Crawford avalanche. (Grayling, Mich.) 1879-19??, 1900-03-15

the People with the Bugaboo OF
Threatened Financial Ruin Coma
dence In Republicans Party. 4@
So farfas debate isnconcerned In the
political campaign 'of this year the
money question does not promise to be
CONSPICUOUS. Mr.. Bryan will not say
that the silver issue is to be dropped;
none of the silver leaders Will say that.
The platform as repaired at Kansas
City will include the financial plank Of
1896 without material change. The
platform will declare for free silver,
the presidential candidate will stand
for free silver but 1.-THE paramount is
sue" of four years ago will be little In
mems thoughts or speech In the cam
paign of 1900. The fact that gold
standard statute has been passed by
Congress in the meanwhile will not
provoke appeal to the people to arouse
themselves to the work of saving their
homes and firesides from overwhelm
ing financialruin. The campaign zeal
OTIS Of the Democratic party will let 1t
all pass. Here and there an individ-
ual, unable to turn himself In four
years, WILCOX to free silver and 16 to
/, but he will be apart from the crowd.
The Populsts, out on the prairie some
where, may say to themselves that 1t is
the second battle, and If doubt leaks in
upon them they will cite the platform
and point to Mr.. Bryan. 1t is not pro-
posed that the Populists, of either par
ty label, shall receive more shock than
the emergency requires, But the cam
paign will be on other grounds.
Such political transition in four
years is remarkable thing to cOntem-
plate. But the Democratic directors
will account for it. They will say that
the Republican party has forced upon
the country new questions that are of
more urgent character. Yet If what
they said In 1896 had truth back of it
nothing could be more urgent than the
salvation of our own people from the
bondage of the gold standard. But
some way or other that peril cannot be
vitalized into a campaign issue of
promise. The ,lurid character of the
pictures of four years ago has faded
out. The leaders know 1t, and the fact
will be of quite common knowledge by
the time the votes are in next fall. The
Republican party has no reason to
shrink from the responsibility of hav-
ing wrought this transformation. If
credit shall be assumed, however, cred
it will be denied. 1t will be said that
tension has been taken off OF the mon
ey issue by changed conditions that
have come in spite of the gold standard
and in spite of all the Republican party
has done. But these changed condi-
tons have come. This is the import
ant fact. The fundamental proposition
upon which the Democratic party
placed itself four years ago was that
a change for the better was impossible
without opening the minis to the free
and unlimited coinage of silver. The
important fact is that the Democratic
party was wrong. 1t may be that the
discovery of new deposits of gold, con-
ditions of war, and all that, afford such
explanation as is needed. 1t must be
admitted, however, that the Republi-
can party was not wrong when it said
that the evils complained of would dis
appear with a revival of the industries
of the people, and that such revival
was not dependent upon the debase-
ment of the money of the country. But
never mind that. The Democratic party
was wrong. The acknowledgment of
that wrong is to be made this year by
the substitution Of silence for frenzy.
But the Democratic party will not be
silent. 1t will not be as noisy as it was
in 1896, but it will be as noisy as it can
be. The country was going to the bad
in 1896 in one direction, and 1t will be
as positively asserted this year that it
is going to the bad in another direction.
The trouble this year will not be a new
trouble 1t will simply be a revival of
very old trouble. At the very begin
ming of the life of the Republican par
ty it was charged that the success of
\ the Republican party would mean the
destruction of the Constitution. Now
ave are to have that old, old song again.
OF course the Democratic party is not
now standing for slavery; it is not
standing for the extension Of slavery
undertake. Constitution to the Terri
tories. Nevertheless it can see clearly
/. that if the Republican party is longer
trusted all the guarantees Of the Con-
J. stitution are to be broken down. The
Democratic party now trembles for lib
erty. Singularly enough, however. the
Democratic party will go back to the
days of John G. Calhoun for its ,argu-
ments.
The civil war demonstrated that the
Constitution could not be set up as a
bar to enlightened progress nor used
as a shackle to the moral expansion of
| The people The Democratic party will
now find that the Constitution cannot
be used to, tie the hands of this great
nation. In the discharge Of its response
bilities under the treaty with Spain.
nor to dwarf its powers In the contest
for supremacy among the enlightened
nations of the earth, The Constitution
Is no more than an expression of the
will and purpose of the people of this
country; it exists for the people and
. not the people for 1t. The assumption
that the Constitution has power supe-
rior to the power of the people is a
y false assumption. Prior to the civil
war the Democratic party was unwill.
ing to trust the people; the Democratic
party is repeating its record in that re-
gard now.