St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1895-03-08
FUTURE OF PoPULIsM.


The Populist party of Minnesota,
or at least a numerically strong fac
ton of it, is already deeply engaged
in the task of organization for the
state campaign of 1896. That it will
cut considerable figure in the contest
of that year there is no occasion to
doubt, even in spite of the incum-
ORANGES it carries in the shape Of
calamity howlerS, ranters and rain
bow chaSerS who frame their creedS
on the designs submitted by Waite,
Coxey and Donnelly. There is little
for the old parties to fear from the
Populists, however, so long as the
platforms of that party are drawn
by the clumsy carpenters who con-
Structed the last one, and there is
still less to fear from it SO long as
it carries with it the Republican and
Democratic camp followers who have
thus far been able to command its
strongholds of defense and SOW the
seeds of anarchy in the ready soil
of discomfort upon which the party
, is largely built.
There is no denying that the cardi-
nal principles upon which the party
was established contained much that
was commendable, and in the recon-
structive period which follows the
long stay of business stagnation it
might have been possible to so
amend and reform the original as to
render it fit for adoption by the con-
sentative men who reject the eX-
tremes of the older parties.
1t would seem, however, that it
has been the mission of some, guile
full politicians to gain admission to
the Populist ranks and force upon
the party such hotchpotch of i'm
practical incongruitieS to serve the
purpose of a party platform that men
of intelligence reject it without
second thought. The PopuliSt party,
there is no reason to doubt, has been,
time and again, betrayed by men
who have joined it for no other pur-
pose than to wreck it, and who have
accomplished their purpose by an
appearance of zeal which carried
them clear beyond even the
most radical of the irrational re-
formers, and landed the whole party
so far to the leeward of rational
thought that the craft became top
heavy and swamped itself.
There is vast amount of dissatis-
faction among the common masses,
and the party to which they are nat
urally inclined to turn for relief is
that which purports to be recruited
from the ranks of these same NAL
contents, but when a party organ
lied ostensibly for the good of the
masses begins to freight itself with
prohibition, woman suffrage, wild
cat currency and the dozen other i'm
becilities which are usually injected
by cunning and hostile hands into
tie party platform it loses at one
end all that it gains at the other,
and while it is engaged in the hope
less task of lifting itself over the
fence by the boot-straps, the other
parties are picking up the drift in
proportion as each supplies what the
Populists lack in deferring to the
real wants of the people.
The Populists have been the vic
Tins Of a bunco. game ever since
they formed their organization, and
what they have gained by their
tremendous energies and their de-
votion to the principles which have
been made for them they have lost
by the treachery of spies and dis
organizers on the one hand and
jealous leaders on the other. Popu-
lism occasionally wins by a"scratch,
as in Kansas, Colorado and other
states, but it seldom holds it's own
longer than to divide up the spoils
of office. It is not the party of the
people, because there are no privates
in it. Those of it's members who are
sincere are, as a rule, lacking in the
qualities essential to leadership,
while those who have the capacity
to be leaders are engaged in the
work of misleading the masses as
far as possible. Before the Populists
can hope to achieve any practical
successes they must purge their par
ty of it's Wreckers, and consent, for
a time at least, to take the epau-
lettes from the shoulders of it's lead
ers and place them all side by side
in the ranks