The Dalles daily chronicle. [volume] (The Dalles, Or.) 1890-1948, 1895-12-16
ST. LOUIS views ON THE CON.
HENTION.
TFrom the Globe.pemocrat.l

In 1896 for the second time in its his
tory the republican party is to hold a
national convention in southern state.
Missouri, of course, is really northern
or western, and not a southern state,
but in social and partisan sense-it
was slave stale, and it has been demo-
cratic for many years, like the other
states in which slavery existed-it has
been classed with the South. It will do
no harm to defer to that notion in this
instance. All the republican national
conventions along to this time except
that of 1864, which met in Baltimore,
were held in the North. The first
national convention of the party, that
of 1856, met in Philadelphia, as also did
that of 1872; those of 1860. 1868, 1880,
1884 and 1885 were held in Chicago, that
of 1876 met in Cincinnati, and that of
1892 took place in Minneapolis.
But the selection of a southern state
for meeting-place for a republican
national convention means more now
than it did in 1864. The convention of
1864 held In Baltimore was called a
union convention, and not strictly re-
publican convention. The call was ad-
dressed to those who ''desire the uncon-
ditional maintenance of the union, the
supremacy of the constitution, and the
complete suppression of the existing re-
beiiion," and the first resolution of the
platform declared that "laying aside all
differences OF political opinion, we pledge
ourselves as Union men, animated by q
common sentiment, and aiming st q
common object, to do everything in our
power to aid the government" etc. The
object of holding the convention in Bal
timore was to strengthen the Union
cause in the border states, then an OBJ
ject of great interest to the government.
Many war democrats took part in the
convention, and were expected to vote
for the ticket, which had war demo-
crat on it for the second Office, although
of course, most of those in the conven-
tion and who supported the ticket were
republicans.
The selection of ST. Louis as the meet
lng-place of the convention of 1896 has a
profound and lasting significance. 1t is
a recognition of the fact made plain by
the recent elections that the geograph-
ical line erected by Texas annexation
and made hard and fast by the Kansas
conflict, has at last dropped out of poll
tics. The republican party, forced oy
the Issue which brought it into being
and by the convulsion which that issue
caused, to be sectional organization for
nearly forty years, has now broadened
and developed into national proportions.
All the votes received by the first re-
publican speaker and all the ballots
cast in the Electoral College for the first
republican president were from the free
states, and, practically speaking, from
the same region has come all the strength
of the republican party ever since until
1894 and 1895, except in the temporary
and artificial conditions of the recon-
struction period. But now Mason and
Dixon's line-and the parallel of $3.50
have ceased to be political boundaries
and have become mere geographical des-
ignations. The solid South has been
abolished. Freed from the Instructions
by which its growth was restricted,
the republican party has crossed into
new field, and has started out on larger
and grander conquests than it has yet
achieved.