The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1892-06-09
Issues of the CampaiGn-Facing and
Dodging.

One cannot help siding, on the
whole, with the Administration or
H~arrisonian side in the struggle now
in progress at Minneapolis. 1t has
the merit of comparative honesty,
that rarest of virtues in Republican
politics. 1t proposes that the party
shall run on the record it has made on
the issues it has created itself, fairly
and squarely without dodge or sub
terfuge. This may be fatuous, but it
is respectable.
The Blaine element, on the con-
trary, is shifty and false Is every
thing has been in the career of the
trickster who leads it. 1t seeks to
evade the consequences of the con-
duct Of the Republican administra-
ton by cowardly and treacherous dis
avowals. 1t tries to get away from the
legislative policy of it's party by jug
Cling and thimble rigging, by trim
ming and hairsplitting. This curse
of procedure is neither respectable
nor wise.
1t is certain that Mr.. Harrison, if
renominated, will be beaten. He will
be beaten, not because he is a cold"
man, a ''non-magnetic" man OIL a
small, weak man. He will be beaten
because he appointed to high offices
bad men-including Mr.. Blaine-who
betrayed their trust, wronged the
people and disgraced the Government.
He will be beaten because whep- his
party secured control in Congress it
abused its power to injure and
insult whole sections of the
country, to upset the principles
of the Constitution, and to render
nugatory the right of parliamentary
representation; because his party
abused its power to impose upon the
country an outrageously oppressive
burden Of expense and subsidy, and
a grossly partial system of raising
revenue, whereby the poor are made
to suffer that the rich may increase
their store; above all because his
party strained its utmost to destroy
the liberties of the people by placing
the Federal government in military
control of the exercise of the right of
suffrage, and because it was only pre-
vented from consummating that
treason through the sordidness of
some of it's members, who bartered
away their votes for support for silver
legislation in which they were inter
ested. These are the principalSele-
ments which will cause President
Harrison's defeat in case he iSSlQm-
mated. But, withal, Mr.. Harrison's
defeat will be the most honorable
event in his career since his election
as President. He can at least claim
that he placed the issues of the hour
frankly before the people that they
may pass final judgment upon them
according to their Constitutional
prerogative.
But if Mr.. Blaine becomes the can
didate of the party, he will endeavor
to evade every real issue, without
being able to succeed. If Mr.. Blaine
had resigned from the Cabinet at any
time during the session of the Billion
Congress, if he had resigned when the
Porter crime was committed against
New York, when the Wanamaker
bank looting was revealed in Phila-
delphia, when the President con
Quoted his outrageous campaign OF
bluster against the sister republic of
Chill, if he had ever come out boldly
against-the %unseating of Democratic
members of the House of Representa-
tives, if he had protested against the
wrongs of the Mckinley law; if he
had even made an open opposition
to the revolutionary Force bill,
then indeed, he might have some
standing before the people as a Presi-
Dental candidate on Il platform OF
condemnation OF the offenses of Har-
rison and his faction. But Mr.. Blaine
never had the honesty or the courage
to do any of these things. He had
secret emissaries to whisper and sug-
gest that he did not like this thing, he
disapproved of that; but he-why he
stood in with the Administration as
long as there was anything to be made
by it, and only made an open move
when he thought a sensational stroke
would complete his campaign of hum
bug and bring the nomination tum-
bling into his lap.
1t was too late. The people know
and understand Mr.. Blaine. Trim
mer and trickster in every fibre of his
nature, and finally traitor to his own
cause, he stands even a more dis
graced and discredited man than he
did in 1884. With his own wicked
ness a milestone about his neck and
the crimes of the last four years a
weight to his heels, he would enter
the field, if nominated, without even
the prospect of an honorable defeat.
Nh. Blaine is dead. He has worked
out his own ruin.
Trr, D1@,bliaon nanc1nat napcD rAhrn