The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1896-05-31
THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY'S CEN
TENNIAL.

l ne DenOcFdLlC party DeSdH us HIS
sion in the year 1896, and therefore this
| is the centennial of its existence. Dur
ing this hundred years of useful and
honorable history. it has attended
the funeral of its two great antagonists
and of dozens of parties that have
come to the surface for time upon
some temporary wave. Prior to the
war the Democratic party had cleo
ted twelve and Federalist and Wing
parties four Presidents, con trolling
the Federal government forty eight
out of the sixty four years of it's exist
ence, the Federalists and Wings only
controlling sixteen years.
1t was thought by superficial think
ers that the division of the Democratic
party by the war issues would utterly
destroy it, but its power of recupera-
ton was such that within eleven years
after the war it elected a President.
though the power of threatened force
kept him out of the White House,
General Grant having often said that
Mr. Tilden was fairly elected. In spite
of the condition to which the party
was reduced by war issues and the war;
the Democrats have elected fourteen
Presidents to the Observation-Disclosures
list, Wing and Republican parties
eleven. If Tilden had been seated it
would have been fifteen to ten.
The Harrisburg Patriot suggests
a centennial celebration. The Phila-
delphia Record, animated by Vance's
faith that democracy is immortal"
very truly says; THAT the Demo
cracy has made its lasting impress
upon the character of the Federal
government as illustrated in the ac-
cepted Interpretation of it's constitu-
tional powers" And the Record adds
that there will be no danger of the
dissolution of the Democratic party
as long as the republic shall last, for
it is founded upon the principles which
underlie successful representative
government
This leads the Washington Post, an
independent paper to make some per-
tinent observations:
I'VE hope the Records cheerful
forecast will be indicated by
events of the future, but it is
not fully justified by history. At
ter prosperous career of sixty
four years, during which time it
witnessed the death and burial of
two successive opposition parties,
the Democracy suffered dissolu
ton in 1860. True, it was not SO
destructive a dissolution as that
of sugar and water; it was not dis
solved into atoms or into its orr
ginal elements, but there We're
two wings that could not or would
not flap together" and they dis
solved partnership. In the course
Of time, and after the issue on
which the factions parted had been
eliminated from the situation by
war, they came together again,
just as the loyal and disloyal
States were reunited, but the
Democratic party had twenty
four years in which to repent of
its folly before it could muster
strength enough to carry Presi-
Dental election.
"All this bitter experience has
not, it appears, given the party
it's fill of factional fighting. In
its centennial year, and on the
threshold of the twenty-sixth
leaders and organs of the Demo-
cratic factions threatening to bolt
the Chicago convention. Many of
the advocates of the gold standard
openly declare that they will not
accept the decision of the MAORI
ty unless that decision fayors
their side Some of the advocates
of the free coinage of silver assert
that they will bolt if their side is
outvoted. Both are equally wrong
and both are occupying un-Dem-
ocratic ground" ;.
The Democratic party was born in a
conflict between the right of money
and class or the whole people to gov
ern. During it's entire existence, every
now and then there has been an ele-
ment in the party that antagonized the
position of the party on the vital point
of finance and the right of the people
to rule There were those who wanted
to Federalize the party in Jefferson's
day; there were those who left it tenn
porarily in Jackson's day because they
believed the National Bank more capa-
bic to dictate financial policies than the
| voters; and there are not few to-day
who would Shermanize the party, and
make it but an echo of Republican
| financial policies which have brought
untold losses and wrongs to
| the whole country. In such in
stances, struggles in the party, while
unpleasant, are safeguards. Peace can
only be secured by a surrender to
those who would put the single gold
standard in place of bi-metallism.
Peace purchased at such a price would