The weekly clarion. [volume] (Jackson, Miss.) 1863-1882, 1882-04-26
PARTY PROBLEMS.

Ioh CAri cchuKz IN North American Review !
/ Great corporations have grown up, WELD
ing power which may challenge that of the
Government ITSELF New interests have
developed themselves, and with them new
conflicts, some of them beyond the reach
and control of local selfgovernment In
consequence, we have a people with new
social organization, new wants, new griev-
anees, and new aspirations, and becoming
more and more accustomed to look to
central authority for things which formerly
were not considered within the range of its
/ functions. Whether we consider these
tremendous changes as good or evil, as
/ fraught with danger or full of promise, they
are the natural outgrowth OF development
bound to come and to go on, and they can
not remain without great effect upon the
nature and working machinery of the
+ Government.
The simple principles which form the
+ foundations Of republican institutions re-
main the same. But their application to
! the state of things now existing, with its
new requirements, is no longer as simple as
/ it was defined in the formulas of the past.
+ These requirements cannot be safely disre-
garded. The powers of the general govern
ment have to be so adjusted that they may
be equal to the demands of our present
condition without encroaching upon the
/ legitimate province Of local self-government,
and without becoming a dangerous instru-
ment of usurpation in the hands of those
who WELD them. The responsibility for the
exercise Of those powers has to be so sys-
tematically distributed and fixed, that no
public function be without its well-defned
and tangible share of it-a need which is
very obvious in view of the confused anar-
chy which now prevails in that respect A
way has to be found to make more availa-
bic and useful to the Government, in all its
branches, the best intelligence and character
in the country, now in great part excluded
from public employment by the peculiar
nature Of our constituencies and the work
ing of the party machinery, or Withdrawn
from it by the superior advantages ofpriyate
pursuits. The administrative machinery
of the Government has to be so organized
that not only higher degree of integrity,
intelligence knowledge, and efficiency be
secured for the service, but that the public
offices cease to be an agency of corruption
and decentralization in our political lite.
OF this comprehensive problem the reform
of the civil service is only part, but a very
important one, and the only one that has so
far come in a definite form to the attention
of the people. These problems are of greater
consequence even than our questions of
finance and customs, for their solution will
be destined to produce more permanent and
farther-reaching results.
The existing political parties, in their
Rsesepe condition, appear scarcely fitted for
recitation and treatment of this
The purposes for which they
inally organized in the past had
to a different state of things. |
h civil service reform they have |
eed themselves in a perfunctory, |
far as the regular organizations are
erned, insincere or Indifferent manner. |
1ther of them represents at present any |
thing like "organzed opinion as to the |
tasks Of the future. The spoils system has |
brought forth that kind of machine politics |
one of whose characteristic features it is to |
look at every topic with reference to the |
advantage its treatment, one way or another, |
will yield at the next election, the parties |
thus living from hand to mouth.
But the very fact that they are so evenly |
balanced in strength as to be obliged to
reach for whatever outside support they can
obtain, makes them accessible to the influ- |
ence which an enlightened and Independent |
public opinion can bring to bear upon |
them. In the present period of transition
the popular mind is unusually open to the |
discussion of those great problems of gov
ernment which are upon US, and currents OF
thought and sentiment may thus be put in
motion sufficiently strong to carry one or
the other Of the existing parties from point
to point, thus accomplishing through that
instrumentality results in detail, growing in
Importance as they accumulate. The party
which receives these influences most readily
and gives them effect, will thereby develop
new elements of vitality-which, however,
can be done at the expense of those methods
of political management which have sprung
from the spoils system. If, on the contra
ry, both of them resist those currents of
opinion, the latter will probably grow
powerful enough to force into existence a
new formation, with courageous spirit of
initiative and a programme born OF the
requirements of the times.