New-York tribune., 1888-04-14
Mr.. LOWELL'S LAMENTATIONS.

Mr.. Lowelps address at Steinway Hall last
evening was in a plaintive minor key. lie had
been asked to sound the cymbals In honor of the
Independent in politics, and was expected to
make joyful noise; but he was altogether
doeful and disappointed the young enthusiasts
in his audience. 1t was an essay on the deca-
dence of American public life, with casual ref
erences in a chilling tone to the duties and re-
spopsibilities Of those who consider themselves
superior to "the ruck of politicians and party
men, He confessed his want of faith In the
political progress of the United States under
republican institutions and a democratic form
of government. The country, in his judgment
has lost the power to produce statesmen; the
tricks of management are superSeding the SCI
ence of governments matters have grown stead
ily worse for the last twenty years; and the
only hope of political regeneration lies in the
efforts of men dissociated from the interests OF
party. This was the burden of his sorrowing
discourse. 1t was not tribute to Mugwump
pride and prescience, but jeremiad on gen.
Grafton of small politicians and party bosses
and hacks.
Since Mr.. Lowell takes so discouraging a
view of American politics and finds so many
signs of retrogression since Mr.. Lincoln's DEATH
IL may be we'll to remind him that twenty years
ago the conditions of public life were incom-
parably worse than they are now. In 1868
there was high tide of corruption. There
were Credit Mobilier scandals and Back-Pay
iobs in Congress there were monstrous election
frauds in this State; and in the metropolis it
self Tweed and his confederates re1gned su-
nreme. There is not State in the Union IN
which politics are not on higher plane now
than they were then. Elections to the United
States Senate were marketable then but they
are not to-day. Public men are more honest
now than they were twenty years ago; money
is not used in elections as it was then; pollucal
bosses and wire pullers are far less powerful ana
more scrupulous; and party management IS
under more direct control of the forces OF pub
lie opinion Mr. Lowell's assumption that the
English rotten borough system has been gener-
ally introduced in America and that bribery and
corruption are rampant everywhere is as Wlid d
fiction as one Of Ophela's disOrdered dreams.
Politics have become cleaner and more reputa-
bic in twenty years.
Equally open to criticism is Mr.. Lowelfs as
sertion that both parties have been guilty In
evading as successfully as they can the living
questions Of the day, and consequently that
there IS no choice between them, and thought
full men inspired with moral purpose must
maintain toward them policy OF armed neu-
trality. The party with whose commission
Mr.. Lowell has been armed abroad under two
Administrations has not shirked the RESPONSE
bilities Of it's high calling. 1t adhers with
equal courage and intelligence to the wise pol
icy of protection first proclaimed by Hamilton
greatest of American inanciers. 1t stands In
every State in the Union for practical temper
ance legislation by which the drink evil-the
chief blight on the fortunes Of the country
may be brought under control. 1t introduced
the first practical measure of Civil Service re-
form which the Administration of Mr.. Lowell S
typical American, President Cleveland, has re-
duced to system of canting hypocrisy and
broken pledges. Every one of the living ques-
tions of the time that party faces and does not
evade, and Mr.. Lowell never loses an oppor-
tunity of sneering at it as unworthy of conf
dence The party that evades its responsible
ties in all those living questions-the tariff,
temperance and Civil Service reform-is the one
| for which Mr.. Lowell and his fellow Independ-
ents have sneaking and servile fondness with
all their high talk and independence and moral
purpose in politics.