The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1895-04-30
TUMBLING TO THE RACKET.

=
| new year few men were to be found
who would admit that there was any
possibility for the Democratic party
in the next national campaign. The
| protests recorded in November, against
everything that the administration,
| and its majority. had attempted or ac-
compliShed, were overwhelming. Its
excuses for revising the Mckinley
tariff and for repeating the silver act
were but pitiful So complete WAS
the humiliation of that party as regis
tered by the votes counted out of the
ballot boxes of the fall election, that
Republicans could not find their hearts
TO crow. Democrats. born of mothers
who had won smiles and compliments
from "Old Hickory" himself at a time
when he had the national bank beneath
his feet and was twisting the neck
of notification, stood around in the
gloom of the past winter curSing the
day that Cleveland was begotten. 1t
was struggle between disgust and de-
spair
While it is true that so far as the
west and south are concerned there has
been no amelioratiOn of the spite in the
breaStwOrkS of the average moSSback
against His Serene FatneSs, there is
nevertheless a revival Of hope there.
And what should concern the Repub-
lican party, that hope has entirely too
much foundation in fact. The black
cloud which envelops the national
Democratic aggregation has silver
lining which OutShineS the gold in the
texture of its body. Its warp of silver
is more than its wool of gold. There
are Il greater number of white metal
the aggregation of conventions which
must follow within the next year, the
whites will not only outnumber but
outweigh the yellows, and next June,
Il year, bids fair to show the Demo
cratic party with the pull on the silver
string which will prove a cable-chain
in comparison to the gold thread spun
by Wall street.
Just one year ago the Eagle in adj
yising the Kansas Republicans to re-
cogniZe the demands of the silver men
in their state convention, declared its
conviction that the overshadowing is
sue in the national convention of 1896
would be the silver question. Later,
at the converting of the state con-
vention a majority of the Republican
leaders, at Topeka, laughed TO scorn
that such a thing was possible. And
when the bastard silver plank was ad-
mitted to the platform it was put there
as vOte-catcher, rather than a con-
yiction, or with any expectation that
the nominees would be called upon TO
define their positions and to indorse
1t more particularly and emphatically
than the other items of that declara-
ton of principles. Yet afterwards it
was all that the central committee
and its speakers could do to keep the
silver plank from becoming the prin-
cipal issue of the campaign. Their
tariff talks and prohibition promises
were everywhere cut into and inter
rupted with ''how about silver"
Now, fourteen months in advance of |
the converting of the national conyen-
tons, and with a long session of con-
gresS intervening, the country is alive |
with the discussion of the currency
question. SO intense and pointed is |
the controversy, so widespread its in |
fluence, that the president of the United |
States was impelled to put up a job |
in order that he might be afforded |
an opportunity to issue Il quasi-mes-
sage to the American people for the |
purpose of staying a |
sweep, which is proving
both contagion and an epidemic |
His address, in falling fat as a con-
vfncing argument, disguised the great |
body of his own party more than even |
the blunders Of the last congress.
SO the silver question is on. its issue |
uppermost. At present it is rather
sectional than political, but as it in
wolves class interests it must. newt |
ably, become political. The leaders of |
both national parties, are one by one.
daily and hourly, in street parIance.
''tumbling to the racket" But out
side of the west. there seems to he Il
more general move upon the part of
the Democrats than upon the Republi-
can side. Therein lies the danger To
the Republicans upon the one side. the
hope for the Democratic party upon the
other. The parity idea might pos
sibly save the Republican party. bur
if the issue should be one souarelv
Of gold standard for the Republicans
and free silver for the Democrats. the
outside of New York and
New England. would not carry a half
dozen states.
At present the movement is indie
pendent and above party, but as. from
It's very nature, it cannot remain 80.
the question which everybody is ask
ING is, will ii be possible to draw party
lines between the classes and the
masses. and in which event where will
the final victory lie:
WHO Is TO RULE.