The Ocala banner. (Ocala, Marion County, Fla.) 1883-194?, 1913-01-24

mG0L III EDSIduu, IuptuSu do IL ID W
other branches, aristocratical and he
reditary shows yet the power OF the
representative principle toward i'm
proving the condition of man.
Again he quotes from the same
fountain source:
That I should lay down my charge
at a proper period is as much a duty
as to have borne it faithfully, If some
termination of the services of the
chief magistrate be not fixed by the
constitution or supplied by practice,
his office, nominally, for years, will. in
fact, become for life, and history
shows how easily that degenerates
into an inheritance. Believing that a
representative government, response
Bile at short periods Of election, is
that which produces the greatest sum
of happiness to mankind, | feel 1t
duty to do no act which shall essen
TALLY impair that principle; and |
should unwillingly be the person who,
disregarding the sound precedent set
by an illustriOus predecessor, should
furnish the first example, of prolong-
alton beyond the second term OF Of
flee
With this imposing array of sages,
philosophers, historians, statesmen
and iurists." says Senator Bailey, All
asserting with one unbroken voice
that a representative democracy is
the best government for mankind, and
asserting with equal uannimity that
a direct democracy is fraught with
unspeakable disasters, I do not fear
the verdict of the American people
when this question is submitted to
them after a fair and full debate. My
faith is unwavering that the counsel
OF Washington and Jefferson, of Ham
ilton and Madison, of Marshall and
Monroe, will prevail. Indeed, sir,
when the passions aroused by these
appeals to ignorance and prejudice
have subsidized. and the sober second
thought has returned to the American
people. they will marvel that any con-
siderable number of them could have
ever consented to abandon those gov
ornamental principles which, until re-
cent times. they have cherished with
an almost religious fervor"
Again, commenting approvingly of
an extract from the president-elect,
Senator Bailey says:
Not only would the initiative and
referendum result in hasty and incOn-
siderate legislation through a lack of
debate, but it would de-
stroy also the safeguards afforded by
our present system of double legisla-
tive chambers; and in my opinion,
that would be a calamity from which
our country could never recover. The
most enlightened opinion in this
country, and the most enlightened
opinion in every civilized nation in
the world calls for two houses in ev-
cry legislative assembly. Manifestly,
the two legislative chambers are de-
signed to insure a consideration by
one house and a reconsideration by
the other for every law by which the
people are to be bound and it would
be The excess of folly to strike down
this arrangement which the wisest
statesmen in every country pronOunc-
ed one of the most Statutory restraints
ever invented.
Again, he calls attention to a fact
this paper has frequently pointed out,
to-wit: That the initiative and refer
endum would cause a dissolution of
political parties.
Upon this head Senator Bailey com
ments as follows:
Another serious objection to a sys-
TEN of direct legislation is that it will
eliminate in a dissolution of political
parties and the division of our people
into groups or factions. l am aware,
of course, that some who look only
at the surface of things would hail
that as a contamination devOutly to be
wished, because they are constantly
lamenting the violence of party spir
it, But, sir, we can never correct that
evil by substituting factions for par
ties, because the factiOnal spirit is al
ways incomparably more violent than
party spirit | do not need to appeal
" u4SIOly III pIOOI Ol ludC d6SeIlIOl.
l do not need to interrogate the phil
Osophers about it, for some very re-
cent political events must have made
the truth of it patent to every unbias
ed mind. Sixteen years ago, when the
democratic party divided into warning
factions, each hated the other worse
than the republican party, and men
who had spent their lives in declaim-
ing against republican policies openly
and actively solicited their neighbors
to vote the republican ticket Last
year the republican party was torn
asunder, and, as we all know, each
faction hated the other worse than its
ancient enemy, the democratic party.
We saw men VINO had passed their
manhood in defending the republican
party men who had fought shoulder
TO shoulder through many campaigns,
denouncing each other with a bitter
ness more intense than that which
had riven our party in 1896.
Refusing to wear any semblance Of