The Leavenworth echo. [volume] (Leavenworth, Wash.) 1904-current, 1910-04-22
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Q
created equal and have inaienable
right to life, liberty and the pursuit Of
happiness; and in the name of democ-
racy, and under the banner of the
Democratic party, men are found in
few years fighting the battle for the
divine right Of slavery. The Republi-
can party, too, has often departed from
the principles Of its founders.
And so we often hear it said, The
good citizen must support men and not
parties" " No principle could be more
fallacious than this. and it would seem
amazing folly to anyone but an Ameri-
can. That has been too often the
trouble. We have too often supported
men without knowing for what they
stood. It is not enough that we stand
for a good man." Many good
man" fought on the side Of King
Charles and the cavaliers against the
parliamentarians and patriots. We are
not to suppose that all the Tories at
the time Of the revolution were rascals.
Men fought for slavery in the south
with conscientious but mistaken mo-
tives. 1t is not enough to say that
they thought they were right. The
fact remains that they were wrong. 1t
is all in mans viewpoint. A man
may be brought up in the atmosphere
OF conservative prejudice and special
privilege, looking out upon a world of
divinely ordered favoritism, where God
in His wise Providence" has given the
natural resources of the country to
Christian gentlemen" so that it
shapes all his moral judgment. We
might as well say that a church in call
ing a minister should pay no attention
to what the clergyman's belief was-as
to whether he was Protestant or Cath
olic, Christian Scientist or Unitarian, or
anything else, in fact, other than to the
question, Is he good MANI" From
the standpoint Of the Progressive the
question is, What are his principles7"
Which means, What is his viewpoint
in life?" Which is Of greater import
ance with him, the man or the dollar,
human happiness or big business, So
ciety or the privileges Of the individ-
ual?
Our trouble arises from two sources,
and the first is the spoils system. With
US, public Office is usually looked upon
as a reward for faithful work on behalf
Of the organization. Almost every
little Office is in politics. and the
prime importance of party organiza-
ton is to get Offices. So the machine
motto is, Office on this platform if we
can, but on whatever platform, let us
get Office" That there is healthy
sentiment in the country against this
condition must be evident to all. The
increasing demand for the commission
form Of government in the cities is but
a single evidence Of this. There is
strong and growing feeling, also, in
favor of the long tenure of Office. The
public is not so much concerned in
passing the Offices around so that all
the boys" may have chance at the
pie counter as they are in getting com
petent officials and keeping them in
office. The long tenure of Office with
the right Of recall would seem to ap-
peal to everybody except the machine
politician.
The other source Of our present sys-
TEN of machine government is our
election laws, which give legal status
to political parties at election. Many
people enormously suppose that We
have the privilege Of the Australian
ballot. The Australian ballot does not
permit the name OF any party on the
ticket. In our system we patent the
name so that the organization may use
it for any set Of principles-Democrat
may be used for the most undemo-
cratic things. A Brtisher, on his ar
rival in the United States, is at loss
to know which party corresponds to the
two great parties in British politics. He
has equal difficulty in getting a salts
factory answer to the question, What
is Republican," or What is a Dem
ocrat1" An American, being ad-
mitted to citizenship in almost any