Year: 1875

Hcans. lnelr press ana speakers nave


brought the school question into the fore


ground, and are waging war against the


Catholic Church rather than against the


democratic party. This is unfortunate not


only because the introduction of religious


questions into politics is contrary to the


genius of our institutions, but because IN


the pending Ohio canvass it so confuses the


issues that nobody can interpret the result


after the election is over If the repuohcans


carry the State on the school question the


country at large will be left in the dark as 10


the public sentiment of Ohio on the great


question of the currency, which is of vital in


terest to the nation. When the democrats


startled the country by presenting the intia-


ton issue it was desirable that they should


be met and beaten on that naked question:,


in order that there might be no doubt as to


the meaning of the victory. The intiationists


cannot be crushed by defeating the demo-
cratic party on the school question: But II
they were soundly whipped on the initiation
issue pure and simple they would have to
acknowledge their defeat and would give no
further trouble. The fact that the Ohio
republicans are subordinating this great issue
to religious question foisted into the can
vass MS a make-weight will be interpreted as
a confession that they have no confidence in
their ability to carry the State in pitched
battle with the infationists.


Spectators of the contest in other States
feel anxious at this shifting of the main issue,
especially as they cannot see that the school
question is of any immediate urgency in
Ohio. The republicans are fighting Chin
era. The common school system of the State
is in no danger. large majority of the
Ohio democrats are Protestants, as firmly
attached to the common schools as the repub-
lican Protestants. Quite proportion OF the
Catholic laity send their children to the
common schools, and will continue to do so
in spite of the priesthood. The Geghan law,
about which such an outcry is raised, was no
doubt passed by the democratic Legislature
to please the Catholics. but it is harmless
enactment, having no relation to the
common school system. 1t merely pro-
vides that persons confined in the prisons
and penitentiaries of the State shall not
be compelled to receive religious instruction
from ministers who are not of their own faith
The religious issue which the republicans
have dragged into the canvass is q false and
Fictitious appeal to religious bigotry and
prejudice. If they should turn the scale by
such an issue the infationists might still
claim that majority of the people were with
them on the imitation question and that their
q = hat lin
because they were conscious that they would
have been beaten.


The change of base by the Ohio republi-
cans is bad omen. 1t is an indication that
their own party is so infected with the infia-
ton heresy that they dare not risk a canvass
on that issue 1t is true, in point of fact
that the republican party of Ohio is divided
on this question and that considerable pro-
portion of its voters are infationists. In the
last Congress nine of the twelve republican
members of the House from Ohio voted for
imitation and they, no doubt, supposed at the
time that they were in accord with their con-
stituents. Those republican constituencies
in Ohio may have waived their views,
but not changed them, and this
is probably the reason why the
party dare not make a square fight on the
imitation issue Their change of base to the
school question in the midst Of the canvass
is likely to be interpreted as a confession
that on the imitation issue the democrats
would carry the State. We had hoped that
the Professionalism party might be defeated
without the aid of extraneous issues and the
infationists receive their coup de grace. The
whole country has reason to regret that the
republicans of Ohio do not think it safe to
meet the democrats on their chosen ground,
since defeat on that ground would take the
imitation issue out of politics and bury a set
of mischievous demagogues.


The initiation demagogues in Ohio will try
to make political capital out of the failure of
the Bank of California, for they have pro-
possible that voters who are too stupid to see
through their other fallacies may also be
deluded by this. The argument of the glib
tongued Carey and his confederate dema-
gogues will be that a specie currency is no
protection against financial disasters, since
ShlllOIulti, WHlCH Hho anyways DoeH HtAu
money State, has suffered worse disaster
than has overtaken any other community
in the United States. Whether such nom
sense will be swallowed remains to be seen.
The obvious truth is, that no abundance of
greenbacks in California could have pre-
vented or mitigated this disaster. If green
backs had been the currency of the State, the
Bank of California, with scheming, am
bilious speculator like Mr.. Ralston at it's
head, would have run the same course and
have reached the same end. No kind of cur
rency can prevent people from running in
debt, and when they come to owe twice as
much as they can pay they are equally at the
mercy of their creditors whether the cir
culatinp Medium is sound ar not Tho caraer