Year: 1872

Warfare is the very life OF a poEucaI


party. It must have issues to tight 1or'


and an enemy to combat, or it ceases to


exist: and this, whether its cessation OF
/ hostlities springs from the triumphant es-
tablishment of its principles, or from so
! complete defeat and so thorough a dis
organization as renders further strife use


less and impossible. There is much in
name, and men will sometimes cling to it
after the thing it symbolized IS no more;
/ but not long. Our country, though so
young, has already witnessed the dissolu-


ton of more than one great party The
old Federalist and the old Republican par
| ties died almost simultaneously. After


this came an inteTegnum. Then sprang


up the old Democratic party, under Jack


son, which was soon confronted by the


Wing party. Opposed to each other on


every point of national policy but


one, these two great organizations
nEaied each other in upholding
the cause Of slavery, and in courting the
influence Of the South. The issues upon


which they differed, after a time, becom-


ing obsolete, or losing their Importance as
compared with the absorbing question Of
slavery the parties themselves lost their
vitality, The Wing party died outright
but the Democratic party, owing partly to
its name, but mainly to its more assured
position on the great question Of the day,
lived as the representative of slavery and
disunion. These questions having been
definitely settled by the triumphant sue
cess Of that champion of freedom patriot
ism and progress, the great Republican
party, there remains but one thing for its
defeated opponent to do-namely to aban-
don the name Democratic, so long an
empty word, cease its organization SO
fruitless of results, and release its mem
bers from their allegiance-in Short accept
the situation and submit to the inevitable


This, Judging from present appearances,
it is about to do, if the Cincinnati conven-
ton, whose approaching session is "big
with the fate" of parties, if not with that
Of nations, acts wisely in its adoption of
principles and its choice of men. A mis-
take in either would be fatal, for the reor-
ganization of an established party, de-
sign which the prefix liberal plainly in
dicates, like the initiation Of a new one,
can claim the support of the people only |
as it is the expression Of new OR untried |
principles which the people recognize as
just and necessary, and by, at the same
time, Offering for their suffrages men who |
fairly represent such principles. A great |
people can not be raised to such pitch of
enthusiasm as to come out in numbers,
and oust an administration, merely for the
purpose of ousting an administration.
They must have some assurance that the
change is to be an improvement |


The death of the Democratic party,
then, significant as it is of the complete
triumph Of its adversary, and Of the estab-
ishment of the principles formerly at issue
between them, is, at the same time no
less significant of that other fact spring
ing necessarily from these, namely: the
regeneration, or, failing that, the dissolu-
ton Of the Republican party. For, we
repeat, political party must fight or die,
and how can it fight without cause Of
quarrel or an opponent? The new Liberal
Republican movement, therefore, must
adopt some rallying cry which shall call
the people to its standard, or else succumb
to the Grant wing of the party which can
only linger on a short while, a monument
of departed worth, to see itself supplanted
by some organization representing the
wants of the day. No party, no matter
what the services it may have rendered to
the country can expect to be supported
from motives of gratitude, after it has
outlived its usefulness.


Let US hope, then, that the great polit-
icaI budy which meets to-day at Cincin-
natl may adopt such course as shall
start the true Republican party, invigor-
ated with fresh blood, upon a second
career Of triumph, as glorious as that
which is about to close.