Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1892-09-30
ISSUES AND PARTIES.

One of the most philosophic remarks OF
Governor Mckinley at the Washington
meeting was his observation that ''parties
do not make issues, but issues make par
ties" This will be pretty well shown by
the tariff discussion, before it is over.
For while voters may feel disposed to
divide according to party lines upon new
| questions, or upon new aspects OF old
ones The impulse is to answer to the
| familiar name and to follow the accus-
toned leaders. But when their interests
and their intelligence are touched deeply
voters shape their convictions for them
selves. This will be illustrated upon the
tariff and the money issues more strongly
than upon any others recently before the
| public. The benefits of protection in en-
abling industries to be started and profit
ably maintained are felt in one way or
another as much by Democrats as by Re-
publicans 1t is not easy to see how
there could be substantial difference be-
tween five manufacturers who call them
selves Democrats and five manufacturers
who call themselves Republicans as
to the practical workings of an economic
policy affecting their business; or between
five workingmen who call themselves
Democrats, five who call themselves Popu-
lites, and five who call themselves Repub-
licans as to whether protection is or is
not beneficial in keeping American mills
and shops going, and in holding the
standard of wages above the European
level. But if at the start each group were
to range itself, through force of habit, in
line under Democratic or Republican
leaders, there is nothing surer than that
experience would ultimately drive them to
the same platform. The manufacturer
and the workingman, no matter by what
political names they call themselves, both
want what is best for them; and it is their
experience and intelligence, not the in
citations of transient clap-trap or dema-
goguery, which will finally attach them to
parties or issues that sharply and vitality
affect their means of livelihood
The same holds true upon the money
question. If the idea of abolishing ma
tional banks and substituting wildcat
currency were carried out, the man who
found himself victimized with deprecated
or worthless bills would denounce the sys-
TEN none the less heartily because he had
been an ardent Populite or Democrat in
place of a Republican.
Governor Mckinley was wise in pre-
senting this line of thought to the people
of the great manufacturing district around
Pittsburg. Whatever doubts the farmer
of the Northwest may have about the
tariff, because he does not perhaps see at
once the benefits to himself, the evidences
of what the tariff has done in building
up this part of the country are all
around u.s. 1t is not alone Republicans
who are concerned in the operation of the
thousands of factories; nor are the mer-
chants who depend for their trade upon
the population engaged in these factories
divided by party names; nor have the
owners of real estate in the various cities
and towns the less at stake because they
have hitherto called themselves Demo-
Gratis or Republicans. The interests of
each are the interests of all. These inter-
ests, too, are more important to them than
the qualification of helping this or that
set of politicians to the eminence and
emoluments of Office.
1t is not a question of Republican or
Democrat this year so much as the more
question of voting for the
policy that is best adapted to the business
interests of the country and to local inter-
ests in most particular degree.