National Republican., 1883-08-14
DANA AS A DARK HORSE.


the Other Candidates Out OF the Field
He Begins to Prepare the Way for a
Journalistic CSndidnto-why He Wants
the Republican Party to Go.
Nep York sun.
The constitution guarantees that any
American citizen born in the United States,
thirty.five years old and for fourteen years
resident within tho United States, shall
have the right to be president, provided he
is duly elected to that Office.
In this provision of tho constitution no ex-
ceptiou is mado against the members of any
profession and yet we find considerable
number of newspapers in diflerents parts of
the country, all edited by gentlemen Of in.
telligence and culture, contending that no
journalist ought to think Of being president,
and that what may be legitimate ambition
among other men should not enter the mind
of any editor or writer for the public press.
This strange proposition they always fortify
by reference to tho examples of the late DR..
Greeley and the late Thurlow Weed. The
former, who was potent journalist and
great figure in the history of his time, became
q candidate for president near tho end of his
life, and was beaten, and then died under
painful circumstances; while Mr.. Weed al
ways refused to be n candidate for any office,
and preferred instead to remain the editor of
q newspaper and managing politician.
These two instances are held up by those who
would not allow newspaper man to think of
becoming president as tremendous warning
against every such notion ON tho part of any
journalist.
In regard to Horace Greeley, the truth is
that his fatal error consisted in not getting
elected. II he had succeeded aud had really
become president, the same philosophers who
now use him to deter and to alarm, would
doubtless have spoken of him with enthu-
siasm as showing how, under the happy in
tiuence of American institutions, q man of
genius and energy can rise from poor be-
ginning to tho tallest political eminence.
But he failed, and the failure was too much
for him. and his saddened soul found the long
repose that knows no waking.
AS for Thurlow Weed, every one who knew
him well, and who knows the history of the
period in which he played part will admit
that he was not so much q journalist as q
managing politician. He was, indeed, tho
editor of an influential newspaper and he
was very pointed and effective, though not
broad or productive writer but his chief
delight was in the preparation Of primary
elections, the manipulation of legislatures
and conventions and the distribution of po-
litical rewards aAd punishments In him
the newspaper editor was subsidiary and
incidental; the practical politician was
everything. He had not that supreme faith
in ideas which belongs to the real journalist.
He conceived but imperfectly that intellectual
status which puts forth its propositions, de-
monstrates its arguments, and leaves the
result to be worked out in the acts of others.
He did not understand what 1t was to make
the case clear to the public, to discuss calmly,
impartially, goodnaturedly the merits of
opposing candidates and varying policies, and
then to leave it all to be determined by the
Judgment of the people. He loved to go
down into the arena himself and fight out
the scrimmage with his own weapons and
his own devices.
Moreover, it is true respecting Mr.. Weed
that his unwillingness to take Office was in a
considerable degree prompted by his inability
rs o public speaker. He knew that he could
not make q figure in the senate, because he
could not make consecutive speech of iive
minutes length; and so he would not be
senator. But for this natural disadvantage,
il is quite likely that his career might have
lain in different direction.
The instances OF DR.. Greeley and Mr.
Weed, then, are inadequate and unsatisfac-
tory when they are adduced as evidence that
it is wrong for o journalist to reflect about
becoming president. If Greeley had sue
ceeded in the election of 1872 instead of be-
ing beaten, his case might have been alto
gether different; and if Weed had been able
to make figure In the upper range of polit-
ical activity, his case might have been diff
ferent also. They were peculiar characters,
and all other men are not concluded by the
limitations of these two.
Whether or not a journalist should accept
political office of any sort is entirely ques-
tion for the individual himself. Those who
draw the great prizes in the newspaper pro-
tession may very naturally be reluctant and
turn deaf ear to the seductions of official
power as they are displayed before them.
Such q journalist may be Justified in thinking
that he already occupies position of greater
INF nd txy fhaf hat ~
the president, and it is for him to decide
whether he will change it should the induce
ment be offered. Yet nobody can be allowed
to assert that, in adopting ths newspaper pro-
fession man has forfeited the rights of an
American citizen, or that any ambition that
is legitimate in another is not equally legiti-
mate in him.
But, finally, our candid advice to every
newspaper man is under no circumstances to
entertain the idea Of running for president.
1t must tend to distract the mind from higher
meditations.