The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1896-12-24

UankefOuS democrat, as lOlIOWS:
The future of the Democratic party
is subject that just now very natur-
ally engages the attention of all it's
thoughtful leaders. Except as an op-
position party it is very plain that it
has no immediate future. But this is
q country in which political condi-
tions are apt to change rapidly, and
it is our habit as soon as one presi-
Dental contest is over to speculate
upon the circumstances under which
the next one will be waged.
An old prOVerb admOnishes us that
it is useless to cry over spilled milk,
and without doubt the Democratic
milk was badly spilled in the recent
national election. At the same time
it is not wholly useless to consider
how and why the milk was spilled,
with a view to discovering what prac-
tical steps may be taken toward re-
covering in 1898 and 1900 what was
lost in 1886. 1t may be safely prom
ised that as the divided national De
mocracy went to defeat this year. it
cannot reasonably hope to remain di-
vided and have any chance of con
quering four years hence. There is
apparently disposition on the part
of several of the Bryan leaders, in
Guiding Mr.. Bryan himself to treat
the recent national verdict as though
it were not conclusive, but merely a
temporary Judgment, from which an
appeal might be taken with success
in 1900. But we see no indications of
a tangible sort that the Democrats
who refused to vote for free silver
coinage at the late election can be
either persuaded or coerced into
changing their minds. Neither can
we discern any solid ground for be
lieving that, even if the Republican
party should be 50 unwiSe as to leave
the currency issue open, free silver
coinage could be presented with any
better chance of proving IL winning
card in the next national campaign
than in the one which closed last
month.
Many thousands of Democrats in
every State voted for Mr.. Bryan this
year simply and solely because they
regarded him as the regular standard
bearer of the party, without sharing
his currency views, and fully believ-
ing that the Chicago platform was a
blunder. That large body of voters,
whose ballots were given to Mr. Bryan
on what may be termed strictly tech
nical grounds-in Difference to the
strict construction of a party mans
obligation to stand by his party,
right or WrOng-will certainly object
to a REPETITION of what they all along
regarded as a disastrous piece of party
strategy, which the final result GER
tainly showed it to be. Yet we are
told by some of the free-silver states
men who cannot reconcile themselves
fn no of hn Il
clared last month that the new Dem
ocratic party created at Chicago last
summer has come to stay, and that it
will stand intleXibly by its platform
from now on until 1900, and that then
it will seek victory again by appeal
ing to the same sectional alliance
which was expected to prove success
full this year, but which failed so ut
terly at the ballOt-boX. They are
still dreaming of a combination of
Southern and Western electoral votes
sufficiently strong to overpower the
capitalistic East
Mr.. Charles Nordhoff, in a recent
letter to the New York Herald, points
out very clearly the futility of basing
any hope of future Democratic ma
tional success upon such a league Of
the South and the West against the
East. Not only in the late national
canvass, but in Congress for a good
many years past, Southern leaders
have cOurted an alliance with the
West. The recent disastrous attempt
to carry the nation by the drawing
of new sectional line, with the At
lantic and Middle States on one side
of it and the Southern and Western
States on the other, was the culmi-
mating step in long course of policy
which ought now to be frankly &C
knowledged to be mistaken by South
ern statesmen. If the West, in the
larger sense of that geographic eX-
preston, were actually ready to join
hands with the South, using that
term also in its broadcast significance,
it would be a feasible project to gain
the control of the national govern
ment by such partnership. But, as
Mr.. Nordhotf says, the West, whose
alliance the Southern silver leaders
have been building their hopes upon,
has been steadily growing smaller as
the years have gone by. He observes
truly that the East sis no longer only
the Atlantic seabOard, down to Mason
and DiXon's line, as the Bayan people
believe. 1t is not merely this and the
MluIllo w est. L he East, III Si)lElJ
in temper, in opinion on vital ques-
tions, has in the course of the years
since the war, since 1861, come to in.
clude for all important public pur-
poses all OF the States east of Kansas
and Nebraska and the Dakotas and
north of Missouri. That is SOCIALLY
and politically now the East anG
the West, the political West, con
sists of Kansas, Nebraska, Colorado
the Dakotas, Wyoming, Utah anc
Washington"
The truth is that the gospel of the
new sectionalism is fiat failure
There is a deep-rooted repugnance OF
the part of all patriotic and cOnserva
tive citizens to the election of another
geographical barrier like that which
so long divided the North from the
p South and which at last gave to party
strife that form and character which
made civil war inevitable. The warn
ing of Washington on this subject
given in his farewell address, was Sc
deeply impressed by that appallins
object-lesson upon the minds of al
rejecting Americans that thei
aversion to the formation of new par
+ias o,, n cactioDoI ba siG Gan no sIlrp /,