, 1922-05-23
P~rooincialsm Versus Nationalism

DROVNCIALISM as a substitute for nationalism
L was declared to be the chief present peril in Amer
lean politics and public affairs by Senator Wads-
worth of New York.
The National Republican and other sound party
organs declare the senator to be right
Members of congress. with party authority and
party responsibility weakened by the abolition of the
convention system under which an expression of party
win was possible, are more and caore appealing to
public opinion as it exists within their own immediate
constituencies, regardless of the effect of the policies
thus espoused upon the party or the public good.
Hence the rapid decline of responsible government at
Washington, with chaos in politics and public affairs
resulting.
For many years so-caIled Independents, reformers
and ~uplfters have been doing all in their power to
break down political parties based upon national con-
siderations, though these are the only practical instru-
mentalities of responsible government in a republic
like ours. To this end the anti-party agitators have
tried to take public offices from without the control
of political parties, and create instead a huge office
holding class, with a political program all its own and
constituting a new bloc in politics based upon self
interest.
The substitute for the political party is the sec
tional, occupational or class bloc. animated only by
the ambition to put it over on the rest of the country.
AS a substitute for government by the people through
political parties, We have government of the people by
No program better calculated to weaken and finally
destroy responsible government could be devised. It
has been carried to the point where the people have
begun to recognize its dangers through the abuses
attendant upon the order that is being substituted,
and there is a strong reaction in favor of the restor-
alton of the political party as a paramount influence
in the public affairs of the nation.
The National Republican does not advocate the
repeal of the primary laws. These are expensive and
under the present method of operation unsatisfactory,
but they can be utilized without substituting personal
for national party government if accompanied by leg
islation making party action possible preliminary to
these primaries.
Political parties, through the election of delegates.
under rules safeguarding the right of every voter of
their faith to participate in them, should be privileged
by the representative or convention method to name
their official tickets to be placed upon the primary
ballot and either accepted or rejected in favor of
other candidates by the voters.
Such a system would make it impossible to perpe-
trate in conventions the abuses which were RESPONSE
BILE for the abandonment of the convention method
and the substitution of a system whereby a political
party may actually be controlled against itself. and
under which candidates may be named who openly
repudiate the policies for which the party, nationally,
stands.
This government is fundamentally a representative
republic and not a direct democracy. If it had
adopted the pure" democracy scheme, it would have
gone to ruin long ago. The direct nominating sys-
tenn, with the representative method of government
in political parties abandoned, is wrecking the politi-
cal parties. President Harrison once said that the
difference between our republic and the Latin Amer
lean nations was that here we followed a principle
and there they followed a cockade. But under the
present system we are becoming cockade chasers. and
our government is becoming one of individuals, groups
and factions, rather than of by and for the whole
people.
The system of direct nominations, without the in
Prevention of any form of party expression is result
ing in the destruction of political parties. the rapid
increase of demagogism in public life, the growing
power OF venai or demagog1c papers, and a lowering
of the level of our public life which is startling when
comparisons are made with the conditions of a quar-
ter of a century ago.
The time has come when thoughtful and patriotic
citizens should assert themselves in favor of the res
%toration of the representative system in national p-
litical parties. Thus only may we restore responsible
government through great national organizations of
public opinion, in place of exploitation of our public
affairs and of the people by demagogical and un-
scrupulous adventurers whose loyalty does not extend
beyond a devotion to the safety of their own political
skins and an ambition to grab and to hold all the
personal powers possible for their own selfish ends.
Forward to the methods of representative repub-
lcanism through which this nation has attained great
ness, and through which national Republication has
written some of the most glorious pages in the annals
Of this or any other government in history Away
with the narrow, selfish petty partisanship of per-
sons, groups. localities and factions, and up with the
standard Of national welfare around which "the wise
and the good will repair" to the end that there may
be progress and diffused prosperity in all the republic,
and that government Of the people, by the people,
for the people shall not perish from the earth"