pe7manent share in the government"
No one will deny that this has been pretty
effectaully done. Just before the last
presidential election General Garfield an.
nounced that the influence of Hamilton
was waxing, while that of Jefferson was
waning The Federalist- Republicans draw,
as they always did, and as they boastfully
avow, their inspiration from Hamilton.