The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1894-01-16
DEMOCRATIC NERVE.

With . sublimity otnervs whicl
would inspire admiration if one could
recover sufficiently from the shock, the
leading organs of Democracy are be-
ginning to speak of those who stand
opposed to the hybrid Wilson tariff and
who take occasion to expose its hurt
full crudities and havoc working effects
as panic mongers" and 'alarmists. "
Now Of all the designations which
prefervid and squirmiug. press, weight
ed down with the accumulating bur
den of popular ceusure along all lines
of Democratic policy, could utilize to
ease its pitiable chagrin, these surely
are the most utterly gratuitious, the
least deserved.
Have the Democratic editors no re
collection Of time, less than four
years ago, when every eager one of
them was raising hue aud cry about
the "calsmitous' Mckinley bill? Do
their excited minds retain no memory
Of the tremendous strain to whic h they
were put prior to the congressional
elections of 80, in the eudeavor to
prove that American farms were being
abandoned by wholesale, American
farm mortgages plastering the surface
of the thrifty west, and the American
laborer bowed down under the stress
Of war taxation without end? There
had never, in the history of American
politics, been calamity cry equal to
this; nor had there ever been an equal
instance of panic mongering so SYSTEM
attic, persistent, and consummately un.
ScrupuloCs
We all know the sequel The cry
heightened the excitable element in
our citizenship There was a rush to
get in the tariff reform procession.
Schemes and propositions, the most
preposterou5, born in the heat Of men,
tai panic and economic lunacy, and en-
braced in smoking warmth without in-
quiry or pause. quickly dotted the field
of American legislation as mushrooms
dot the surface of fermenting soil.
And yet, with all this chaotic Populis-
tic revolt impeding it and turning
mems minds from the equipoise OF sane
politics, the Republican party bore up,
averted panic and started the indus
tries of the country upon a new career
Of profitable activity, which was not
interrupted until the Democratic anna
tours, having deceived the masses into
a lemented misbestowal of trust, took
hold of the helm, tried to steer the
craft according to the misty lines of
their confused economic day dreams,
and wound up, before half under sail,
by preCipitating the most disastrous
panic in thirty eVentful years.
And now, for sooth, the Republican
who expresses himself with regard to
the contemplated prolongation of this
disastrous and well.nigh imbecile
policy must say nothing of the harm it
has already achieved, lest he should be
called an "alarmist,' or crushed under
the sarcasm of the appsllation. panic
monger" The men who for three de.
cades made panic mOngering a fine art
now rise to remark, from the soft van.
lage of entrenched political authority,
that the thing must stop. The poll.
ticians whose sole claim to considera.
tion at all is the amazing proficiency
with which they fool the masses, hay
ing gained their coveted end, now pos
sess the eiTrontery to decree that crit.
cism must cease.
Itisa a beautiful study in the posi-
bilitiss Of human nature; but as a
check to outspoken public opinion we
surmise that it won't work.