The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1896-11-04


great questions that are to be settled
now that the election is over is what
is to be the future attitude and align
ment of political parties in this coun-
try. For the moment, party lines are
all in confusion. Not even when the
party of abolition was being built up
from fragments of the others was there
SO general a. transgression of party
relations as in this campaign. Each
one of the candidates in the field has
received large number of votes from
men who never before in their lives cast
ballet for the party which he repre-
sents. Both Republicans and Demo-
Gratis have become Pcpulists. Repub-
licans have Joined the National Demo-
cratic movement Popuists who do
not enjoy the sight of the Democratic
title at the head of their ticket have
found, for the time being, congenial
home in, the Republican. party. All
lines of cleavage have been disturbed,
and it will be months or years before
there is a Encouragement of par
sis for political campaign.
1t seems to us that the election Of
1896 marks a permanent change in the
American party system We do not
mean that party ties will hereafter
always sit more lightly on the indi-
vidual than: they have ever before al
though that is undoubtedly true We
mean that hereafter the struggle for
political supremacy will probably lie
between three parties instead of two.
In past contests there have always
been two leading organizations; one or
the other of which was sure to be vic
torious. Factions have split off from
either from time to time, and third
parties have risen and grown numer-
ous but only in the end for the pur-
pose of impressing the particular doc
trines which they represented upon one
of the two grand divisions AS soon
as they succeeded in having their re-
form or their mistake, whichever it
might be, adopted, partially or wholly,
by Democrats or Republicans, they
have fused into the body of that par
ty and disappeared So we have had
an alienation of political theory and
political power, which was necessarily
violent because it meant the suprem-
acy Of one extreme or another.
This is not the case in most Of the
other countries, where there is a par
liamentary government that amounts
to anything. In general, the political
body in such nations is divided into.
three sections They may and do bear
different names, according to the is
sues local to the country where they
exist, but they may all be designated
broadly by the terms Right, Left and
Center. These three divisions rep
resent the three controlling tendencies
Of the human mind. One is extremely
radical; another is supremely conserv
alive; the third occupies the middle
| ground between the two, and as it
sWayS from one to the other they rise
and fall. The conservatives hold on to
power, and run public affairs in the
old groove until changes become imper-
| alive and reforms will no longer be
denied. The radicals, not satisfied with
moderate changes, rush off into the
oretical experiments that react disas-
| trously upon the state. Public discon-
| tent then puts them in the minority
| Between the two is modified the body
of those who want reform without dis
order and conservatism without abuse
| Such an arrangement is wise, and has
| become necessary in the United States.
1t exists today, as a matter of fact,
! in the appearance in this campaign Of
the Republican party, the Demo-Popu-
list party and the National Democratic
party. Regardless of the names they
BEAR these represent quite accurately
the three divisions that we have been
describing. Republicanism in the cam
paign Of 1896 stands for the conserva-
ton of conditions as they are, includ-
! ing a vast bulk of evils and privileges
that must be abolished if they are not
to destroy the state. The Populist par
ty, which knows nothing Of Democ-
racy, except the hyphenated name
that it chose to bear, stands for wild
vagaries in politics and attempts tc ac-
complish necessary reforms by the in
PRODUCTION of new abuses. 1t is like
the man who burned down his house
in order to drive out the rats that in
! tested it. The National Democrats
stand for the little division of earnest,
thOuQhtful men who cannot oO tO ov-
IRENE lengths with either Republican
or POpulist, who believe in the consti-
tuition and the laws, who will never
rest satisfied with existing abuses, but
who insist that these can be remedied
in an orderly way through the exer-
else of the political power of the free
and independent voter
We have here the framework Of a
party organization which will, we
doubt not, be filled in and established
perpetually by coming events. The
so-called Democratic party, which is
represented by men like Altgeld and
Tillmen among the revolutionists, and
by narrow-minded fossils like Morgan
and Vest and Harris, has already lost
its balance and toppled over the verge
of the precipice into Populism They
will find the return difficult or impos-
sible, not because Democrats. would
not welcome back these men, but be-
cause they will not be able themselves
to ascend the cliff. There will be one
great, aggressively radical party in the