The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1885-08-03
CURRENT PRESS COMMENT.

THE time has not yet come, historically speaking,
for an accurate ana ysis of the events which gave
meaning and direction to the period during which
Grant was at the head of the governments; bat it is
venturing little or nothing to say that the future
Buckle who shall pass them in review will declare that
our foremost soldier was also a statesman of the first
class, who deserved not less of gratitude from his
countrymen for services rendered after the war than
for those which brought that awful conflict to a satis.
factory and splendid Closest. Louis Globe Demo.
crat.
AFTER all that the public schools have lone the
illite' ate voters still hold the ba ance of power. In
some of the States they constitute an actual majority
and their influence is strong wherever corrupt politics
and misrule prevail. The public school is not only an
agency for the increase of intelligence, but il ia q
training g 'ound for citizenship; it fosters no forms of
class prejudice, but puts al on level of equal rights
without regard to color, religion or nationality. Aside
from technical instruction the free school affords
the best preparation for future citizenship, and no
other form of education can be permitted to take its
place.-Chicago Tribune.
IT seems that these Southern whites do not know
what they want. They will and they won't. When
the negroes are living quietly among them, they
curse their fate at having to put up with such incon-
gruous neighbours; but the moment the blacks try to
leave them, out come the shotguns, and woe betide
the e~migrant agent. They are like Pharaoh, who
wouldn't let my people go, and yet wouldn't furnish
them with straw to make bricks. They don't want to
part with their labor supply, for that would involve
white labor in the fields; and yet they grudge their
laborers the rights which they would enjoy in more
liberal States.-San Francisco Chronicle.
DURING the past year there have been signs that
the youth of the country have not been fully in.
structed upon the meaning of the war, and have, there.
fore. tailed to give due appreciation to the combatants.
The historical study of the war is the best means of
connteracting this delusiOn, and from a sufficiently
remote view the study can now be advantageous "
pursued. War articles and lectures are valuable
methods; but the most inspiring, the most influential
and deepest lesson is given to the youth in the flags at
half-mast, the mou' ming %emblems, the universal ex-
pressions of grief which nations are to-day paying to
an heroic and noble journal.
THE Anarchists are ridiculously few in comparison
with the masses whose heads have not been turned by
hard times Or the rot preached by such men as
Gorsuch. In any test of strength they would cut an
absurd figure, and there is probably no city in the
United States where they could overpower the local
bunting the public conscience and gradually disturb
ing the public faith in the laws of society. Even the
widest clamor of lazy and vicious fools has its effect,
and it becomes a more serious question daily how far
the right of free speech car be abused without doing
a civilized community a great injury.-Cleveland
Leader.
THE next step will be that Democrats will begin to
Witty their own administration. They will say, be-
cause fraud has not been discovered, it must be con-
cealed and shared by the new administration Thus,
as the unhappy hunter of old was devoured by his
dogs, the Democratic leaders are in a fair wav to be
hunted to death by the very ISLANDERS with which they
hunted down Republican officials. Nobody will she'd
a tear. We may all be entirely conscious that they are
most unjustly judged by the mean creatures of their
party, whose malignant fondness for thinking evil
they have stimulated to the utmost. But one cannot
help thinking that on the whole it serves them right.
York Tribune.
The recent action of Secretary Manning, in letting
contracts to employers of convict labor, has already
been commented upon, and it is evident that the Dem
ocrats Of the working classes are beginning to fully
appreciate what it means. Setting aside the question
of whether such announcement Of convict labor is
right or wrong in principle, the fact remains that the
present administration is pledged to regard it as
wrong. After what we have seen of the governments
methods of observing its pledges with regard to civil
service reform, and its methods of fulfilling goverA-