The Caucasian. (Clinton, N.C.) 188?-1913, 1893-05-04
The NATIONAL ECONOMIST" an OLD
PARTY ADJUNCT.

i ~ FNNS<#N~
We clip the following from big
Metropolitan political daily, aud as
long as the National Economist stood
By and fought squarely for the de-
mands Of the Farmers Alliance, the
big Metropolitan papers never noticed
it or clip from its columns. The Econ
omist was one of the first Alliance pa
pers to endorse the Peoples party as
the only party that had endorsed the
demands Of the Alliance, but before
the campaign was over it deserted the
fight aud become an old party adj
junct. Since then We frequently see
in the big Metropolitan dallies cdito-
rial notices about the Economist like
the following:
'|THE FARMER N POLITICS..
at was recently stated by US
that there are more than surface
signs Of dissolution Of relations he
tween the Farmers Alliance and the
Peoples party and that word had
been passed along the line by DR..
Macune urging the total disconnec-
ton of the Alliance with any politi-
cal organization. We have also re-
marked that II grave suspicion was
engcndered during he last National
campaign that the doctors sympa-
thies leaned largely in IL democratic
direction"
"a reply to these obligations ap-
pears in the National Economist, in
which their correctness is in the nam
substantiated. The Economist dwells
at length upon the value of educa-
tional rather than political effort for
the accomplishment of reform and
says:
"political party utilization and
the exercise of suffrage and personal
duties and privileges, and are attli-
butes which cannot be exercies and
do not belong to farmers or labor
ers' fraternal Organization. The work
of political party in support of its
platform is only to very limited ex-
tent educational, because it commen-
ces campaign by the adoption of a
platform which instantly becomes a
dogma to which all the party work
ers seek to secure converts
"'On the other hand, the fraternal
labor organization has no political
platform to begin with. 1t merely
unites I'll men eligible to member
ship, and they discuss measures till
they agree on certain demands, and
they announce these subject to
change whenever any man can pro-
pose a change that will be benefit.
This conclusion each member strives
for by ali the methods at his com
mand, and seeks to have adopted as
the policy of the political party to
which he belongs. The question as
to whether they should band them
selves together and form a new par
| ty in the event they cannot control
the party to which they belong is one
of both principal and policy
at is admitted by our esteemed
contemporary that the time may
come, the emergency may arise, when
this fraternal organization will be
called upon to doff partisan habll
ments and save the country; but the
idea that the country's salvation de-
ponds in any wise upon the Peoples
party, as at present constituted, is
steadily kept out of sight.
GAS to Dir. Macune's sympathie:
during the late campaign, we arc
told that there was never any occa
sion for a suspicion that the editor
of the Economist leaned toward De
mocracy because he announced fire.
quently in the columns of the paper
and from the platform that he be
lieved in and adhered to the origina
principles of Demo cracy, but did no
hesitate to condemn the abuses Of
that party and its corrupt politicians
as it does those of the Republican
and the Peoples party. 1t was
therefore, not so much of a suspi
cion as fact as to where his sympa
thies were.
''The Economist should under
stand that what The Post said wa
not in the nature of criticism. w
believe DIR. Macun9 to be entirel
right in his position and that his ad
vice to the farmers to keep out of en-
tangling political alliances will b
best for themselves and best for tn
, country.