The weekly register. [volume] (Point Pleasant, Va. [W. Va.]) 1862-1909, 1889-01-09
me Dufy OF Denloerafs.

general, and for the moment sum-
Gent answer to the query, what
shall we dOg" constantly and natur-
ally heard among Democrats, we
may observe that the country has
elected Us to, do nothing
IF it be often a good thing TO let
well enough alone, it is occasionally
a wise thing to let bad enosgh alone.
We shall have two years to deter
mine what we ought to do before we
are required to choose new Con-
gress and four years before we are
required TO choose new President.
Meanwhile, and particularly in the
hour of defeat, only selfish, small
and captious spirits will fume and
worry over the irremediable. This
is decidedly no time for mock hero
les, except among the Republicans.
among Democrats, it should be a
time for sober inspection and serious
reflection, taking in the whole range
of the political field.
There are those who think, or af-
feet to think, that the battle was
lost to as on account of the tariff is
sue. If that be true, it were better
so; for brave and honest men, who
fight for cause, can afford to be
beaten, sure that truth will rise
again and they with it. There are
those, again, who think that defeat
might have been averted by better
management; the more's the pity {;
since this view leaves behind it the
sting of that kind of remorse which
comes from sense of lost opportuni-
ties: Our own impression amounts
to something more than conviction,
being, indeed, the result of knowl-
edge in detail, not in the possession
of the public, and immaterial now,
seeing that is no longer of any avail;
though it may not be improper to
say, in answer to some ill-advised
detraction, that among those who
had charge of the practical workings
of the campaign, there are not two
opinions about it.
On this point the least said the
soonest mended. Nobody, inspired
by an intelligent and lust RESPONSE
L :i:A---rI l-lL.--.s----------,
with perhaps a single exception,
premeditated or conscious treachery
in the party anywhere. From the
President down, everyone connected
with the campaign did his best, ac-
cording to his light, to do his duty );
and, but for personal and local.
troubles in the State of Now York,
the political conditions of the mo
ment would be exactly reversed.
So much for our side.
But as the Democrats have not
found their migrations between
Dan and Beersheba the last four
years an uninterrupted round of
picnics, we imagine that the Repub-
lieans will, in turn, find the Jordan
ahead of them an exceedingly hard
road to travel
En- the first place, they will have
to deal with an enormous and ever
increasing surplus in the National
Treasury2wrung from the people
by unjust taxatiop-and there are
but two ways of dfsposing of this,
either by removing the source of it,
or wasting its substance en- rioteus
legislation.
Take whichever horn of this df-
lemma they please, they may ex-
plot, but they are not likely to en-
joy themselves.
In the next place. they ars COM
mitted to what they calI free elee-
tions and fair count in the South
ern States, and this involves new
sectional and sentimental crusade,
the end of which VIII be the destruc-
ton of all business interests, North
and South, and such a financial con-
vuIsion as the country has never
seen before.
We do not believe that the policy
of negro domination, tried unsuc-
ccssfulIy by Gen. Grant during
eight years of absolute power, can
be made to succeed now.
In the third place, Gen. Harrison
wlr be ne happier in tackling the
patronage. than Mr.. Cleveland has
been, and, when the Republicans in
Congress come to meet the affirma-
tive responsibilities of legislation,
and to set up a policy of creation,
the sectional and belicose inspira-
tons which held them together dur
ing the campaign will break before
the needs of large geography, and
the mercenary demands of the shent
per shent monopolists.
On all these lines they Will be
Not h., n ,DifaJ DaDoo1.,.oox,