The record-union., 1896-11-01
A CALM JUDGMENT.

Rev. Lyman Abbott, D. D., in very
Daiin ana dispassionate review of thepo-
ntical campaign and it's vital issues,
says IN monograph in the November
Review of Reviews:
AT this writing political Indications
point to the election of MIR. Mckinley
ny d large popular majority and con-
siderable majority in the electoral col
iege. With this election the coinage is
sue may perhaps disappear from Amer
ican politics. On the one hand, it is not
impossible that international agreement
may be secured witt. France and Ger
many, II not with other European pow
ers, Tor bimetallic currency; on the
other, it is not impossible that the dis
covery of the immense gold fields in
south African may at once lessen the
difficulty of establishing bimetallism.
The distinguished and venerable es
sayist, after some further remark, adds
these words of wisdom and warning
which may we'll be considered and taken
into the chambers of thought by all
patriotic people:
But it appears to me very clear that
the party which has selected Mr. Bryan
as its Standard-bearer will not disap-
pear. Though the issues formulated in
1896 will never again be similarly for
mulated, the tendencies appearing in
1896 will certainly reappear in two
great national organizations. COnserv-
atIsm will be represented in the one
party, radicalism in the other. too
staM and self-satisfied content will be
the fault of the one, and a too restless
and eager demand for change the fault
Of the other One will have too little, the
other too much faith in popular govern
ment; the one will fear the excuses of
liberty, the other will be impatient of
constitutional restraints; the one will
tend toward Toryism. the other toward
radicalism, if not socialism. Let us hope
that they may find as leaders worthy
successors, the one to Alexander Hamil-
ton, the other to Thomas jefferson. that
the great middle body of voters. alter
nately attracted by the promises and re-
PEELED by the failures of the competing
parties, may wisely mediate between
them. that the country may thus be pre-
served from falling either into the polit-
ical stolidfty and stagnation of Spain or
the restlessness and untempered radi-
calism of France. and by the sometimes
inspiring, sometimes restraining, influ-
ence of the people may be kept in that
path of real and rational progress which
has been the safety of Great Britain and
the glory of AngloSaxon history
Here is a distinguished scholar and
noted American who is not blinded by
partisan zeal not bewildered by political
fallacies. His words ought to quicken
the earnest efforts of all people who be-
heve that the destiny of the American
republic is very far from being accom-
plished, and that it must be saved from
the theories and experiments of radicals
and extremists on the one hand, and
from too much content of the optimists
on the other, who believe that great
problems in government and civilization
will work themselves out through evo-
lutionary processes, without much or
any effort on the part of the people TO
shape the course of events.
The campaign now closing has its les
sons, and we will be more than foolish if
we do not improve them. The extrem-
lists who have on one side held that the
country is in slavery to those who design
to establish an oligarchy, and the ex-
tren1ists on the other side who have
looked upon all protest as unreasonable
and revolutfonary-these two are to be
made more conservative and reason
able, and brought to look upon each
other as having broader and higher
common interest and concern in each
other and the republic.
The national heart is sound. 1t will
not cease its beat, nor the current that
flows in and out of it viii not cease to
yitalize the Nation. But radicalism on
all sides must be toned down, the patri-
otisn and wisdom of the people at large
aroused; correctives applied where the
need is for the national and social ills,
and the comon interest of all the people
knit together in a closer union and
greater dependence upon each other.
And this will be accomplished. OF that
TO true lover of his country should en-
terrain the slightest doubt.