The Montgomery advertiser., 1906-03-11

Copyright 1906, ty J. l.. steffens. Washington, D. c. March e.---A polit- ieal realignment is going on here. Theer is a great slanting crack across the face of both the old parties. IL isn't a new crack; on the contrary, IL is very old, but it is spreading Just now and so rapidly that the outlines of four political divisions are discern able Republican and Democra.,c, Conservative. and Get us say) Lio- eral. The Democratic leaders seem not to see the cleavage very Wiling 1y, put the President does and so does Senator Aldrich
 Neither of these tMo men could trace the line in language for me. MT. Aldrich had names for the two sides. 1t was he that first used the word "Conservativer for those who stood with him in both the old parties, and he waved away all others as Rad icais" He said that the division was not one of principle, but he couldn't or wouldn't describe what it was. And neither could be President. Yet these two men are the leaders, at prese of what may turn out to be two new American parties
 and we need two new political par ties. One Isn't enough. When Gov ernor Folk. of Missouri, was Circuit Attorney of St. Louis, he aclled on the President and they spent an even ing together. After it MT. Folk said:
 "Isn't it too bad that two men who agree as the President and do on all moral questions. should be in different partiesr
 when this remark was repeated to the President, he answered, quick as a flash: No, it isn't bad. It's good that there should be men in both parties who agree on all moral ques- .tions."
 The President was wiser than Mir. Folk. but not so practical. Both par ties should stand for right things, but they don't. In representative democracy both parties should rep resent the public good. But our par ties don't. They might, and they should differ as to the policy to pursue to serve best the common interest. But our parties don't differ at all. They both stand today for special interests and graft, and we are coming to req li1e--we, the voters,--that we haven't any parties at all, nothing but orga- nizations that have us.
 What is the difference between the Republican organization that exploit < ed Philadelphia and the Democratic or- ganization that sold out St Louis? Or between Tainmany Hall in New York and the so-caIled Republican party or Cincinnati? There wasn't any differ ence. They were alike In the character of their leadership, the purpose of their organization and the methods of their stealings. I have never been South, but in the North and West and East, the only correct classification Is be- tween the outs and the tns. All re- tormed majority parties-no matter what their names-whether Bepuhli- ran or Demoeratic, look alike, act alike and talk alike.
 And, curiously enough, the minority parties all resemble one another. The : minority Republican party of St. Louis was replica of the Democratic minor ity organization of Philadelphia; 1t wasn't quite so miserable because the St. Louis Republicans got some Federal graft fro mtheir national party. The Philadelphia. Democrats lived only on the crumbs dropped from the table of the majority party. And that's the way our minority parties live, on the majority party. They are Kept" by the boss grafters, to keep us divided and catch us if we run away.
 That there is this tacit agreement be- tween the two parties we all know well. but we can see it best in a State like New York, where one party con- troIs the city. the other .he State. All ''business" that is done at Albany Is handled by a combination of Tam many Democrats and upstate Repub- Iicans, the majority groups. I know of but one Stg wheer the people, sick of \ "theirYs majority party, have had a mirority party fit to go to. That State is Ohio. In Missouri. wisconsin and now in New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Illinois, reformers have had to seize, clean up and set about the reor- l Ranization of the rotten old majority lparty, whichever 1t was.
 After visiting a few such States and Icities one becomes party blind. When q came down here I couldn't tell the difference between a Democrat and a ,Rpublican, and 1t hurt my pride to lhave statesmen tell me about their lparties. The candid thieves who run Jour States and cities had ceased long ago to try to work off that sort of buncombe on me, and I thought that all talk of parties was for the pee pull" not for me and the railroads and the boodlers, who change parties as we change cars to follow the majority from State to State. But still they would talk parties, and the Speaker, MT Cannon. was especially annoying. He sat me down in a big chair, gave me a cigar, stuck another in his own mouth, and then he stood up over me