The morning call., 1892-11-19
PRESIDENT CLEVELAND.

The Democratic vote cast on the Sth was
so overwhelming that no State or coterie
can claim to have elected the President.
Mr.. Cleveland would still have been elected
though New York had gone against him,
and had cast its electoral vote for Harri-
son. Thus, he will enter upon the duties OF
his Office untrammeled by obligations to
Tammany Hall, or Senator Hill. or ex-Mayor
Grace, or the mugwumps. No President
has entered the White House of late years
who ceuld 80 truly say that he is his own
man. The situation will exactly suit Mr..
Cleveland. No attribute OF his mental
organization is SO marked as his dogmatic
confidence. During his last term, he
showed that he was not only Indifferent to
advice. but that he was impatient and in
tolerant of it. When bis friends recon-
mended man for Office, their Endorsement
was generally fatal. When party leaders
advised a certain line of policy, that was
enough TO set the President against il. He
honestly believed that he would be uu-
faithful to his trust If be divided any por-
ton of his responsibility with advisers. In
his secret soul he seemed To hold that be
was the embodiment of all wisdom from the
Democratic standpoint. not only in matters
of abstract policy, as to which he might
of officials whom he did not know, and
could not have known.
The independence with which he will take
office will, of course, intensity the sponsi-
biity which will fall on his shoulders. II
be makes mistakes. he will only have him.
self to blame. And he will not be the only
one 10 blame. AS he is the chosen leader OF
the Democracy, his party will have to pay
the penalty if he eTrs. Thus, he may be
said TO hold the future of the Democracy in
the hollow of his single hand. Its pros
poets will depend upon his conduct of pub
lie affairs. They will be made or marred by
him and him alone.
Whether any man is so supereminently
endowed with omniseence that be can dis
pense with counsel from any source is per-
haps question. 1t is fact that the sblest
men who have tried to go through life lean
ing on themselves alone. sooner or later
committed mistakes which sometimes
proved fatal. No man OF modern times was
the equal of the great Napoleon in sagacity
and foresight; he was far superior to his
advisers; but because he did not take their
advice at the critical period of his career.
because he insisted on Carrying out his own
ideas in defiance of the warnings of ralley-
rand. Metternich, Nesselrode and other men
Oh cOmnon-SenSe, ne went utterly 10 ruin,
wrecked by too much self-reliance. History
repeated itself-on a smaller scale-in the
last administration of Cleveland. At the
time of the election OF 1888 almost every
prominent Democratic leader was secretly
hostile to the nominee of the party. He was
barely on speaking terms with the leading
Democrats of the Senate and the House.
He had contemptuously rejected their coun-
sells and sighted their suggestions. Atthat
time his pleasantest relations were with
Republicans.
Whether during his four years retirement
the President-elect has learned the lesson
that even the wisest Of men may benefit by
the advice of those who are honestly friends
remains to be determined after next March.
The path which Mr.. Cleveland has to tread
is not as smooth as an asphalt pavement.
By an unmistakable verdict the people have
decided in favor of change OF fiscal policy,
but 1t will require the utmost circumspec-
ton to effect the change without injury.
Under the Mckinley tariff the country has
been prosperous, and a diminution of the
prosperity coinciding in time with an
amendment of the tariff would Justly be
imputed to the amendment, and Mr.. Cleve-
lands policy would be held responsible for
the change.