The Canton advocate. [volume] (Canton, D.T. [S.D.]) 1877-1897, 1883-11-15

To candid observer the results of the
elections in Pennsylvania, Massachusetts,
and New York on the 9th. indicate that
the boasted democratic success of wear
ago was based upon a slimsy foundation,
merely temporary and deceptive victory.
With the tenacity characteristic of drown
ing man, the election of Butler in Massa.
chusetts, Cleveland in New York and a
democratic governor in Pennsylvania were
clutched by democratic editors and leaders
as llte-savlng straws to float the democrat
lc party into safe harbor, and into nat
lonal power and success at the presiden-
tial election in 1884. Many weak kneed
and sore headed republicans, timid, and
desirous of riding the popular tide, were
deluded by the brief victory ana the deafen-
ing clamor of the half crazy victors into a
partial belief thar the party that had SO
long hungered and thirstcd after the spoils
and power was surely on its way to COM
plete consummat'on of its object, and even
some who were true to their colors to the
last, and had enlisted for the life service of
the republican craft, at times feared that
the party that had done so much for the
human race, that had saved a tottering
government from the assaults of its inter-
nal enemies, and brought into a new be-
ing model structure purged of the foul
stain its home born traitors had given it,
was liable to be overcome by the same ele-
ment that had quarter of century ago
plunged the nation into an abyss that mil
lions of money, hundreds of thousands of
lives, and years of strife and bloodshed
alone relieved from.
The defeat the democrats met with this
last election has bewildered them more
than the republicans were at the unac-
countable success of the democrats a year
ago. Butler, who had been hera'ded as
chief amoung the thousands for his CRU
beraational victory under the democratic
banner, and who was in fact coming grad
ually under the wire for the presidential
race of 'S4, has been buried by the cleo
tors of Massachusetts, too deep to send back
an echo. The stunning democratic 2OO,-
900 majority in New York Of a year ago
has beed wiped out, and new enthusiasm
reused republicans to realizing sense of
their near danger, and the petty local
issues that temporarily disaffected the re-
publicans in Pennsylvania were smothered
asst Tuesday, and the temporary hopes
the democrats INDUCED in of capturing
that state are shattered.
The Ohio result Of the October election
so eagerly grasped and harped upon as
harbinger of coming democratic success, is
clouded by these unexpected and stagger-
ing blows of the republicans of the three
great states, and to-day these present a
brighter picture, more promising for the
party than there was three
years ago.
If the reader will refer back to the
status of the two parties in 1879, the year
previous to the nomination of Garfield,
he can but admit that the republican
outlook is full as promising now as then,
and in fact better, for these late results
have bursted the well arranged plans of
the democratic leaders who have been fast
to arrange matters prior to
the sitting of congress preliminary to Or
ganizing for the campaign of 1884, A
bomb shell has split the slate. and conf
dence in an easy victory has be been sup
planted by an i'll omened outlook.