Morning journal and courier., 1882-02-21
Tuesday Morning, Feb. 21. 1882.
THE POLITICIAN.

The Hon. Adm Thayer recently made an
elaborate and able defense of the caucus, and
| showed how, by the efforts of good citizens,
it might be made what it ought to be. At
the meeting of the Massachusetts Club in
Boston Saturday Mr.. Thayer made a very in
teresting and able address wherein he showed
that the politician has honorable and nee
essary function in a republic and that the
words politician and citizen should be synon-
ymous.
assume said Mr.. Thayer in the course of
his address, that every good citizen should,be
politician, to the extent, at least, of intelli-
gent and conscientious action at the polls and
caucus. If all good men would be politi-
clans to the extent of an educated, intelligent
attendance at the caucus and polls, the rest
would easily take care of itself. There may
possibly be in the northern States two or
three Congressional districts wherein the
vicious criminal and dangerous classes are in
majority. Certainly not more. In the
South society has not yet practically accepted
the democratic idea, and, until it does, we
can only consider it part of our territory
wherein free institutions rest upon the power
of the central government, but that power
is now amply sufficient in peace or war to
guarantee republican government through
out the country, at least in form There
is, then, no probability that our republican
institutions will be overthrown by the unaid-
ed efforts of scoundrels. It is only when
the corrupt and vicious are reinforced by the
inert and Indifferent that the contest becomes
desperate, the result doubtful. We know ex-
actly how to attack actual wickedness, for
our lives have been trained for warfare with
evil, and the great forces of the universe for
ever fight on our side but for the laziness,
the absorbing love of prosperity and ease, the
marasmus of conscience and intellect, which
render men incapable of seeing or resisting
evil, there is no adequate remedy. Thus it
is, he continued, that free government is al
ways overthrown-not because vice and
crime have become too powerful to resist, but
selfish and luxurious ease have grown too
feeble to longer upbear the ark of the cove
nant. Thus it is that professional pugilist
and gambler has represented great metro
politan district in the lower House of Con-
gress, through the combination, none the less
real because not understood or intended by
either party, of the ward hummer at the polls
and the cultured man of ease in his dressing
gown and slippers at home-a partnership in
which all the odds on the score of morality
are immensely in favor of the ward hummer,
who makes no concealment of his motives or
intentions, and whose character and sur
roundings are not such as to excite the envy
or the emulation of his neighbers, while his
dormant partner, the cultured man of ease,
influence, y >a-u-sssieserved it may be, in
shaping the ., cnis associates and
friends
This is strong language, but not too strong.
It would be we'll for this republic if it could
be read and appreciated by all those who by
simply neglecting their political duties are
endangering the stability of our institutions
We must have politics in free government.
The kind we have depends entirely on good
citizens At present too many of those who |
ought to be good citizens are in the condition |
described by De Toqueville, whom Mr.. |
Thayer quotes 'The discharge of political |
duties appears to them to be troublesome /
impediment which diverts them from their |
occupations and business. If they be re- |
quired to elect representatives, to support |
the government by personal service, to meet |
on public business they think they have no
time; they cannot waste their precious hours
in useless engagements. Such idle amuse-
ments are unsuited to serious men, who are |
engaged with the more important interests of
life These people think they are following
the principle of self-interest. But the idea
they entertain of that principle is very rude
one, and, the better to look after what they |
call their own business, they neglect their
chief business, which is to remain their own
masters"