Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1883-01-31
The Flu IRE OF Politics.
BY BISHOP JESSE T. PECK, D d, H.. D.

Timothy Titcomb says we must trust
somebody or die. So, if we trust the
wrong persons, we shall die. Just so far
as the republican party has trusted the
wrong men it is dead Whom has it
trusted?
First, few thorough patriots, who had
guided it through the great struggle for
liberty which has left us an emancipated
nation. The record is grand one. The
tried and faithful leaders in cabinet and
field are peerless in the history of this
epoch. They seized great principle and
moved it to the front, and compelled the
world TO respect and obey it. Liberty.
personal and civil under their direction,
emerged with the smile of a seraph from
her baptisms of blood. Many strong and
true men of other political relations
arranged themselves by their side and
struggled and dared nobly in the conflict
But the time came when the party of
freedom must be made to do the work of
a political party. Then it appeared that,
in the main, the leaders in the civil wal
were not politicians. They could lead to
emancipation, but were not astu,e partisan
organizers. They could not broaden the
great morality which brough them together
into q national administration, so us to
make 1t include the elements OF Justice
kindred to the one which had combined
them. They could not, therefore, construcl
a political ethical system which would
protect the government and people from
| plunder and which would withhold power
from vast and ruinous monopoies: which
would rescue the government from the
grasp of intense individualism, personal
and combined. They could not shield the
suffering reoplc from the ruins of the
liquor traffic, nor protect the holy Sabbath
from wicked disturbances, nor the mails
nor the schools from Oh Gene prints or
books They could not trust themselves
to lift politics into any such spheres OF the
great right; and, hence, they did not make
political party under the denomination
OF the moral element, which made them
a compact rather than n political party.
The guiding minds which organized what
was known as the republican party were
rapidly superseded by practical po iticians
who soon carried them under the control
of struggle for Votes. and the capital
vices of party politics seized the republi,
cans, and the people were defrauded out
of what had been a s'rong hope of a
government in which the great right
should predominate over selshness and
| robbery. The republicans trusted the
wrong men; intriguing politicians an
astute, scheming demag ogaes, rather than
men of sterling virtue.
We must now 20 back to identify un-
mistakably this down hlll track, step by
step, till we reach the present crisis. This
party threw itself into the arms of dU1.i0
bphty, the greatest enemy with which
political justice ever had to contend The
result was that we went largely into the
army for candidates. Therp, rs a rare
exception, man might possibly be found
having the crude elements of statesman;
but, as a great rule, it was immensely
otherwise. The candidate must be able
to trace himself back to the war, or he
would not be available; and, if he had
been a general, OF at least Il corporal, u
civilian, however wise and great, could
stand no chance against him in the caucus
This threw the party largely into the con-
troll OF incompetent persons. Then the
matter of availability must go further, and
the foreign elements would absolutely
demand II ticket that would pay for their
votes Now, the vice is not in the former
nationality of the candidates, but in the
fact that the men had not become inlelli
gent, loyal American citizens. But, to
conciliate them, men of Euro lean ideas
must be allowed to control The party, and
rule out the great principles of liberty
which have made us great people. Take
notice, ii is not an occasional mistake OF
this kind which has guided the republican
party straight to its ruin; but it has made
this method of availability absolutely
controlling and The patronage OF the best
citizens of the country has been sold by
the hundreds of thousands to secure the
support of men who are in principle and
practice the bitterest enemies true Ameri
can liberty ever had. Yes, trusted the
wrong men. And there is now reason to
believe that the loyal patriots of America,
whether of native or foreign birth, will
endure these cruel wrongs no longer,
Indeed. like men reused from sleep
scorched with fire, they rushed they knew
not whittier.
Will the politicians accept the over.
whelming political revolution which has
swept through the country like n tornado
as sufficient evidence that they have trust.
ed the wrong men? Let them tell us
what has become of the vote of the rum
sellers, to gain which they have sold out
the temperance cause, so dear to the heart
of every true citizen? What has become of
the anti-American foreign vote for which
they have alenated and driven away
their own staunch fellow citizens, com.
prising the bone and sinew of this free
America? And will they go to work TO
build up again upon the very policy by
which they have been wrecked and for
which they have been robuked and
deserted by the people, whose rights they
have trampled into the mire? / think l
am in position to know that they cannot
do this. Whether it is to be by organiza-
tion or reorganization, under the old or
new name, they must take u new depart.
ure. They must consult the class of men
they have heretofore ignored. They have
been rejected, upon various pretenses;
their great and righteous principles have
been pushed aside, upon one preteXt or
another, and waived with specious and
unreliable PROMISES but the time has
come when the best patriots of the country
will rise in their might and assert their
/ lights in words and acts which cannot be
misunderstood.
But my hardest task remains. l must
attempt to show how this can be done.
At the beginning the conviction must
be profound and pervading that great
reform is imperatively demanded. take
it that the great revolution which has Just
revealed itself is the concentration of the
general feeling that in some way reform
must come, But the thinking, talking,
writing, and acting must 20 on, which
will harden this conviction and feeling
into durable organic unity. Agitation and
conflict are inevitable. This is no child's
play. 1t will be the attempt of moral
principle TO assault and break down the
power of untold consolidated millions of
money, to challenge and defy the most
enormous class interest which ever tram.
pied upon free people. 1t will be the
most terrific conflict ever known on this
continent.
The preparation must, therefore, be
proportionally large, durable and strong.
The leaders must be tremendously in
earnest, but not men of passion. They
must be broad-minded, far-sighted, calm
and dignified; but every man of them of
"the stuff that martVrs are made of - Rnt