The morning call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1878-1895, 1895-01-03
POLITICS AND MERIDIAN.

The New York Sun contains. an inge-
NOUS article, arguing that. to. q certain
extent, politics in this country are ques-
ton of race and of meridian. 1t SLOWS
that the counties in New York State along
the Hudson. WHICH. were peopled by the
Dutch and their descendants. have gener-
ally been Democratic. and have been. true
to their faith. Migration westward from
New England followed the line of the
Mohawk Valley and the shore of Lake
Erie, and maintained due west course to
ana beyond the Mississippi; hence North
ern New York, Northern Pennsylvania,
Northern Ohio, the upper portions of ln-
diana and Illinois and the whole of Iowa
became and have remained Republican ;
while New Jersey, Southern Pennsylvania
and the southern tier of counties In ONO.
Illinois and Indiana, which were largely
peopled from the South and Europe, took
on Democratic hue. and have generally
kept it. The Sun pursues the idea further
perhaps than the facts warrant; it finds
Republicans In the mountain regions Of the
Southern States, and ascribes their :pQliti-
cal leanings to their descent from Puritan
forefathers. Until the last election the
Repu blcans OF The Southern States have
not cut much of figure, for the simple
reason that the race question has d0mi-
mated all others.
The Sum s argument is a paradox-noth-
ing more. To Justify it it should have
been able to show that the ;Repu blican
party had been coexistent with the Demo
cratic party. whereas the former can only
claim an existence of forty years at nost.
Our contemporary gets over the difficulty
by assuming that it is the legitimate off
spring of the old. Wing party, which is
doing violence to history. The thew and
sinew and brains and principle of the old
Democratic party of the North went with
the ranks Of the Republican party--with
Charles Sumner. Hannih Hamlin,5 Sal
mon p. Chase; Preston King, John A. Dix,
Lyman Trumbull, Edwin NJ. Stanton and.
their compeers OF the founders Of Re-
publicanism Lincoln and Seward are al
most the only ones who were original
Wings. 1t is rue that the New England
strain of thought opened up the Mohawk
Valley and along the lakes. to the Mis-
souri,, while simultaneously the Southern
spirit ran over into the southern counties
of Ohio, Indiana and Illinois. But these
divergent philosophers did not always
crystallize.in TO political tenets. No States
were more intensely Southern in spirit
than Kentucky and Tennessee, yet. they
were generally carried by the Wings, who,
according 10 the SUMS theory, were the
precursors OF the Republicans.
A safer key to the politics of the Sc Yerar
States or sections than mere meridian.iS to
be found in PHYSICAL geography and acct
dental antecedents. Pennsylvania politics
have been. governed by concern for her coal
and iron interests aud the manufactures
which have grown out of these. Nomat-
ter what race her reople have belonged to,
they have always voted for the party
which promised the largest measure of
protection to these interests. Kansas
might have been debatable ground but for
the insensate efforts of the slave-owners to
plant slavery thereon. The memory of
that struggle made the State as firmly Re
publican as Vermont, and proximity led
Nebraska to follow the example. twas
not their New England bio cd but the
scars of the civil war which converted
Ohio, Indiana, Illinois and Iowa from
doubtful States into Republ strong
holds; and by parity of reasoning it is not
because of their cavalier ancestry that the
landowners of the South have generally
been Democrats, but because to their mind
the Republicans represented the party
which was hostile to their peculiar institu-
ton.
Still, on smaller sphere and for limited
periods of time there is something In: the
Suns theory. We can observe its work
lngs ia this State. For many years, and
to a certain extent even now, Colusa has
been the banner Democratic county, be-
cause it was chiefly peopled from Missouri.
The same reason will apply to Stanislaus,
which bias been a stanch Democratic
stronghold. Until lately Los Angeles,
Kern and TuIare were almost as firm in
the faith, simply because their early set
tiers of the American race came in by. the
southern route or we're of Southern extrac-
ton. On the other hand the great bulk of
the immigration from the North, which
came in by the northern overland route or
landed at this port. settled In such conn
ties as Sacramento, Alameda, Y olo, Con-
ira Costa and the river counties generally
and made them Republican. La these
cases it was not so much a question OF
race as i. was of the section which the i'm
migrants left when the country was
plunged into red-hot controversy in
which every man took sides.