New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1915-04-28
The Constitutional Convention.

Republican political history In this
state is plainly to be divided into three
parts in the present year.
At Albany q weak and ambitious Gov
ernor and stupid and reactonary Legis-
lature have already completed record
which all over the country will be &C
copied as indicative Of what Republican
leadership in New York State means in
1915. Look at Chicago; we can get
away with anything" arc the words at
tributed to Senator Brown, the actual
master Of the last Legislature. Rightly
or wrongly attributed, they completely ex-
press the spirit displayed by the two
branches of the Legislature.
In Syracuse there is unfolding day by
day a photographically complete picture
Of Republican leadership in the state as
it has been. Not since the Insurance In
vestigation has so great an audience daily
fixed its attention on the details and per-
sonalities of Republican party leadership
as in the recent weeks. If the Albany
session has demonstrated what contem-
porary Republican spirit is, the Syracuse
trial is not less satisfactory as COM
plete record of q past. not yet remote.
From these two incidents It is natural
that the people Of the state will turn to
tie Constitutional Convention to obtain a
final statement Of the Republican case in
New York, prospectus Of the future, as
il has now had conspectus Of the past
and present. In this convention the Re-
publican control is overwhelming, quite
as overwhelming as in the recent legisla-
tive session, quite as complete as in the
years Of the Platt supremacy In state
politics. What, then, is to be the spirit in
which the Constitutional Convention ap-
proaches its great work?
Will it be the Barnes spirit, revealed In
the testimony which alleges that the AL
bany politician affirmed again and again
that the people could not be trusted?
Will it be in the spirit of the Albany ses-
sion, that 1--WE can get away with any
thing this year.? Will it be in the spirit
that induced the passage Of the cannery
bills, the attack upon the Health Depart
ment, upon the Tenement House Commits
sion of New York? Will it be a spirit in
stinct with reaction? Or will there be
some recognition of the fact that 1915 is
not 1895, that 1916 cannot be 1896?
To the Constitutional Convention, a
body utterly Republican, the people of the
state are turning for the evidence of
some forward looking views in the Repub-
Ilican leadership of the state. To the
convention the people of this great city,
with far more than half the population
Ct the commonwealth, are turning to see
whether it will serve political purposes
or free this city from rural domination
by giving it fair representation, from
rural control Of its finances by providing
for an equalization of taxation through
the length and breadth of the state.
There never was time when people
were studying Republican performance
more closely than now all over the nation
A few empty takers and sleazy thinkers
insist that the collapse Of the Progressive
party and the return of many Of its men,
bers to the Republican party are guar
antee Of the disappearance Of all that the
Progressive revolt of 1912 meant in
theory and principle. Similar politicians
pronounced an equally vain opinion when
the Free Soil Democrats who marched out
with Van Buren, in 184S came back with
J Pierce in 1852. But acting upon this
opinion they so wrought that after one
more election the Democratic party went
out of power for quarter Of a century.
If the Republican party in New York,
in the nation, desires to quarrel with a
rising generation; II It is prepared to
tell young men, with ideals and aspira-
tons and enthusiasms, that the great
thing is organization, county organiza-
ton; if it desires to assert that what
Plat practised it now means to reafiirm;
if il follows the Albany Legislature IN the
assertion that patronage is all and the
Syracuse testimony IN the conviction that
the people cannot be trusted is it difficult
to believe that what happened in American
politics two generations ago will presently
be repeated2
Improve the Police Stations.
/ II ought to be an affront to the pride