The Abilene reflector. [volume] (Abilene, Kan.) 1883-1888, 1886-01-21
STILL ALIVE:
Notwithstanding the Gloomy Prognostiea-
lions OF the Republicans the Democracy
Has Hot Ruined the Country.

Notwithstanding the Gloomy Prognostica-
lions of the Republicans the Democracy
Has hot Ruined the Country.
There is hardly any good Repub-
ican, who voted for Blaine in 1884,
who may not do something for his own
political education by giving portion
of whatever time he sets apart for ned-
itation at the beginning of the new
year to the consideration of the fears
about his country from which the ex-
perience of 1885 has delivered him.
There were intelligent men-we know
many of them ourselves personally
who thought one year ago that the
election of n Democrat to the Presi-
dency would produce some terrible
financial disaster SO great as to threaten
social order. We can recall one
wealthy and still active ard prominent
Republican who predicted with much
solemnity in November, 1884, that in
one year from that date workin gmen
would, in the bitterness of their suffer-
ing, be knocking down and robbing
the well-to-do in the streets of this city,
without interference from the police.
We know of another who in a fit of
mingled rage and despair offered to sell
his securities at fifty cents on the dol
lar.
All through the country districts,
particularly IN New England, there
rested on the souls of Republican men,
and particularly on the souls of Repub-
lican women, the shadow of a great
fear, with which the Republican ora
tors and journalists had for many years
filled the air. The old gentleman who
predicted the great robberies and the
gentleman who offered to sell his prop
erty at half price, had in their minds
eve general closing of the factories
brought about by some mysterious
move of a Democratic Administration,
the exact nature of which they had
probably never thought out for them
selves. The bulk of the party was in
fact in that most melancholy of all sit
uations in which the citizens of free
democratic country can find himself
a situation in which he sees at every
election all that he holds dear put in
imminent peril, in which the question
is not which of two parties will best
administer the Government, but wheth-
er the Government itself will last more
than three months.
The result was that Republicans went
to the polls and mounted the stump in
the alarmed, if not desperate and reck-
less frame of mind, of men who feel that
they are on the eve of a battle which
win dispose of both life and fortune. A
long succession of political contests
conducted under such conditions would
of course in the end have proved fatal
to constitutional government. Men
long tormented by such fears finally
become ready for any refuge from them
even despOtism itself. The deliver
ance of the country from this hideous
nightmare during the past year is, we
do not hesitate to say, blessing only
second in Importance to the suppression
of the rebellion. and hardly less neces-
sary to the safety, honor and welfare
of the Nation. For it all Americans,
of all parties, ought at the opening of
the new year to be profoundly thank
full. 1t means at last real peace and
real security.
Only one degree less valuable is the
deliverance from the Southern bug
bear, which also the past year has wit
messed. Nothing but actual expert
ment would have suiliced to destroy
the old tradition of the slavery period
that the Southern people had interests
different from or opposed to those of
the North. There was in the Repub-
lican party a widespread belief that If
they got into power, or if President
were elected by means of their vote,
they would in some manner, take i'm
mense sums of money out Of the Treas
ury-one estimate of the amount was
So, 900, 900, 000-and divide it among
themselves, partly as compensation for
the emancipated slaves and partly as
compensation for other damage sus-
tanned during the war. How they
would get hold of this money, how they
would persuade people to lend it to the
United States, if it were not to be Sc
cured by taxation, and how they would
manage to have the taxation borne by
the North exclusively and not by the
South, was never explained. and prob
ably few people ever asked themselves.
The phrase. 1.-THE Confederscy again in
the saddle" was in fact considered a
suSicient answer to all cynical de-
mands for minute particulars.
Moreover although it was the pride
and boast of the Republican party that
the war had destroyed slavery, and al
though it was a cardinal article in the
creed that it was slavery
which made the South hostile to the
Union, nevertheless until last year the
fact that slavery was really dead was
never thoroughly brought home to the
minds of the voters. Very much like
the man who still feels pains in the leg
he has lost by amputation, the party
still felt the pangs of the old South in
their bones, and nothing but Demo-
cratic triumph would ever have relieved |
them. In the Imagination of multi |
tudes, the Yanceys, the Rhetts, the |
Brookses, and all the other fire-eaters
were still brandishing their plantation |
whips, and preaching the degradation !
of labor, and threatening dissolution |
for the sake of the peculiar institution. |
Cleveland's election may be said to |
have kanished all these phantoms from
tho NHTt horn brain V DosF