The weekly Floridian. [volume] (Tallahassee, Fla.) 1867-19??, 1886-08-12
The Dangers In National
Elections.


Elections.
Last week we advanced the idea of
abolishing the Presidency of the United
States and substituting the executive au-
tbority of Presiding Council of five
members elected by FIVE districts of States
Already our correspondence and the COM
ment of local readers indicate such inter-
est in the plan as is not unfavorable, not
withstanding its somewhat startling nov
city. This is satisfactory evidence that
the popular mind was prepared for the
acceptance of the idea by uneasy feeling
as to the increase Of the one-man power,
and by the revolutionary dangers of the
electoral struggles to put that man in
power. If the plan does not prevail as
outlined, we believe that some other will
accomplish the end, and that at no dis
tant period the last national election will
have convulsed the Union in order to
elevate as the head of republic per-
sonage welding the patronage of the
chief of an empire, enlisting for his sup
port an army of followers in the civil
service, additional to his control of the
military and naval establishments. But
it was not view of possible usurpation
of monarchicsl power by President
that primarily suggested discussion Of
the expediency of abolishing an Office not
in accord with democratic republicanlsm.
1t was the consideration Of the sectional
-rr-a-----y 49,. .i4- n u, s.'.d Cv"'i'
which is kept alive by the antagonism of
the two great political parties, and is so
embittered in the national elections as to
threaten armed revolution, that led up to
the conclusion that the principal cause of
trouble could be avoided by dispensing
with the Presidency, and thus doing much
toward breaking down the line of sec
tionalism that separates in popular feeling
and in political effort the Democratic
South and Republican North. That these
elections keep the sections and the senti-
ment Of their people aligned in opposing
ranks is indisputable. and that danger Of
war and disruption of the Union lies in
them is unquestionable. But the other
day great man died who was really
elected to the Presidency and only lost
it because his lofty patriotism refused to
embroil the country in an armed struggle
for the rights of his party against the de-
feated opponent in whose support an Ad-
ministration of like party politics was
prepared to array the army of the United
States, to whose stapdard would have
tlocked republican paftisans in the cause
of the fraud who was seated, fortunately
without fight. Such involvement may
occur again, and the result is likely to be
civil war. More than fifty years ago a
French political philosopher came to this
country to study our institutions and gov
ernmental affairs, and one of the conclu-
sions set forth in bis remarkable book was
that the greatest peril to the permanency of
the Republic was involved in the national
elections. The great war of the States
resulted from the election of Lincoln, and
history has such a way of repeating
itself that another war may be expected
on the election of some other man. 1t is
undeniable that there would have been
fight in hundreds of thousands of
hearts, North and South, if Blaine, the
champion of rabid, prosecuting sectional
ism, had been elected.
To prevent consequences avoid causes.
The dangers involved in national elections
are obvious. An amendment to the con-
stitution will remove them.