The intelligencer. [volume] (Lexington, Mo.) 1887-1891, 1889-02-16
WESTERN

country that the next nominee for
president should come from the west.
The very nature of the platform of
principles upon which the issues of the
next campaign must be made and
fought, suggests this policy with all
the force of unyielding logic If
converts are TO be gathered in large
numbers To the principle of tariff
reduction, or a tariff for revenue only,
they must come from the agricultural
classes in the agricultural states, for
surely the farmers, who have mOrtgaged
their property to the industrial states
as a direct result of federal protection
to ~'infant industries" are the men
most interested in the work which the
democratic party proposes to accom-
plish four years hence. The agricultural
states are in the west, and the fight
will be a western fight, not as a matter
of section. but purely by the material
conditions involved. 1t is u curious
fact that for twenty -four years the
republican party has chosen its
presidential timber from the western
states, and that it never lost a contest
until it went east for a candidate.
Lincoln, Grant, Hayes, and Garfield
were all from the west, and they
carried the states of New York be-
cause they were far removed from the
local tactional quarrels which in
variably overthrow the candidate who
Is identified with them. 1t was only
when the republican party put up
Blaine, q Maine man, that it found
itself shorn OF its strength. But 1T
recovered itself quickly, and by the
nomination Of all Indiana candidate,
it regained its power, to the astonish-
ment and temporary confusion of the
democrats. Seymour was from New
York; Greedy was from New York /;
Tilden was from New York; Hancock
was from New York; Cleveland was
from New York. 1t is just possible,
too, that Cleveland would have suf-
fered defeat in 1884, as he did in 1888,
if a western man had been nominated
against him. An injudicious nomins-
ton on the part of the republicans, q
sort of forsaking of their citadel in the
west, contributed largely TO Cleve-
lands election.
There is talk of Gov. Hill, Of
New York, for president, and a great
deal of talk, at that. Gov. Hill
is a strong New York man, but the
democratic party of the country may
as well make up its mind that the
election can be carried without New
York, and then the political necessity
for the nomination of a New York
man will have disappeared. If certain
territories are admitted into the union,
as they surely will be, the old reckon
ing upon the solid south, New York,
New Jersey and Connecticut must be
revised. New states, like Illinois,
Indiana, Michigan, Wisconsin, Ohio.
must be turned into the democratic
procession, and they can only be
brought there by transferring the
fight from New York to The western
states. Nominate some good Illinois
democrat, or Indiana democrat, for
the presidency, and there will be such
a rafting of dry bones, such a shaking
up of the tariff question as the world
has never
A revolution of methods appears to
be a necessity to democratic success in
1892. This thing of nominating a New
York man at the instigation of the
Janizaries who constitute Tammany
hall, or a New York man who is not
of that faction, and hence certain TO be
knitted by it, has come to be a sort of
chestnut. 1t is time for the democratic
party to put nom but true friends on
guard, men who have a higher idea of
political duty than the acquisition of
of local spoils at the expense OF
national success. 1t is time that the
democratic party arouse itself from
dallyings with the east, and concentrate
its strength upon the great field,
white for the harvest, in the west.
Western methods and western princi-
pies are predominant and the demo-
cratic party will have hall Vol It's
next victory when il dominates a
western man for the presidency.
All this is said with the greatest
respect for Mr.. Cleveland, than whom
the United States has never had a more
able or patriotic president. We
have no idea that defeat will relegate
such a man as he from the high position
he has occupied in the minds and
hearts of the people to %obscnrity, or
anything like it, and he may once more
by his great force of character be the
nominee of the party, but if such
thing does occur it will be against the
logic of the situation.
The welfare of the democratic party
points to the justice as we'll as the
expediency of a recognition of western
men and western ideas.
When Mr.. Tilden was elected in
1876, as all the world knew. and still