Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1895-07-24
They Won't SnIIt


Nothing makes us so tired as seeing
the iteration and reiteration that "sil-
yer is the rock upon which the two old
parties will split" 1t does seem like
reform editors who had been in the
service for twenty years and had
watched the fierce contentious over
the tariff question in the Democratic
party, as well as the greenback Ques-
tion, and who never yet saw that
party split" would stop the stereo-
typed expression so often INDUCED in.
Threats have been made time and
again, just as they are made now, that
If the party did not do so and so there
would be a bolt But when the crisis
came we have always found those who
talked the loudest and made the biggest
threats, were the first to line up with
their party and eat their dish of crow
The fact is 1t is no trouble whatever
for the politicians to eat crow. The
Democratic party is a family of crow
eaters. 1t doesn't represent a single JEFF
fersonian principle. Its policy is die
tated by place hunters and salaried Of
ficials. There may be disintegration
from the ranks of disgusted voters, but
so far as a split is concerned ii is be-
coming more evident every day that
there will be no such thing. The free
silver Democrats are already hedging
by the declaration that financial re-
form must come through the Demo-
cratic party and that all members Of
the party must abide by the action Of
"a. Ill
likely to receive a black eye in the ma
tional convention, as it did in the Ken
lucky state convention, the free silver
Democrats who are now acting as cap
pers to prevent the dissolution Of their
party will be found sneaking into line
while they eat the dish of crow pre-
pared by themselves. In 1891 twenty
one out of twenty-three states that
held Democratic conventions adopted
free silver platforms, and South Caro-
lima threatened to bolt the national
convention IL a free silver plank was
not adopted. A free silver plank was
not adopted and South Carolina did
not bolt, while the twenty-one states
that had the year before adopted free
silver platforms lined up with the
party and voted for the king of gold
bugs. Watterson declared that the
nomination of Grover Cleveland was
march through the slaughter house
to an open grave" and recently he was
clamoring for resolution indorsing
him in the Kentucky state convention.
The Democratic party has become
too tough to split, and the Republican
party is too well disciplined. The
only way to make inroads on their
ranks is to educate the rank and file Of
the two old parties. Take advantage Of
the prevailing disgust among the yot-
ers and see that they are provided with
wholesome Populist reading matter.
There is no royal road to success in the
reform movement. The devil always
holds his forces well together. This
eternal cry about the two old parties
splitting does us more harm than good.
1t warns the enemy to provide against
it. while 1t soothes our own forces into
inaction. The only split there will be
in the two old parties viii be In the
ranks. and we must make that by push
ing the work of education IL the peo-s
pIe held the conventions we might look
for a split. but the politicians hold the
conventions, and the politicians want
offices, and Offices come through the
united action of the party. So the poll
| ticians would rather eat crow In the
interest of harmony and official sala-
ries than to split and not get the Of
fees. So there will be no split, and
ve'u bet a four-dollar dog on it.
MORGAN'S BUZZ-SAW.