Nevada County picayune., 1890-11-13
THE NEW POLITICAL ARITH
 METIC.

It is never possible to see any fur ther ahead in American politics than a man with lantern can see in q dark night. Too often the lantern is lacking, but it was lighted by the people last Tuesday, and it is possi- ble to look ahead into the future as far as it is ever possible to see at all.
 Undoubtedly the country has faced about and taken new direc- tion, and there is every reason to be- lieve that it will hold it. This does not mean, however, that there is any certainty of results in the next Presl- dential election. On the contrary, It is now almost sure that the coming Presidential contest wi'i differ In no essential particular from similar con tests for the last 16 years. The practical politician is the last man on earth to grasp a new idea or to un- derstand the meaning of revoIu- tion. There are exceptions, but this is so much the rule with practical politicians in all parties that the ex- captions go for nothing. The practi- cal politicians of this country in both parties have been figuring for 20 years on New York and Indiana com binations. They have the arithme- tic of such combinations at their tongues ends. They are masters of it, but it is all they know. And they are too old to learn. Heaven and earth would contend in vain to di- vorce them from that idea, for it is the only political idea they have in stock. They will die with it. As long as they remain in politics that will be the dominant idea of politics. In less than eight years there will hardly be any of them left, but at present they are everywhere, from the steps of the county court house to the United States Senate.
 Last Tuesday cleared one party of a large number of them, and for the Republican party It was a good rid dance, though at present the Repub- lican party is in no position to ap- preciate such blessings in disguise. There will be two or three more such occurrences, the meaning of which all the gimlets Tn the world could not insert into the skulls of the profess ional practitioner at the "bar of pub lie opinion," but fortunately it will not be necessary for them to under stand. They will all be disposed of in time, and not very long time either. In the meantime, they are in control, and they will make the fight on the old alignment of cival war sectionalism Tn the electoral col lege, with New York and Indiana to decide. The Republican party will rally, and one side or the other will win "by scratch," as heretofore, unlesss one side nominates an East ern and the other Western candi- date. Then, unless one candidate or the other represents and typliies some principle or policy great enough to subordinate sectionalism, the chan ces are that the West will do in 1892 just what it has done in 1890, and just what it has done in ten out of the twelve national campaigns since lS4O,
 Tae Republic has been fighting the Western fight against the cival war sectionalsm. It is winning but it must also be a waiting fight. The practical politicians who do not know the difference between an ichthy- osaurus and an encrinite, who have never studied the geology of the electoral college, or the geography of American history, will add and subtract, until they get their old com bination worked over, and then they will play their game for the spells.
 This is almost certain for 1892, and there is not the least use of complaining about it. After that there is a promise of better things. The New West is sick of the old civil W dI S'CtIOHdllSil, WlIll lVo dhCliudtIN combinations. It was the New West which spoke last Tuesday, and it will go on speaking until from the Senate to the court house steps in the country town every practical pol itician in the country will understand it's meaning, There will be a new political arithmetic then, and the Re publican party will either adapt it's self to it or go through such com plete reorganization as that which changed Federalists into Wings. Last Tuesday gave civil war section alsm it's death blow, but if will die hard.-LSt. Louis Republic.