The Bamberg herald. [volume] (Bamberg, S.C.) 1891-1972, 1903-11-19

| its agents. These are but trustees and
stewards-accountable to the peoples in
telligent will Other, they are defaulters.
Believing that under God man shall not
fail, believe utterly in demo eracy, ass the
final experiment of time, up to which all
others have led. If this idea is bankrupted
all goes down. Only as it reasons deeply
as to the source Of its rights and the
scope of its duties shall it avert failure
and cataclysm. God, or the deluge!
[ believe in democracy because l hold
that man is not mechanism but a me-
chanic-that every individual soul of the
race is sacred, that the probation of man
kind lies in the full consent to human
| equality before God, and to all the equities
which that involves. Here stands the last
bulwark against tyranny. This must be
the method, if there be any, before which
a false subordination and false insub-
ordination are both to be banished. The
salvation of the peoples is in divine hu-
man society which at last shall realize the
whole purpose of Jesus Christ. 1t has
not vet been seen; but ITO this bear all
| the prophets witness "a society feeling
all it's common responsibilities, and leach
because it is Ideal" is the fnality. In
it democracy and Christianity would
meet, and righteousness wed peace!
| To conquer this ideal into actuality is
the task and travail of time-to doubt
that it can be is to surrender the cause of
mankind
There is now in some quarters a siekly
! and sentimental dissent from the, goal of
democracy, and a cowardly whispered
preference against the substantive CLAIM
| of man as man. This reluctaney from the
the coed of lie manv is ordinarily tracea-
| bic to a selfish and absentee spirit. 1t
| assumes to distrust what love of ease dis
, likes, and what comfortable and compla
| cent apathy would postpone. Its invest
ments are all in the present, as it is, and
| it will take no stock in the future as it
should be. It interprets the major con-
| siderations of life by the minor. "The Of
| Tense of the cross is not ceased" But it
| IS crucifxion that leads to resurrection.
| Away with this droning and whining pes.
| simism!
And, on the other hand, there are those
! who applaud democracy without reckoning
! its principles and it's foundations. Be-
| tween it and absolutism there is, in times
| long run. no logical half way. Can man
| learn that democracy brings no one down,
| but every one up? Can man learn its
reciprocities and its emancipations? Will
| man see the basilar doctrine OF the in
herent value and birthright of each several
I cOUt-fdluS W 1ISSll, W oil OluSlS duU w
| the one God Of all?
| If not. then all falls apart and society
| not made up of bulk of subservents and
| few preferred creditors is a faulty and
| a dream. and the Nazarene was a dreamer.
| But that way lies the madness of anarchy.
ANY government is, at a given time,
! strong, as the ratio is of it's people Tor
| parts} who believe in it and are ready to
back that belief. Ultimately it is as
strong as it has principles worthy. to be
believed in, The bottom idea of dem
ocracy is the utmost diffusion of two
things: .(a) authority, (b) responsibility.
| or can stand fast, alone. These balanced
centrifugal and centripetai forces main
! tain the orbit. All the phases and hopes
| OF genuine and rational democracy are
reducible to the balance of this double
idea. The duality is critical
By this as a definition / will stand.
that true democracy is government in
which every whole man, ana because a
man, counts one. Persons are the. units,
and government of, by and for these is
the sum Of all its parts. Its spirit is as
| it, and as good as the number of good
| spirits that share it. Its division exactly
| equals the dividend, and the quotient is
| one.
Division Of labor" which is made to
mean you labor and I divide" is not
democracy. Since. in this long division
of authority and responsibility" every
man should be fitted to count one. Dem
| ocracy menaces itself, denies its raison
d'etre, when it for a moment Reglects to
seek this fitness of its merits. Represen-
| is valid only in this. The ballot af6rms
| the Importance of each integer. Its quail
| ified intelligence and its unmolested free
dom is its safety, that always it shall be
counted as one, and never more or less.
| Less or more is the suppression somewhere
! of manhood; less, it were tyrannized;
| more, it were tyrannical. To corrupt, to
seduce. to intimidate or to suppress it is
| to violate democracy. Democracy alone
| majority. For all and by all this recog
milton of man declares that because every
man should count one he shall! No other
| method of government declares this, or
! attempts to realize it, Resting its case
upon "the right assessment OF what con-
| stitutes human value" it implies that
| rights and duties are strictly correlative
| and reciprocal. 1t studies its rules in the
daylight of its principles. Our Supreme
Court is governed by this overriding equi-
fy. Democracy is its test and its dictum.
IL lS SuC AoCAOud1 tC1uSS VI tAS
people. 1t gives the higher law.
The distributlve assignment Of govern
ment is the radical end of democracy, not
descending to man, but ascending with
| him. 1t is not paternal, but fraternal.
Human ethics rising from loyalty to
one mere tribe or clan - IsbEnaelitish!-
| rises toward the comprehension of man
right. The history Of this growth of hu-
man institutions, making and remaking
themselves, discovers that they move with
| the instinct of a generic human life. The
impulse strengthens as if by hdrostatic
pressure. That great democrat, Lincoln;
that splendid representative of the fine
old aristocratlc family of man, said well,
in 1856. what has the broadest possible
applications. 'They who deny freedom
to others deserve it not for themselves,
and under the rule of just God cannot
long retain it." The paramount doctrine
| of equal rights is that each soul has a d.
vine right, kingly and knightly right,
to all the liberty be can use. and has the
right to stand un. in his Makers image,
to show what he< can use. Its formative
proposition is that a just society lies in
the good of all its elements, and that this
good lies in the removing, by pick or
| powder, of all avoidable hindrances to
| the affirmation of social personality, lies