Chapter XXXV: Section 1: All men are by nature free and independent, and have certain (2)

“While this poison of decay has been eating into our vitals the possibilities of the country in nearly every other industry have reached a plane of development beyond the dreams of the most enthusiastic theorizers. We have spread out in every direction and the promise of the future beggars imaginations attuned even to the key of our present and past development. We have a timber area of 560,000,000 acres, and across our Canadian border there are 900,000,000 more acres; in coal and iron production we are approaching the Old World.

1842. 1879.
Coal— _Tons._ _Tons._
Great Britain 35,000,000 135,000,000
United States 2,000,000 60,000,000

Iron—
Great Britain 2,250,000 6,300,000
United States 564,000 2,742,000

During these thirty-seven years the relative increase has been in coal 300 to 2,900 per cent., in iron 200 to 400 per cent., and all in our favor. But this is not enough, for England, with a coal area less than either Pennsylvania or Kentucky, has coaling stations in every part of the world and our steamers cannot reach our California ports without the consent of the English producers. Even if electricity takes the place of steam it must be many years before the coal demand will cease, and to-day, of the 36,000,000 tons of coal required by the steamers of the world, three-fourths of it is obtained from Great Britain.

“It is unnecessary to wire-draw statistics, but it may, as a last word, be interesting to show, with all our development, the nationality and increase of tonnage entering our ports since 1856:—

_Country._ _Increase._ _Decrease._
England 6,977,163
Germany 922,903
Norway and Sweden 1,214,008
Italy 596,907
France 208,412
Spain 164,683
Austria 226,277
Belgium 204,872
Russia 104,009
United States 65,901

“This,” writes Lindsay, “is surely not decadence, but defeat in a far nobler conflict than the wars for maritime supremacy between Rome and Carthage, consisting as it did in the struggle between the skill and industry of the people of two great nations.”

We have thus quoted the facts gathered from a source which has been endorsed by the higher naval authorities. Some reader will probably ask, “What relation have these facts to American politics?” We answer that the remedies proposed constitute political questions on which the great parties are very apt to divide. They have thus divided in the past, and parties have turned “about face” on similar questions. Just now the Democratic party inclines to “free ships” and hostility to subsidies—while the Republican party as a rule favors subsidies. Lieutenant Kelley summarized his proposed remedies in the two words: “free ships.”

Mr. Blaine would solve the problem by bounties, for this purpose enacting a general law that should ignore individuals and enforce a policy. His scheme provides that any man or company of men who will build in an American yard, with American material, by American mechanics, a steamship of 3,000 tons and sail her from any port of the United States to any foreign port, he or they shall receive for a monthly line a mail allowance of $25 per mile per annum for the sailing distance between the two ports; for a semi-monthly line $45 per mile, and for a weekly line $75 per mile. Should the steamer exceed three thousand tons, a small advance on these rates might be allowed; if less, a corresponding reduction, keeping three thousand as the average and standard. Other reformers propose a bounty to be given by the Government to the shipbuilder, so as to make the price of an American vessel the same as that of a foreign bought, equal, but presumably cheaper, ship.

Mr. Blaine represents the growing Republican view, but the actual party views can only be ascertained when bills covering the subject come up for consideration.

Current Politics.

We shall close this written history of the political parties of the United States by a brief statement of the present condition of affairs, as generally remarked by our own people, and by quoting the views of an interesting cotemporaneous English writer.

President Arthur’s administration has had many difficulties to contend with. The President himself is the legal successor of a beloved man, cruelly assassinated, whose well-rounded character and high abilities had won the respect even of those who defamed him in the heat of controversy, while they excited the highest admiration of those who shared his political views and thoughts. Stricken down before he had time to formulate a policy, if it was ever his intention to do so, he yet showed a proper appreciation of his high responsibilities, and had from the start won the kindly attention of the country. Gifted with the power of saying just the right thing at the right moment, and saying it with all the grace and beauty of oratory, no President was better calculated to make friends as he moved along, than Garfield. The manifestations of factional feeling which immediately preceded his assassination, but which cannot for a moment be intelligently traced to that cause, made the path of his successor far more difficult than if he had been called to the succession by the operation of natural causes. That he has met these difficulties with rare discretion, all admit, and at this writing partisan interest and dislike are content to “abide a’ wee” before beginning an assault. He has sought no changes in the Cabinet, and thus through personal and political considerations seems for the time to have surrendered a Presidential prerogative freely admitted by all who understand the wisdom of permitting an executive officer to seek the advice of friends of his own selection. Mr. Blaine and Mr. MacVeagh, among the ablest of the late President’s Cabinet, were among the most emphatic in insisting upon the earliest possible exercise of this prerogative—the latter upon its immediate exercise. Yet it has been withheld in several particulars, and the Arthur administration has sought to unite, wherever divided (and now divisions are rare), the party which called it into existence, while at the same time it has by careful management sought to check party strife at least for a time, and devoted its attention to the advancement of the material interests of the country. Appointments are fairly distributed among party friends, not divided as between factions; for such a division systematically made would disrupt any party. It would prove but an incentive to faction for the sake of a division of the spoils. No force of politics is or ought to be better understood in America than manufactured disagreements with the view to profitable compromises. Fitness, recognized ability, and adequate political service seem to constitute the reasons for Executive appointments at this time.

The Democratic party, better equipped in the National Legislature than it has been for years—with men like Hill, Bayard, Pendleton, Brown, Voorhees, Lamar and Garland in the Senate—Stephens, Randall, Hewitt, Cox, Johnson in the House—with Tilden, Thurman, Wallace and Hancock in the background—is led with rare ability, and has the advantage of escaping responsibilities incident to a majority party. It has been observed that this party is pursuing the traditional strategy of minorities in our Republic. It has partially refused a further test on the tariff issue, and is seeking a place in advance of the Republicans on refunding questions—both popular measures, as shown in all recent elections. It claims the virtue of sympathy with the Mormons by questioning the propriety of legal assaults upon the liberty of conscience, while not openly recording itself as a defender of the crime of polygamy. As a solid minority it has at least in the Senate yielded to the appeal of the States on the Pacific slope, and favored the abridgment of Chinese immigration. On this question, however, the Western Republican Senators as a rule were equally active in support of the Miller Bill, so that whatever the result, the issue can no longer be a political one in the Pacific States. The respectable support which the measure has latterly received has cast out of the struggle the Kearneys and Kallochs, and if there be demagoguery on either side, it comes in better dress than ever before.

Doubtless the parties will contest their claims to public support on their respective histories yet a while longer. Party history has served partisan purposes an average of twenty years, when with that history recollections of wars are interwoven, and the last war having been the greatest in our history, the presumption is allowable that it will be freely quoted so long as sectional or other forms of distrust are observable any where. When these recollections fail, new issues will have to be sought or accepted. In the mere search for issues the minority ought always to be the most active; but their wise appropriation, after all, depends upon the wisdom and ability of leadership. It has ever been thus, and ever will be. This is about the only political prophecy the writer is willing to risk—and in risking this he but presents a view common to all Americans who claim to be “posted” in the politics of their country.

What politicians abroad think of our “situation” is well told, though not always accurately, by a distinguished writer in the January (1882) number of “_The London Quarterly Review_.” From this we quote some very attractive paragraphs, and at the same time escape the necessity of descriptions and predictions generally believed to be essential in rounding off a political volume, but which are always dangerous in treating of current affairs. Speaking of the conduct of both parties on the question of Civil Service Reform, the writer says:

“What have they done to overthrow the celebrated Jacksonian precept ‘to the victors belongs the spoils?’ What, in fact, is it possible for them to do under the present system? The political laborer holds that he is worthy of his hire, and if nothing is given to him, nothing will he give in return. There are tens of thousands of offices at the bestowal of every administration, and the persons who have helped to bring that administration into power expect to receive them. ‘In Great Britain,’ once remarked the American paper which enjoys the largest circulation in the country, ‘the ruling classes have it all to themselves, and the poor man rarely or never gets a nibble at the public crib. Here we take our turn. We know that, if our political rivals have the opportunity to-day, we shall have it to-morrow. This is the philosophy of the whole thing compressed into a nutshell.’ If President Arthur were to begin to-day to distribute offices to men who were most worthy to receive them, without reference to political services, his own party would rebel, and assuredly his path would not be strewn with roses. He was himself a victim of a gross injustice perpetrated under the name of reform. He filled the important post of Collector of the Port of New York, and filled it to the entire satisfaction of the mercantile community. President Hayes did not consider General Arthur sufficiently devoted to his interests, and he removed him in favor of a confirmed wire-puller and caucus-monger, and the administration papers had the address to represent this as the outcome of an honest effort to reform the Civil Service. No one really supposed that the New York Custom House was less a political engine than it had been before. The rule of General Arthur had been, in point of fact, singularly free from jobbery and corruption, and not a breath of suspicion was ever attached to his personal character. If he had been less faithful in the discharge of his difficult duties, he would have made fewer enemies. He discovered several gross cases of fraud upon the revenue, and brought the perpetrators to justice; but the culprits were not without influence in the press, and they contrived to make the worse appear the better cause. Their view was taken at second-hand by many of the English journals, and even recently the public here were gravely assured that General Arthur represented all that was base in American politics, and moreover that he was an enemy of England, for he had been elected by the Irish vote. The authors of these foolish calumnies did not perceive that, if their statements had been correct, General Garfield, whom they so much honored, must also have been elected by the Irish vote; for he came to power on the very same ‘ticket.’ In reality, the Irish vote may be able to accomplish many things in America, but we may safely predict that it will never elect a President. General Arthur had not been many weeks in power, before he was enabled to give a remarkable proof of the injustice that had been done to him in this particular respect. The salute of the English flag at Yorktown is one of the most graceful incidents recorded in American history, and the order originated solely with the President. A man with higher character or, it may be added, of greater accomplishments and fitness for his office, never sat in the Presidential chair. His first appointments are now admitted to be better than those which were made by his predecessor for the same posts. Senator Frelinghuysen, the new Secretary of State, or Foreign Secretary, is a man of great ability, of most excellent judgment, and of the highest personal character. He stands far beyond the reach of all unworthy influences. Mr. Folger, the Secretary of the Treasury, possesses the confidence of the entire country, and the nomination of the new Attorney-General was received with universal satisfaction. All this little accords with the dark and forbidding descriptions of President Arthur which were placed before the public here on his accession to office. It is surely time that English writers became alive to the danger of accepting without question the distorted views which they find ready to their hands in the most bigoted or most malicious of American journals.

“Democrats and Republicans, then, alike profess to be in favor of a thorough reform in the Civil Service, and at the present moment there is no other very prominent question which could be used as a test for the admission of members into either party. The old issue, which no one could possibly mistake, is gone. How much the public really care for the new one, it would be a difficult point to decide. A Civil Service system, such as that which we have in England, would scarcely be suited to the “poor man,” who, as the New York paper says, thinks he has a right occasionally to ‘get a nibble at the public crib.’ If a man has worked hard to bring his party into power, he is apt, in the United States, to think that he is entitled to some ‘recognition,’ and neither he nor his friends would be well pleased if they were told that, before anything could be done for him, it would be necessary to examine him in modern languages and mathematics. Moreover, a service such as that which exists in England requires to be worked with a system of pensions; and pensions, it is held in America, are opposed to the Republican idea.[57] If it were not for this objection, it may be presumed that some provision would have been made for more than one of the ex-Presidents, whose circumstances placed them or their families much in need of it. President Monroe spent his last years in wretched circumstances, and died bankrupt. Mrs. Madison ‘knew what it was to want bread.’ A negro servant, who had once been a slave in the family, used furtively to give her ‘small sums’—they must have been very small—out of his own pocket. Mr. Pierce was, we believe, not far removed from indigence; and it has been stated that after Andrew Johnson left the White House, he was reduced to the necessity of following his old trade. General Grant was much more fortunate; and we have recently seen that the American people have subscribed for Mrs. Garfield a sum nearly equal to £70,000. But a pension system for Civil Servants is not likely to be adopted. Permanence in office is another principle which has found no favor with the rank and file of either party in America, although it has sometimes been introduced into party platforms for the sake of producing a good effect. The plan of ‘quick rotation’ is far more attractive to the popular sense. Divide the spoils, and divide them often. It is true that the public indignation is sometimes aroused, when too eager and rapacious a spirit is exhibited. Such a feeling was displayed in 1873, in consequence of an Act passed by Congress increasing the pay of its own members and certain officers of the Government. Each member of Congress was to receive $7,500 a year, or £1,500. The sum paid before that date, down to 1865, was $5000 a year, or £1000, and ‘mileage’ free added—that is to say, members were entitled to be paid twenty cents a mile for traveling expenses to and from Washington. This Bill soon became known as the ‘Salary Grab’ Act, and popular feeling against it was so great that it was repealed in the following Session, and the former pay was restored. As a general rule, however, the ‘spoils’ system has not been heartily condemned by the nation; if it had been so condemned, it must have fallen long ago.

“President Arthur has been admonished by his English counsellors to take heed that he follows closely in the steps of his predecessor. General Garfield was not long enough in office to give any decided indications of the policy which he intended to pursue; but, so far as he had gone, impartial observers could detect very little difference between his course of conduct in regard to patronage and that of former Presidents. He simply preferred the friends of Mr. Blaine to the friends of Mr. Conkling; but Mr. Blaine is a politician of precisely the same class as Mr. Conkling—both are men intimately versed in all the intricacies of ‘primaries,’ the ‘caucus,’ and the general working of the ‘machine.’ They are precisely the kind of men which American politics, as at present practised and understood, are adapted to produce. Mr. Conkling, however, is of more imperious a disposition than Mr. Blaine; the first disappointment or contradiction turns him from a friend into an enemy. President Garfield removed the Collector of New York—the most lucrative and most coveted post in the entire Union—and instead of nominating a friend of Mr. Conkling’s for the vacancy, he nominated a friend of Mr. Blaine’s. Now Mr. Conkling had done much to secure New York State for the Republicans, and thus gave them the victory; and he thought himself entitled to better treatment than he received. But was it in the spirit of true reform to remove the Collector, against whom no complaint had been made, merely for the purpose of creating a vacancy, and then of putting a friend of Mr. Blaine’s into it—a friend, moreover, who had been largely instrumental in securing General Garfield’s own nomination at Chicago?[58] Is this all that is meant, when the Reform party talk of the great changes which they desire to see carried out? Again, the new President has been fairly warned by his advisers in this country, that he must abolish every abuse, new or old, connected with the distribution of patronage. If he is to execute this commission, not one term of office, nor three terms, will be sufficient for him. Over every appointment there will inevitably arise a dispute; if a totally untried man is chosen, he will be suspected as a wolf coming in sheep’s clothing; if a well known partizan is nominated, he will be denounced as a mere tool of the leaders, and there will be another outcry against ‘machine politics.’ ‘One party or other,’ said an American journal not long ago, ‘must begin the work of administering the Government on business principles,’ and the writer admitted that the work would ‘cost salt tears to many a politician.’ The honor of making this beginning has not yet been sought for with remarkable eagerness by either party; but seems to be deemed necessary to promise that something shall be done, and the Democrats, being out of power, are naturally in the position to bid the highest. The reform will come, as we have intimated, when the people demand it; it cannot come before, for few, indeed, are the politicians in the United States who venture to trust themselves far in advance of public opinion. And even of that few, there are some who have found out, by hard experience, that there is little honor or profit to be gained by undertaking to act as pioneers.

“It is doubtless a step in advance, that both parties now admit the absolute necessity of devising measures to elevate the character of the public service, to check the progress of corruption, and to introduce a better class of men into the offices which are held under the Government. The necessity of great reforms in these respects has been avowed over and over again by most of the leading journals and influential men in the country. The most radical of the Republicans, and the most conservative of the Democrats, are of one mind on this point. Mr. Wendell Phillips, an old abolitionist and Radical, once publicly declared that Republican government in cities had been a complete failure.[59] An equally good Radical, the late Mr. Horace Greeley, made the following still more candid statement:—‘There are probably at no time less than twenty thousand men in this city [New York] who would readily commit a safe murder for a hundred dollars, break open a house for twenty, and take a false oath for five. Most of these are of European birth, though we have also native miscreants who are ready for any crime that will pay.’[60] Strong testimony against the working of the suffrage—and it must have been most unwilling testimony—was given in 1875 by a politician whose long familiarity with caucuses and ‘wire-pulling’ in every form renders him an undeniable authority. ‘Let it be widely proclaimed,’ he wrote, ‘that the experience and teachings of a republican form of government prove nothing so alarmingly suggestive of and pregnant with danger as that cheap suffrage involves and entails cheap representation.’[61] Another Republican, of high character, has stated that ‘the methods of politics have now become so repulsive, the corruption so open, the intrigues and personal hostilities are so shameless, that it is very difficult to engage in them without a sense of humiliation.’”[62]

Passing to another question, and one worthy of the most intelligent discussion, but which has never yet taken the shape of a political demand or issue in this country, this English writer says:

“Although corruption has been suspected at one time or other in almost every Department of the Government, the Presidential office has hitherto been kept free from its stain. And yet, by an anomaly of the Constitution, the President has sometimes been exposed to suspicion, and still more frequently to injustice and misrepresentation, in consequence of the practical irresponsibility of his Cabinet officers. They are his chief advisers in regard to the distribution of places, as well as in the higher affairs of State, and the discredit of any mismanagement on their part falls upon him. It is true that he chooses them, and may dismiss them, with the concurrence of the Senate; but, when once appointed, they are beyond reach of all effective criticism—for newspaper attacks are easily explained by the suggestion of party malice. They cannot be questioned in Congress, for they are absolutely prohibited from sitting in either House.

For months together it is quite possible for the Cabinet to pursue a course which is in direct opposition to the wishes of the people. This was seen, among other occasions, in 1873–4, when Mr. Richardson was Secretary of the Treasury, and at a time when his management of the finances caused great dissatisfaction. At last a particularly gross case of negligence, to use no harsher word, known as the ‘Sanborn contracts,’ caused his retirement; that is to say, the demand for his withdrawal became so persistent and so general, that the President could no longer refuse to listen to it. His objectionable policy might have been pursued till the end of the Presidential term, but for the accidental discovery of a scandal, which exhausted the patience of his friends as well as his enemies. Now had Mr. Richardson been a member of either House, and liable to be subjected to a rigorous cross-questioning as to his proceedings, the mismanagement of which he was accused, and which was carried on in the dark, never could have occurred. Why the founders of the Constitution should have thrown this protection round the persons who happen to fill the chief offices of State, is difficult to conjecture, but the clause is clear:—‘No person holding any office under the United States shall be a member of either House during his continuance in office.’[63] Mr. Justice Story declares that this provision ‘has been vindicated upon the highest grounds of public authority,’ but he also admits that, as applied to the heads of departments, it leads to many evils. He adds a warning which many events of our own time have shown to be not unnecessary:—‘if corruption ever eats its way silently into the vitals of this Republic, it will be because the people are unable to bring responsibility home to the Executive through his chosen Ministers. They will be betrayed when their suspicions are most lulled by the Executive, under the guise of an obedience to the will of Congress.’[64] The inconveniences occasioned to the public service under the present system are very great. There is no official personage in either House to explain the provisions of any Bill, or to give information on pressing matters of public business. Cabinet officers are only brought into communication with the nation when they send in their annual reports, or when a special report is called for by some unusual emergency. Sometimes the President himself goes down to the Capitol to talk over the merits of a Bill with members. The Department which happens to be interested in any particular measure puts it under the charge of some friend of the Administration, and if a member particularly desires any further information respecting it he may, if he thinks proper, go to the Department and ask for it. But Congress and Ministers are never brought face to face. It is possible that American ‘Secretaries’ may escape some of the inconvenience which English Ministers are at times called upon to undergo; but the most capable and honest of them forfeit many advantages, not the least of which is the opportunity of making the exact nature of their work known to their countrymen, and of meeting party misrepresentations and calumnies in the most effectual way. In like manner, the incapable members of the Cabinet would not be able, under a different system, to shift the burden of responsibility for their blunders upon the President. No President suffered more in reputation for the faults of others than General Grant. It is true that he did not always choose his Secretaries with sufficient care or discrimination, but he was made to bear more than a just proportion of the censure which was provoked by their mistakes. And it was not in General Grant’s disposition to defend himself. In ordinary intercourse he was sparing of his words, and could never be induced to talk about himself, or to make a single speech in defense of any portion of his conduct. The consequence was, that his second term of office was far from being worthy of the man who enjoyed a popularity, just after the war, which Washington himself might have envied, and who is still, and very justly, regarded with respect and gratitude for his memorable services in the field.

“The same sentiment, to which we have referred as specially characteristic of the American people—hostility to all changes in their method of government which are not absolutely essential—will keep the Cabinet surrounded by irresponsible, and sometimes incapable, advisers. Contrary to general supposition, there is no nation in the world so little disposed to look favorably on Radicalism and a restless desire for change, as the Americans. The Constitution itself can only be altered by a long and tedious process, and after every State in the Union has been asked its opinion on the question. There is no hesitation in enforcing the law in case of disorder, as the railroad rioters in Pennsylvania found out a few years ago. The state of affairs, which the English Government has permitted to exist in Ireland for upwards of a year, would not have been tolerated twenty-four hours in the United States. The maintenance of the law first, the discussion of grievances afterwards; such is, and always has been, the policy of every American Government, until the evil day of James Buchanan. The governor of every State is a real ruler, and not a mere ornament, and the President wields a hundredfold more power than has been left to the Sovereign of Great Britain. Both parties as a rule, combine to uphold his authority, and, in the event of any dispute with a foreign Power, all party distinctions disappear as if by magic. There are no longer Democrats and Republicans, but only Americans. The species of politician, who endeavors to gain a reputation for himself by destroying the reputation of his country was not taken over to America in the ‘Mayflower,’ and it would be more difficult than ever to establish it on American ground to-day. A man may hold any opinions that may strike his fancy on other subjects, but in reference to the Government, he is expected, while he lives under it, to give it his hearty support, especially as against foreign nations. There was once a faction called the ‘Know-Nothings,’ the guiding principle of which was inveterate hostility to foreigners; but a party based upon the opposite principle, of hostility to one’s own country, has not yet ventured to lift up its head across the Atlantic. That is an invention in politics which England has introduced, and of which she is allowed to enjoy the undisputed monopoly. * * *

“Display and ceremonial were by no means absent from the Government in the beginning of its history. President Washington never went to Congress on public business except in a State coach, drawn by six cream-colored horses. The coach was an object which would excite the admiration of the throng even now in the streets of London. It was built in the shape of a hemisphere, and its panels were adorned with cupids, surrounded with flowers worthy of Florida, and of fruit not to be equalled out of California. The coachman and postillions were arrayed in gorgeous liveries of white and scarlet. The Philadelphia ‘Gazette,’ a Government organ, regularly gave a supply of Court news for the edification of the citizens. From that the people were allowed to learn as much as it was deemed proper for them to know about the President’s movements, and a fair amount of space was also devoted to Mrs. Washington—who was not referred to as Mrs. Washington, but as ‘the amiable consort of our beloved President.’ When the President made his appearance at a ball or public reception, a dais was erected for him upon which he might stand apart from the vulgar throng, and the guests or visitors bowed to him in solemn silence. ‘Republican simplicity’ has only come in later times. In our day, the hack-driver who takes a visitor to a public reception at the White House, is quite free to get off his box, walk in side by side with his fare, and shake hands with the President with as much familiarity as anybody else. Very few persons presumed to offer to shake hands with General Washington. One of his friends, Gouverneur Morris, rashly undertook, for a foolish wager, to go up to him and slap him on the shoulder, saying, ‘My dear General, I am happy to see you look so well.’ The moment fixed upon arrived, and Mr. Morris, already half-repenting of his wager, went up to the President, placed his hand upon his shoulder, and uttered the prescribed words. ‘Washington,’ as an eye-witness described the scene, ‘withdrew his hand, stepped suddenly back, fixed his eye on Morris for several minutes with an angry frown, until the latter retreated abashed, and sought refuge in the crowd.’ No one else ever tried a similar experiment. It is recorded of Washington, that he wished the official title of the President to be ‘High Mightiness,’[65] and at one time it was proposed to engrave his portrait upon the national coinage. No royal levies were more punctiliously arranged and ordered than those of the First President. It was Jefferson, the founder of the Democratic party, who introduced Democratic manners into the Republic. He refused to hold weekly receptions, and when he went to Congress to read his Address, he rode up unattended, tied his horse to a post, and came away with the same disregard for outward show. After his inauguration, he did not even take the trouble to go to Congress with his Message, but sent it by the hands of his Secretary—a custom which has been found so convenient that it has been followed ever since. A clerk now mumbles through the President’s Message, while members sit at their desks writing letters, or reading the Message itself, if they do not happen to have made themselves masters of its contents beforehand.”

The writer, after discussing monopolies and tariffs, closes with hopes and predictions so moderately and sensibly stated that any one will be safe in adopting them as his own.

“The controversies which have yet to be fought out on these issues [the tariff and corporate power] may sometimes become formidable, but we may hope that the really dangerous questions that once confronted the American people are set at rest for ever. The States once more stand in their proper relation to the Union, and any interference with their self-government is never again likely to be attempted, for the feeling of the whole people would condemn it. It was a highly Conservative system which the framers of the Constitution adopted, when they decided that each State should be entitled to make its own laws, to regulate its own franchise, to raise its own taxes, and settle everything in connection with its own affairs in its own way. The general government has no right whatever to send a single soldier into any State, even to preserve order, until it has been called upon to act by the Governor of that State. The Federal Government, as it has been said by the Supreme Court, is one of enumerated powers; and if it has ever acted in excess of those powers, it was only when officers in States broke the compact which existed, and took up arms for its destruction. They abandoned their place in the Union, and were held to have thereby forfeited their rights as States. In ordinary times there is ample security against the abuse of power in any direction. If a State government exceeds its authority, the people can at the next election expel the parties who have been guilty of the offense; if Congress trespasses upon the functions of the States, there is the remedy of an appeal to the Supreme Court, the ‘final interpreter of the Constitution;’ if usurpation should be attempted in spite of these safeguards, there is the final remedy of an appeal to the whole nation under the form of a Constitutional Amendment, which may at any time be adopted with the consent of three-fourths of the States. Only, therefore, as Mr. Justice Story has pointed out, when three-fourths of the States have combined to practice usurpation, is the case ‘irremediable under any known forms of the Constitution.’ It would be difficult to conceive of any circumstances under which such a combination as this could arise. No form of government ever yet devised has proved to be faultless in its operation; but that of the United States is well adapted to the genius and character of the people, and the very dangers which it has passed through render it more precious in their eyes than it was before it had been tried in the fire. It assures freedom to all who live under it; and it provides for the rigid observance of law, and the due protection of every man in his rights. There is much in the events which are now taking place around us to suggest serious doubts, whether these great and indispensable advantages are afforded by some of the older European systems of government which we have been accustomed to look upon as better and wiser than the American Constitution.”

A final word as to a remaining great issue—that of the tariff. It must ever be a political issue, one which parties cannot wholly avoid. The Democratic party as a mass, yet leans to Free Trade; the Republican party, as a mass, favors Tariffs and high ones, at least plainly protective. Within a year, two great National Conventions were held, one at Chicago and one at New York, both in former times, Free Trade centres, and in these Congress was petitioned either to maintain or improve the existing tariff. As a result we see presented and advocated at the current session the Tariff Commission Bill, decisive action upon which has not been taken at the time we close these pages. The effect of the conventions was to cause the Democratic Congressional caucus to reject the effort of Proctor Knott, to place it in its old attitude of hostility to protection. Many of the members sought and for the time secured an avoidance of the issue. Their ability to maintain this attitude in the face of Mr. Watterson’s[66] declaration that the Democratic party must stand or fall on that issue, remains to be seen.

POLITICAL CHANGES IN 1882.

With a view to carry this work through the year 1882 and into part of 1883, very plain reference should be made to the campaign of 1882, which in several important States was fully as disastrous to the Republican party as any State elections since the advent of that party to national supremacy and power. In 1863 and 1874 the Republican reverses were almost if not quite as general, but in the more important States the adverse majorities were not near so sweeping. Political “tidal waves” had been freely talked of as descriptive of the situation in the earlier years named, but the result of 1882 has been pertinently described by Horatio Seymour as the “groundswell,” and such it seemed, both to the active participants in, and lookers-on, at the struggle.

Political discontent seems to be periodical under all governments, and the periods are probably quite as frequent though less violent under republican as other forms. Certain it is that no political party in our history has long enjoyed uninterrupted success. The National success of the Republicans cannot truthfully be said to have been uninterrupted since the first election of Lincoln, as at times one or the other of the two Houses of Congress have been in the hands of the Democratic party, while since the second Grant administration there has not been a safe working majority of Republicans in either House. Combinations with Greenbackers, Readjusters, and occasionally with dissenting Democrats have had to be employed to preserve majorities in behalf of important measures, and these have not always succeeded, though the general tendency of side-parties has been to support the majority, for the very plain reason that majorities can reward with power upon committees and with patronage.

Efforts were made by the Democrats in the first session of the 47th Congress to reduce existing tariffs, and to repeal the internal revenue taxes. The Republicans met the first movement by establishing a Tariff Commission, which was appointed by President Arthur, and composed mainly of gentlemen favorable to protective duties. In the year previous (1881) the income from internal taxes was $135,264,385.51, and the cost of collecting $4,327,793.24, or 3.20 per cent. The customs revenues amounted to $198,159,676.02, the cost of collecting the same $6,383,288.10, or 3.22 per cent. There was no general complaint as to the cost of collecting these immense revenues, for this cost was greatly less than in former years, but the surplus on internal taxes (about $146,000,000) was so large that it could not be profitably employed even in the payment of the public debt, and as a natural result all interests called upon to pay the tax (save where there was a monopoly in the product or the manufacture) complained of the burden as wholly unnecessary, and large interests and very many people demanded immediate and absolute repeal. The Republicans sought to meet this demand half way by a bill repealing all the taxes, save those on spirits and tobacco, but the Democrats obstructed and defeated every attempt at partial repeal. The Republicans thought that the moral sentiment of the country would favor the retention of the internal taxes upon spirits and tobacco (the latter having been previously reduced) but if there was any such sentiment it did not manifest itself in the fall elections. On the contrary, every form of discontent, encouraged by these great causes, took shape. While the Tariff Commission, by active and very intelligent work, held out continued hope to the more confident industries, those which had been threatened or injured by the failure of the crops in 1881, and by the assassination of President Garfield, saw only prolonged injury in the probable work of the Commission, for to meet the close Democratic sentiment and to unite that which it was hoped would be generally friendly, moderate tariff rates had to be fixed; notably upon iron, steel, and many classes of manufactured goods. Manufacturers of the cheaper grades of cotton goods were feeling the pressure of competition from the South—where goods could be made from a natural product close at hand—while those of the North found about the same time that the tastes of their customers had improved, and hence their cheaper grades were no longer in such general demand. There was over-production, as a consequence grave depression, and not all in the business could at once realize the cause of the trouble. Doubt and distrust prevailed, and early in the summer of 1882, and indeed until late in the fall, the country seemed upon the verge of a business panic. At the same time the leading journals of the country seemed to have joined in a crusade against all existing political methods, and against all statutory and political abuses. The cry of “Down with Boss Rule!” was heard in many States, and this rallied to the swelling ranks of discontent all who are naturally fond of pulling down leaders—and the United States Senatorial elections of 1883 quickly showed that the blow was aimed at all leaders, whether they were alleged Bosses or not. Then, too, the forms of discontent which could not take practical shape in the great Presidential contest between Garfield and Hancock, came to the front with cumulative force after the assassination. There is little use in philosophizing and searching for sufficient reasons leading to a fact, when the fact itself must be confessed and when its force has been felt. It is a plain fact that many votes in the fall of 1882 were determined by the nominating struggle for the Presidency in 1880, by the quarrels which followed Garfield’s inauguration, and by the assassination. Indeed, the nation had not recovered from the shock, and many very good people looked with very grave suspicion upon every act of President Arthur after he had succeeded to the chair. The best informed, broadest and most liberal political minds saw in his course an honest effort to heal existing differences in the Republican party, but many acts of recommendation and appointment directed to this end were discounted by the few which could not thus be traced, and suspicion and discontent swelled the chorus of other injuries. The result was the great political changes of 1882. It began in Ohio, the only important and debatable October State remaining at this time. The causes enumerated above (save the assassination and the conflict between the friends of Grant and Blaine) operated with less force in Ohio than any other section—for here leaders had not been held up as “Bosses;” civil service reform had many advocates among them; the people were not by interest specially wedded to high tariff duties, nor were they large payers of internal revenue taxes. But the liquor issue had sprung up in the Legislature the previous winter, the Republicans attempting to levy and collect a tax from all who sold, and to prevent the sale on Sundays. These brief facts make strange reading to the people of other States, where the sale of liquor has generally been licensed, and forbidden on Sundays. Ohio had previously passed a prohibitory constitutional amendment, in itself defective, and as no legislation had been enacted to enforce it, those who wished began to sell as though the right were natural, and in this way became strong enough to resist taxation or license. The Legislature of 1882, the majority controlled by the Republicans, attempted to pass the Pond liquor tax act, and its issue was joined. The liquor interests organized, secured control of the Democratic State Convention, nominated a ticket pledged to their interests, made a platform which pointed to unrestricted sale, and by active work and the free use of funds, carried the election and reversed the usual majority. Governor Foster, the boldest of the Republican leaders, accepted the issue as presented, and stumped in favor of license and the sanctity of the Sabbath; but the counsels of the Republican leaders were divided, Ex-Secretary Sherman and others enacting the role of “confession and avoidance.” The result carried with it a train of Republican disasters. Congressional candidates whom the issue could not legitimately touch, fell before it, probably on the principle that “that which strikes the head injures the entire body.” The Democratic State and Legislative tickets succeeded, and the German element, which of all others is most favorable to freedom in the observance of the Sabbath, transferred its vote almost as an entirety from the Republican to the Democratic party.

Ohio emboldened the liquor interests, and in their Conventions and Societies in other States they agreed as a rule to check and, if possible, defeat the advance of the prohibitory amendment idea. This started in Kansas in 1880, under the lead of Gov. St. John, an eloquent temperance advocate. It was passed by an immense majority, and it was hardly in force before conflicting accounts were scattered throughout the country as to its effect. Some of the friends of temperance contended that it improved the public condition; its enemies all asserted that in the larger towns and cities it produced free and irresponsible instead of licensed sale. The latter seem to have had the best of the argument, if the election result is a truthful witness. Gov. St. John was again the nominee of the Republicans, but while all of the remainder of the State ticket was elected, he fell under a majority which must have been produced by a change of forty thousand votes. Iowa next took up the prohibitory amendment idea, secured its adoption, but the result was injurious to the Republicans in the Fall elections, where the discontent struck at Congressmen, as well as State and Legislative officers.

The same amendment had been proposed in Pennsylvania, a Republican House in 1881 having passed it by almost a solid vote (Democrats freely joining in its support), but a Republican Senate defeated, after it had been loaded down with amendments. New York was coquetting with the same measure, and as a result the liquor interests—well organized and with an abundance of money, as a rule struck at the Republican party in both New York and Pennsylvania, and thus largely aided the groundswell. The same interests aided the election of Genl. B. F. Butler of Massachusetts, but from a different reason. He had, in one of his earlier canvasses, freely advocated the right of the poor to sell equally with those who could pay heavy license fees, and had thus won the major sympathy of the interest. Singularly enough, Massachusetts alone of all the Republican States meeting with defeat in 1882, fails to show in her result reasons which harmonize with those enumerated as making up the elements of discontent. Her people most do favor high tariffs, taxes on liquors and luxuries, civil service reforms, and were supposed to be more free from legal and political abuses than any other. Massachusetts had, theretofore, been considered to be the most advanced of all the States—in notions, in habit, and in law—yet Butler’s victory was relatively more pronounced than that of any Democratic candidate, not excepting that of Cleveland over Folger in New York, the Democratic majority here approaching two hundred thousand. How are we to explain the Massachusetts’ result? Gov. Bishop was a high-toned and able gentleman, the type of every reform contended for. There is but one explanation. Massachusetts had had too much of reform; it had come in larger and faster doses than even her progressive people could stand—and an inconsistent discontent took new shape there—that of very plain reaction. This view is confirmed by the subsequent attempt of Gov. Butler to defeat the re-election of Geo. F. Hoar to the U. S. Senate, by a combination of Democrats with dissatisfied Republicans. The movement failed, but it came very near to success, and for days the result was in doubt. Hoar had been a Senator of advanced views, of broad and comprehensive statesmanship, but that communistic sentiment which occasionally crops out in our politics and strikes at all leaders, merely from the pleasure of asserting the right to tear down, assailed him with a vigor almost equal to that which struck Windom of Minnesota, a statesman of twenty-four years’ honorable, able and sometimes brilliant service. To prejudice the people of his State against him, a photograph of his Washington residence had been scattered broadcast. The print in the photograph intended to prejudice being a coach with a liveried lackey. It might have been the coach and lackey of a visitor, but the effect was the same where discontent had run into a fever.

Political discontent gave unmistakable manifestations of its existence in Ohio, Massachusetts, New York (where Ex-Governor Cornell’s nomination had been defeated by a forged telegram), Michigan, Nebraska, Kansas, Iowa, Connecticut, California, Colorado, Pennsylvania, and Indiana. The Republican position was well maintained in New Hampshire, Vermont, Rhode Island, Minnesota, Illinois, and Wisconsin. It was greatly improved in Virginia, where Mahone’s Republican Readjuster ticket carried the State by nearly ten thousand, and where a United States’ Senator and Congressman at large were gained, as well as some of the District Congressmen. The Republicans also improved the situation in North Carolina and Tennessee, though they failed to carry either. They also gained Congressmen in Mississippi and Louisiana, but the Congressional result throughout the country was a sweeping Democratic victory, the 48th Congress, beginning March 4, 1883, showing a Democratic majority of 71 in a total membership of 325.

In Pennsylvania alone of all the Northern States, were the Republican elements of discontent organized, and here they were as well organized as possible under the circumstances. Charles S. Wolfe had the year previous proclaimed what he called his “independence of the Bosses,” by declaring himself a candidate for State Treasurer, “nominated in a convention of one.” He secured 49,984 votes, and this force was used as the nucleus for the better organized Independent Republican movement of 1882. Through this a State Convention was called which placed a full ticket in the field, and which in many districts nominated separate legislative candidates.

The complaints of the Independent Republicans of Pennsylvania were very much like those of dissatisfied Republicans in other Northern States where no adverse organizations were set up, and these can best be understood by giving the official papers and correspondence connected with the revolt, and the attempts to conciliate and suppress it by the regular organization. The writer feels a delicacy in appending this data, inasmuch as he was one of the principals in the negotiations, but formulated complaints, methods and principles peculiar to the time can be better understood as presented by organized and official bodies, than where mere opinions of cotemporaneous writers and speakers must otherwise be given. A very careful summary has been made by Col. A. K. McClure, in the Philadelphia _Times Almanac_, and from this we quote the data connected with the—

The Independent Republican Revolt In Pennsylvania.

The following call was issued by Chairman McKee, of the committee which conducted the Wolfe campaign in 1881:

HEADQUARTERS STATE COMMITTEE,

CITIZENS’ REPUBLICAN ASSOCIATION, GIRARD HOUSE,

PHILADELPHIA, December 16, 1881.

_To the Independent Republicans of Pennsylvania_: