The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1884-07-24
POSITION OF THE INDEPENDENTS.
Judge Tourgee Leaves Them Not Leg t.
stand On.


stand On.
From The Continent
President Seelye, of Amherst. is one of those
independents who think that life and strength of
a high moral purpose have departed from the
Republican party. He considers it dead. inert,
honor or beaten into new life with the surviving
disaster. The pessmistic tendency of our mod
ern thought was never better displayed than IN
the line of argument adopted by class of think
ers represented by Professor SeeIye. They are
unceasing in their assertion that the Republican
party is in its decadence. Saving the blessed
remnant composed of the querulous and fas-
tidous few there is nothing of moral worth or
value left in it. They boastfully refer to what
it was and modestly eulogize themselves as the
sole heirs of all its virtues and traditions The
general state Of political grace they constantly
bewail and bemoan their sad fate in being cast
upon the shores Of time In such dull ana
pulseless era
Such people make two mistakes. In the first
place they are no better than the masses OF the
party they so relentlessly mahgn. The Repub-
ican party of to-day is composed Of the same ele
| ments that have always mustered under its ban
ner. The great bulk of the intelligence patriot
ism and integrity of the people of the North is to
| be found in its ranks The helpless and the OPP
4 pressed of the South-those that need aid and
49, y struggle toward light and liberty
comfort ---- = thew go
stand with them Over sga,Ne~ s0oI ~
the Democratic party Its most p0sse-eui ei0-
of slavery and the rebellion-the 'solid South. I"
The very best characteristics of this element are
Its most dangerous ones. 1t has always been
the source of turbulence and peril to the country
Its tendency has been backward and revolution
airy. Its ideas of right and wrong, of liberty and
oppression, are radically different from those
prevailing among the better elements of our
Northern life that one hardly wonders at the
fact that it is mainly the ignorant and vicious of
the North that affiliate with it.
The remedy which President Seelye presents
for Republican Generalization would be laugha-
BILE, If we did not know that an earnest, candid
mind stood behind the absurdly cautious by
potheses. He says, with the most serious
gravity
IF the Democratic party shall nominate men
who can be trusted-men who are wise and true
and can resist pressure-it will, in my judg-
ment, be wise to elect them"
He we'll knows that such a thing is an impos-i
sibility. No man can be made President by
party without being, or being supposed to be, an
exponent of that party's thought IF, he says,
the Democratic party shall nominate men who
can resist pressure"-the pressure of what,
prayY Evidently the pressure of the Democratic
party-of the power that WHITES and
creates-the power they represent, with
which they must cooperate, and to which
they must look for inspiration. In other
words President Seelye thinks that if the
Democrats will nominate a man who will sell
out his party and give himself up to the lead of
such political nondescripts as the independents,
then it might be we'll to help elect him. Presi-
dent Seelye knows full we'll that men do not
gather grapes of thorns. He knows. too, that
the Democratic party is bundle of thorns.
There is hardly an element of it that were it in,
the power to morrow, would not be a menace to
prosperity and progress. Whatever it has done
of good it has done grudgingly and at the latest
minute. 1t has opposed every good thing the
Republican party has achieved until compelled
by public wrath to desst The achievements of
which it most clamorously boasts are of purely
negative character. It's proudest claims are that
1t has prevented the Republican party from
doing what might have been hurtfuL Mr.. Seeyle
knows that white crow would be discovery
thousand times more likely than the Particular
Democratic candidate whom he describes. He
knows and reveals in the very sentences we
quote for his conviction-that what is good and
patriotic, and worthy, is not to be ex-
pectedf from the Democratic party. BE would risk
it under certain conditions, however, for the sake
words, because the Republican party has not
done exactly as he wishes, he will, to show his
spite, act with parry which he does not believe
will do any of the things that ought to be done.
The truth is, the Independents have not the
courage or the self denial to attempt the build
ing up of new party. They wish to be courted
and petted by the Republicans, and accounted
the leaders of the party while they labor for its
defeat. If they had an issue, an idea for the
success of which they were willing to sink their
own vanity, they would be worthy of respect
When however, they simply talk about selling
their votes to this party or that merely to have
their own way or punish those who fail to agree
with them, they become simply political pirates,
who are willing to hoist the black flag for the
sake of revenge.