The Mason County journal. [volume] (Shelton, W.T.) 1886-1927, 1894-10-12

In my judgment, one of the great
causes Of the errors and heresies into
which the American people have fall
len, one great occasion of the diff
eulties under which Kansas has labor
ed in the past four years, has been
from the inattention of the people to
the discharge of their difficult duties
and obligations. We hear a great
deal in these latter times about the
bad governmentin this country, that
this is government of the plutecrats,
that it is a government OF classes, in
which republican legislation has been
enacted for the benefit of one class,
and for the oppression of other classes.
l want to say that the people OF this
country have exactly as good govern
msnt as they deserve to have.
The government of this country is
exactly what the people OF this coun-
try see fit to make it. I have heard
the senate of the United States de-
scribed as a syndicate of millionaires,
as bankers club, and l want to say
that if there be in that body a dull.
vacant and degraded millionaire, with
not intelligence enough to vote audi
bly, when he is called on the yeas and
nays list, he is there because some
constituency sent him there, because
there is no man, whether he have the
mill ions of Vanderbilt multiplied by
those of Astor many times, who can
break into the senate of the United
States by his millions and obtain a
certificate unless some constituency
sends him there. We hear great
deal about boodlsism in municipal
government, about sugar senators,
about men who, like Judas. BETRAYED
their masters with Il kiss and sold out
ehO o~Niou O"usC vi lipcIIy IOi thirty
pieces of silver; they got there because
some delinquent community sent
them there. If you have q freak in
the house of representatives that
would be disgrace to political dime
museum, he goes there because freaks
send him there, and if there be man
vino sells out his vote for shares in the
sugar trust, he is there because the
men who ought to have been atten-
tive to their duties at the primaries,
at the nominating conventions and at
the polls failed to perform their duty,
because there are more good men,
there are more upright men, there are
more patriotic men, there are more
intelligent men in every community
in this country than there are the re-
| verse. If there is not, then self
government is a failure, and this gov
eminent is failure, and this govern
ment had better be thrown into
liquidation and have receiver ap-
pointed and close its concerns
TWO DEGRADED PARTIES.
There is a class of people in every
community, and [ am sorry to say
they have been growing more numer-
Gus in the United States in the last
few years, who make it point to
hold up .heir hands in holy horror at
the degradation in American politics
There is no higher duty in this coun-
try of ours than citizenship, and pop
ulists and democrats have obtained
control because republicans have been
delinquent in the discharge of their
duty. Every act that ever was-l
will not say proved-but every act
! that was alleged against the republi-
can party of the state or nation
during the thirty years of possession
of the state and national power paled
| into absolute insignifcance beside the
record OF democracy and populism in
this state and nation in the last two
wears, and we don't have to resort to
republican newspapers to prove It,
either. There is no necessity IN this
campaign for appealing to partisan
statements to prove the accusations
that are made against these parties
They have furnished their own wit
nesses.
Grover Cleveland has written the
epitaph of democracy. He has IN
! scribed upon the stone that this
nation is preparing to erect over Its
dishonored remains on the 9th oi
November next that it is disgraced
and degraded party of perfdy and dis
honor: and there is the accusation
against populism of lust, of Doodle
ism. of corruption, of prostitution, OF
brutality that can be substantlated
out of the mouths of witnesses of the
populist party itself; and this cam
paign is an appeal to the patriotic
sense and intelligence of the people ol
Kansas and of the United States. 1t
!. an appeal to the patriotic judgmen
and business sense of the American
people, addressed to their interests
their business, their pockets, their
prosperity and the welfare of them.
calves and their families and those
I,