People's voice. [volume] (Wellington, Sumner County, Kansas) 1890-1917, 1894-04-13


d;scloses that the people have armed
force which Is inconsistent with free
citizenship, and whose opposition NO
man of them can endure. Is this re.
form? Is this what they have to offer?
What is this better than the leader
ship of McGrath, Corning. Matchet,
Wrightmier, Willis, Brush, Elder.
Holden, Mrs. Lease. Dickinson, Otis,
Clover, and all other spiked Alliance
guns whose voices woke the dead in
1890. Here is an agency which can
silence as many more as the occasion
may require. See what pitiful humil
alton of the right purposes of the tru-
est Populist is required to stand in"
with this force. Is that a crime of
which am suspected? Criticism and
free choice which are vital to citizen
ship must be wrong if these things are
right. What is to follow the resulting
paralyis of concience and slaughter of
convictions. The black vomit of self
seeking, with which the old parties
are putrid, has broken out in the Pop
ulist camp. and nothing short of
hard frost or a thunder storm will save
us. There is no permanence in the
situation. There will be an end. An
end to parties.
Where is the agency to correct these
evils; all evils. 1t is not in the cleo
t on of new officers, any officers, with
out new conditions. The virtue of the
Republican party is to oppose the Dem
ocrats, and vice versa. The Populist
party, our last hope, is found to be
Bonded reed. The People! There is
no people. Kansas has a population
but it has nc people. They are not a
force to act, but an instrumentality to
be manipulated. Self-moYing once
only in modern times, the people I'M
dertake to demonstrate their own ex-
istence, the larger part of them. They
sent representatives whose authority
was denied, and their designated exec
utive was insulted as an usurper. The
representatives found that, above their
judgment, patriotism and sense of JUS
tice, as they must answer to the peO-
pie, there was other force which called
them to answer, concerning their o..
gauization. The governor counter
mlnded his orders and capitulated to
force which was able to demonstrate
itself on the spot, and without formal
ity of vote. The sactiOn or condem-
nation of the people has been dispens-
ed with.
Their party in the matter has al
ready been attended to and they are
expected to devote their attention to
other matters. Resulting from this,
there stands upon the record an in
scription, which by the law of our ex-
istence is a precedent controlling the
future. That inscription is that the
Judiciary is the sole possessor of SUI
preme power. Beside that record the
people must record their protest. This
they must do if the facts no more than
beclOud their prerogatives. if tEey
would demonstrate their existence as
an independent factor. A vote of
the people cannot reverse decision of
the supreme court. but an utterance
now of the voice of the power which
makes courts may COMPEL it's review
when, in some future moment of ex-
IRENE peril, it is invoked as barrier
to the peoples authority. Says the
supreme court of Georgia as Ga. 406.)
while during the contest the courts
must and would be poIerless, they
might, after the contest is over, recog-
nize that as the true one which was
practically successful with the people.
Hence the Importance of the pending
election, The people can do no act
with such certainty of meaning, in
this respect, as the repetition of the
election of l.. d. Lewelling to the gov
ernorship No malleship, no substi-
tute, no other candidate of the same
party, no trenchant resolutions of con-
ventions, nothing can vindicate the
determination of the people themselves
to rule, like the single fact of that one
mans election. That record stands
athwart the peoples pathway, an in
surmOuntable obstacle between the peo-
pie and their actual control of their
own public affairs, which control is
the one first, and only adequate rem
edy for every existing public evil.
Democrats, who may convict him of
ingratitude in the distribution of pat
ronage, Republicans, who may believe
the gibbet to be only the proper re-
ward for his calling out the militia,
Populists, who may regard him as a
traitor to his party, will you all vote
for him? In thunder tones you an
Swer, no. We will not support with
our votes that which we so heartily
condemn! Gratitude for preferment is
the basis of the Democrats hope, the
Republican substitutes the purity of
the judges for the virtue of citizenship,
and the PopulistS depends upon elect
ing better officer.
Good bye, as things are, to all hope
of the Environment of the people. The
end has come. The preservation OF
our institutions is no longer acquisition.
We have already lost our co untry. The
work of our ruin is complete. The PEG.
pie possess but the semblance from
which the virtue of power is extracted.
Farewell to the greatness of American
citizenship. Still we must wait till,
as people, we know we are lost. The
salvation of God is for the lost only.
Never till the darkness is realized
can the dawn of reconstruction begin.
No seer can prophesy what will be the
signs of the dawning, except through
the inspiration which is born of de.
spair.
When men see each other in the
light of that dawn, every man will be
take = imself to his trusted neighbors
every group of these terrified neigh
bors, in their respective townships and
cities, will become barricaded unit Of
government controlling its own affairs,
and jealously debating and doing ou'
only such delegated powers as are es