The record-union. [volume] (Sacramento, Calif.) 1891-1903, 1896-11-01
SOME RAMBLING THOUGHTS
By MEMO.
(Copyrighted.)

county. they can be found in the columns
of this paper only. as we have made ar
rangements with the author for their ex-
elusive publications.
Already the earth is trembling with
the tread of the armies that shall do
battle on Tuesday next. The hush OF ex-
pectancy is over hearts and homes, not
knowing how the conflict will turn.
Look backward a moment. The men
of rs battled for a principle with
scythes and swords and fiintlocks
through bloody ambuscades and re-
treats; winning by defeat, and at last
victorious at Yorktown. The men of
'61, faithful until death to their respect
i've sides, drenched the earth with the
crimson tide of life at the shrill call of
the Mimic bullet and the Shrek Of the
cruel shell.
And we of '96? We will march into
the fiercest political fight in thirty five
years armed with ballots and nothing
else. The millions ranged on each side
will advance or retreat, triumph or bow
defeated at the behest of particles of
paper noiselessly directed to their err
rand by the will of freemen. Dead, in
deed, must be his imagination who is
not thrilled by the silent Inightiness of
the vote of the intelligent majority to
overturn or upbuild, to change the cur
rent of thought or to stem it. Such
flexibility of government is the perfec-
| ton of civilization; crown Of humane
glory to dying century.
Then cursed be the men on either side
who. ON platform or in private, talk
force and resistance" They would
turn back the hands of Time one hun
| dred years and make our country's
| sun set at the end of a glorious century
| in murky clouds of darkness, greed
hate, strife, sectionalism. They are fit
comrades for the blood-mad sans Gu
| lottes of the French Revolution: they
| are unfit sharerS in the benign infiu-
ences of our free-will Government. Out
upon these fiends, Ours is common
wealth of brains and conscience and not
| of brute force, like the bastard repub-
| lies of Central America Their con-
slant turmoil of contendFng parties
| now in power and tyrannous. and again
out of power and outlawed. has as yet
| no counterpart with u.s. blessed be the
God who helps the nation that helps it
self. Infinitely more safe is our Presi-
dent, intrenched behind the suffrages of
a majority Of a sovereign people, than
any fierce chieftain sustained in his
despotlsm by myriad soldiers.
These things of peace, like sunshine
after storm, are ours to possess because
of those who wrought that we might in
1rit nd Ja6 fhot
Their physical contests, their wars.
their struggles, have built up an en-
pire OF freemen. vast military
ma alton, seeking its highest development
along paths of gentleness and peace. All
that they gained for us shall not be
thrown to the winds by those whose
ideas Of patriotism are wrapped up in
violence instead of actual essentials
like the purity, honesty and industry of
the citizen, and obedience by all to law
and the representatives who express the
will of The people.
Should Tuesday defeat your plans
and purposes, your line of action is
ciear-"Work for majority next
time Recognize the absurdity of
force killing a man does not make
him agree with you. To knock him
down is a very poor argument and
frightful comm entary on your own
narrowness. Why narrowness? Be
cause the man who expects all others
to agree with him displays total ig-
norance and misconception Of what
popular government is In running so
vast a machine as ours opinions must
differ as to what is best to be done;
they always will differ and change
more or less: and It is we'll that they
should, because the nation that lives
grows, and growth causes change, and
change causes new measures and con-
slant realignment Of political opin-
ion.
You and I and thousands besides
must climb up to a higher plane OF
politics. Then when we are high
enough to look over our neighbors'
fences, to our establishment we may
find that he feels just as patriotic as
we do; and he probably is, from his
point Of view If you live in a valley
you do not get the view of yourself
that is visible from the towering mass
above: if you dwell on the hillside the
valley below is what you see. Yet
beth hill and valley are there, and both
are parts of the eternal truths of ma
ture. So the man who differs from you
in politics is not necessarily wrong, or
at any rate he Is not necessarily UNI
patriotic.
No one walk of life absorbs all of
patriotism. A banker, Robert Morris,
was our greatest and most long suffer-
ing friend in the dark days of the
Revolution, and the contributions from
the ranks Of farmers and mechanics are
so plentiful that an enumeration is out
Of place here We are not hampered
with a class that can pose as a fount-
ain head of love of country; ours is
democracy of patriots, every class fur
nishing it's quota, the seed time and
harvest" of self forgetting men never
falling hitherto. We tread a land where
IN. even the intelligent wanderer from
other shores may, if his heart be true,
take his stand with those whose past
generations have been given to our
service.