The Iola register., 1889-11-22
AS STRONG AS EVER.
The Intellect and Conscience of the Nation
and the Republican Party.


Democratic newspapers and Demo-
cratic politicians have been attempting,
during the past two or three years, to
make the country believe that the in
tellect and conscience of the Nation are
forsaking the Republican party. The
clergy and the educators, we are told,
are not finding their association with
the Republicans congenial, and are
either going over to the Democracy di-
rectly and completely, or are allying
themselves with the mugwumps or the
Prohibitionists, who are the aiders and
abettors of the Democracy, and from
whom that organization has been largely
recruited in recent years. As an illus
tration of this tendency the Democrats
triumphantly cite the abandonment OF
the Republicans by George William
Curtis, Thomas Wentworth Higginson,
John L. Andrew, President Eliot, OF
Harvard College, Seth Low, the new
president of Columbia College, and
several other men who, down to 1884 or
later, were conspicuous members OF
the party. The Democrats still con-
cede, in effect at least, that the
great bulk OF the morality and
the intelligence Of the Northern
States of the country are in the Repub-
lican party even yet, but they contend
that these elements are gravitating from
it and uniting with the Democracy or
with one or other of the parties or fac
tions whose weight in National divi-
sion hangs on the Democratic side of the
balance.
This assertion, it will do no harm to
acknowledge, has a certain degree of
plausibility, but it will not stand the
test of serious examination. The men
whom we have mentioned and others
whose names will suggest themselves to
the intelligent reader have left the Re-
publican party within the past few
years, but their action in nearly every
instance was prompted by their lack of
harmony with the party on one par
ticular question. They desire what is
conventionally called free trade, while
the party is still the champion of the
protective policy. AS this is the leading
issue of National concern their place, OF
course. is with the Democracy. On every
other issue they were in harmony with
the Republicans and in opposition to the
Democrats. That their old aversion to
the Democracy clung to them even
after they had left the Republic
ans is shown by the lapse of time
between their preliminary and final
steps toward the new association which
the severance of their old relations COM
mitted them. Nor was their reluctance
to formal and complete surrender to
the Democracy surprising. They were
and are aware that their old party-the
party of freedom, preservation Of the
Union and maintenance of the National
honor and credits still the party Of
equal political rights, of reformed bal
lot, and of the purity and efficiency OF
the civil service. Reason and considera-
tions of the fitness of things show that
the morality, intelligence and progress
iveness of the country must still be on
the side of the Republican party; the
facts prove that they are on its side. In
quiry il any community in the Northern
States, which comprise two-thirds Of the
voting strength of the country, will
show that the vast majority of the
clergymen of all denominations, the
educators, the business men and the
representatives of the enterprise, intel
ligence and the mental and moral forces
Of the country are members of the Re-
publican party and vote the Republican
ticket-St. Louis Globe-Democrat.