Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1890-11-24
wEATHERcoCK srATEsMANsH1P.

Senator Cullom, of Illinois, is now posing
in the character of a statesman who con-
fesses that he had no Judgment, and wants to
crystalline that confession In the shape of
legislative action. The Senator asserts that
"the Mckinley bill will have to undergo
material modification" and having started
in that process he thinks that ''the inter-
State commerce bill will also have to be
modified" Even that does not satisfy the
Illinois Senator, for he finally gets full
expression of his idea in the assertion, 'In
short, everything will have to be revamped
politically"
The Senator's passion for making over the
acts of legislation in order that they may be
cut in a new fashion is based on the idea
that by so doing his party can win back lost
ground. But the fallacy of any such idea
is shown by considering the position in
which Senator Cullom places himself indi-
viduallv by this change of front. The
measures which he now says "have
to be modified" were framed and
passed largely by his support. They
were the fruit of ample debate and full con-
intelligent legislation vote on them was
the result of careful study and settled con-
yiction. Yet the Senator is in such haste to
advertise his own Senatorial decisions as
foolish and worthless, that within three
months after he voted in favor of the tariff
bill, by reason of an adverse gust of popular
opinion be declares that the deliberate ac-
L he
swallowed whole. Why he wants the Inter-
State Commerce act modified does not ap-
pear from any popular demand. Perhaps
some railroad corporations influential with
the Senator may wish it done; but even they
might be satisfied with the general condition
of non-enforcement which surrounds that
measure at present.
Such indecent haste to recant and dIsavow
his deliberate acts will do anything rather
than rehabilitate the Senator. 1t exposes
him rather as a politician who by his own
confession is alike destitute of conviction or
Judgment. Il is evident that he has no idea
of claiming the character of statesman who
acts in accordance with settled principles
or makes up his mind on the merits
OF the subject But even in his
chosen character of political weathercock
the practical declaration that his action of
last September was all wrong does not help
him. 1t simply gives him the rank of
weathercock, which has no idea of how the
wind is blowing until it is too late to make
its in formation of any value.
This applies to the party even more thor
oughlv than to the individual. The Repub-
lican party is completely committed to the
policy of protection as outlined in the Nc
Kinley bill. A party cannot discard its
policy and convictions like an old shoe,
and for it to attempt to do so utthe first hasty
expression of popular disapproval would be
to confess itself a humbug, and to declare
itself utterly unworthy of trust. Wholly
apart from the merits of the protective
policy, there is much more wisdom and
honesty in the position that the tariff act
has not had a trial; that its results cannot
be judged until it has been in operation at
least year; and that the party must stand
by its deliberate acts until their impractic-
ability is demonstrated.