The Abilene reflector. [volume] (Abilene, Kan.) 1883-1888, 1888-04-19
REPUBLICAN PRINCIPLES.

mittee OF Illinois w ny tine eGanu VIC
Party Is Bound to Succeed Next Fall
Mr.. CHAIRMAN AND GENTLEMEN: We have
heard many good speeches and many good re
ports from the different sections of this grea,
State. 1 hail, not from Appomattox and the
celebrated apple tree exactly, but from the
next best place, the fair county OF Mclean,
which, geographically and ornamentaliy, We
someI- mes think is the breastpin Of this gal
liant Republican State; county where Repub-
| licanlsm is a constituent OF the common air,
and where the soil is too good to grow the FOX.
ious weeds OF Democracy; county in which,
under the wise admon ton Of that great father
! OF Republicanism. Abraham Lincoln, this Re
publican party was born; county which gave
Grant :, 800 majority, and proposes to beat even
her own splendid record at the coming election
in November. And what have said in regard
| 10 the Republicanism of Mclean County will
apply with equal force 10 the entire country.
A party asking the support OF the free peo-
pie should be able TO look forward without
! fear, and backward without shame. Twenty
! three years have brought US beyond the sound
4 Of Grants cannon at Petersburgh. A new gen.
1 Grafton with faces toward the rising sun are
upon the stage. In the race for industrial sue
cess men look more TO the future than 10 the
past, and, in my judgment, the party that sue
ceeds in the coming Presidential election must
I show not only better record but also better
prospectus than its opponent. II record
alone insures success, the Republicans would
never have lost power. II a record alone could
defeat party, the Democrats could not, any
time in forty years, have carried the filthiest
ward in New York City.
But three years ago an inscrutable Provi-
dence, moving il q mysterious way, permitted
! this Democratic party to come into power in this
country. For twenty-iour years the Republic
an party had triumphed at the polls; but now
/ since the advent OF Democracy Its greater tri-
3 n3ub ia in he irni Of da-
| famers. The party in power has in three
| years proved itself the most musty and noisome
| depository Of political vacuity and decay to be
| found in the world. There are barely enough
/ live men in the Democratic museum to exhibit
the mummies and take gate money. the public
service runs to-day solely upon the momentum
supplied by Republican force and IDEAS fud
those in power, though having the desire, have
not the courage to change its course. All they
can do is to ride.
The Democratic party arrived at the White
House without a single sincere conviction it
dared Rvow. The barbarous ideas which had
once vtsllzed IL for evil had all been consumed
years before in the white heat OF the aroused
public sentiment OF Christendom-in fact slain
by the rising spirit Of militant Republicanism.
Through all the grand years of Republican
progress-the grsndest years IN American his
tory-aye the grsndest years in human history
the leaders OF the Democratic party sat like
daZed owls upon dry limb OF the charred and
blackened trunk OF rebellion, and solemnly
hooted that constitutional liberty was beng
destroyed by the Republican party. The great
statesmen and patriots who arose to immor-
talIty out OF sIavery's decline, and stand to-day
canoniZed in the grateful memories OF a race,
were all, in the active days Of their glory, the
targets Of Democratic abuse. The politics of
each successive Democratic campaign consist
ed in taxing back an old falsehood and telling
new one. Even the sweet uses of adversely
seemed lost upon the Democratic managers.
But we can afford to forgive all the hard
words said of US Dy the Democratic party, in
view OF the great admiration attested by their
actions, which speak louder than words. Imi-
tatioa is the highest possible praise. Through
all the years of Democratic abuse, that party
has been industriously padding out its withered
frame and shrunken shanks, in the vain hope
of making them ell the Republican pattern,
and, really. it is not their fault if our old
clothes don't TT them. Through the Dust and
debris which marks The historic course of Re-
publican achievement, the managers of the
Democratic party have crawled slsvishly on
their bellies after the advancing Republican
column. They wear no plume to-day they did
not pluck from the tail Of the Republican eagle.
and, usually. about the time the bird was ready
to shed.
Searching around in dark political corners
the Democrats at length found in their party
village Statesman" so obscure as not to be
widely odious. They took this man up and
loudly proclaimed him great savant and
political reformer True, he had then never
reformed any thing, and has not yet, but there
seems to be a theory that he can. Anthems
were sung over his discovery. in which Mr.
Curtis and Mr.. Schurz carried the alto and
tenor, and the reformers OF Tammany fur
nished the heavy bass. This champion OF
Democratic reform was altogether too lofty to
become interested in the little questions that
troubled Lincoln and Grant twenty-five years
ago. The reform ear was not attuned to hear
the guns of Sumpter, the echoing call of
Father Abraham for " three hundred thousand
more" The eye so keen for the penny abuses
of the civil service, could only see the glory
of the coming of the Lord" through the me-
dunn of substitute; and when peace and
freedom blushed over glad land the heart OF
the reformer thrilled strictly by proxy The
great moral movement OF the centuries thun-
dered itself through the hey-day Of Grover
Cleveland's youth, and he made sign. Such
small things were beneath him. He was, evil
IDENTITY, waiting for the disabled soldier, on
whose SCARED and shrivelled person he might
illustrate the benefcence of modern Demo
cratic reform.
Impartial history will write 1t down that this
Government had never, sInoe Washington's
first inauguration, been more faithfully more
1t was on the day Arthur passed il over into
the hands of Cleveland; and yet q campaign
or the most vrulc1t abuse and falsehood de-
ceived some Re. .ublicans into believing there
was corruption IN high places, and that the
public good required "a change"
The vain efforts OF Mr.. Cleveland to carry
out the false pretense OF the campaign and
pose before the world as great reformer have
been painful in the extreme, and remind one of
nothing SO much as q hippopotsmus trying to
balance on a slack-rope. HIS whole administra-
ton has been a solemnly stupid masquerade,
with spoi!s and party greed as its real motive,
and Civil-Service reform as its false and dis |
honest pretense Despite the vigilance of uli- |
nois' own great reformer, Mr.. Oberly, the pub |
lie service has been made the bsttening- ground
of campaign strikers, where the dirtiest party
service finds high and sure reward 1t was, / |
believe, q member of the Presidents own party |
who said tried Democrats we're all right but he |
objected to tried and eoavicted Democrats
Not least OF the duties of the next Republican |
canvass will be to tear the mask from this re-
form humbug. The facts are At hand and the |
fraud under which Democracy came in must |
be exposed. and when exposed the American |
people will lash il from its gh places with |
a whip of scorpions
The President realizing the thinness Of the |
ice beneath the Democratic reformatory, has |
lately made feint in the direction Of the sur
plus and the ta.i1. One naturally asks, in view |
OF his present alarm, why he did not mention |
the subject sooner. Emerging from the fog of /
his own turgid rhetoric, to make his first intel
ligiole utterance on any question OF National
importance, Mr.. Cleveland proves mself the /
sworn enemy, not of the inequalities Of the |
present tarin, but the enemy of the principle /
Of protection The Republican party long ago |
set the example OF revising the tariff, and may
be relied on 10 correct all its present and its
future inequalities. But there is one thing the