Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1882-07-10
REArINa THR ToM-Tons.

ocrats do not know many trlcksi ana tnere-
fore are much given to repeating themselves.
Just now they have hauled out the bat
tered and weather-stained Anti Monopoly
costumes from their political property room,
and have resolved to give the public that
worn-o old farce once more. It is very
easy one to play, the lines being simple and
thoroughly familiar. There was not
speech made on Saturday night which was
not the counterparto of fifty speeches just like
it which have served other demagogres in
their time. 1t is the easiest thing imagina-
bic to frame one OF these speeches. 1t de-
mands neither knowledge, honesty, sin
cerity or conviction. 1t is perfectly safe
to say that every one Of the speakers knew
that he was playing the part of a hypocrite
and an impostor, and it is equally certain
that three-fourths of the audience under
stood this also The fact, perfectly plain
to al who have eyes, is, that the Demo-
cratic party of California has no genuine
Issue upon which to 90 before the people,
and that therefore it has taken up the Anti
Monopoly cry as forlorn hope. We are
well aware that the Democratic candidates
do not really mean anything by it. All
they want is Office. If they can obtain
that by making the majority of the voters
believe that they are In earnest, they will
be content, ard after they have been
elected they will easily End means of drop
ping the siam issue.
| Nobody need be in apy doubt about this.
for everybody can refresh his memory by
referring to the political campaigns of the
past ten years. The Democrats would like
to have it thought that the RECORD. UNION,
as the advocate of fairplay to the railroads,
as for all other interests, is greatly alarmed
at their attitude But that pretense will
not serve. We entertain no apprehension
whatever in that regard. We have seen
too many anti'monopoly campaigns to be
!. irisnteneo@ -tReIr- stage. thunder. We
happen to be acquainted with most of the
people who are just now masquerading as
Anti Monopolists. We know them without
their stage costumes. We know how they
talk and how they act when they are not
before the footlights. We know the springs
that move them, the ambitions to which
they are so ready to sacrifice their man.
hood, the businesses to which they are pro.
pared to stoop, the csllous and shameless
hypocrisy and immortality of their theory
of life. We know Just how far they will
go, and what will stop them, and how will
ing they all are to be persuaded to abate
their sham ferocity, and how anxious and
eager most of them are to have it under.
stood, in the proper quarter, that they are
only making believe. And knowing these
and many other things which appertain to
the {" true inwardness OF Democratic pol
itics, it would be strange indeed if we
should be alarmed by the tom-tom beating
of these mountebanks.
We donounce their policy, not because
we fear that it will result in any serious
harm to corporate interests, but because
it is dishonest, knavish, hypocritical,
mean and sordid. Because we know
that these office-hungry politicians are,
consciously to themselves, prepared to lie
to and cozen the people of California !;
because we know that they are impostors,
who have staked everything upon their
ability to gull the voters into accepting
their sounding brass for genuine gold be-
cause we know that their sinister methods
are calculated to debaueh and degrade
politics hopelessly; because we know that
it is such as they who compel great corpora.
tions to enter into politics, and to exercise
a disturbing influence because we know
that with all their fulsome pretenses of
hostility to the railroad they all want and
seek railroad help; because they are
always alternating treacheries to the peo-
pie with treacheries to the interests they
believe to assail because while the
puolic allow themselves to be fooled by the
shallow roguery of such creatures it will be
impossible to induce large-minded and
trustworthy men to 90 into politics at all !;
because the more false issues like this are
employed, the wider will fraud and
corruption be disseminated through the
country because, if there are any abuses
which call for reform, the men we
speak Of are the last ones to be intrusted
with the work.
The public must be very simple if they
can be deceived by the Autobiography
platform of the Democrats. Let them in.
quire how General Stoneman obtained his
nomination if they want to get at the
truth. Let them ascertain what alliances
Hearst and his hackers wanted to make
if they desire to arrive at the inside of
the situation. The Democratic platform
is fraud, and the Democratic candidates
are in league to aid and abet one another
in hoodwinking the people. They have
no stomach for real issues. Whoever
doubts this has only to observe with what
strange unanimity every one of the
speakers at the ratification meeting
avoided the Sunday Law plank. They
dared not discuss that, because they would
have had to explain their positions, and
they have seen enough already to realize
that public opinion is not with the side to
which they are committed. They think
that by combining themselves to the Anti
Monopoly plank they can conceal the
other planks of their platform. But they
forget that they are very late in the field
that this cham issue has been most thor.
oughly exploited years ago and that it will
therefore be difficult to get up any en-
thusiasm over it. They have put at the
head of their ticket very fitting man to
lead such a fantastic procession. AS a
Railroad Commissioner, when he had the
power, he has failed to do anything, and
SO he is put forward as Governor, in which
office he would haveno power to do anything.
We do not doubt that General Stoneman
would be as harmless Governor as he has
been Railroad Commissioner. There is
no reason whatever for apprehending that
he would do anything desperate. But he
is in thoroughly false position. He is
being placed before the public as a
political stool-pigeon. The Democrats
are certainly very sanguine of tim
permanent, or they would never have
thought it possible to delude the California
voters into accepting their rattle-trap mas.
querade as a genuine thing. Their ratifca-
ton meeting must have been very uphill
work for the speakers who had to simu-