The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1897-01-09
DEMOCRACY AND DEMOCRACY.


of his address at the Jackson day cell
ebration in Chicago with a considera-
ton of the claims OF the sound money
and the cheap money elements VINO
bear the name and represent the faith
of Democracy. His argument has a
strong family resemblance to his dis
cussions of the money question. 1t is
superficial and mere quibbling about
words, and as such, Valueless. There
are two very different things signified
by the terms Democrat" and ''Democ-
racy." 1t pIeases Mr.. Bryan to confuse
these uses and to adopt the one or the
other as it suits his convenience for
the time being. In Mr. Bryan's mouth
the term Democracy" signifies that
particular idea which may at that par
: tieular moment have received the ap-
p. Dfoval Of a party convention, called by
tie regular authorities of the party
denominated Democratic, and governed
by a majority vote of the delegates
elected thereto. Nobody needs to quar-
rel with him, or would wish to, on the
proposition that this is one meaning
OF the word. Unquestionably, the party
organization which is the regular sue
cessor in official line of the old Demo-
cratic party has a legal right to call
itself Democracy" 1t is not worth
occupying an evening to tell us so
much. All the men who followed the
lead Of the Chicago convention are
~
term, as so many of them are in
wider and nObler way. No National
Democrat, as far as we are aware.
questions the title of the supporters of
Mr. Bryan to call themselves Demo-
Gratis in the sense that they belong to
regular party organization, no mat
ter how improperly the control of that
organization was transferred, as it was
at Chicago, to a single faction, by the
decision of the Michigan contest,
against all the rules of propriety and
justice.
But the word Democracy has a
wider content and a deeper significance.
which it is folly for any man, and espe-
cially for one as prominent as Mr..
Bryan, to deny or ignore 1t has been
used for the best part of a century to
designate certain ideas of government
which are Independent of and greater
than any political organization, al
though they have been, during practi-
calIy that entire time, the faith and
the hope of the political party which
a 70 Il
principles we need not recapitulate
here, because they are familiar TO all
and were summed up with admirable
force and clearness in the IndianapoIis
platform. The essence of Democracy
50 considered is freedom of the indi-
NiduaL destruction Of favoritism, abso-
lute equality before the law, the pre-
eminence of individualism and the
strict limitation of the powers and du-
ties OF the state to the narrowest circle
within which government can be con-
Quoted efficiently. 1t is the antithesis
and contradiction Of socialism and pa
ternalism in ali their varied and evil
forms. Now it is obvious that DE
mocracy' in this sense is a BODY of
doctrine which is wholly independent of
the action of any convention, and which
cannot be changed by any body of pol
iticians. In this it is analogous to other
creeds that have commended them
selves to human belief. Those creeds
may be changed or they may be aban-
doned altogether. But so long as a
man processes himself their follower he
commits himself to the propositions
which they lay down, and cannot alter
or amend them at his pleasure So a
man who processes himself to be an
"agnostic" denies his own right to the
description if he AYERS his personal
belief in certain physical conditions of
future life or asserts the infalIibil-
ity Of the pope.
a man has no right to continue to
call himself free trader" if he advo-
Gates duties on imports for the sake of
building up American industries. The
word "Prohibitionist' has very posi-
tive significance because it is limited to
advocacy Of single proposition. If
the Prohibition party were to hold q
convention tomorrow and declare for
the manufacture and sale of alcoholic