Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1882-09-19
THE IMPOTENCE OF DEMAGoGIsM TO
PRODUCE REFORM.

pretended TO be IN favor OF radical changes
in the transportation system. Neither
will prodGce any change whatever. Neither
will improve the existing conditions one
iota. .Neither viii b.ncfit the people of
California one jot or title. The Republi.
can party has adopted specific platform
on this subject. 1t hes pledged itself to
the enactment of certain definite measures
1t will not enact one Of those measures.
All is professions and pro:estations are
false, fraudulent, hypocritical and delu-
sive. And what is more, tine candidates
vino stand upon the platform, from Estee
downwards, know perfectly well that the
planks referred to are a. once preposterous
and impracticable, and that they were
never intended for any other purpose than
to deceive the credulous voters. There is
no choice between the parties on this issue
however. The Democrats are to the full
as demagogical and dishonest as their op-
ponents. But what we propose to show
here is that the actual effect OF all such
fraudulent movements as this anti.rail.
road movement is to put real reforms
farther off, and to engage the people with
shams and make believes while the condi.
tions of which they complain remain un.
changed.
1t is very certain that there are evils in
the railroad system which call for RENE.
dies, but it is equally certain that these
evils will never be cured by such blind,
foolish, ignorant and insincere movements
as the present. Nor is this mere mat.
ter of conjecture. The crazy raid upon
the railroads which the demagogues and
political chsrlatans of California are max
ing in 1882 is but clumsy imitation of the
Granger movement OF ten years ago. There
are no my steries about this kind of crusade.
1t is rs certain of failure as anything can
be. 1t is not even new in this State. On
the contrary, it is the third time cam
paign has been based upon the same issue,
and for the third time thu people will be
taught how little credit for common sense
their politicians give them. And yet the
diagnosis Of the present fraud is very sim.
pie and easy. The demagogues strive to
make it appear that the more drastic and
sweeping their regulation" propositions
are, the moro certain they are to be effect.
i've. Now the very opposite of this is the
truth. 1t is perfectly safe assertion that
the corporations laugh at the propositions
of the Republican platform. They are not
calculated to alarm anybody. They are so
wild and nonssnsical that there is not the
slightest danger of their getting enacted,
and the railroads know from experience
that when sham effort to do great things
has failed and been abandoned, the whole
movement collapses, and nothing at all is
attempted. This is what must be antici-
pated in the present case, and the situa-
ton is such that notwithstanding the ap-
parent hostility of both parties, the corpo-
rations really have at no time had less to
apprehend politically.
For all this fume and rattle and
smoke is at most but an affair OF outposts.
Ii the Central Pacific Railroad Company
had the management of the present cam.
paign it could not have chosen a more thor.
oughly harmless issue to divert the public
with than the "cost of service" issue
which the Republican party and Mr.. Doyle
have brought SO conspicuously to the front.
For this is as grotesque fallacy in trans.
portation as the doctrine of fat money is
in finance, and those who espouse it can
never occupy more respectable position
| intellectually than the Greenbackers do in
politics. Now if the railroads were anxious
to distract public attention from real
abuses they could not have done better
for themselves than their alleged enemies
are doing for them. For these latter are
working Justify to fix the public mind
upon chimeras, while the points which
really offer opportunity for practical i'm.
proTement are ignored. The result Of all
this will be a complete waste of the ener.
gies expended in the present campaign.
False issues, full of sound and fury, sig
"niiying nothing" will consume pub.
lie attention. 1t matters not what
ticket is elected, the ensuing Legislature
will do nothing. Even if it wore homes,
and in earnest it would fail, because it is
committed to the impossible. But there
is neither honesty nor earLestnsss in the
anti-railroad movement. All that the
politicians have thus far done 10 to prove
themselves to be shameless deruagogues,
without distinction of party. In doing
this they have also exposed thei-. baseness
and utter lack of public spirit, and their
unmanly and sneakiDg pusillanimity, by
trying to make scapeegoat of that rail.
road interest which has done thousand.
fold more for California than all the polit.
ical panderers that ever truckled slavishly
to mob.prejudice.
But if these creatures are mean and ser.
vile in the pursuit of their selfish ends,
they are equally mendacious and unreliable.
They never had any intention of keeping
faith with the people. On the contrary,
they hoped to be able to strike . bargain
with the railroad, and to secare the sup.
port OF the corporation whilo making
believe to fight it. Their mistake consisted
in their failure to realize that they DOS.
sesssd no leverage upon the railroad. They
were not formidable in any sense. Tneir
sham hostility could not brighten those
who knew that their intelligence was too
feeble to enable them to formulate q really
effective attack. As it is they have fired
10 the air. All their wild denunciation of
the contract system, and of the existing
principles of adjusting freight charges, and
so forth, and so on, are mere theatrical
thunder. There is literally nothing in
them. No Legislature will or can frame
laws to carry these ridiculous propositions
into effect. And even if o Legislature
were found silly enough to waste its time
in such. puerilities. the Courts would at
once brush away the unconstitutional en-
sctments. There is nothing real or serious
about such attacks. They deceive only
one element, and that is the people. They
enable rogues to get into office, and that is
the end of the agitation.
OF course popular gullibility encourages
such political frauds. The voters are SO
hard to disillusionize that, as in the field
Of medicine, every impudent quack is
tempted to tr.f his hand at cheating them.
Year after var they rise to the same
clumsy bats. Year after year they swal.
low the same gross and fulsome fiattery.