Western Kansas world. [volume] (WaKeeney, Kan.) 1885-current, 1886-10-09
DEMOCRACY IN KANSAS.

DEMOCRACY IN KANSAS.
appear before you as the candidate of
a great party, honored by its confidence
and proud to bear its standard, to ask
you in its name for your support. I have
been a citizen of this state for nearly
thirty years. 1 came here, boy of Is,
when Kansas was poor, weak, distracted
territory, rent and torn by civil war, in
vaded by hordes of ruffians and maraud-
ers, and suffering under all the evils of
the worst government that ever harassed
and oppressed a free people. For more
than two years this intolerable lawless-
ness had prevailed-for nearly three
years longer it continued; and the party
that confronts us to-day, and is asking
your support, is the same party that, from
1854 to 1861, held Kansas by the throat,
and by fraud, and murder, and arson,
and turbulence, and every crime that ever
disgraced humanity, endeavored to fasten
upon it the curse of human slavery.
Beaten in its attempt to enslave Kansas,
the Democratic party plunged the whole
country into civil war, and for four long
and bloody years the nation struggled on
to universal freedom and national unity;
and this young state, that had been fight
ing for five years to get into the Union,
now had to fight for four years more to
preserve the Union. Republicanism and
Kansas were welded together in this long
and terrible struggle. When Jefferson
Davis marched out of the senate, William
II. Seward moved to take up the Kansas
bill, and as the coat tails of the rebel
chief disappeared through one door,
young Kansas, smiling and triumphant,
marched in at the other.
REPUBLICAN CONTROL IN KANSAS.
For twenty -four years the Republican
party controlled the government OF the
Republic, and from that day to this the
Republican party has moulded, directed
and controlled the affairs and destiny of
of Kansas. Has the trust reposed in the
Republican party by the people OF this
state been misplaced or betrayed? Has it
administered the government wisely and
Has it justified, by its con-
duct, the reasonable expectations OF an
people? Has it enacted wise
laws? Has it honestly collected and dis |
bursed the public revenues? Has it |
maintained peace? Has it made liberal |
provisions for the education of our youth?
Has it fostered institutions for the care
and maintenance of the unfortunate?
Has it remembered that the only liberty
that is valuable is liberty founded on Just
laws, and connected with public order?
Has it allied humanity with justice? Has
its rule promoted enterprise, fostered ag-
riculture, encouraged industry and nour-
ished commerce? Has it endeavored to
further morality, to promote sobriety, to
suppress vice, to punish crime, to abolish
and to curb and scourge
lawlessness? Has it, in brief, in the dis
charge of its public trusts, made this
state great, prosperous, intelligent, law
commonwealth, in which everv
citizen enjoys the largest possible liberty
with social order and due re-
gard for the rights of his fellow-men? If
;hese questions can be answered in the
the Republican party has
ust right to expect that the people of
Kansas will continue to give it their con-
idence and support.
What, then, are the facts? Kansas
celebrated only a few months ago the
irst Guarter-century Of her existence as a
tate During all that period, as have
aid, the Republican party has controlled
Is destiniex and administered its govern
nent. The accidental break in the gov
rnorship four years ago does not modify
his assertion, for the legislature was,
Turing that period, Republican by an
majority; all the other
tate officers were Republicans, and the
ocal governments OF the state were, as a
ule. OF similar faith. The Republicans,
therefore,, controlled public affairs just as
ertainly and as firmly during the years
1872 and 1888 as they did before aud
ave since.
: cATTT.E PR0CT.AM4mroN