Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1898-03-16

cause it would be inconveuient and
would result in confusion. To avoid
such confusion, voters get together
and in platform enumerate and de
clare in favor of the governmental
principles and theories in which they
have a cannon faith; and men who
at given election, thus act and vote
constitute a party. Nothing can be
palmer than that party has no per.
sonal identity; no body; no soul OF
conscience separate from the voters
who for the time being see fit to agree
to the joint plan of exercising individ-
ual suffrage. Any of these electors
that the joint purpose of the platform
IS not carried out, or that its provisions
are obsolete, has both the right and
the duty to withdraw from the party.
1t was a sincere conviction that the
heretofore platforms, declared pur.
poses and principles of the Republican n
party were deserted by the St. Louis
National Republican convention of
1896 that caused thousands of Repub
licans in Kansas to support Bryan
and bimeta llism.
The assertion that any members of
a party are to give up their beliefs
and their rights of withdrawal at the
dictation of a majority welded to
party name, and submissive to the
unscrupulous manipulation of special
interests, and not to principles there
tofore collectively agreed to, is un-
democratic and un-American.
If they are men of common sense
they will not insist on points of minor
difference, and thus weaken the broad
and important principles in which
their belief is common; but on the
other hand, if they be any better than
generation of flunkeys they will
withdraw from a p1rty whenever it
ceases to represent their honest con-
victious upon vital and important is
sues; and when they so Withdraw they
exercise the highest attributes of pa
triotism and intelligence. BY such
action more can be done fer good gov
ernment than has been accomplished
in the last 30 years of partizan bigotry.
We dissent from the present course
of the Republican party because by
tradition and interest we have learned
that it is unrepublican, we having
been taught Republicanism TO be the
advocacy, among other things, of
monetary system that would open the
mints of the country to the unrestrict-
ed coinage of both gold and silver into
primary money at an agreed ratio,
and the free use of each metal when
so coined for any monetary purpose
for which the other might be used,
leaving with the debtor the option of
making payment in either coin or its
representative. That was the doctrine
of the party until June, 1896; in proof
of which we cite few of its platforms,
the declarations of it's statesmen and
its press:
Platform of Kansas Republican
Convention held at Topeka, Septem-
ber 3 and 4, 1890: The practical oper-
alton of the silver act now in force,
recently passed by Republican ma
jority, and opposed by a Democratic
minority, in both houses of Congress,
is rapidly increasing the value of sill
yer, is good step in the right direc-
ton; but we, the Republicans OF Kan
sas. demand free coinage of silver,
measure strongly opposed and vigor-
ously denounced by the late Democra-
tic administration, led by ex-President
Grover Cleveland"
The Kansas state senate, January
%, 1891, passed the following resolu
ton:
Whereas, The recent action of the
senate of the United States, in promp-
ly passing free coinage of silver bill,
is move in the direction of the res
toration of prices and prosperity to the
agricultural industry: therefore, be it
''RESoLvED, That the senate of the
state of Kansas urge upon the nation
al house of representa- tives prompt
concurrence in the passage of the sill
yer bill; that this body, representing
the Republicans of Kansas, respect
fully but earnestly request our delega-
tiou in Congress to insist, in the inter-
ests of the country and the welfare of
the Repub ican party in the West, up
on the passage of the bill, and its ap-
proval by the Republican executive,
as being in line with Republican
pledges
The Topeka Capital, on January 4,
1891, said:
1.-The Capital wishes to send a short
message to Csngress. 1t will be brief,
but important to the West. It is this:
Stop your windy speeches about cleo
tion bills; pass the Plumb measure for
the free coinage of silver, and give the
country one or two hundred millions
of paper currency. 1t is not as long as
the Presidents message, but it will do
the country and the Republican party
more good, if acted upon, than dozen
messages like tine last one. The West
and South are growing very tired of
eng the money influences of the
East stop the promised financial legis-
lation."
Men for years have clung to the
party declarations of principles above
cited, vainly hoping that the party
making them would in due time enact
them into statutes and administrative
policy. In 1896, thousands became
convinced that all these declarations
were merely masks to hold in line for