The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1888-02-27
THE PAST. PRESENT AND FnTnRE.


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THE PAST PRESENT AND FUTURE.
The Hendricks County Republican pub
fishes call, quite numerously signed, for q
convention to be held in Danville of Repub-
licans who yoted for John C. Fremont for
President in 1856. Such convention might
be made interesting and profitable. Fremont
was the first presidential candidate of the
Republican party, and a convention of those
who voted for him would therefore embrace
men who participated in the organization of
the party and who have presumably acted
with it since. The period from 1886 to the
present is beyond comparison the most inter-
esting and important of any of like extent in
our national history, and during most of that
time the Republican party has controlled the
government and its destinies. lis political rec
ord and achievements such as Republicans
may well point to with pride, and those
who have acted with it since its organiza-
ton may we'll feel that they have not
lived in vain. A man may not have achieved
wealth or fame, he may never have occupied
a large place in the public eye and may have
kept the noiseless tenor of his way. plain
and humble citizen; but if, during period of
thirty years, he has given the influence of his
voice and vote to the party that has regene-
rated the Nation and reconstructed the gov
eminent, contributing the weight of one
mans personality to the achievement of re-
suits that have challenged the admiration of
the world, he has right to feel that he has
record a more remarkable series of political
events than those which preceded and accom-
panied the organization of the Republican
party. In the great moral purposes that gave
it birth, in the generous enthusiasm
of the motive that inspired it, and
in the popular uprising that carried it to
success within four years from its organiza-
ton, it has only been paralleled by the great
ovement, itself an outgrowth of Republican
ideas, that swept over the North after the
firing on Fort Sumter. In those days politics
meant something. The Republican party was
invincible in its very infancy because it
represented great principles. It had convic-
tions and the courage of them. It realized
that politics were ennobed by the introduction
of a sentiment and that party was immeasur-
ably strengthened by linking itself with moral
idea. Universal freedom, universal equality
and universal justice were the ideas that gaveit
birth and inspired its organization. It ac-
cepted with positive pleasure every con-
temptuous phrase and opprobrious epithet by
which the slave-holding and slavery-worship-
ing Democracy of that day sought to bring it
into disfavor. The phrase 'bloody shirt"
had not been invented then, but if it had been
coined to cast contempt on any principle of
the party, Republicans would have worn it
with pride and pleasure in token of their
faith and defiance of their enemies. This
was Republicanism in 1856, when John C.
Fremont marshaled the advance guard Of the
coming host, ard in 1860, when Abraham
Lincoln led to its first victory the greatest
political party the world has ever seen.
It was Republicansm during tho war and
for some years after tho war. While the
party was animated by this spirit it was in
vincible. It has ceased to be invincible just
in proportion as it has fallen away from the
inspiring motives of it's earlier career. A
political party cannot be maintained on an
exclusive mercantile basis. The popular
heart cannot be deeply stirred by the S mark.
The Republican victories of the past were not
achieved under that banner. The Republican
party of to-day cannot live on its past how
ever glorious. but it may draw inspiration
from the sources that gave it such noble
birth and from the influences that started it
on such grand career. The Republicans
who voted for Fremont are considerably past
middle age Some of them are getting old
The enthusiasm of youth is past, but it's
memories remain. If they are too old to
marshal or lead the Republican hosts of to-
day they could at least shoulder their crutches
and show how fields were won. Perhaps
general reunion of Republicans who voted for
Fremont might lead to general revival of
Republicanism.