Shenandoah herald. [volume] (Woodstock, Va.) 1865-1974, 1884-08-08
Sham Democracy Only.

When Democracy in America
meant something, when it embOdi-
ed fundamental principles of gov
eminent, and was the pledge of a
policy in administration, its habit
was to take as its Presidential can
didates its ablest and best known
representatives. 1t is a truly
melancholy evidence of the deca-
dence of a once great party that in
the present Presidential campaign
it retreats from all its profound
principles and all its declared as
pirations, by setting aside all its
representative statesmen, and Sc
lecting as its candidate for Presi-
dent one whose sole claim upon
his party is that he is absolutely
without a record in national poll
tics.
Grover Cleveland was sheriff OF
Erie county, in which Buffalo is
located, and he was subsequently
Mayor of Buffalo, and is now Gov
ernor of New York, which latter
Office he has filled a little less than
TWO years, but quite long enough
to show capacity for creating dis
sensiOns in his own party, sufficl-
ent to deprive it of reasonable ex'
pectatiOn of carrying the state in
November So far as the public is
informed, Mr.. Cleveland has no
views and no record upon political
questions now dividing public
opinion in America. He is strong
ly suspected of those prO-English
views and sympathies which under
the leadership of gentlemen like
Ran Tucker are rapidly condemn
ing the Democratic party as the
British party of America, in the
minds of the American people.
The fact that Mr.. Cleveland is the
candidate now of all the British
newspapers in this country, as well
as of the English press and that
his associations are all of the Free
Trade persuasion, is preSumptive
evidence that he is not in sympa-
thy with the policy of Protection to
American industries and labor,
and with the distinctively Ameri-
can policy to which our people are
now welded.
Nevertheless, Cleveland must be
accorded the benefit Of a plea as
potential as that of the baby act.
He has never had any connection
with national politics, never served
a day in Congress nor in any
branch of the national service, and
therefore having nc experience in
national affairs Is an eminently fit
candidate ofaparty which the cOun-
try persistently condemns, when
ever it selects a truly representa-
tive candidate.
Is not this the present attitude
of the Democratic party So-called ?
How inconsistent this practice of
modern Sham Democracy with the
practice of the grand party which,
beginning with Jefferson in 1901,
governed the country almost con-
tinuOusly for the sixty years pre-.
ceding the era of secession. Yet
there are men, calling themselves
Democrats today, who petend that
availability was always the object
most considered 10y the national
Democracy in selecting Presidential
candidates, and that obscure men
have often proven the most avail
able candidates. 1t is common to
have the cases of Polk and Pierce
cited in illustrations Of this theory.
James X. Polk had been long a
member Of the House Of Repre-
sentatives, and speaker of that
body, besides being Governor of
Tennessee. Few men were better
known IN national politics than Mr..
Polk when he won the nomination
from veterans like Van Buren,, CasS
and Buchanan. Franklin Pierce
had been a United States Senator
nd had in that capacity won the
unstinted praise of Old Hickory, q
fact WHICH Virginia well knew,
when at a critical moment, she cast
her vote for him and secured his
nomination at Baltimore in 1852.
No, gentlemen of the Sham De
mocracy, Mr.. Cleveland will noH
win because, and only because, he
has no national record, which is the
strongest plea you make for him.
He will not win for a great many
reasons, one chief among them is
the fact that the party behind him
has nominated him in order to get
rid of its own record, which for
many years past has been so dis