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+Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for
+eBook #65707 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/65707)
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-The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Crime of Caste in Our Country, by
-Benjamin Rush Davenport
-
-
-This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most
-other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions 
-whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of
-the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at 
-www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have
-to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook.
-
-
-
-
-Title: The Crime of Caste in Our Country
-
-
-Author: Benjamin Rush Davenport
-
-
-
-Release Date: June 26, 2021  [eBook #65707]
-
-Language: English
-
-Character set encoding: UTF-8
-
-
-***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CRIME OF CASTE IN OUR
-COUNTRY***
-
-
-E-text prepared by Tim Lindell, Martin Pettit, and the Online Distributed
-Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from page images generously made
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-
-[Illustration: ABRAHAM LINCOLN.
-
-A Man of the People, who Loved and Served the People.]
-
-
-THE CRIME OF CASTE IN OUR COUNTRY
-
-Americans Enforce Equality
-
-No Sham Aristocracy of Wealth Permitted by the People
-
-Lesson of 1892 Taught Imitators of
-English Aristocracy
-
-History of the Power of People Re-Told
-
-Records for Three Thousand Years Searched for Examples
-
-Bullets, 1861--Ballots, 1892
-
-by
-
-BENJAMIN R. DAVENPORT
-
-
-
-
-
-
-Philadelphia:
-Keystone Publishing Co.
-1893
-
-Copyright by
-Joseph W. Morton, Jr.
-1892
-
-
-
-
-THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED TO ALL AMERICAN CITIZENS,
-
-WHO BELIEVE
-
-THAT PATRIOTISM, HONESTY, VIRTUE, AND MERIT
-
-ALONE CONSTITUTE INEQUALITY IN MANKIND;
-
-WHO OBJECT TO AND RESENT ARROGANCE AND PRESUMPTION
-UPON THE PART OF
-
-THE POSSESSORS OF WEALTH
-
-AND TO THOSE TO WHOM
-
-“CASTE” AND FOREIGN MANNERISMS ARE OBNOXIOUS.
-
-THE AUTHOR.
-
-
-
-
-_DEFINITION OF “CASTE.”_
-
-
-_The word “Caste,” we derive from a Portuguese word, which means “a
-race;” the Portuguese being the early voyagers to the East Indies,
-where they found the distinction of classes of society established
-under the Brahminical regime of India. Thence it came to be applied as
-a term of distinction of society in other countries. There were four
-castes in India: 1, the Priests; 2, military; 3, merchants; 4, the
-servile classes._
-
-_Members of the lowest caste were forbidden to marry those of the
-upper. Children of such unions were outcasts and irredeemably base;
-they could not accumulate property, nor change or improve their
-conditions. Along with many other senseless and inconvenient rules for
-the conduct of the different castes, were such as those forbidding
-members of different castes from using the same springs or running
-streams, sitting at the same table, eating with the same utensils, or
-preparing food in the same vessels. It was contamination for those
-of the first class to even mingle in the public highway with those
-who were of the lower castes. For convenience, and in the interest of
-the commercial prosperity of India, the British, after much exertion,
-have been able to eradicate many of these absurd distinctions, and the
-habits that resulted therefrom._
-
-_The attempt to create class distinctions in Free America, upon the
-basis of wealth or assumed social superiority, is a crime, and as such
-will be punished by the Common People._
-
-
-
-
-INDEX.
-
-                                                   PAGE.
-INTRODUCTION                                          11
-
-
-CHAPTER I.
-
-Vox Populi, Vox Dei                                   33
-
-
-CHAPTER II.
-
-The Alleged General Discontent                        65
-
-
-CHAPTER III.
-
-November 8, 1892                                      79
-
-
-CHAPTER IV.
-
-Society as the People Found It November 8, 1892       91
-
-
-CHAPTER V.
-
-Some Reasons for Wrath                               111
-
-
-CHAPTER VI.
-
-The Aristocratic “Chappie” _vs._ Abraham Lincoln     145
-
-
-CHAPTER VII.
-
-Hon. John Brisben Walker, on Homestead               161
-
-
-CHAPTER VIII.
-
-Surrender at Homestead.--Organized Labor Defeated    183
-
-
-CHAPTER IX.
-
-Possible Fruits of Victory                           204
-
-
-CHAPTER X.
-
-The Cause of Bullets, ’61; Ballots, ’92.--Abraham
-Lincoln, the People’s Choice in ’60                  225
-
-
-CHAPTER XI.
-
-Andrew Jackson, 1828                                 241
-
-
-CHAPTER XII.
-
-Thomas Jefferson, 1800                               249
-
-
-CHAPTER XIII.
-
-The Revolution in 1776                               257
-
-
-CHAPTER XIV.
-
-The French Revolution                                278
-
-
-CHAPTER XV.
-
-England, 1645                                        295
-
-
-CHAPTER XVI.
-
-The German Empire, 1520-1525                         307
-
-
-CHAPTER XVII.
-
-Switzerland, 1424                                    312
-
-
-CHAPTER XVIII.
-
-Russia                                               315
-
-
-CHAPTER XIX.
-
-Patricians and Plebeians in Rome                     320
-
-
-CHAPTER XX.
-
-Greece.--Venice.--The Rule of “Caste”                324
-
-
-CHAPTER XXI.
-
-Egypt, 4235 B. C.                                    330
-
-
-CHAPTER XXII.
-
-Christianity                                         333
-
-
-CHAPTER XXIII.
-
-Not a Democratic Party Victory.--Democracy is Not
-the Name of a Party, but of a Principle              346
-
-
-CHAPTER XXIV.
-
-Not a Defeat of Abraham Lincoln’s Republican Party   390
-
-
-CHAPTER XXV.
-
-The Populist: the “Allies.”--Elected by the People;
-therefore, with the “Common People”                  409
-
-
-CHAPTER XXVI.
-
-“Flabbyism” and the Income Tax                       417
-
-
-CHAPTER XXVII.
-
-CONCLUSION                                           428
-
-
-
-
-ILLUSTRATIONS.
-
-                             PAGE.
-Abraham Lincoln      Frontispiece.
-
-Grover Cleveland                32
-
-James B. Weaver                 64
-
-John D. Rockefeller            105
-
-Ward MacAllister               110
-
-“The Public be D----d”         115
-
-Mrs. Benjamin Harrison         127
-
-Benjamin Harrison              131
-
-American Queen                 136
-
-American Duchess               137
-
-Jay Gould                      143
-
-Abe, “The Rail-Splitter”       154
-
-“Chappie” on Fifth Avenue      155
-
-Andrew Carnegie                160
-
-Henry C. Frick                 162
-
-The Mistake at Homestead       182
-
-William H. Vanderbilt          219
-
-W. Seward Webb                 223
-
-Andrew Jackson                 240
-
-Thomas Jefferson               248
-
-
-
-
-INTRODUCTION.
-
-
-Had a Johnstown flood, a Charleston earthquake, a war with Chili, or a
-Homestead strike occurred on November 8, 1892, instead of an election,
-those Napoleons of journalism, James Gordon Bennett, of the New York
-_Herald_, Joseph Pulitzer, of the New York _World_, and Whitelaw
-Reid, of the _Tribune_, would have had a score of representatives on
-the scene at once, without thought of expense; would have had every
-detail in its most minute particular investigated, and reproduced
-every statement, embellished by the pencils of a host of artists,
-utterly regardless of expense, keeping, as these magnificent journals
-ever have, good faith with the public and their readers, making
-lasting monuments of their wonderful papers for coming generations of
-journalists to gaze upon.
-
-But a revolution occurred on November 8, 1892, a revolution of the
-American people, so overwhelming, so decisive, and so pronounced
-as to absolutely stupefy even the genius of the press. Instead of
-corps of reporters, artists, special correspondents, speeding over
-the land to ascertain the cause--not the result; the cause, the
-origin,--of this stupendous surprise, all the great journals of the
-country, having each nailed to its flag-staff some theory or text
-utterly inconsistent with the result, utterly disproportioned to the
-overwhelming revolution, that they have sought by vain endeavor to make
-an overwhelming result compatible with and agreeable to some one part
-or portion of the cause thereof.
-
-To loudly proclaim, as did the New York _Sun_, that an exhibition of
-the will of the people, so pronounced as that of November the 8th,
-was occasioned by the Force Bill, is as utterly unreasonable as to
-ascribe the magnificent volume within the banks of the Mississippi to
-some little trickling rivulet flowing from the plains of Nebraska.
-To say, with the _Tribune_, that the grand result pronounced in the
-mighty voice of the people was produced by the misunderstanding of
-the McKinley Bill, is as groundless as to ascribe the echoing thunder
-tones of heaven to the swelling throat of a canary bird. To herald
-over the land, “Pauper emigration did it,” with the New York _Herald_,
-is about as pregnant with truth as would be the assumption that the
-foundation and everlasting strength of Christianity has for its basis
-the misguided vaporings of a negro preacher in Richmond, who proclaims,
-“The sun do move.” To announce, as did the _World_, that “Tariff reform
-and WE, the Democrats, achieved this victory,” is entitled to as much
-respect as would be given the utterances of a drummer boy of the
-Federal Army at Gettysburg.
-
-It was not any one nor all of these causes that moved the people. Each
-newspaper, Democratic or Republican, has selected some nail upon which
-it hangs the laurel wreath of victory, inscribed with its own puny text
-for which it has fought its little battle, and each newspaper of the
-Republican press has covered, with the tattered garments of defeat, its
-little text wherein it had proclaimed that the Republican party would
-be victorious, and labeled its tattered garment of lack of judgment
-with some phrase like, “Disloyalty of Platt,” “Incapacity of Carter,”
-“Want of Organization,” “Lack of Popularity and Magnetism of our
-Candidate,” “The Voters didn’t come out.” Had the press no part of its
-own reputation at stake, they would have searched and delved into the
-bosoms of men; yes, neither space nor distance, time nor expense, would
-have been spared by the magnates of the newspaper world to ascertain
-the true cause. But in ascertaining that true cause, it would have been
-necessary, in announcing the same, to stultify themselves in what they
-had been predicting, proclaiming, foretelling, and advising, for months
-and years.
-
-The truth is in the air; was in the air before the election. ’Twas
-breathed; it was thought; yea, better, it was _felt_, by the
-great throbbing, aching heart of the men and women of the Union.
-From the hovel to the palace, the insidious, poisonous vapor of a
-supposed affected, sham aristocracy, with the noxious slime of a
-half-proclaimed doctrine of the inequality of man and woman, by reason
-of non-possession of wealth, had crept. The air of freedom was polluted
-by the emanations arising from the imported English decaying corpse
-of aristocracy. It was everywhere. In blindness and self-delusion,
-the press made its battle; in the very air of it, howling against
-Protection and for Protection, against Force Bill and for Force Bill,
-while the wretched, cankerous ulcer was eating into the pride of every
-free-born man and woman in the land. The very silence of the people,
-the general apathy, was evidence of but one of the symptoms of the
-insidious disease with which the body politic was being consumed.
-
-A scene that has been described in Washington just prior to the late
-Civil War best illustrates the condition of the people. The city of
-Washington was filled with silent, sullen, suspicious men. A sombre
-air pervaded the Capital. South Carolina had seceded; the Union was
-disintegrating. All that had been, was being forgotten. Old ties
-were breaking; old friendships becoming strange. Each man viewed his
-neighbor and his friend of yesterday, with a doubt in his mind as to
-whether they would fight side by side, or beat each other’s throats
-to-morrow. Men paced their rooms in the various hotels, anxious
-and careworn, sleepless and fearful. Yet, the surface was still, a
-dangerous state of general apathy obtained, if silence and murmuring,
-without action, can be called apathy.
-
-It was night, yet the streets were not deserted. Suddenly a window
-of the Ebbitt House was raised, a man stepped on to the balcony out
-of the window, and in clear, vigorous, and manly tones began to sing
-“The Star-Spangled Banner.” Windows were raised; the crowd collected
-around the Ebbitt House. It was the signal for the breaking of a dam.
-A flood of patriotism burst from the hearts of the hearers; it was the
-bugle note, calling upon Americans to save their country. Where there
-had been silence, were now outspoken vows of fidelity and loyalty
-to the Union. The battle was won that night; not at Gettysburg and
-Vicksburg[1].
-
-Just so with the people of America in 1892; for years they have
-endured in silence, murmuring and thinking, heart to heart speaking by
-responsive heart throbs; not by word. The rich, who had accumulated
-their wealth by reason of monopolies which were the necessary
-consequence of the Civil War, men who had laid the foundation of
-their fortunes by speculating upon the necessities of the government
-while contending for the very existence of the Union, had, year by
-year, by a stealthy, yet ever-increasing presumption, begun to assume
-the possibility of a class distinction, presuming that the possession
-of wealth entitled them to privileges, and arrogating to themselves
-mannerisms of the titled classes of Europe, adopting crests, coats of
-arms, claiming descent from titled foreigners, an exclusiveness in
-their social relations, disregarding the laws of morality. The women of
-this would-be aristocratic class, flaunting their jewels and laces in
-the faces of their poorer sisters, with elevated noses, and garments
-drawn aside, feared to touch or gaze at the poor but honest mothers and
-wives of America.
-
-It was not much: it was rank presumption; it was nonsense, absurd.
-“There’s no such thing possible in America as class distinction; in
-fact, it does not exist, cannot exist; the ‘Four Hundred’ of New York
-is a joke, a by-word, a stupendous folly.”
-
-But, good people of the said “Four Hundred,” remember that while the
-American is neither a Socialist nor an Anarchist, when you presume to
-make a distinction, socially, between the poor man, his wife, children,
-and mother, you touch him in the most sensitive part of his being. You
-may have your villas at Newport, you may ape the English fashionable
-season in London by a similar one in New York; you may have your steam
-yachts; you may ride to hounds; your women may marry divorced dukes and
-puppified sons of lords; but, mark you, claim no privilege, attempt no
-distinction between yourselves and the poorest honest man and woman in
-the land. Equality is the jewel that every true American holds most
-dear. No free son of our Republic will sell this treasure for gold,
-whether it be offered directly as a bribe or shrewdly tendered under
-the guise of “protected” wages.
-
-It did not do for the Republican press of the country to demonstrate
-that Protection brought higher wages to the workingman. They might
-have proved that by voting the Republican ticket the workingman’s pay
-would have been a hundred dollars a day; they might have shown him
-that in point of pocket he would be eternally blest by supporting the
-party which he deemed identified with those who attempted to force
-“caste” upon our country. It is not a question of money; the equality
-of man is the American’s birthright. For it, our fathers sought these
-shores, contending with privation, enduring untold labor, dangers,
-and death. For it, our forefathers fought the most powerful nation on
-earth, when they were but a scattered handful of colonists, scattered
-from Massachusetts to Georgia. When the attempt was made--that it was
-attempted, there can be no doubt--to buy the American’s birthright by
-preaching to him “increased wages,” it failed.
-
-Take every speech of every Republican orator, every bit of Republican
-literature, every editorial in the Republican papers, all speak from
-but one text, viz.: “Workmen, farmers, in fact, all ye good people
-of America, you can make more money under Protection;” which plainly
-means, “Let Protection and the Republican party (which you designate in
-your hearts as The Rich Man’s party) continue in power, accumulating
-wealth, creating class distinctions, and you can have better wages.”
-
-In other words, “Sell us the right to create a Republic like that of
-Venice, wherein the rich became the privileged class, and we will give
-you better pay.”
-
-The Democratic press, orators, and literary bureau were no better.
-They no more understood the feeling of the people, for their continual
-cry was, “Free Trade, and you will be better off in pocket.” They
-excoriated trusts, monopolies; they talked of corruption and what would
-be done to benefit, IN POCKET, the poor man, if the Democratic party
-came in power; just as blind as their brothers of the Republican party,
-they appealed to the American pocketbook.
-
-While every Democratic orator knew that he felt the sting of the
-venomous and growing reptile, “caste,” in no place in the literature of
-the Democratic party, in no paper, can be found one single reference
-to the pride of the American in his citizenship, in his equality. It
-seemed as if each man thought that he alone endured a pang upon the
-subject of “caste” and social distinction; for, bear in mind, the man
-with one million will feel the slight and attempted distinction between
-his family and the family with ten millions, just as keenly as the
-cashier of a bank will feel the distinction that the president attempts
-to make between their social positions; the farmer with ten acres feels
-towards the farmer with a hundred acres, exactly the same as the farmer
-with a hundred does towards the farmer possessed of a thousand acres.
-
-This disease was not confined to the horny-handed sons of toil; the
-heart in the hovel was not the only one that ached. It was not confined
-to the follower of the plow; but its pestilential breath pervaded every
-home in the land, leaving everyone below the multi-millionaire unhappy.
-The clerk of the dry-goods store was hurt because the floor walker
-assumed a superiority; the floor walker, because the proprietor assumed
-it; the proprietor, because the importer from whom he purchased goods
-assumed a distinction; and so it continued, from the longshoreman up,
-until it reached our millionaire would-be princes, who ape and mimic
-English life and manners, leaving, as it arose, a sting of increasing
-bitterness; but each man felt too proud to give utterance to what he
-thought it shamed him even to recognize as a sensation.
-
-Hence the apathy on the surface, the sentiment confessed only to
-themselves and in the closet of the voting booth. Because the people
-had identified the Republican party with the class of men who were
-striving to create this class distinction, and because of the very
-charm of the word Democracy to their aching hearts, they voted the
-Democratic ticket--not Democrats alone in a political sense, but men
-who believe in democracy in the broad sense that St. Paul preached on
-Mars Hill at Athens, in the broad sense that Christ’s life demonstrated.
-
-It was useless, against this first overmastering, powerful emotion in
-the American breast, to call upon the old veterans of the Civil War, to
-whom the Republican party had given increased pensions. It was useless
-to cry even to the negro, to whom the Republican party had given
-freedom. He, too, had become imbued with the spirit of equality. The
-wealthy could not purchase the birthright of the veteran by appealing
-to his pocketbook, any more than they could that of the laborer.
-He had shed his blood in the cause of equality, resisting then the
-assumed superiority of blood and birth so often flaunted in his face by
-gentlemen from the South.
-
-In 1861, the “mudsills” of the North and West, the tillers of the soil,
-had shouldered their muskets at the call of that great man of the
-people, Abraham Lincoln, leaving home and loved ones to face unknown
-dangers and diseases in the cause of EQUALITY. Down in their hearts
-then was a sentiment which is revived in 1892. That thing which had
-been the hardest to bear, for the laboring settler of the West and the
-workman of the North, was the existence of “caste” in the South, and
-the supposed superiority of the Southerners in the halls of Congress.
-Love of the Union was the outspoken, pronounced cause of their coming
-at Lincoln’s call; but there was something behind and beneath all of
-that, that had been growing for years; it was resentment, because of
-the South’s assumption of “caste” in our country.
-
-The question was settled, by these very veterans, from 1861 to ’65 with
-bullets, and it was utterly unavailing to call upon them for ballots in
-1892 against the cause for which they fought in 1861.
-
-The very negro said to himself: “You gave us freedom, the Republican
-party, but the Republican party of Abraham Lincoln was purely a
-Democratic party, in a broader sense.” To the negro’s mind, no three
-Presidents of the past will more thoroughly represent a picture
-pleasing to the eye of the enslaved or the lower classes, than
-Jefferson, Jackson, and Lincoln. All were Democrats--men who believed
-in the people and labored for the people, leading lives of pure
-simplicity, affecting no superiority of rank or position. It was
-useless to attempt to hold the negro vote.
-
-The very name of the “People’s Party,” so strongly did it indicate and
-describe this sentiment of the people; enabled that party, with all its
-incongruous doctrines, to carry the electoral votes of some States of
-the Union.
-
-How frivolous seemed the claim of the Democratic papers and
-politicians, that the popularity of Grover Cleveland, and the
-confidence that people had in his rectitude and honesty, caused this
-revolution. How it appears to be trifling with truth to ascribe the
-victory of the people, the true Democracy, to the “masterly manner in
-which Mr. Harrity managed the campaign.” Mr. Whitney’s diplomacy, Mr.
-Dickinson’s energy and ability, Mr. Sheehan’s shrewdness, sink into
-utter insignificance, and become as a grain of sand upon the seashore,
-where they have happened to be tossed by the mighty wave of the ocean
-of feeling, full of resentment, that filled the hearts of the people.
-Their little all was but the piping of a penny whistle in a gale of
-wind. W. H. Vanderbilt’s four words, “The public be damned,” uttered
-from the pedestal of $150,000,000, made a greater impression, and
-became more indelibly impressed upon the minds of the whole people,
-ranging in wealth from $10,000,000 to less than a cent, than all the
-management of Harrity, the diplomacy of Whitney, the skill of Sheehan,
-or the energy of Dickinson. The reported expression of Mr. Russell
-Harrison, when asked, while in London, what his position was in
-America, as son of the President,--“Oh, about what the Prince of Wales
-is here,”--was thought of and resented to greater purpose than was
-produced by all the speeches of the eloquent Cockran.
-
-The women of the land made more speeches, and effective speeches,
-to the voters of the land when they thought of the much-advertised
-American Duchess. They had felt most keenly--for woman’s life is social
-much more than man’s--the attempted social distinction; and, strange as
-it may appear to some of the skillful politicians that they had never
-recognized it, the women of America had become largely Democratic, and
-in them the Democratic party had its most powerful orators; for even
-the most brutal, neglectful, and unloving husband resents in a vigorous
-manner the least slight or insult offered to his wife. Upon every
-occasion, gathering, entertainment, charitable undertaking, some wife
-had been slighted. Because of the attempted creation of “caste,” she
-became a powerful factor, at once, in the campaign of the people. It
-mattered not whether her husband was a millionaire or not, no matter in
-what portion of society,--the clerk in a dry-goods store, the farmer,
-the banker, the millionaire,--the same result would follow. Some would
-attempt to arrogate to themselves a better position, and claim certain
-superiority over her. The banker’s wife feels as keenly the slight of
-the wife of a railroad president, as the wife of a longshoreman does
-any assumed difference in social position on the part of the wife of
-the retail grocer.
-
-This all-prevailing crime of “caste” does not, like most crimes are
-supposed to do, originate in the gutter, but it permeates the mass of
-the population, like the source of a great river, starting at the very
-top of the mountain, and dripping constantly downward.
-
-The example of the rich in imitating the immoralities of the privileged
-classes of Europe, presents a spectacle of presumed immunity from the
-consequences of their crimes which would be as detrimental to the
-continuation of the purity of American homes, as the increase of the
-feeling of “caste” would be to the happiness of the people. A most
-beautiful illustration of corruption in high places was presented
-in the disgusting and nauseating Drayton-Borrowe affair, wherein the
-daughter of an Astor, a multi-millionaire, one of the members of the
-supposed upper “caste,” is paraded before the public as imitating the
-vices and immoralities of the Court of Charles II. Yet these same
-Astors would claim, by reason of their assumed position, some exemption
-from the result of the crime, which would not be accorded to the wife
-of a farmer, clerk, or a bank cashier, to say nothing of the fact
-that, had this beautiful sample of America’s sham aristocracy been
-a laborer’s wife, she would, by the peculiar ethics adopted by the
-corrupt English aristocracy, have been a fit subject for the police
-court.
-
-Another of the disgusting apings of foreign vices, along with the
-foolish claim of “caste,” is exhibited in the delightful Deacon
-assassination in France. Another representative of American
-aristocracy, so-called, would play the part of a French Countess.
-Fortunately for the world, the man Deacon had left remaining a few
-drops of American blood in his veins, and rid the world of a brute,
-as any honest American laboring man would have done. The class which
-the shameless imitators pretend to represent in America assumed the
-privilege abroad (in Europe) to indulge in drunkenness, debauchery,
-gambling, and general immorality; leaving the virtues, sobriety,
-honesty, and purity to the lower classes. In America, there being but
-one class, those who assume to imitate the manners of the immoral, to
-carouse and debauch, render themselves obnoxious to the mass of the
-people, and that political party which becomes identified in the minds
-of the people with any set, or “caste,” possessing such distorted
-principles, becomes correspondingly objectionable. There can be but
-one law of morals in America. Debauchery, drunkenness, and dishonesty,
-though sheltered by a palace, are as odoriferous to the senses of the
-people as the polluted air from a sewer.
-
-There are many able and learned men of America who think seriously and
-have thought intently for years upon this subject, but hesitated to
-utter sentiments that falsely and absurdly are called socialistic and
-anarchical. There is no desire upon the part of Americans to deprive
-any citizen of his property and his freedom to enjoy the same as he
-will, so long as he has due appreciation of and respect for the rights
-of others. No man in the Republic can possess any right, by reason of
-his wealth, greater than the poorest in the land. Each citizen of a
-republic, in consideration of the liberty that he enjoys, surrenders
-all claim to be anything except one of the people, and any assumed
-immunity from the consequences of his acts is objectionable, and will
-be visited upon his head. The roistering sons of millionaires, though
-clad in evening dress and drunk with champagne, are no less disgusting
-rowdies than the sons of the laborer, hilarious as the result of gin
-drunk in a groggery. Unfortunately for the Republican party, in looking
-over the row of America’s money princes (?), we find “Republican”
-written behind almost every name. The villa at Newport, the castle in
-Scotland, the Tally Ho coach, is generally owned by a Republican. In
-fact, our would-be aristocrats began to assume that it was almost a
-disgrace to be anything else than a Republican; one would lose “caste”
-thereby.
-
-The Republican party, of course, is not responsible for this. The
-Republican candidate, Benjamin Harrison, than whom there is no better
-example of a patriotic, earnest, honest American, Christian, father,
-husband, son, gentleman, and soldier, is worthy to be an example to the
-young men of our country. He was not responsible for the impression
-made by this excrescence that has grown like some hideous and poisonous
-fungus upon the stalwart oak planted by Abraham Lincoln. The decay
-has arisen from this polluting attachment. The McKinley Bill and
-Protection, while possessing many points of excellence it behooves the
-country to examine with care before erasing from the statute-books, are
-not responsible for the natural animosity of the people toward this
-child, deformed, misshapen, Sham Aristocracy, clinging to the skirts of
-the Republican party. The attack was upon this hideous tumor, and, by
-its amputation by the people, the life-blood of the Republican party
-has become exhausted; for the operation necessarily was made painful,
-deep-felt, and severe. The Democratic party derived all the benefit
-from the defeat of the Republican party, at the hands of the people,
-without having contributed thereto to any amazing extent.
-
-The result of the election of 1892 should be as the warning written on
-the wall was to Belshazzar. The rich must understand, and learn now in
-time, that they hold their lives, their liberty, and their property
-in this Republic only by the will of the people; that the people,
-Democratic always in the broad sense of democracy, are long-suffering;
-but retribution, as surely as night doth follow day, may come, if
-this warning be not heeded, in some more terrible shape than an
-overwhelming defeat, at the polls, of that party to which the rich
-attach themselves. It is not well to flaunt riches or claim privileges
-or “caste” before the face of a free people.
-
-It would be well for the rich to learn this lesson. It was taught by
-the people under the name of the Republican party when they elected
-Lincoln; under the name of the Democratic party when they elected
-Andrew Jackson; under the name of the Democratic party when they
-elected Thomas Jefferson. It was taught to rich and powerful England
-when she lost a continent in 1776; it was taught to Anglo-Saxon England
-when Charles I. lost his head; it was taught to France when the
-long-suffering peasantry and poor broke down the barriers of “caste,”
-and flooded her fair fields with the tide of blood.
-
-It has been taught in every nation--Rome, Greece, Egypt. The people
-will suffer long and much, but the resentment occasioned by “caste” and
-social distinction far outweighs any advantages that money can buy them.
-
-November 8, 1892, showed that the workmen couldn’t be bought, the
-farmer couldn’t be bought, the veteran couldn’t be bought, the negro
-couldn’t be bought, by all the fair promises held out by the party
-of Protection, because this cup of nectar was poisoned by the deadly
-essence of “caste,” which means extinction of all that the people
-hold dear. Should the Democratic party create, cause, or have arise
-under its administration, and become attached to that party, any set,
-or “caste,” claiming any superiority over their fellow-citizens, the
-Democratic party would be killed, though the eternal sun might never
-shine again upon America should that party be defeated.
-
-The purpose and object for which this book is written is not for the
-instruction of the people as to how they _are_ to do, but it is, if
-possible, to put notes to the music that has been singing in the hearts
-of the Common People,--for we are all Common People. That song which
-echoes our own sentiments, even though we cannot sing the song, is
-always the sweetest. The man who tells the story we have thought and
-felt, is the greatest writer to us. Dickens is dear to the hearts of
-us all because he echoes and puts in words the sentiments of our own
-souls. If this book tell, in words, that which has been throbbing in
-the breasts of the people, it but articulates that which they have
-spoken silently for themselves. The author is one of the people, but he
-has felt what he believes others have felt. The book is not intended
-to aid or to harm either the Democratic or the Republican party.
-The writer is a supporter of ANY party, call it what you will, that
-represents the BEST INTERESTS, THE HONOR, DIGNITY, VIRTUE, of AMERICANS
-and American homes.
-
-
-     “Is there, for honest poverty
-       That hangs his head, and a’ that;
-     The coward-slave, we pass him by.
-       We dare be poor, for a’ that;
-     For a’ that, and a’ that,
-       Our toil’s obscure, and a’ that,
-     The rank is but the guinea’s stamp;
-       The man’s the gowd for a’ that.
-
-     “What though on homely fare we dine,
-       A prince can make a belted knight,
-     A marquis, duke, and a’ that;
-       But an honest man’s aboon his might
-     Guid faith he manna fa’ that,
-       For a’ that, and a’ that,
-     The pith o’ sense and pride o’ worth
-       Are higher ranks than a’ that.
-
-     “Then let us pray that come it may,
-       As come it will for a’ that,
-     That sense and worth, o’er a’ the earth,
-       May hear the gree, and a’ that,
-     That man to man, the world o’er,
-       Shall brothers be for a’ that.”
-
-
-[Illustration: GROVER CLEVELAND.
-
-Selected by the “Common People,” November 8, 1892, to Represent the
-Interests of the Masses against the Classes.]
-
-FOOTNOTE:
-
-[1] This story has frequently been related, verbally, but the Author
-has never seen it in print. Its authenticity, however, is fully
-established.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER I.
-
-VOX POPULI, VOX DEI.
-
-
-The voice of the people, is indeed, the voice of God, and in grand and
-tremendous tones has that voice resounded through the land. The 8th of
-November, 1892, will long be remembered in the history of our country
-as one which stands in the annals of time as a monument to the might
-of the people, upon which might be carved in letters of everlasting
-durability, “Do not tread on me.” The tidal wave, so often referred to
-by the newspapers, has come with unexpected momentum, washing aside the
-puny politicians as thistledown on the mighty stream of the Mississippi.
-
-That mirror of public opinion, so generally correct, so apt to be
-accurate, is absolutely stupefied by the tremendous character of the
-uprising of the people. Even those who fondly hoped for victory,
-among the Democratic journalists, stand in reverential awe before the
-stupendous results so noiselessly and irresistibly effected by the
-masses. They vainly seek, like one bereft of sight, for the delusive
-cause of this great outpouring of Democratic sentiment.
-
-That most preëminent and respectable organ of mugwump principles,
-the New York _Times_, of November 9, 1892, sounds the praises of
-Cleveland and his popularity as the cause; which is pardonable, as the
-_Times_ has consistently closed its eyes before the blinding light of
-Cleveland’s preëminence and brilliancy, and refused to see anything
-else or any other issue in the campaign, arguing that by the magic of
-the one word, “Cleveland,” victory could be attained. Its leader on
-the result of the people’s resentment to the crime of “caste” in our
-country, is a sounding eulogy upon Cleveland, with here and there a
-glimmer of light breaking upon the vision.
-
-
-     “Meanwhile the victory of Mr. Cleveland is the most signal since
-     the re-election of Lincoln in the last year of the war for the
-     Union.”
-
-
-It is noticeable in this paragraph that Cleveland’s preëminence so
-overshadowed, in the mind of the _Times_, Lincoln, that the prefix
-of “Mr.” is used before Cleveland’s name, while just plain “Lincoln”
-is good enough for the man who preserved the Union. One would hardly
-expect, therefore, that the _Times_ would do more than shout the
-praises of Cleveland, and give no credit to the sense of the people for
-their victory. Quoting from their article:--
-
-
-     “The nomination of Mr. Cleveland was dictated by the general
-     sentiment of the party, inspired wholly by confidence in his
-     integrity, purity, firmness, and sound sense. It was unaided by
-     any organization, promoted by no machine, advocated by no literary
-     bureau, appealed to no base passion. * * * * * * His election is
-     due to the recognition by hundreds of thousands of sound-hearted
-     American citizens, who had not before acted with the Democratic
-     party, that under his guidance, with its avowed policy, that
-     party was a fit depository of the powers of the Government. It
-     is, moreover, preëminently a victory of courage and fidelity to
-     principle. The Chicago Convention, in taking Mr. Cleveland as its
-     candidate, planted itself firmly on the ground of principle.”
-
-
-It is perfectly plain to be seen that, from a source where the wreath
-of victory dangles, inscribed with but one word, and that “Cleveland,”
-one could hardly expect to find information as to the cause that
-brought about this revolution in the minds of the people. Not that
-there is any objection to the praises of Cleveland, because all that
-they say of him is believed by thousands throughout the country, and
-the same thing is believed to be true of thousands of other men whom
-the Democratic party might have nominated. Horace Greeley, could he
-have been taken from his tomb and reanimated, would just as surely
-have been elected upon the Democratic ticket, had the people believed,
-as they did, that that ticket represented that “caste,” moneyed
-aristocracy, to which they were bitterly in their heart of hearts
-opposed.
-
-The New York _World_, controlled by one of the brightest, keenest, and
-shrewdest of men in the journalistic field, in an excellent editorial
-of November 10, 1892, proceeds to tell what the victory means. And one
-sentence particularly would be significant, if followed by a little
-definition of “plutocracy.” Were this word significant enough to cover
-the objectionable features of the peculiar kind of “caste” which had
-become identified with the Republican party, it would be sufficient,
-but such is not the understanding of the word.
-
-New York _World_, November 10th: “The President elect is the very
-embodiment of conscientious caution. He is preëminently conservative.
-His administration will mean economy, reform, retrenchment in every
-branch of the Government. The victory does mean putting a stop to riot,
-extravagance, profligacy, and corruption.”
-
-Few, very few, men who voted the Democratic ticket believe that there
-had been corruption, profligacy, under the Republican administration.
-The people were not directly affected by the aforesaid charges. The
-victory did not mean that.
-
-The people are no longer political drones; they are thinking men, moved
-by sentiments and forces which have not as yet been explained by the
-most laborious newspaper articles written in the heat of the campaign,
-actuated in many cases by partisan interests, party journalists,
-aristocratic tendencies, and political affiliations. Each would see
-only his side of the party shield, and that was sure to be golden.
-
-Mr. Cleveland, in his speech at the Manhattan Club, New York,
-commenting on this fact, states: “The American people have become
-political, and more thoughtful, and more watchful than they were ten
-years ago. They are considering now, vastly more than they were then,
-political principles and party policies, in distinction from party
-manipulation and distribution of rewards for political services and
-activities.”
-
-The reason for this is obvious. The country has been flooded of late
-years with newspapers, brought down to a nominal price; the people
-have read them thoughtfully; have written to them for explanations
-of difficulties and doubts arising in their minds, and have profited
-by these explanations. They have seen paraded in the newspapers the
-exhibitions of the pride of “caste”; they have seen chronicled the
-doings of the American Duchess with her divorced duke; they have
-learned to hate that which the Republican party would have preached
-to them as the source of all their happiness and prosperity. The
-Republican party, viewing it only as a means whereby fortunes were
-accumulated, espoused the principles which created a desire in the
-minds of divorced dukes, puppified lords, and degenerate descendants of
-English nobility, from cupidity, to marry America’s fair daughters. The
-cheapness of the newspapers placed within the reach of the poorest the
-information upon which he based his faith. The penny paper is the great
-leveler of the land.
-
-The New York _Herald_, of November 13th, commenting on the recent
-election, takes a biblical text as its theme: “Then were the people of
-Israel divided into two parts. Half of the people followed Tibni and
-half followed Omri; but the people that followed Omri prevailed against
-the people that followed Tibni: so Tibni died and Omri reigned,” and
-says:--
-
-
-     “In those days, questions in dispute were settled by pitched
-     battles. In these modern times, the arbitrament of war has become
-     wellnigh obsolete, and national policies are decided by ballots
-     instead of bayonets. We doubt if the history of the world records
-     a spectacle as inspiring or instructive as that presented by the
-     American people on Tuesday last, when by an orderly revolution
-     they sent one class of political ideas to the rear, and another
-     class to the front. The party leaders on both sides may have gone
-     into the conflict for personal emolument, or some advantage for
-     their followers, which is scarcely concealed under the words,
-     ‘Patronage and Purposes,’ but the body of the people were the
-     rank and file--the merchant, mechanic, artisan, and farmer; they
-     cast their votes for the greatest good to the greatest number,
-     because the prosperity of the whole means the prosperity of each.”
-
-
-In other words, 65,000,000 people have made themselves acquainted with
-the principles which underlie their government; have learned, through
-innumerable newspapers, which fall on hill and prairie as thick as
-snowflakes in December, the value and effect of the differing national
-policies, and on election day, expressed an intelligent and honest
-opinion.
-
-In his work on “The American Commonwealth,” James Bryce put the matter
-in terse and brilliant language, as follows:--
-
-
-     “The parties are not the ultimate force in the conduct of affairs.
-     Public opinion--that is, the mind and conduct of the whole
-     nation--is the opinion of the persons who are included in the
-     parties, for the parties taken together are the nation, and the
-     parties, each claiming to be its true exponent, seek to use it for
-     their purposes. Yet, it stands above the parties, being cooler
-     and larger-minded than they are. It awes party leaders, and holds
-     in check party organization. No one openly ventures to resist it.
-     It is the product of a greater number of minds than in any other
-     country, and it is more indisputably sovereign. It is the central
-     point in the whole American policy.”
-
-
-The people have spoken. Democracy is triumphant. Democratic principles
-have prevailed. They are rooted in the hearts of the common people.
-The voice of God has spoken. To you, Mr. Cleveland, is entrusted a
-great task. You took the enemy in flank, you invaded his own territory;
-you put him upon the defensive, and the defence was unsuccessful, while
-his offensive operations against the Democratic stronghold crippled
-and embarrassed. You have the love of the American people. Nourish
-it; cherish it as the apple of your eye, and your name will go down
-into history, linked with the name of Jackson, Jefferson, and Abraham
-Lincoln.
-
-Mr. Thomas Dolan, a well-known manufacturer, of Philadelphia, told
-some plain truths in an impromptu speech at the Clover Club banquet in
-that city, shortly after the election. Some parts of it have become
-public. Mr. Dolan was asked, jokingly, why “it snowed the next day.”
-His answer had the pungent, incisive, trenchant quality characteristic
-of the man. “You ask me,” he said, “why it snowed the next day. If
-you want an answer, I will give it to you; but I must give it in
-plain terms, for I can speak in no other way. It ‘snowed the next
-day’ because there was the most stupendous lying in this campaign of
-any that I have ever known. It has been said here this evening, that
-this was a campaign without personality and without mud-flinging. That
-may have been so in the treatment of candidates, but in reference
-to others, it was a campaign of shameless lying, vituperation, and
-calumny. The manufacturers of the country, some of those here to-night,
-were held up as thieves and robbers who are stealing what belongs
-to labor. The very men who are giving labor its employment, and are
-seeking to assure it good wages, were assailed and denounced as its
-worst enemies. The Democratic press was full of abuse of those who
-have done their best to build up the prosperity of the country. There
-never was more unscrupulous lying than there has been in the dishonest
-and demagogic attempt to array class against class, and it is because
-of this persistent lying, imposed upon the people for the time being,
-that ‘it snowed the next day.’” This is, of course, an explanation by a
-_representative_ Republican, of Republican defeat.
-
-The New York _World_, of November 20th, gives a better explanation,
-though not a true one:--
-
-
-     Republican politicians are searching in all manner of
-     out-of-the-way corners for the causes of their party’s defeat.
-     They are carefully overlooking the actual cause which lies open to
-     less prejudiced view. The Republican party was defeated because
-     its politicians have strayed away from honest and patriotic
-     courses. They have worshiped strange gods; they have allied
-     themselves and their party with the plutocratic interests of the
-     country; they have betrayed the people to the monopolists; they
-     have sought to substitute money for manhood as the controlling
-     power; they have tried to buy elections; they have squandered
-     the substance of the country, in order that there might be no
-     reduction in oppressive taxes, which indirectly, but enormously,
-     benefit a favored class. The party is punished for its sins. It
-     has forfeited popular confidence by its misconduct. It has ceased
-     to deserve power, and the people have taken power from it.
-
-
-Murat Halstead, a deep thinker, wielding a forceful pen, writing about
-the recent mistakes of the Republican party, says:--
-
-
-     “There was too much ‘Tariff Reform’ and too little attention
-     to practical politics in the conduct of the recent Republican
-     campaign. The mistakes of the Republican party were many. They
-     attempted too much tariff reform and too much ballot reform and
-     too much civil service reform, and strangely mingled too little
-     and too great attention to practical politics. The high character
-     of the Harrison administration was not of the ‘fetching’ sort.
-     There were strong and distinguished Republicans sharply opposed to
-     another Harrison administration, in California, Nevada, Colorado,
-     Kansas, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York,
-     Maine, and several of the Southern States. In some States, there
-     was grief because he did too much for Senators and too little for
-     Representatives, and in others, the Senators suffered because the
-     Representatives were especially recognized; and there were scores
-     of personal irritations that were nothing in themselves, but in
-     the aggregate, became an element of mischief that was magnified
-     into disaster. The ranks seemed solid toward the close of the
-     campaign, but there were weaknesses, here and there, known to
-     those whose information was from the interior. There were three
-     things that seemed to give assurances of Republican success:
-     First, the country was prosperous, and the economic value of
-     protection seemed to be demonstrated, and nowhere more clearly
-     than in the Homestead strike. Second, it was the testimony of home
-     statistics and foreign news that the McKinley tariff was helping
-     our workingmen, and had a powerful tendency to the transfer of
-     industries to our shores, while the reciprocity treaties were
-     aiding our manufacturers and food producers alike to new markets.
-     Two of the grandest steamships on the Atlantic, one the swiftest
-     ever built, were to hoist the stars and stripes and be transferred
-     from the British navy to our own, and this was understood to be
-     the dawn of an era of restoration of our lost strength on the
-     seas. Third, President Harrison was revealed to the nation in
-     his administration as a man of the highest order of ability, of
-     industry that never wavered, and will that was unflinching and
-     executive, while he was the readiest, most varied, and striking
-     public speaker of his time. We have had no President with more
-     influence with his own administration than he wielded. The
-     Republicans have so long been accustomed to holding at least a
-     veto on the Democratic party, that they could not be aroused to
-     the full appreciation of the danger of giving that party the whole
-     power of Government. The masses of men declined, in this fast
-     age and rapidly-developing country, to be warned by the events
-     of more than thirty years ago. The first surprise was public
-     apathy. There were few displays. It was not a great summer and
-     autumn for brass bands and torches. It was not a great year for
-     newspapers. Those that largely increased their circulation did it
-     outside of presidential excitements and political attractions. The
-     second surprise was the immense registration. Then it was seen
-     that comparative public quietude did not mean lack of interest.
-     Everybody knew something was going to happen. Republicans were
-     cheered, and said: ‘This means the quiet vote. The secret ballot
-     is with us. Times are good. There’ll be a big vote, on the quiet,
-     to let well enough alone. Harrison is a great President, and it
-     is the will of the people that he shall continue his good works.’
-     The Democrats said: ‘The secret ballot is with us this time.
-     The workingman is dissatisfied. He gets more wages than he does
-     abroad, but he holds that he is robbed of his share of the riches
-     of the land, and the quiet vote is with us. The workshops are
-     for a change.’ There was much in what they said. The workingmen
-     gave the Democrats New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Indiana,
-     Illinois, and the election; but was there ever such a combination
-     of antagonisms gathered into an opposition force, to carry the
-     Government by storm, as that which the Democracy was enabled
-     to make? Contrast the Democratic platforms of Connecticut and
-     Kentucky. They are more flagrantly opposed to each other than the
-     Minneapolis and Chicago papers. Connecticut is rankly Protection,
-     and Kentucky rabidly Free Trade. Both are for freedom. The
-     Democrats joined with the Populists in several States to give
-     Weaver votes, and in other States terrorized, threatened,
-     assaulted, and cheated his opponents.
-
-     “Take the money matters; we find the Democracy are red dog, wild
-     cat, rag baby, silver pig, or gold bug, according to the local
-     demands. They are all for Cleveland, however. The very ferocity
-     of the personal factions of the Democratic party in New York
-     was converted into steam power to drive the Cleveland machine.
-     There was emulation in his service, between his old friends and
-     enemies; and the enemies of other days exceeded the friends in
-     the competitive struggle. The Democrats who hoped he would be
-     defeated, and there were many thousands of them, were the most
-     particular of men to vote for him because they felt their future
-     in the party depended upon their ‘record.’ What they wanted was to
-     be beaten in the ‘give-a-way game,’ and they trusted to the last
-     to be able to say: ‘There, you see how it is; we told you he was
-     impossible. We’ve done all we could, and it is just as we said.’
-
-     “When the shriekers of calamity are able to harness the prosperity
-     of the country and turn it against the Government; when the
-     beneficiaries of a great policy turn against it and vote it down;
-     when those who lick the cream of good times, hunger and thirst
-     for experimental changes; when opposing interests and factions,
-     principles and purposes, personalities and all the potencies
-     of all the fads, can be united for a common purpose, there are
-     surprises for citizens who have held in a commonplace way, but
-     the unreasonable and inconsistent, the unwarrantable and the
-     illogical, must also be the impracticable.
-
-     “It has been remarked of St. Petersburg, that in case of the
-     occurrence of, first, a great flood in the Neva; second,
-     extraordinary high tide; third, a long, strong blow from the gulf,
-     the city must be overwhelmed. The years, the decades, and the
-     centuries come and go without the disaster. It was long understood
-     in the Ohio valley that there would be a flood beating all in
-     history, and competing with Indian tradition, if there happened,
-     in the order set down, these events: (1) during a wintry night,
-     a sudden general rain, followed quickly by a freeze, covering
-     Western New York and Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Kentucky, West
-     North Carolina, Tennessee, Ohio, and Indiana with a sheet of
-     ice; (2) if, upon this vast glassy surface, there should fall a
-     series of heavy snows; (3) if, upon the snow, there should come
-     rain, beginning near the Mississippi, which should be full and
-     filling all the streams, locking them from the mouths against
-     speedy discharge; (4) and if there followed rain-storms for a
-     week, so distributed as to boom all the rivers in order from west
-     to east; (5) culminating with three tremendous downpours over all
-     the mountain regions, sweeping from the glazed earth the whole
-     accumulation of snows, and so timed as to tumble all the floods
-     at once into the Ohio, whose channel has been obstructed by the
-     piers of many bridges, and a habit of encroaching upon it, then
-     the river would make a demonstration memorable and marvelous.
-     All this took place, just as we have set it down, five winters
-     ago, and the high-water-mark at Cincinnati is seventy feet above
-     low-water-mark. Up to this, the boast of the old folks in the
-     valley was, that they had seen ‘the flood of ’32,’ and there could
-     never be anything like it. The world did not now-a-days afford
-     such spectacles as they had beheld in ’32! A few dingy old houses
-     had incredible high-water ’32 marks upon it. If the river looked
-     angry, and rushed through a few low streets, the veterans would
-     say: ‘You should have seen the flood of ’32. ’Twas the biggest
-     thing we ever had, or ever will have. But they do say the Indians
-     said, they once hitched canoes to walnut trees away above the ’32
-     mark; but them Indians was such liars.’ The flood of 1885 beat
-     that of 1832 two feet, and the flood of 1887 was nearly seven feet
-     above the old high-water-mark. Averaging the chances, it will not
-     happen again for one hundred years. The river Rhine has a way of
-     rising at the same time with the Ohio, and was higher in 1885
-     than it had been in two hundred years. There was favoring the
-     Democratic party this year, such a combination of circumstances as
-     that which made an Ohio flood seem a prodigy. The high-water-mark
-     is astounding. The country is still here. There is something to
-     eat, and even to drink. Such a Democratic disaster will not be due
-     again for a generation.”
-
-
-John Russell Young, the brilliant journalist, writing in the
-Philadelphia _Evening Star_, quoted by the New York _Press_, of
-November 19th, has his explanation for the defeat ready: “Communities
-are like men, like women, like children, like dogs. Why do they do it?
-Why does a man buy wildcat stocks? Why does a woman rave over a bonnet,
-or marry a student of divinity? Why? Because we are more or less fools,
-even as the good Lord made us fools, and if we were not fools, it would
-be a teasing, tiresome world. Why does a boy go to bed as cross as
-the roaring forties after his Christmas dinner? He has had too much
-mince pie. The country has had too much mince pie. It kicks. It kicked
-after Quincy Adams, the best of all Presidents. It kicked after Van
-Buren, who was as downy as an Angora cat. It kicked after Arthur, whose
-administration was sunshine. It kicks after Harrison, the radiant,
-prosperous Government. Too much mince pie! Cleveland comes in because
-of his medicinal properties. We must take to our herbs now and then.”
-
-The practical politicians of the Republican party feel it incumbent
-upon them to give their version of the great defeat. James S.
-Clarkson, who, for many years, has been a guiding spirit among
-Republican leaders, of the late verdict says: “It is an order from the
-American people for a change in the industrial economic policy of the
-Government.” He charges that the Republican party has lost strength
-and votes among the rich and among the people of independent means,
-who now want cheap labor; also among the workingmen, who have come to
-believe that free trade will cheapen the expense of living, while the
-Trades-Unions will still keep up their wages. He says: “The result is
-not a personal defeat of President Harrison, nor really a defeat of
-the party. It was a Protection defeat, a repudiation of high tariff, a
-Republican reverse in a field where it put aside all the nobler issues,
-and staked everything on economic and mercenary issues.”
-
-The surprising overturn of affairs in the distinctly Republican State
-of Illinois is accounted for by Senator Cullom by distinctive issues
-other than the McKinley and Force Bills: “Our losses in this State are
-mainly due to the school question, but in the nation at large they
-are due, in my judgment, to the passage of the McKinley law, and the
-impression in the minds of the masses in regard to it. When it was
-passed, the people expected us to revise the tariff, and revise it in
-the direction of reducing duties, and, while we did make reductions,
-they were dissatisfied because so many increases were made. When
-the bill came to the Senate from the House, we cut many of these in
-pieces, but, when it went back to the House and got into the Conference
-Committee, enough of them were restored to put us on the defensive
-and at a great disadvantage. Yes, I think our defeat can fairly be
-attributed to the McKinley Bill,” and Senator Cullom represents the
-State of Abraham Lincoln. The prairies that gave breath to the typical
-champion of the people, produced this statesman, who, representing
-the State of a man who stands first in the minds of the people as
-their representative, sees only the indications of the mercenary
-spirit of the people. How Abraham Lincoln would have gauged correctly,
-instinctively, the heart-throbs of the people whom he assumed to
-represent in the councils of the nation!
-
-Senator Cullom, in his opinion, mirrors only the reflection, cast upon
-the surface of his mind, by the aristocratic and multi-millionaired
-Senate of the Union, in which he occupies a seat. He sees only the
-cold, hard dollars and cents at issue.
-
-He does not appreciate, as Abraham Lincoln would have done, the
-feeling of the people whom he pretends to represent. In every prairie
-home of Illinois there was an insulted wife or mother by the assumed
-distinctions made by the would-be aristocrats of the Republican party.
-Stevenson’s speeches awakened no echo in their hearts, except that it
-gave an opportunity for the exhibition of the old, old story, written
-by the swords of the Anglo-Saxon people, “Caste is a crime.” That the
-State of all States, Illinois, which gave to the Federal Union Abraham
-Lincoln, should be presented in the sedate Senate of the Union, by a
-man whose views are so narrowed by the horizon of his own thoughts as
-to express a sentiment like the foregoing; namely, that the people
-were governed in their selection of their representative, the Chief
-Magistrate, by the power of the pocketbook; to be so unresponsive to
-the throbbing hearts of his constituency, is most disappointing.
-
-Editors can be at times epigrammatic, and this election has brought
-forth some keen and trenchant opinions on the causes of defeat.
-Here are a few of them. All of them seek, as a child playing
-blind-man’s-buff, in darkness, for that which, had the bandage which
-blinds them been removed from their eyes, would have been made plain,
-and which was occasioned by their own presumption in assuming to
-measure the depths and power of the people’s feelings and impulses:--
-
-Clark Howell, in the Atlanta _Constitution_, says: “Now, after
-thirty-one years, since Buchanan’s Democratic administration, another
-political revolution has taken place, and, as a result, the election
-of 1852, which destroyed the Whig party, is repeated in the Waterloo
-defeat of the Republican party, and the question is, will this defeat
-finish the career of that party? The probability is that it will.”
-
-The Atlanta _Constitution_, of November 17th, in a brisk editorial,
-states that “Colonel J. B. McCullagh, the esteemed editor of the St.
-Louis _Globe-Democrat_, is not very happy. Naturally, he has his
-regrets and his hours of gloom, but he is not so miserable that he is
-unable to appreciate a mystery that crosses and recrosses his path in
-broad daylight. He cannot, for instance, understand the post-mortem
-talk of his party leaders. ‘Curiously enough,’ he says, ‘they are now
-claiming that Harrison was defeated by the very things which they then
-said must insure his success.’ Of course, these statements have a
-humorous twang, but it seems to us that a Republican as prominent as
-Colonel McCullagh would be willing to drop a veil over these gibbering
-evidences of human frailty. After all is said, there is but one trouble
-with the Republicans. They have but one regret. Editor Grubb, of
-Darien, outlined the situation very aptly when he said that the only
-thing that the Republicans desired, was the opportunity to steal a
-State. They are perfectly willing to see Harrison defeated; they are
-perfectly willing to retire from the control of the government; the
-only bitterness they feel is the realization of the fact that they
-failed to steal a State. They stole three Southern States in 1876.
-They stole two Northern States in 1890, and they stole a Western State
-last year, but they have failed to steal a single one in 1892. It
-is no wonder they are going about talking wildly and rolling their
-eyes. These are the symptoms of paresis, and, under the circumstances,
-Senator McCullagh ought to forgive them. The grief and disappointment
-of the Republican leaders are natural; a general election, and not a
-State stolen! Surely, their hands have lost their cunning. They made a
-tremendous effort to keep up their record. They tried to steal Delaware
-and West Virginia and Connecticut, but everywhere the Democrats met
-them and exposed their plans. The result was, that they failed to steal
-even one State. Under the circumstances, we think editor McCullagh
-should treat his brethren gently; he should not make satellite
-allusions to their troubles. Let them gibber.”
-
-Thank God, with our Australian Ballot system, each free-born
-American citizen carries with him into the voter’s booth, if he
-be at all sensitive, and clothed with an enlightened conscience,
-the same awful sense of responsibility with which the enlightened
-and tender-conscienced Catholic enters the sacred realm of the
-confessional-box. Tremendous issues are at stake. He feels their force,
-and arises to the occasion, as he ever has done when the exercise of
-worth, virtue, or virility has been required upon his part, and of the
-great mass of the common people, Daniel Webster, Henry Clay, Abraham
-Lincoln, furnish fair samples of the people’s worth, virtue, and
-virility.
-
-The Buffalo _Commercial_, than which there is no paper in the State of
-New York in possession of more perspicacity and political common-sense,
-in speaking of Senator Allison, a Republican leader of the Senate,
-states that just before leaving for Europe he intimated that the
-McKinley Bill was too strong a specific for the Republican party. “You
-remember,” he said, “that epitaph on the tombstone of the young man who
-died before his time: ‘I was well; medicine made me ill, and here I
-lie.’”
-
-The Illinois _State Journal_ remarks: “Until the post-mortem is held,
-it is, perhaps, just as well not to be certain what it was that hit
-the G. O. P. last Tuesday. It may have been the McKinley Bill, or the
-Homestead matter, or the Lutheran business, or the naturalized vote,
-or several other things, and then it may have been a complication of
-all these diseases.” Thou wise physician, who would lose sight of the
-most important evidence of the disease, the discontent of the people,
-the artificial class distinction created by the sham aristocracy of
-America, the diagnosis of the disease, called discontent, as made by
-the press generally, is as faulty and erroneous as would be the opinion
-of the quack who would call measles, smallpox. Every symptom of the
-displeasure of the people at the prevalence of the crime of “caste” in
-our country was evident; yet, apparently, the most learned failed to
-discern it.
-
-The Toledo _Bee_ says: “The Republican party is dead. The step backward
-has been taken, and it was a step back that led the party over the
-precipice of power into the depths of oblivion. The Democratic party
-has relegated the boodlers, the spoilsmen, and the factional leaders to
-the rear. What is there left for us to live for?”
-
-Says the Louisville _Courier-Journal_: “The people will have none of
-its high tariffs, and none of its Force Bills; but without its high
-tariffs and its Force Bills, it is only an organized hunt for official
-plunder. The people will not support it in its old course, and will not
-believe its brittle promises of reform.”
-
-“‘High tariff did it,’ said Mr. Harrison; but in taking satisfaction
-for his defeat out of the Napoleonic McKinley, the President is less
-than just to the magnetic Blaine; for, if high tariff caused the
-explosion, despite the ‘reciprocity attachment,’ what might it not
-have done without that little Pan-American vent-hole?” This from the
-Philadelphia _Record_.
-
-The President, had he combined the magnetism of Blaine, the Napoleonic
-ability of McKinley,--yea, had he, in fact, borne the magical name of
-Lincoln,--could not possibly have been re-elected, for the people were
-opposed to the ideas of “caste,” fostered with such care by the members
-of the Republican party, in whom, in some mystical manner, have become
-concentrated the wealth and objectionable characteristics which tended
-to make the Southern cavalier so unpopular in 1860. The people, in
-their wrath, would have risen against any party so besmeared with the
-slime of that noxious crime.
-
-The Atlanta _Constitution_, of November 17th, claims that “the leaders
-of the two great parties have had a good deal to say during the past
-few months about ‘the campaign of education.’ In the main, this
-phrase very correctly describes the work of both parties. Republican
-speakers and journalists work night and day to convince the people
-of the benefits of high Protection. On the other hand, the Democrats
-are equally active in exposing the true inwardness of McKinleyism and
-class legislation. This educational literature covered the country,
-and the average voter got a clearer insight of the questions at issue
-than he ever had before. One effort of this campaign of education was
-to eliminate personalities; principles and measures were discussed,
-and the candidates escaped the usual mudslinging. Another result is
-seen in the sweeping and decisive nature of the vote. The revolution
-was so complete that the defeated side realized the utter absurdity
-of indulging in any bitter complaints, with the great mass of American
-people arrayed against them. Our victory was so crushing, that it
-absolutely restored something like good feeling; and we find Whitelaw
-Reid and Chauncey Depew saying pleasant things to Mr. Cleveland at a
-banquet, and speaking of their defeat in a humorous fashion. This would
-not have been the case, had the election been close and only a bare
-majority of electoral votes for the successful ticket. Altogether, the
-country has good reason to be satisfied with its campaign of education.
-It has purified our politics, wiped out sectional lines, and made our
-people more thoroughly American than ever.”
-
-And for the erasure of sectionalism, God be thanked! but that a man of
-Mr. Clark Howell’s preëminent ability should have wandered around so
-near to the object of his search, the cause of the Republican party’s
-defeat, and not found it, is astonishing. In his own home, the State of
-Georgia, the Empire State of the South, and as editor of the leading
-paper in the State, that he should be so oblivious to the fact that
-the election, by the votes of the people, was a protest upon the part
-of the people against the assumption by the rich, that such a thing as
-“caste” could be possible in America.
-
-Georgia, of all the Southern States, is preëminently industrial.
-Oglethorpe, when he first settled on the banks of the Savannah river,
-was himself surrounded by the poor debtors of England. The Salzburgers,
-who sought the shores of the uninhabited, uncivilized, new colony, were
-poor, uncultured people. Georgia never possessed, as a colony or as a
-State, the aristocratic tendencies of its neighbor, South Carolina. The
-foremost men have ever been essentially of the people; her settlers
-largely of the Democratic masses; the names preëminent in her history
-are the names of industrial New England. So Democratic is and was the
-State of Georgia, that her most eminent son, Alexander H. Stevens,
-had to be weaned away reluctantly from the doctrine of which Abraham
-Lincoln was the personification. Since the war, the State of Georgia
-more readily adapted herself to the new condition created by the result
-of the struggle. It was never a State of tremendous landed proprietors.
-The influx of emigration from the crowded Northern States found readier
-assimilation in the State of Georgia than in any other Southern
-State. In that State, the negro sooner realized his responsibilities
-as a citizen of the South, sooner became convinced that his best and
-wisest course was to merge himself into the large class of toilers and
-laborers in the commonwealth. That a man with the opportunity, ability,
-and brilliancy of Clark Howell, should become so utterly befogged by
-the mists arising from the marsh of old party cries and principles,
-should fail to recognize that the tremendous majority accorded the
-Democratic candidate, was but an exhibition of that spirit which has
-pervaded the State of Georgia from its embryonic existence on the
-Savannah river; that Mr. Howell should have forgotten the lesson taught
-by the forefathers of the Georgians of to-day, that Democracy was one
-of the essential elements to the happiness of the citizens, settlement,
-colony, commonwealth, and State, is passing strange. The very negro,
-upon becoming a Georgian and a citizen, became a Democrat, almost as
-a matter resulting from the atmosphere he breathed. Georgia’s vast
-majority for the Democratic nominee was not rolled up except by the
-aid of the negro, who, in his heart of hearts, is a Democrat, and the
-appeals of the Republican party to his gratitude, claiming that they
-were the emancipators of his race, were as futile as was the waving of
-the bloody shirt in the face of the veterans of the North. The negroes
-of the State of Georgia joined with their fellow-laborers of the
-Anglo-Saxon race, to give added weight to the opposition of the masses
-against “caste” in our country.
-
-The _Mail and Express_, in an editorial of November 9th, says:
-“If Benjamin Harrison is defeated, the people of this country, by
-their ballots yesterday, decided again to try the experiment of the
-Democratic administration. It is most extraordinary and unusual for
-the American people to seek a change in administration at a time of
-unwonted prosperity; to render a verdict in favor of a change, while
-the working masses are everywhere busily employed, while farmers are
-reaping their richest harvests, factories running day and night, and
-building extensions and our foreign trade growing with rapid strides,
-all under the beneficent influences of Republican policy, wisely and
-faithfully administered by a President whose conduct of affairs has
-been conspicuously conservative, successful, acceptable, and clean.
-If Grover Cleveland has been elected, a change in administration has
-been ordered. What shall we get in return? We shall see! The triumph
-of Democracy would mean a radical change in our economical policy. It
-would mean the selection for Vice-President of a man whose political
-record has stamped him as unsafe, untrustworthy, and conspicuously
-unfit for the high office to which he has been called. An ardent
-advocate of the unlimited issue of greenbacks and fraudulent silver;
-a bitter opponent of National Banks, and the advocate of State Banks
-issue; outspoken in his demand for the imposition of the abandoned
-and inquisitorial income tax, Mr. Stevenson would, after the 4th of
-March, occupy a place separated from the Executive head of this
-Government by the frail tenure of a single life. In the Senate, the
-highest legislative body in the land, over which Mr. Stevenson, as
-Vice-President, would preside, a Senate which may possibly have a
-Democratic majority, his influence in favor of economic and financial
-heresies would be potential. Let the people bear in mind the peace,
-the happiness, and the prosperity they now enjoy. When anxiety and
-unrest come, as they speedily would, with the renewed agitation in
-the next Congress, of an attack upon our protective tariff; when the
-spindles of our mills are silent, the forges black with ashes, our
-looms yellow with rust, and unemployed men clamor here as they are
-clamoring to-day in the streets of London and Lancashire against the
-reduction of wages, let them listen to the plausible excuses and
-fine-spun prevarications of the Free Trade tariff reformers, who will
-be responsible. And if, as Vice-President, he should do the evil he can
-do by aiding the meddlers with our financial and taxation systems, the
-honest money men of New York and New England, of Illinois and Indiana,
-who voted for him because he was associated with their idolized free
-trade candidate, would have only themselves to thank for the prospect
-of disaster and panic they might face. They would then pay the penalty
-of their reckless inconsideration. Protection for American homes, for
-American workingmen and American farmers, an honest dollar for honest
-men, and a policy of free trade extension by the beneficent influences
-of reciprocity, may all suffer assaults in the four years to come,
-but we can trust the sober, second judgment of the American people,
-in the light of another but recent experience with the free trade and
-fraudulent silver Democracy, to do again in 1896 what it did with that
-party at the close of the first Cleveland experiment, and turn the
-incompetents out.”
-
-It _is_ most extraordinary and unusual for the American people to seek
-a change in the administration at a time of unwonted prosperity, but
-the inward agitation of soul at the thought of great wrongs committed
-by a pretended beneficent party led to the revolution of ’92, in very
-much the same manner as inward agitation on another subject brought
-about that which placed Abraham Lincoln in the Presidential Chair. The
-American workman is above the American dollar!
-
-The New York _World_, in an editorial of November 16th, says: “The
-_Iron Trade Review_ is putting the manufacturers up to a dodge in order
-to make the people sorry that they voted for Mr. Cleveland. Its advice
-is that the manufacturers reduce the wages of their workingmen ‘to
-fortify themselves in advance in view of the increasing probabilities
-of destructive foreign competition.’ Is this an indication of
-the kindly feeling entertained by the Protectionists for their
-workingmen? They have professed that their tax policy was maintained
-for the purpose of increasing wages. They have been charged with
-misrepresentation; and they are now advised by one of their organs to
-prove that the charge is true, by making the wage-earners suffer in
-order that revenue reform may become unpopular. Nothing could better
-show the dishonesty of the Protection claim that the tariff exists for
-the workingman. If that claim were true, the manufacturers would resist
-every tendency toward downward wages, instead of pushing them down in
-order to gain an advantage for themselves in a political controversy.
-The wages of labor are regulated by the supply and demand of the labor
-market, and the people who would cut down wages, not because they must,
-but because they want to revenge themselves for a Democratic victory by
-making the workingman suffer, are the people who have been insisting
-that the McKinley law repealed the law of supply and demand, and that
-they are the true and unselfish benefactors of the workingmen. Happily,
-the next President is a Democrat.”
-
-[Illustration: General JAMES B. WEAVER.
-
-Presidential Candidate of the People’s Party, 1892.]
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER II.
-
-THE ALLEGED GENERAL DISCONTENT.
-
-
-The workmen of our country, it is true, want better times, cheaper
-clothing, the doing away with trusts, and many other desirable changes;
-but far more than this, they feel the need of the absolute crushing
-out of the last vestige of “caste.” They at last realize that “caste”
-is a crime; and the common people have, at heart, no sympathy with
-criminals, and especially criminals of that class. The common people
-stay at home, work hard, and very seldom have need to “go to Canada,”
-or take a flying trip to Southern Europe. Their sins are mainly
-those of passion. At their best, they are kindly disposed to their
-fellows; but they are _human_. They feel a snub from their employer
-or employer’s son as keenly as their honest, hard-working wives and
-daughters feel the haughty stare and condescending patronage of Madame
-Crœsus and her bejewelled daughters. Here we offer our readers some
-explanations, given by the common, average American citizen, for the
-defeat of the Republican party at the polls on November 5th. The
-article is taken from the pages of the New York _Tribune_, November
-21, 1892, the official organ of the Republican Vice-Presidential
-candidate, and therefore entitled to more than ordinary consideration.
-The article is headed “The General Discontent.”
-
-It consists of talks with the people about the recent election in
-New York State and Vermont. It is, largely, the observations of a
-correspondent who has walked through the State, asking farmers and
-workingmen why they voted for Cleveland. Let it not be forgotten that
-Whitelaw Reid is the editor of this paper.
-
-
-     “The politician who attempts to explain defeat is ‘crying over
-     spilt milk.’ The newspaper which tells ‘how it was done’ is
-     ‘whining.’ The writer of a political obituary has hardly an
-     enviable task. A defeated party is supposed to accept with
-     philosophical resignation the rejection of pet policies, and with
-     the calmness of the fatalist, tell itself that it ‘was to have
-     been.’ The reasons given for the result of the recent election
-     are as numerous as there are differences in the minds of the two
-     parties. Some say that the desire for free trade is the cause of
-     the Republican overthrow. Others, that the thing that did it is
-     the McKinley bill; others again, that the people want the ‘repeal
-     of the Bank Tax law’; but to him that looks beneath the surface,
-     there is ample evidence that the defeat of the Republican party is
-     not mainly due to the ‘unpopularity’ of its candidates, nor to the
-     love which the people are said to bear for Grover Cleveland; not
-     to the McKinley bill, nor to any ‘desire on the part of the people
-     for free trade;’ not because free silver is or is not wanted.
-     Not through the ‘superb generalship’ of the Democratic National
-     Committee was a victory gained, nor was the battle lost through
-     the ‘lamentable incompetency’ of the Republican leaders. The chief
-     cause of Republican defeat and Democratic victory is the modern
-     tendency toward socialism.
-
-     “This statement by no means implies that the socialistic
-     propaganda has taken a firm hold upon the citizen of the United
-     States, or that its tenets have but to be sowed in American soil
-     to bear an abundant harvest. The people have not subscribed to
-     the mild doctrines of Henry George, nor to the more radical and
-     incendiary plans of John Burns, nor do they place confidence
-     in the ability or stability of the leaders of the ‘New Order
-     of Things.’ They have not the slightest desire to overturn
-     existing government; the ravings of the Anarchists they repudiate
-     altogether.
-
-     “But since 1873, on Black Friday, political and social conditions
-     in the United States have been those of unquiet and discontent
-     among certain thousands. The Greenback party then had its origin.
-     It is within the last decade, however, that social discontent has
-     manifested itself more markedly in the formation of political
-     parties, all of which, according to the leaders of them, were
-     destined to glorious futures, when the Democratic and Republican
-     parties should be wiped out of existence.
-
-     “This unsettled state of affairs showed itself in the formation of
-     the Greenback party, the Labor party, the Socialistic party, the
-     Farmers’ Alliance, and, finally in the People’s party.
-
-
-     THE RISE OF THE PEOPLE’S PARTY.
-
-     “The true reason for the formation of the Alliance, or People’s
-     party, in the North, West, and South, is not difficult to find.
-     When the tide of immigration and settlement turned toward the
-     great wheat and corn fields of Iowa, Nebraska, North and South
-     Dakota, every natural condition was favorable to the growing of
-     abundant crops, which brought the farmer a golden return for his
-     labor. But beginning with 1884 the crops in many sections of the
-     Northwest were failures. This unfavorable condition lasted until
-     1890, when a great demand for cereals from Europe, and enormous
-     crops harvested in America, turned the flood of prosperity back
-     again to the farmer, who had for six years suffered because of
-     poor crops. During these years of hard times the farmer had
-     encumbered himself with numerous and necessary debts, so that
-     the profits of the prosperous years of 1890 and 1891, as well as
-     those of this year, have gone in payment of accrued interest
-     and the liquidation, in part, of a vast mortgage indebtedness.
-     After having been obliged to stint himself for several years,
-     it is but natural that when a chance presented itself he should
-     desire to surfeit upon the plenty, rather than be obliged because
-     of his indebtedness to pay out the first money which had come to
-     him from several years of toil to those whom he owed. It is but
-     natural, too, under such conditions, that he should have embraced
-     a project which, as he understood it, was to lift the burden from
-     his shoulders and put it upon the back of the Government, to make
-     money ‘easy,’ and to render indebtedness not a hardship, but
-     rather something which might be wiped out as easily as it could be
-     incurred.
-
-
-     THE DISCONTENT IN THE EAST.
-
-     “The result in Wisconsin shows clearly that the wounds received
-     in the battle over the Bennet law had not yet healed, and the
-     agitation over the repeal of the Edwards law is the cause of
-     Republican disaster in Illinois; but no such issues as perverted
-     the minds of Republicans in the Northwest, and in Wisconsin and
-     Illinois, were matters of controversy in the old line Republican
-     States of Ohio and New Hampshire.
-
-     “The political veteran who has battled in these States for many
-     campaigns is puzzled where to seek the cause of such overwhelming
-     disaster. To cry ‘boodle’ is to bring ridicule upon the party, but
-     to give the McKinley bill as the only or main cause is to show
-     only a superficial knowledge of the existing condition of affairs.
-
-     “To find out why the people voted as they did, one must ask
-     them. It is they that have piled up these great majorities, and,
-     seemingly, have repudiated Republican doctrines, and put the seal
-     of disapproval upon what the Republican party believes has given
-     this country unexampled prosperity. Let any man who believes
-     that the ‘popularity’ of Grover Cleveland, the demand for free
-     trade, or any policy which is shown in the Democratic platform,
-     other than that which embodies the general statement that the
-     Democrats will give the country better times, is the cause of
-     Republican defeat, ask the people why they voted as they did, and
-     he will find that it is this tendency, unconscious and entirely
-     undeveloped, toward socialism which has given the Democrats
-     victory. It is not permanent nor lasting, so far as it exists in
-     seeming antagonism to Republican policies. In 1896 a cyclone of
-     disapproving votes is just as likely to sweep over the Democratic
-     camp as it has this year devastated the Republican stronghold.
-
-     “But it is one thing to make a statement, and another to prove
-     it. In order to ascertain what it was that brought defeat to the
-     Republican party, I took a trip through the States of New York and
-     Vermont, and in five days interviewed several hundred laboring
-     people and men who are in business in a small way in various
-     mercantile pursuits, and who voice the opinion and sentiments of
-     thousands in similar walks of life. Talk with many was profitless.
-     They had nothing against President Harrison, nothing in particular
-     that they knew of against Protection. They did not vote the
-     Democratic ticket because they were impressed with the greatness
-     of Mr. Cleveland, or with the soundness of his views, or with the
-     policy of the party as presented in the Chicago platform. They
-     said they wanted better times and more money. They wanted cheaper
-     clothing, cheaper fuel, cheaper everything; but they wanted to
-     sell what they had to sell, whether it be labor or goods, at the
-     highest possible price. They did not, because they could not, deny
-     that the country as a whole had grown vastly prosperous under
-     Republican administrations.
-
-     “They were not sure that the McKinley bill or previous tariffs had
-     had anything to do with the hard times which they declared exist.
-     The laborer could not say but what the cost of store articles had
-     decreased largely in the last quarter of a century. In fact, many
-     of them could remember when articles of common consumption and
-     use cost much more than they do to-day; while the products of the
-     farmer and the stocks of the shopkeeper, so the farmer and the
-     tradesman were obliged to affirm, were sold not many years ago at
-     a lower price and with less profit than to-day.
-
-     “The farmers acknowledge that perhaps the elements may have had
-     something to do with poor crops, that the opening of the vast
-     farming territory of the Northwest, and the inexorable enforcement
-     of the law of supply and demand, may have had something of a
-     disastrous effect upon the farmers of the East. But these were not
-     looking for reasons. They did not want reasons. They did not wish
-     to consider causes. They did not think that they and their affairs
-     have anything to do with causes, effects, policies, or platforms.
-     All they know is that times are bad--with them. All they want
-     is better times. ‘Figures don’t prove anything,’ they say. ‘We
-     are hard up, and have been for years; we do not know what causes
-     hard times, nor do we care, if the future only brings prosperity.
-     The Republicans are in power, and have been since 1862, with the
-     exception of four years; therefore, if they have not given and
-     cannot give us better times, who can but the Democrats? We are
-     going to try them.’
-
-     “This is what a part of that vote which gave the Democratic
-     majority in New York thought. They would have voted just as
-     readily for Populist, Prohibition, or Socialist candidates
-     had they thought that any of these parties had the power to
-     better their condition. But this element was not large enough
-     alone to give Mr. Cleveland a majority in New York State. It
-     was the smaller tradesman, the farmer, and the laborer. These
-     are the ones, and such the element whose vote gave success to
-     the Democratic party, and in voting thus they had no intention
-     of rejecting any particular Republican, or of approving any
-     particular Democratic policy.
-
-
-     AN EXAMPLE OF POPULAR REASONING.
-
-     “A tailor who lives in a little town not far from Albany, and
-     whose entire stock in trade does not amount in value to the
-     cost of one bolt of goods owned by his more fashionable brother
-     who does business in Broadway, voted on November 8th his first
-     Democratic ticket. I asked him why he did so, after having voted
-     for four Republican candidates, and having all his life approved
-     the Republican policy of Protection. He said: ‘I voted for Mr.
-     Cleveland, not for anything Mr. Cleveland or the Democratic party
-     have done, but rather for what he and his party have said they
-     would do. Nor did I vote against Mr. Harrison because I do not
-     like him, nor against the Republican party because it has always
-     stood for Protection, but more with a view of making an experiment
-     than anything else. I do not believe that times are good with a
-     majority of people; I know they are not with me. This does not
-     seem to be the day for the man who is in business in a small way.
-     I don’t know anything about the condition of affairs in free-trade
-     England, but I know that here we have Standard Oil trusts, a sugar
-     trust, a rubber trust, and a trust in almost every line, and if a
-     small dealer attempts to compete with a large dealer, the weaker
-     man is crushed. The great clothing company, with its millions of
-     capital, undersells me, and I am compelled to meet its prices or
-     go out of business and get into something else.
-
-     “‘All the business of the country seems to be getting into
-     the hands of a few people and a few big corporations. I don’t
-     like such a state of affairs. I don’t want to be crushed out
-     of existence for attempting to compete with the millionaire
-     clothing dealer. In order to live and conduct my business I must
-     make a profit on my goods. I do not say that the tariff or that
-     any Republican legislation is responsible for this condition of
-     affairs. It may be that no legislation can eradicate the evil, but
-     legislation certainly can prohibit trusts.
-
-     “‘What I do know is that I, and such men as I am, cannot do
-     business in competition with these combinations of capital. What
-     I want is a living. In this I am not unreasonable; the world owes
-     me a living, but I am willing to work and work hard to get it. All
-     that I want is a fair chance. Maybe I made a mistake when I voted
-     the Democratic ticket. Perhaps Protection is just what we have
-     needed and yet need. Perhaps Free-Trade will make things better. I
-     don’t know how this is, but when I voted I was willing to run my
-     chances in order to find out. I am a Republican still, and if the
-     Democrats cannot make things better I shall try to take life as it
-     comes and do the best I can.’
-
-     “This is, in a measure, the reasoning of most of the smaller
-     tradesmen. They want better times; they want centralization
-     of capital done away with; they want trusts prohibited, and
-     combinations of all kinds destroyed. They want more money, money
-     more easily obtained, with a less rate of interest.
-
-     “The intelligent laborer is giving much thought to the condition
-     of himself and his fellows. He is as yet not enough of a student
-     to dive into theories, to analyze policies; nor is he able, at
-     the present, to plan for himself any legislation which shall
-     better his condition. A group of laborers, some of whom worked
-     on the railroad and some in the quarries, in Washington County,
-     acknowledged to me that they voted on the 8th of November, for
-     the first time, the Democratic ticket. I was not able, after
-     exhaustive questioning, to get from any one of them a reason
-     why he had voted as he had done. The answer one gave me is the
-     answer all gave: He wanted less hours of work, better pay,
-     cheaper necessities. A boss of one of the gangs of quarrymen,
-     a man who in his time had been a day laborer himself, a person
-     of good, hard common sense, an out-and-out Republican, told me
-     that, although the men under him had always before voted the
-     Republican ticket, so far as he knew, yet at this election they
-     had voted for Cleveland, more because they were dissatisfied with
-     their condition, to a certain extent, and the Republicans were in
-     power, and because the Democrats had repeatedly made the general
-     statement that their policies would bring good times, when the
-     laborer should work few hours for large pay, the necessities of
-     life be much cheaper than they are to-day, and the luxuries of the
-     rich taxed to support the general government.
-
-     “‘I tried to reason with them,’ said the boss; ‘but you might
-     as well have tried to reason with a drove of mules, they are so
-     stubborn. I told them they might better leave well enough alone;
-     that the country had never been so prosperous as it was to-day;
-     that wages were good, and that the cost of store articles had been
-     steadily decreasing for years, and had never been so low as they
-     were to-day. But no, they did not believe that; they did not want
-     to believe it; they said they were overworked; that they were not
-     getting good pay--although their wages have never been larger--and
-     they want, well, I don’t believe any one of them can tell what he
-     does want. They said the Republican party was in power and times
-     were not good, and if the Democrats were able to make good times,
-     why, they wanted them in power and would vote the Democratic
-     ticket.’
-
-
-     OBSERVATIONS OF ONE WHO VOTED THE REPUBLICAN TICKET.
-
-     “A shoemaker in the town of Granville, Washington County, a good
-     deal of a philosopher in his way, with plenty of good horse-sense
-     showing in his rugged face, a man whose language was refined,
-     and whose conversation showed him to be a reader as well as
-     a reasoner, gave me the best exposition of the causes of the
-     Republican defeat that I have yet heard anyone make. ‘I am a
-     Republican,’ said he; ‘I always have been and I always shall be. I
-     hoped the party would win, but yet when I talked with the people
-     around this place, and in other towns which I sometimes visit,
-     those people who do a great deal of thinking, and who vote as
-     their reason, wrong or right, tells them to vote, I was mightily
-     afraid the fight would go against us. I do not think very much
-     of Anarchistic ideas, or of the theories of the Socialist, nor
-     of the golden promises made by Weaver and the People’s party. No
-     human being can ever make a paradise out of this world, and at no
-     one time will everyone in it be satisfied and happy. This nation
-     of ours has grown so rapidly, and there are so many foreigners
-     here who have become citizens, and we print so many cheap and
-     silly books, that I am not surprised that the Republican party was
-     defeated. If a party of angels had made up the Government, the
-     result would have been just the same. The same causes that led to
-     Republican defeat in 1892 will overthrow the Democratic Government
-     in 1896. Ever since the Greenback party was started, and ever
-     since the Socialistic and the hundred other ’istic’ agitators have
-     been telling the people how they are abused, how they are robbed,
-     that the rich are growing richer and the poor poorer, everything
-     has been in such an unsettled condition that I do not wonder at
-     the result of the election. It could not have been otherwise.
-
-     “‘I believe the Administration has been everything it should be;
-     that General Harrison has been a splendid President; that his
-     policy has been for the good of the people; but I don’t believe
-     that the best man that ever lived, if he had been a Republican
-     and in power, could have been elected to the Presidency of the
-     United States this year. Up in all this section of the country,
-     and throughout the State, for that matter, the man who had always
-     before voted the Republican ticket in an independent way cast a
-     Democratic ballot, more because he wanted to make an experiment
-     than anything else. It is funny how unreasonable people are. They
-     don’t sit down and calmly figure for themselves, but they jump
-     at conclusions, and because with some of us times are hard, they
-     don’t stop to think who or what is responsible. I was talking
-     with just such a man only the other day. He was hard up, so he
-     claimed, but I know he has been doing business here ever since I
-     can remember, and has always lived and looked and acted just about
-     the same as he does now. He keeps a store. As near as I could get
-     at it, he wanted to sell everything he had to sell at a good deal
-     better price than it is fetching now, but he wanted everybody else
-     to sell to him what stuff he wanted to buy a good deal cheaper
-     than what he is paying for it now. He would not listen to me when
-     I told him that that is what everybody else wants to do; to buy
-     everything cheap and sell everything dear; but I told him that if
-     people did not buy until they could get things at their own price,
-     or sell until they could sell things at their own figure, it would
-     take but a mighty little while for everybody to starve to death.
-     He said he was going to vote the Democratic ticket just to see
-     what would happen in the next four years.
-
-     “‘Many of the quarrymen bring their boots here to be mended. They
-     tell me they want more money and fewer work hours. They have not
-     much of an idea how they are going to get them, other than that
-     the Democrats have told them that if Cleveland was elected they
-     would get what they wanted and everybody would be happy.
-
-     “‘Therefore, they voted the Democratic ticket. But, I believe,’
-     continued the shoemaker, ‘that after all this election will turn
-     out mighty well for the Republican party. In the end, the new
-     way of voting is going to help us. Before this the boss or the
-     politician could take his men or his gang and vote them as he
-     wished. Now this is, to a certain extent, changed. The half-way
-     independent man who before was led to the polls and voted, goes
-     to the polls and votes for himself. Before this he was part of
-     the machine, gave election matters but little thought, and was
-     enthusiastic only because others were so. Now, he must either vote
-     blindly or he must think for himself, and in the end he is going
-     to think it out and is going to do the right thing. He will then
-     see that the Republican policy has been and is for his benefit;
-     that it has contributed more than any other one thing to make this
-     country great and prosperous, and the people happy and contented.’
-
-     “One of the head workmen in a Troy factory possesses similar
-     ideas. He is a man of more than ordinary intelligence, and says
-     that many of his acquaintances voted the Democratic ticket more
-     because they were uneasy and wanted something, they did not know
-     what, than because they had any particular liking for Cleveland
-     and the Democracy, or dislike for Harrison and the Republican
-     party. This opinion is held by many of the skilled workmen of
-     the factories in both Albany and Troy, and in the smaller towns
-     between New York and Plattsburg.
-
-
-     A FARMER’S REASONS FOR HIS VOTE.
-
-     “It was a more difficult matter to get any Republican farmer to
-     acknowledge that he voted the Democratic ticket. One was finally
-     found who admitted that he had.
-
-     “‘What were your reasons?’ I asked.
-
-     “‘Well, I don’t know as I can exactly tell you,’ he answered; ‘we
-     have not had a very easy time of it, we farmers, for the last
-     eight or ten years.’
-
-     “‘But don’t you think,’ said I, ‘that the opening of the farming
-     lands in the West has a great deal to do with the decrease of farm
-     values in the East?’
-
-     “‘Well, perhaps so,’ he replied. ‘It is hard for a man who is not
-     a political economist and who doesn’t make a business of keeping
-     track of such things to give any reason for the hard times, or to
-     choose between the reasons given by Democrats and Republicans.
-     So far as I know, the Republican party has always kept its
-     promises made to the farmers. Since the McKinley tariff we have
-     been getting better prices for our potatoes and other produce in
-     Northern New York, for before, we had not been able to compete
-     with Canada. Yet, we don’t make much of a living, even at this.
-     You say that statistics prove that this country, as a Nation, is
-     vastly more prosperous than any other, and that we are a good deal
-     richer than we were ten years ago; yet I am not any better off,
-     and most of the farmers around here are not any better off, and
-     I made up my mind that if, as the Democrats promise, a change of
-     Administration would make good times, why, I wanted a change; if
-     Free Trade will make things better, I want Free Trade; if State
-     banks will give us money, and more of it, I want State banks put
-     on equal terms with National banks. If these changes are brought
-     about, it may make things a good deal worse than they are now. At
-     any rate, I am willing to try it. If I find that the Democrats
-     have deceived me, in 1896 I shall vote the Republican ticket
-     again.’
-
-     “These interviews show the state of mind among people who are
-     enough in number to turn overwhelmingly a majority for either the
-     Republican or the Democratic party. In them is ample evidence
-     that the people whose votes defeated the Republican party are
-     not dissatisfied with Republican administration of affairs. They
-     do not charge that the McKinley bill, or that the financial
-     or any other Republican policy is responsible for hard times,
-     nor is there any testimony which can be taken as evidence that
-     the ‘unbounded popularity’ of Grover Cleveland or the (by the
-     Democrats so called) broad financial and economic policy of that
-     party, has brought about this sweeping victory. A talk with the
-     independent voter shows, first, that there exists among the
-     smaller tradesmen, among those whose votes turn the tide toward
-     victory or toward defeat, dissatisfaction because, as they claim,
-     they are unable to compete with combinations of capital; they want
-     decentralization of capital, and trusts prohibited by law and the
-     law enforced.
-
-     “A condition of affairs exists, the dissatisfied tradesman claims,
-     in which he cannot earn a living. The Republican party was in
-     power, and had been, with the exception of four years, for a
-     quarter of a century, and while it possibly may not be responsible
-     for trusts and for the centralization of wealth and capital, yet
-     the tradesmen says, ‘I cast my vote for Cleveland and Democracy to
-     make an experiment, the result of which I am willing to take the
-     consequences of.’
-
-     “The workingman was influenced to vote for Democracy more because
-     he had been repeatedly told that all rich men and manufacturers
-     are Republicans than for anything else. Capital, of late years,
-     has been denounced so severely, and strikes, the cause of many
-     of which are hard to determine, have of late been so frequent
-     (fortunately for the Democratic party, because by these strikes
-     Democratic speakers were able falsely to claim that they were
-     caused by the attempt of the rich Republicans to crush the
-     workingman, and because by the shortness of the campaign the
-     Republicans were unable effectively to disprove these Democratic
-     statements) that the Republican party, although its policy of
-     protection was approved by the labor union leaders, has been in a
-     measure handicapped.
-
-     “The independent farmer voted the Democratic ticket because the
-     prices of farm products are not up to the figure he thinks they
-     should be, and because the Democrats have told him that their
-     financial and economic policies, if carried out, will enhance the
-     value of his farm products, give him the markets of the world, and
-     greatly decrease the cost of the necessities of life, although he
-     cannot disprove that this state of affairs does not exist to-day,
-     almost wholly because of a protective tariff.
-
-
-     GREAT NUMBERS OF NEW CITIZENS.
-
-     “But there is another element, and one which always has and
-     always will contribute to Democratic success. Naturalization was
-     unusually large this year; the citizen of foreign birth is a power
-     in the land and the Democratic party was felicitously named. There
-     is something in the word ‘Democracy’ which appeals strongly to
-     the citizen of foreign birth. In this country ‘Democracy,’ as
-     applied to the Democratic party, signifies to them that have left
-     their homes in Europe, a party of the people in contradistinction
-     to plutocracy and to aristocracy, the party of wealth and the
-     party of people of noble birth. That this has weight with a
-     certain foreign element is conclusively shown in the statement
-     made by several foreign laborers in Washington County. Their
-     knowledge of things American is not sufficient for them to grasp
-     the import of the policies advocated by either party, and hence
-     it is that they vote for the party whose name means the most to
-     them. From a talk with many of them I am convinced that it is a
-     natural antagonism toward the party in power, a love for the word
-     ‘Democracy’ that caused not a few newly made citizens to vote for
-     Mr. Cleveland. One of them told me that the Republican party was
-     made up of bankers, of great manufacturers, of men who had formed
-     combinations for the purpose of advancing the cost of necessities
-     of life--the party, in fact, to which every one who has money
-     belongs. In other words, that to be a Republican is to be a
-     capitalist, and to be a Democrat is to be a man of the people:
-     that by voting the Democratic ticket the power could be taken from
-     the capitalist and put into the hands of the people, and that the
-     people ruling the people would mean legislation which would give
-     the greatest good to the greatest number.
-
-     “A talk with the people shows further that the Republican party
-     is still very much in existence; that its defeat in this election
-     does not mean a rebuke for anything that it has ever done, nor
-     for any policy which it advocates, but it means that unless
-     the Democratic party makes good the promise which it has given
-     to bring about better times, it will meet with a defeat more
-     overwhelming than that which overturned and shattered Republican
-     hopes in 1892, and that the Democrats will not only lose the
-     States which have gone from the Republican ranks this year, but
-     that West Virginia, South Carolina, Alabama, and Louisiana will
-     turn from their allegiance to Democracy, cast their vote either
-     for a third party, for fusion, or for the Republicans, and for
-     future years make what is now known as the Solid South nothing but
-     a mournful Democratic memory.”
-
-
-Through the whole of these interviews, when attention is directed to
-the subject, it becomes perfectly apparent that the thread of the story
-is the people’s objection to the prevalence of social distinction among
-them. It is half expressed in nearly every one of these interviews,
-while they hesitate to put it in words; possibly because they highly
-appreciate that as the motive that so powerfully moved them on November
-the 8th. And then again, because of their hesitancy in expressing their
-recognition, even, of the attempt on the part of those possessed of
-greater wealth, to assume social superiority of those less fortunate.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER III.
-
-NOVEMBER 8, 1892.
-
-
-November the 8th, 1892, will be noted, by the historian of the future,
-as a date constituting a milestone to mark the road and journey of
-struggling humanity. What July the 14th is to the French, July the 4th
-is, and November the 8th will be, to the American people.
-
-The surface of the waters of public opinion presented a peaceful
-appearance at the dawning of that autumn day, but beneath the tranquil
-surface there raged subterranean and powerful forces, moving the deep
-waters of public sentiment. The much-discussed “general apathy” was the
-silent, sullen wrath, dangerous in individuals as it is in the masses.
-The silent fighter is tireless and terrible. The people had ceased to
-be moved by oratorical effort, brass bands, and torchlight processions.
-They had become surfeited with argument upon the subject of Protection.
-The changes had been rung upon the effect of the passage of a Force
-Bill, until the people had become as accustomed to the beating of the
-flanges of the newspapers upon the rails of this somewhat attenuated
-subject, as a slumbering passenger on a railway train. In fact, the
-cessation of the clangor would have attracted more attention than the
-continuation of the monotonous drumming.
-
-The leading journal in the Force Bill camp had been that preëminently
-vigorous newspaper, the New York _Sun_. Under the guidance of the
-genius of the Hon. Charles A. Dana, the New York _Sun_ had seized the
-most attractive, because the most novel, instrument of noise presented
-in this campaign of education. It had blown such vigorous blasts, that
-a large portion of newspaperdom, who regarded the opinions expressed
-by Mr. Dana as apt to be eminently reasonable, had joined in the
-chorus of the Force Bill farce, and created discordance and noise
-enough to have nauseated the masses with weariness of the subject. The
-pot-house politician, as well as his more exalted brother of the Fifth
-Avenue palatial political headquarters, was abashed and confused, by
-the fact that his efforts to arouse enthusiasm among the masses were
-utterly fruitless. They neither agreed with him nor disagreed with him.
-There was no room for argument. It was like the professional pugilist
-descanting on the beauties of the bruiser’s art to a Whittier, Holmes,
-or Longfellow; the subjects, upon which the politicians of all degrees
-and kinds had exhausted themselves, were not interesting.
-
-The issue before the people was sentimental. The detestation of the
-prevalence and growth of a pretended and sham aristocracy, became the
-important and all-absorbing theme within their hearts. They heard the
-talk; they read the dissertations of learned editors, and while it was
-all, doubtless, the product of powerful brains, it was not the most
-important matter in the struggle to be decided that November morning,
-between the masses and an assumption of “caste” in free America.
-Mr. Thomas Dolan, at the Clover Club, in Philadelphia, in referring
-to the result of the election, had at least the candor to admit the
-cause of the Republican party’s defeat. Had he, and gentlemen of his
-doubtless aristocratic tendencies, realized the impression that their
-course of conduct was making upon the minds of the mass of the Common
-People prior to that eventful day, November the 8th, and had they
-taken warning by the signs of the times, had they believed less in the
-Burchard theory of Blaine’s defeat in ’84, and more in the efficacy of
-the impression, prejudicing the minds of the people against Mr. Blaine
-and his party by that banquet,--which has been dubbed in political
-parlance, “the Belshazzar feast,”--they might have been forewarned. But
-those who have been, for the last thirty years, attempting to create
-an artificial order to govern society, “caste,” have become so puffed
-up by wealth, and blinded by the ever-narrowing view they are able
-to obtain from their assumed exalted position, that they have lost
-sight of every other consideration; becoming absorbed in their own one
-overmastering emotion--love of money. Before this god of Mammon they
-had performed such obsequious service, that they imagined the only
-appeal necessary to make to the people, was the one so much paraded
-by the Republican press, _i. e._, the advantage of Protection to the
-pocket of the poor man. Upon this day, November 8th, which was to
-decide, in no doubtful manner, the destiny of the nation with regard
-to its social life, in the silence, communing only with their outraged
-sense of the rights of man and the equality of all mankind, the voters
-sought the confessional-like closets in the booths, established by
-the introduction of the Australian system of voting. There was no
-hurrah, no noise, no violence, but a tremendous outpouring of men,
-filling every voting precinct in the land, creating a larger percentage
-of voters who exercise their right of franchise than on any former
-election ever held in America.
-
-As the hours of the day passed, some of the keen observers and astute
-party leaders began to realize that the existence of a general “feeling
-of apathy” had been more apparent than real; else what was the meaning
-of this outpouring of voters, who, silently and with determined, fixed
-certainty of purpose, sought to exercise their right as citizens?
-Even in those sections of the large cities where the wealthy reside,
-and in the back country, where it is difficult for the voter, often,
-to find the time, opportunity, and the means of getting to the polls
-on election day, it was the same story. The nation had been aroused in
-some magical and mysterious manner, which was beyond the expectation
-and prognostication of the politicians and party leaders. The people
-had taken the matter out of their hands. They had simply taken the ship
-of State into their own keeping, and the professional politician had to
-cling to the life-line in the wake thereof.
-
-Wonderment seized these gentlemen of supposed miraculous political
-perspicacity. They asked one another, by their silent and inquiring
-glances: “What does this mean? Is our occupation, like Othello’s, gone?”
-
-The people, regardless of their mistaken mouthing, like some massive
-Percheron horse, had taken the bit; and, regardless of all attempts
-at guidance, were exerting the strength which, when aroused, they
-possess, contrary to the expectations of the learned gentlemen of the
-political profession. When the sun went down, November 8, 1892, none
-were less able to predict the result of this tremendous uprising of the
-people than those who by their diplomacy had arrived at that position,
-so enviable in the minds of petty politicians, Chairmen of various
-Campaign Committees. Chairman Carter might have exclaimed, with the
-drowning people at Johnstown, as he sank beneath the flood of indignant
-“Common People,” “Whence comes this water?” Chairman Harrity might well
-have been drunk and delirious, as the result of his own good fortune,
-for as surprising to him as to Chairman Carter was the existence of
-this slumbering volcano of indignation which had brought about the
-overwhelming success of the candidate who represented, in the minds of
-the people, the opposition to the growing aristocracy which had become
-engrafted upon the Republican party. Chairman Harrity might well have
-been dazed by the remarkable results of his own endeavors, had he not
-realized that his efforts had been incidental to, and not the cause of,
-the success of Cleveland.
-
-It is not presumed to criticise the conduct of the campaign as managed
-by the campaign committees of both sides. Their duties, without
-doubt, were performed in a most masterly manner. The organizations
-with which both committees worked with tireless energy to achieve
-success for their respective sides, cannot fail to impress even a
-very tyro in politics. It was, however, like two learned physicians,
-disputing over the disease of a patient, and both being in error; each
-applying established remedies that experience had taught him were
-efficacious in the disease he had imagined it to be; both equally in
-error because they had mistaken the complaint of the patient. To the
-average politician of the present day, Tariff Reform and Protection
-constitute the sum of all evils and diseases of the body politic.
-Like Dr. Sangrado’s instruction to Gil Blas, they have only two
-remedies: phlebotomy and plenty of hot water. And the astonishment
-expressed by them at the possible existence of some other disease
-and some other remedy, was productive of as much consternation as
-that in the breast of Gil Blas, at the result of the treatment of his
-patients at Valladolid. As the returns from the different States began
-to arrive at the headquarters of the different committees; as the
-result of the opinion of the people upon this momentous occasion (so
-fraught with disappointment to the aristocratic believers in “caste”)
-became apparent, surprise and astonishment were depicted upon every
-countenance; while, mingled with unalloyed delight in the breasts of
-the Democrats, and with mortification in the hearts of the Republicans,
-the same surprise and astonishment existed. That Illinois, a State that
-had sent over 200,000 men to fight under the Federal flag, and in which
-such large sums of pension money had been annually distributed to the
-disabled veterans for many years, should have been so unmindful and
-heedless of the display of the time-honored and ensanguined garment,
-the “Bloody Shirt,” and the howling of the Republican press about
-Cleveland’s vetoes of pension bills, was simply outrageous to the minds
-of the stupefied Republican leaders.
-
-Could it be possible that their so often victorious shout of
-sectionalism, and constant address to the pocketbook of the veteran,
-had been relegated to the shadowy shelf of “innocuous desuetude”?
-
-They looked aghast at the result of the counting of votes in Indiana.
-That much-talked-of, recently-discovered Gas belt, in which had
-sprung up innumerable manufactories, whose workshops were filled with
-“Common People,” had failed to find an all-obscuring attraction in
-the glittering gold that the magnates of wealth had held out to them
-as an inducement to perpetuate the power of the rich and to increase
-those privileges and class distinctions that they fondly hoped would
-be accorded to them by the American people. Verily, like DeFarge, in
-Dickens’ “Tale of Two Cities,” the workman of the manufacturers in
-Indiana had presumed to hurl the magical Louis piece back into the
-carriages of the wealthy, rejecting with indignation the attempt to
-bribe their honor, and their sense of the equality of man.
-
-The negro of Alabama, Georgia, and Virginia, upon whom these
-bondholders thought they had a mortgage, by their claimed procurement
-of his emancipation, had, even in spite of his color, previous
-condition, and gratitude, joined with his fellow-citizens, the “Common
-People,” taking as the representative of those who had most benefited
-him and his race, the immortal Abraham Lincoln, a man of the “Common
-People”; and, by the negro’s vote, was added strength to the blow,
-struck by the white Democracy of the Union, at this arrogant assumption
-of that thing which the negro, along with the white man, had learned to
-hate and resent--the assumption of “caste” upon the part of any set of
-citizens in the United States of America.
-
-The wool-grower of Ohio, the home of the popular McKinley, added sorrow
-to the cup held to the lips of the would-be aristocrats. He no longer
-felt bound to bow his head before the advantages held out by the party
-of wealth. He preferred to take a little less for his wool, and a
-little more respect for himself, his wife, and children in the social
-world, where every landmark of equality was being washed away by the
-tide of aristocratic tendencies. The bewildered Republican leaders
-gazed with terror upon the transmogrified weapons with which they had
-waged war. The sword of steel, when held by the hand clad in a golden
-gauntlet, had become a weapon of straw. They murmured to one another:
-“If these weapons have failed us, in what shall we seek safety?”
-
-Consternation was in the council of the great of that party who, for
-more than a quarter of a century, had controlled the legislation of
-the Republic, and by whom was created, in the minds of the people,
-the errors of social distinction and “caste” that have crept into the
-country. The Republicans, assembled at their headquarters, became more
-bewildered at each new piece of evidence of the disapprobation and
-rejection of those doctrines, the understanding of which they deemed
-such conclusive argument to the minds of the people. The oncoming storm
-had no centre. It was blowing in all directions of the Union. Illinois,
-Indiana, Ohio, even manufacturing Pennsylvania, were sending a
-horrible howling of destructive wind, which would sweep away all their
-carefully-prepared barriers. At the Democratic headquarters, no less
-was the degree of wonder stamped, though with joyous imprint, upon the
-faces of the party leaders. Could it be possible that Illinois had cast
-the majority of its vote for the leaders of the Democratic party, those
-standard-bearers against whom so much had been said to prejudice the
-mind of that great Soldier State, the home of Lincoln, the birthplace
-of the Republican party and of the Grand Army of the Republic?
-
-It was hard for the most hopeful to realize. Had the vaunted undoing
-of the Democratic party in the State of Indiana, the increase of
-the manufactures, and the personal popularity of a President, one
-of Indiana’s chosen sons, been proved false and groundless? Had the
-negroes in Virginia, North Carolina, and Georgia joined the Democratic
-“Common People,” in spite of the promised covenant of their salvation,
-The Force Bill, and added to the majorities in those Southern States?
-Connecticut--much-protected Connecticut; could it be possible that she
-would increase the few hundred majority accorded to the Democratic
-candidate four years ago?
-
-All seemed so utterly out of keeping with the fondest hopes and
-expectations of the sagacious chieftains of Democracy, that incredulity
-was stamped upon every countenance. It seemed to be utterly beyond the
-comprehension of the wisest of the political world of both parties,
-that, possibly, they had been treating an unknown and unappreciated
-disease, the nature whereof they had failed to recognize. The result
-was not compatible with any established theory of either party. The
-people had evinced such utter disregard for all the old arguments and
-well-tried remedies, that it dumbfounded the physicians who pretend to
-minister to the wants of the nation. From such unsuspected quarters,
-and in such ridiculous proportions, had come the disapproval of the
-people, that all were at sea; some wrapping themselves in their own
-glory, proclaiming, like Cock Robin, “I did it, with my little bow and
-arrow;” others, seeking to shield themselves behind the transparent,
-fragile shield of another’s fault: “He did it, his unpopularity;”
-“Protection did it; it was his policy;” each trying to escape the
-general stampede, occasioned by the long-suppressed indignation of
-the people who objected, not so much to the economic doctrines of the
-Republican party (not that they had become converted to the tenets
-of the Democratic faith), but to that crime of “caste” which, with
-its many ramifications in the whole mass of society, was causing them
-unhappiness.
-
-It is not well for the Democratic party to lay the flattering unction
-to its soul, that the mass of the people had become converted to the
-principles enunciated by that party in Chicago, at the Convention where
-Mr. Cleveland was nominated. It would be as delusive and disappointing
-to them, in some future election, as it has proved to the Republican
-party upon the occasion of their late discomfiture. On the other hand,
-the Republican party should be well convinced, by its downfall, that
-the people will not endure the wrapping up, in silken garments, of the
-progeny of the deformed and diseased state of European society, palming
-the enshrouded babe off as an offspring of that land that lit the torch
-of freedom for the world.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER IV.
-
-SOCIETY AS THE PEOPLE FOUND IT, NOVEMBER 8, 1892.
-
-
-Society, as the people found it, on last election day, was certainly
-not as attractive as that autocratic gentleman, the distinguished Ward
-McAllister found it, and has helped to make it, as related by him in a
-book which has been published with much flourish of trumpets, entitled
-“Society as _I_ Have Found It.”
-
-While the volume itself hardly rises to the dignity of a dime novel,
-it still, doubtless, is a true statement and record of the doings and
-pretensions of the very class of people who, by their presumption, have
-aroused the silent and sullen indignation of America. The book referred
-to, and its writer, Ward McAllister, of course, received a large share
-of criticism and ridicule. The absurdities of the book impressed the
-critics of the newspapers all over the land. It was made a butt for
-the squibs, sarcasm, and ridicule of some man on every newspaper
-throughout the country. Passages were selected from the book wherein
-Mr. McAllister poses himself in the position of a first-class cook,
-and where he recounts how he has been playing the millinery maid for
-some lady of fashion. Of course, it struck every one as ridiculous that
-any manly man who claimed to be an American should be impressed by the
-criticism made upon the “cut of the tails of his dress-coat,” or to
-pay any attention to the advice of “a well-dressed Englishman, well up
-in all matters pertaining to society,” as to the peculiar fashion to
-be adopted concerning a man’s hat; how he should wear his watch-chain,
-etc. All such things were so extremely amusing and so utterly farcical
-to the brainworkers attached to the newspapers, that they held up the
-book and McAllister as objects to create merriment. That was the only
-possible view that could be taken by them of anything so absurdly funny
-as a man’s highest ambition, his idea of dignity, his aim in life being
-so small as that evidenced in McAllister’s autobiography.
-
-There was another side to that question. A creature like McAllister
-is not a spontaneous or instantaneous creation of our great Republic.
-There must have existed a congenial atmosphere in his “smart set” to
-produce an exotic of such rare and unattractive perfume. Had it not
-been perfectly apparent that Ward McAllister was not the only person
-who imitated and aped foreign manners, and desired to create a social
-distinction in America, the book would have been a roaring farce.
-Had the people at large supposed that he was the single individual in
-America who approved of and earnestly desired to create a collection
-of idiots who should claim that “caste” could exist in our country,
-then the people would have regarded him much in the manner they would a
-buffoon on the stage of a theatre, or some idiot who, from a desire to
-attract attention, paints his face sky-blue. But the very advertising
-that this blooming flower of sham aristocracy received at the hands
-of the newspapers--which was done by the newspaper men in a spirit of
-levity, possessing, as they do, sufficient brains to find McAllister
-and his subject utterly absurd, in conjunction with many other
-well-advertised and extravagantly absurd assumptions on the part of the
-wealthy, made a much deeper impression upon the minds of the “Common
-People” than it was supposed that it would or could do. McAllister’s
-“smart set” in this country--and his “smart set” is not confined to
-New York City, but exists in some form or manner in every city, town,
-village, and county in the Union--this McAllister-like “smart set” in
-each little community, as well as in the large cities, has managed by
-its arrogance and assumed superiority to arouse a spirit of resentment
-among the “Common People” of the Abraham Lincoln and Andrew Jackson
-stamp, because the masses have seen an attempt to establish something
-which would create an inequality between the citizens of the Republic.
-
-It was a monstrous joke that the Knights of the Pencil saw in
-McAllister and his “Society as I Have Found It,” and, like the
-keen-witted men that they are, they proceeded to hurl the javelins of
-their wit and sarcasm at this balloon of idiocy and impudence; but in
-piercing the balloon, the nauseating odor arising from its explosion
-pervaded the nostrils of the “Common People” with more than ordinary
-unsavoriness.
-
-In every little village and town, and even through the farming
-sections, there is some would-be Ward McAllister and “smart set;”
-some little circle who from some imagined cause or reason, in their
-own conceit are a little better than the typical old settlers of our
-country, who brought the Republic into existence. They try to impress,
-and sometimes most insultingly, this supposed superiority upon the
-minds of the “Common People.” In one little village it will be, for
-example, the owner of some protected little factory, which, in the
-wisdom of the legislators, has been protected to encourage and increase
-the industries of our country. In the solicitude of the legislators for
-the welfare of the people (acting honestly and in the best interests
-of the country), they have created the possibility for this man, this
-small manufacturer in the little village referred to, to accumulate
-a few thousand dollars more than his fellow citizens of the little
-village. The money has not been earned either by his sagacity, business
-ability, superior education, nor his intrinsic merit as a commercial
-genius. It is the result of accidents and the necessity that the
-legislators honestly felt existed, to create manufactories in our own
-country, to furnish the articles consumed by the people, rather than to
-buy the same from England and other foreign countries, sending our gold
-abroad out of the country in payment therefor.
-
-The honesty of purpose and the wisdom of the action of the legislative
-part of the Government, it is not the province of this book to
-question. It is to record the result of the action upon the social
-relations of the different members of that little community, or
-village, in which the small factory was established, and the attendant
-unhappiness arising from the accumulation of a disproportioned amount
-of money in the hands of one of the citizens of the community. The
-manufacturer, becoming prosperous, began to assume an air of social
-superiority. He was enabled to take a trip every now and again to
-some near-by city. He there saw his model McAllister. He returned to
-his village with un-American affectations, aping the manner of his
-model--the McAllister of his near-by city. He began to draw around
-him (in much the same manner as McAllister describes the creation of
-the “Patriarchs” of New York) those whom he deemed suitable for that
-superior social position which he, modelling the machinery after the
-manner of the city McAllister, deemed so desirable.
-
-Before proceeding to describe the birth of this superior social
-class, and the method of its organization, for which information we
-are indebted to this Prince of Cooks and Coats--McAllister--it is
-desirable to regard in a political way this local would-be aristocrat,
-the manufacturer. He imagines that Protection, the tariff, by which he
-has been enabled to amass the wealth, as the foundation upon which he
-bases his claim to a more exalted position, socially, than his fellow
-citizens, is entirely due to the doctrines of the Republican party.
-He loses sight of the fact that the Republican party did not owe its
-origin to Protection. The Abraham Lincoln Republican party did not owe
-its victory and popularity in the hearts of the people to Protection.
-There were other causes which operated powerfully in producing the
-result of the election in 1860; but the manufacturer of that little
-village, before mentioned, absorbed by the one idea that Protection
-has been the one cause of his success, and that it was due to the
-Republican party, becomes oblivious to the fact that the necessities of
-the Government, during a war to preserve the Federal Union, became so
-great that revenue had to be derived from some source, and that many of
-the duties imposed upon foreign importations by the Republican party
-had for their cause the stern necessity of the soldiers in the field,
-fighting to preserve the Union; that the war was not a battle for
-Protection. It had for its origin other and very different causes.
-
-The war, which had been the outgrowth of the election of the candidate
-of the Republican party, created expenses which the Republican
-administration had to meet, and as a means to that end it became
-necessary to increase the existing duty and to place new duties upon
-imported manufactured articles. And by so doing they carried to a
-successful termination the great struggle for the preservation of
-the Union, to which the Republican party had pledged itself; which,
-together with the inclination and desire of some of the prominent
-members of the Republican party to increase the manufacturing
-industries of the country, has brought about that Protection and tariff
-by which he, the village manufacturer, has profited. He never stops
-to consider whether the tariff was a means to the end so profoundly
-desired, the preservation of the Union, a means of furnishing sinews
-of war by which the stars were retained upon our flag. He regards the
-tariff and Protection only in its personal aspect. The Republican
-party, to him, means his benefactor, to whom he owes an eternal debt of
-gratitude for enabling him to acquire that which, without Protection
-and tariff, he never could have obtained in the open field of the
-commercial battle wherein the world at large may contend. The position
-held by great thinkers of the Abraham Lincoln period is utterly
-unappreciated by him. That this tariff and Protection, which has been
-such a boon to him, was not created for his especial benefit, never
-suggests itself to his mind; that men of the Lincoln day and stamp
-should have had in view only the preservation of the Union and creating
-a fund to pay the expenses of those engaged to accomplish that end,
-does not occur to the village manufacturer.
-
-In fact, many of the Republican politicians have made too much of
-the Protection doctrine and not enough of the cause that created it.
-This village, protected, small manufacturer, communing with himself,
-concludes that without Protection he could never have amassed that
-wealth which he is endeavoring to make elevate him above the social
-status of his fellow citizens. He acknowledges, possibly, to himself,
-that without Protection he might still be struggling for existence upon
-an equal plane with the “Common People,” above whose heads he hopes
-to elevate himself socially. He regards only the Republican party of
-to-day, utterly oblivious to the fact that he and men of the McAllister
-and the “smart set” type have no just appreciation and no great
-admiration for the father of the Republican party, Abraham Lincoln, and
-his doctrines, which are the doctrines and sentiments of the “Common
-People.” He merely knows that Protection helped _him_, and he cares
-nothing for what it was that brought about Protection and compelled the
-Republican party to advocate a high tariff during the Civil War.
-
-Hence, this village manufacturer, this would-be social leader, the
-imitator of the city Ward McAllister, is a most ardent Republican. The
-little set of satellites which he gathers round him, glad to imitate
-the examples and opinions of one who has attained success and who is
-a recognized leader of this social movement to create “Caste” in our
-communities, become also ardent Republicans. In other words, it becomes
-almost a mark of respectability (so called) in the little community
-wherein resides the small protected manufacturer, to be a Republican.
-
-The very word “Democrat” smacks so much of the “Common People.” A man
-of intelligence, education, or wealth, who is a Democrat, becomes a
-social anomaly in that little community. A few prominent men through
-the land, who have become associated with the Democratic party, are
-spoken of merely as the result of inherited opinions through a long
-line of ancestry, similar to an inherited religion, or a motto on a
-coat-of-arms. A man who believes in Democracy, in its broad sense,
-is regarded in these little communities, when he is possessed of
-education, intelligence, and money, as a kind of firebrand. His every
-action is viewed with suspicion. So firmly has it become fixed in
-the minds of this little set of satellites, who surround the local
-manufacturing magnate, that “Republicanism” and “respectability” are
-synonymous, that they find it utterly incompatible with reason and
-refinement for a man to be respectable, according to their definition
-of the term, and not at the same time be a Republican.
-
-The “Common People” in these little communities, many of whom have been
-Republicans with Abraham Lincoln, many of whom were veteran soldiers of
-the Union, became more incensed by the impression created by this local
-“smart set,” than convinced by argument, during the campaign of 1892.
-
-Before proceeding to more fully dissect the sentiment created by this
-kind of nonsense, and by its almost invariable association with the
-Republican party throughout the land, we will return to the admirable,
-unabashed Ward McAllister, and quote something from his text-book of
-snobbery, as to the methods adopted in the creation of the “smart set”
-in New York, which has furnished a model for similar creations through
-the length and breadth of the land.
-
-“As a child,” writes this scion of a race of nobles(?), “I had often
-listened with great interest to my father’s account of his visit to
-London, with Dominick Lynch, the greatest swell and beau that New
-York had ever known. He would describe his going with this friend to
-Almack’s, finding themselves in a brilliant assemblage of people,
-knowing no one and no one deigning to notice them; Lynch, turning to my
-father, exclaimed: ‘Well, my friend, geese, indeed, were we, to thrust
-ourselves in here, where we are evidently not wanted.’ He had hardly
-finished the sentence when the Duke of Wellington (to whom they had
-brought letters, and who had sent them tickets to Almack’s) entered,
-looked around, and seeing them, at once approached them, took each
-by the arm and walked them twice up and down the room; then, pleading
-an engagement, said ‘Good-night’ and left. Their countenances fell as
-he rapidly left the room, but the door had barely closed on him when
-all crowded around them, and in a few minutes they were presented to
-everyone of note, and had a charming evening. He described to us how
-Almack’s originated--all by the banding together of powerful women of
-influence for the purpose of getting up these balls, and in this way
-making them the greatest social events of London society.
-
-“Remembering all this, I resolved, in 1872, to establish in New York an
-American Almack’s, taking men instead of women, being careful to select
-only the leading representative men of the city, who had the right to
-create and lead society. I knew all would depend upon our making a
-proper selection. I made up an Executive Committee of three gentlemen,
-who daily met at my house, and we went to work in earnest to make a
-list of those we should ask to join in the undertaking. One of this
-committee, a very bright, clever man, hit upon the name of ‘Patriarchs’
-for the Association, which was at once adopted, and then, after some
-discussion, we limited the number of Patriarchs to twenty-five, and
-that each Patriarch, for his subscription, should have the right of
-inviting to each ball four ladies and five gentlemen, including himself
-and family; that all distinguished strangers, up to fifty, should be
-asked; and then established the rules governing the giving of these
-balls--all of which, with some slight modifications, have been carried
-out to the letter to this day. The following gentlemen were then asked
-to become ‘Patriarchs,’ and at once joined the little band:
-
-
-     John Jacob Astor,
-     William Astor,
-     De Lancey Kane,
-     Ward McAllister,
-     George Henry Warren,
-     Eugene A. Livingston,
-     William Butler Duncan,
-     E. Templeton Snelling,
-     Lewis Colford Jones,
-     John W. Hamersley,
-     Benjamin S. Welles,
-     Frederick Sheldon,
-     Royal Phelps,
-     Edwin A. Post,
-     A. Gracie King,
-     Lewis M. Rutherford,
-     Robert G. Remsen,
-     Wm. C. Schermerhorn,
-     Francis R. Rives,
-     Maturin Livingston,
-     Alex. Van Rensselaer,
-     Walter Langdon,
-     F. G. D’Hauteville,
-     C. C. Goodhue,
-     William R. Travers.”
-
-
-These proud patriots, constituting a tribunal upon whose decision a
-man’s claim to social equality with any other citizen in New York must
-rest, could find much in the conduct of their descendants to question
-with regard to their title to social superiority. The ventilation
-given to the Drayton-Borrowe-Millbank affair reflected no great credit
-upon the great name Astor--the first on the list of the “Patriarchs.”
-The asinine utterances of a descendant of another of the “Patriarchs,”
-which is here given, gives little evidence of inherited wisdom or
-common sense.
-
-In the curious case recently tried in New York relative to the right of
-a women’s association to erect a statue to a lady who, though counted
-among the metropolitan “Four Hundred,” was possessed of much public
-spirit and philanthropic energy, one of the witnesses--a member of
-the same family--testified that her grandfather “never invited such
-people as Horace Greeley” to his house. A correspondent of the New York
-_World_ enquires:
-
-
-     “Is it possible that we have an aristocratic society in this
-     republican country of ours to which the great founder of the
-     _Tribune_ could not be admitted? Horace Greeley was born in New
-     Hampshire, the native State of Gen. John Stark, Levi Woodbury,
-     Daniel Webster, and a long line of soldiers, statesmen, and men
-     famous in literature. If it is a title to aristocracy to belong
-     to a family who were original settlers of the country, the
-     Hamiltons are comparatively a new people, the great founder of
-     the family being an emigrant from the West Indian island of Nevis
-     about the year 1770. The Schuylers derive their distinction from
-     Major-General Philip Schuyler, who was a distinguished officer of
-     the Revolution, but whose services could not compare with those of
-     that sterling old hero of Bennington--John Stark.
-
-     “Why, Mr. Editor, there are thousands of good Democratic citizens
-     who can trace back their descent to the Pilgrim Fathers, more than
-     a hundred years before Alexander Hamilton landed from the West
-     Indies. Is it not a relic of feudal times and barbarism to claim
-     distinction above our fellows and superiority of birth on account
-     of the deeds of an ancestor a hundred or more years ago?
-
-     “‘Honor and fame from no condition rise.
-     Act well your part; there all the honor lies.’”
-
-
-[Illustration: JOHN D. ROCKEFELLER,
-
-A MAGNATE OF THE STANDARD OIL COMPANY.]
-
-Shades of the great dead of journalism, the Bennetts, Raymonds, and
-others who have left the stamp of their genius upon newspaperdom in
-America, look down and pity the inane idiot who gives utterance to
-sentiments concerning Horace Greeley like those of the descendant of
-one of the “Patriarchs!” And men who occupy positions in the world of
-journalism, like Halstead, Cockerill, Clark Howell, how like you such
-utterances?
-
-Really, had Horace Greeley been alive and known of such an utterly
-meaningless assertion, doubtless the old genius would have smiled;
-but here is the query: Would it not have made a Democrat of every
-female member of his family, who regarded him as the epitome of worth,
-virtue, and merit? That a man like Horace Greeley, who had arrived at a
-position so pre-eminent as to disregard the snarls of puppies, should
-be amused at such a statement, would not be astonishing; but it would
-be none the less disagreeable for the women of his family. A woman’s
-life is essentially social.
-
-This illustration, and it would be impossible to find a better, of
-this nauseating attempt to establish “caste” in our country, will
-demonstrate the assertion that attempted class distinction has not
-been confined to the laboring man, the workman, or the poor man, but
-has been attempted, and made obnoxious, in every degree of wealth,
-learning, and position. The little country or village manufacturing
-magnate, whose Republicanism is not the Republicanism of _principles_
-nor the Republicanism advocated by Abraham Lincoln, has adopted
-the scheme set forth by Ward McAllister as a successful one, to be
-imitated in his little community, in establishing his own little “smart
-set”--his own local “Patriarchs.” Proceeding upon that basis, he and
-his little band of innovators have attempted an improvement upon the
-social system of each little community, which has become associated
-in the minds of the “Common People” of these little communities with
-Republicanism; and, therefore, the Republican party, in November last,
-was forced to bear the opprobrium that attached itself, in the minds of
-the “Common People,” to the “smart set” in their little communities.
-
-Never was a greater mistake made than in supposing that the influence
-of this attempted social distinction shall only influence the laborers
-and working classes of a community. In proportion as a man, by increase
-of wealth and reputation, acquires in the work-a-day world a higher
-position with regard to the influence that he wields in the business
-or professional world, just so much more bitterly does he resent
-the arrogance of the few, who, like the Patriarchs, would establish
-a tribunal to try their fellow citizens concerning their social
-positions, at which those outside of the charmed circle have no
-opportunity to appear and offer proofs and evidence of their worth and
-merit. The banker who finds that his wife has been neglected when the
-invitations to the Patriarchs’ ball are distributed, feels as keenly
-and resentfully the insult as does the longshoreman upon finding that
-his wife has not been invited to the butchers’ ball.
-
-Be honest with yourselves, and you will find, down in your hearts, a
-very ocean of bitterness occasioned by some slight or insult inflicted
-upon your family; and these are the things to which men do not give
-words, but which are silently felt, and to change which men silently
-voted.
-
-American men bestow upon the women of their families a degree of
-devotion and admiration greater than that given by foreigners generally
-to their families. The Americans have exalted the women of our
-land, irrespective of wealth or condition, to a position of so much
-pre-eminence in our social affairs, that in that department of our
-lives our women are permitted to have absolute sway and control.
-
-A man who dawdles around society, permitting it to absorb his time and
-attention, loses in a certain degree the respect of the large mass of
-American men. He is considered rather effeminate. Our social lives are
-controlled by the woman. Our opinions are moulded by her; hence, we
-feel that, on subjects of a social nature, her judgment, opinions, and
-thoughts are entitled to the greatest respect--in fact, controlling
-largely our own. Hence the mighty influence of the women who had become
-resentfully Democratic because of social snubs. One woman had not been
-invited to the Patriarch’s ball; another to the railroad magnate’s
-ball; another to the Standard Oil Company king’s entertainment; and,
-so on, it runs all down through the different stages created by this
-attempted crime of “caste,” leaving behind it a sting in the hearts of
-each home as it passes, until it reaches the laborer and strikes him
-and his with telling force and effect. The Fricks, Carnegies, Goulds,
-Vanderbilts, Astors, become names as hateful to him as Tarquin’s ever
-was to the Roman “Common People.”
-
-[Illustration: WARD MacALLISTER.
-
-Self-Appointed Leader of the “Four Hundred” of New York.
-
-“A Prince of Cooks and Coats.”]
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER V.
-
-SOME REASONS FOR WRATH.
-
-
-Had the spurious article, “American aristocracy,” confined its
-vaporings and exhibitions to secluded spots, it would have been
-tolerated by the American people, exactly like many other “isms,”
-shams, frauds, and delusions. Had the worshipers at the shrine of
-“caste,” and supposed social superiority, reserved their devotions to
-some secluded chapel, they might have worshiped in peace at the feet
-of the tinseled god whom they adore--“caste.” The American people
-tolerate almost any kind of “ism” for a time, provided the “ism” be
-not paraded before them, and flaunted in their faces in an insulting
-manner; but a determined people are the citizens of this nation, and
-when once aroused to a sense of outrage, they throw to the winds all
-consideration of law, danger, and consequence. The people of Chicago
-heard the howling of the anarchists with patience and amusement,
-Sunday after Sunday, along the lake front, but when the anarchists at
-Haymarket hurled one bomb among the citizens of the Republic, the day
-of anarchism was ended in Chicago. Innocent or guilty, the leaders of
-the movement must be punished. And they were!
-
-Had the sham aristocrats of America been contented to reserve their
-exhibition of arrogance and presumption to those dervishes who
-worshiped at their own shrine--“caste”--and not to the general public,
-it is possible that their absurd “ism” might have been tolerated
-in a good-natured way for some time longer. It had certainly the
-advantage of anarchism, inasmuch as, when reserved to a few dervishes,
-it was excessively amusing. But, unfortunately for the champions of
-“caste,” their followers, possessing neither a great amount of brains
-nor courage (and in these particulars, even the anarchists have an
-advantage over the sham aristocrats), have absolutely delighted in
-trifling with and imposing upon the good-nature of the public. In
-little, mean, spiteful ways, they have exhibited a smallness of soul,
-and an attempt, in a cowardly manner, to impose upon those who, poor
-in pocket, or dependent in some way, were unable to resent it. Take
-the evidence of the clerks, employés, servants, of the sham imitators
-of English aristocracy, and, almost without an exception, you will
-find their bosoms filled with resentment and hatred for that class;
-born, not with any desire to possess the property of their employers,
-nor from any socialistic tendency, but entirely the result of mean,
-spiteful, scornful snubbing. They have been wounded in pride, for, God
-knows! they are entitled, as free American citizens, to the possession
-of self-respect and pride.
-
-Do you ask, Madame, why it is so hard for you to secure and retain
-servants? The reason is given above.
-
-An explanation of the cause for the dearth of good domestic servants
-was sought by a great New York daily newspaper. It opened its columns
-and asked for communications explaining why a young woman preferred to
-work in a shop ten or twelve hours a day, and receive therefor three
-dollars a week, rather than accept a position as a domestic servant, in
-your house, Madame, where she would have greater comfort in the way of
-food and lodging, and receive more dollars.
-
-Read the answers received by the _Recorder_, of New York. In almost
-every instance, the writer of the communication would say that it
-was not a matter of food, lodging, and dollars, but a matter of
-self-respect. They were snubbed and sat upon when engaged in serving
-the rich.
-
-Go to any fashionable restaurant, or saloon, where the would-be swells
-swill champagne. Ask the attendants their opinion of those who, with a
-supercilious air, throw them a dollar to fee them for their services.
-You will hear expressed, in reply to your question, opinions like this:
-“I feel like knocking their heads off. I am ready to work. I don’t
-want their money for nothing; but I am a _man_, and as good as they
-are.”
-
-The workman was content, nor did it interest him if the rich should
-drive their Tally-hos. He had no desire to divide the money of the
-purse-proud devotee of “caste”; but when, weary from his day of labor,
-trudging along the road to his humble home, with tooting horn and
-flourish of whip the Tally-ho sweeps by him, and he has to scurry out
-of the road, he long remembers the derisive smile of the insolent,
-purse-proud occupants of the coach, and he objects--not to the
-coach--but to the manner and the smile of the occupants.
-
-The heart of the shop-girl or the seamstress is not filled with envy
-because the fine lady (?) of fashion possesses garments of silk and
-laces; but the insolence and supercilious manner, when the fine lady
-(?) brought in contact with her, fills her soul with a sense of injured
-dignity. She knows she’s quite as good as a lady of fashion. Possibly
-her father is not a protected, petty manufacturer; and she goes to
-her home, resenting the assumed superiority in the manner of the fine
-lady, and preaches to father, brother, and lover equality and broad
-democracy. The fine ladies (?) of fashion have ever been most potential
-causes for victories by the people. No orator so eloquent as the wife,
-daughter, sister, or sweetheart; and her wrongs were resented November
-8th.
-
-[Illustration: “THE PUBLIC BE D----D!”]
-
-The New York _World_, of November 20th, 1892, publishes an article in
-connection with New York society, that, having received a place in that
-great Democratic journal, because of its undoubted truth, is worthy of
-a place in this volume. In speaking of the death of Mrs. Belmont, the
-_World_ makes use of the occasion to express some remarkably forcible
-facts with regard to New York society. It says:--
-
-
-     “In the social history of New York it will be a lasting
-     distinction to Mrs. Belmont that she was a conspicuous figure in
-     good society before good society had been vulgarized. I have no
-     quarrel with the society of to-day, which has merely followed the
-     law of its evolution. I merely insist that the New York society
-     of thirty years ago had all the good features of to-day, and was
-     conspicuously free from certain faults which are now conspicuously
-     prominent. The society which accepted the leadership of Mrs.
-     Belmont had birth, and breeding, and culture, ample means and
-     true refinement, and it had also that last test of a genuine
-     aristocracy, that it held its rank by unquestioned title. It had
-     so little fear of the security of its position that it freely
-     admitted strangers of equal social rank.
-
-     “_It was possible for a rich merchant to permit a clerk to visit
-     at his house_, and even scholars and educated people were not
-     considered detrimental. While it had the respect of ingenuous
-     youth for the older aristocracies of Europe, it did not abase
-     itself in comparison with them, and was incapable of servility
-     before them or before anything human. _It was singularly free from
-     scandals._”
-
-
-Then, thirty years ago,--that is, at the time of Abraham Lincoln’s
-great popularity, succeeding by two years the great uprising of the
-Common People, the “mudsills,” of the North and West,--a wealthy
-merchant of the North would receive his clerk, as a social equal, in
-his house. Then times have changed, and manners with them, within
-the last thirty years! The rich merchant of to-day has forgotten
-the force of the argument which resulted in the election of Abraham
-Lincoln,--“Americans enforce Equality.” Two years was not enough,
-thirty years ago, to enable the rich merchant to forget that the first
-man of the nation, the President of the Union, had been a laborer,
-rail-splitter, clerk in a grocery store, and was, while chief of the
-nation, still a man of the “Common People.” No, two years was not
-enough to bring about forgetfulness of these facts; but _thirty-two_
-years was.
-
-Hence, the overturning of the aristocratic party (or that party to
-which the aristocrats belong) cost what it might in dollars to the
-“Common People.” It is not a new economic doctrine that they demand; it
-is a new social system. While the assumed aristocracy of thirty years
-ago may have had respect for the older aristocracies of Europe, it most
-certainly did not abase itself, and was not as servile to them, as is
-the sham aristocracy of to-day.
-
-Quoting from the Koran of that high priest of the “smart set,”
-McAllister, who utters the sentiments of the most exalted in the holy
-of holies in swelldom:--
-
-
-     “It is well to be in with the nobs who are born to their position,
-     but the support of the swells is more advantageous--for society is
-     sustained and carried on by the swells, the nobs looking quietly
-     on and accepting the position, feeling that they are there by
-     divine right; but they do not make fashionable society, nor carry
-     it on.”
-
-
-The “nobs,” then, of this temple of “caste,” feel that they occupy the
-high places by “divine right.” The phrase, “divine right,” sounds queer
-to Anglo-Saxon ears, to us, the descendants of a race who elevated
-Charles Stuart to the scaffold as a result of a “divine right.” It
-sounds strangely in the ears of a nation that furnished the example
-of Liberty and Equality to the world, and which, when followed by the
-Frenchmen, caused Louis XVI. to kiss the guillotine by reason of his
-“divine right.”
-
-The meaningless, senseless sentences in “Society as I Have Found It,”
-would be entitled to not the slightest attention, were it not for the
-fact that they give words to the sentiments of the “smart set,” who
-have allied themselves--or rather stuck themselves on, as a piece
-of mud on a marble column--to the Republican party, and, hence, in
-the minds of equality-loving Americans, the Republican party became
-besmirched by that mud.
-
-Quoting further from the New York _World_, and believing that the
-writer of the article knew whereof he wrote, the following is
-inserted:--
-
-
-     “I am writing about a period now thirty years gone by, and,
-     consequently, beyond the personal knowledge of the great majority
-     of my readers. But New York society of to-day is known to all
-     readers of Sunday papers. They know it as an institution in which
-     the prevalence of gigantic fortunes has made its atmosphere
-     uncongenial for all who are not conspicuously rich. And while
-     the valid claims of birth and breeding and culture have thus
-     been crowded out at one gate of the social arena, the influences
-     which have forced an entry at the other end in company with the
-     mere millions, have all been vulgarizing influences. Society is
-     no longer certain that it is the genuine article. If it were,
-     it would not swagger so much, nor give so much thought to the
-     effect it produces on the outer world. It is insolent, but not
-     courageous; ostentatious, but not brilliant; it splurges, but does
-     not shine; no glimmer of intelligence relieves the dullness of its
-     boredom. It abases itself before the peerage of Great Britain, and
-     the taint of corrupt living is unpleasantly frequent on its gilded
-     exterior. Measured by the tests of a true aristocracy, it is below
-     the standard of thirty years ago.”
-
-
-The readers of the papers, who are the people, know that society is
-an institution, as organized to-day, created by gigantic fortunes,
-which have been accumulated within the last thirty years, and, in
-many instances, by men of low and vulgar instincts, of mean origin,
-poor ability, who have become rich as the result of accident, and the
-result of the necessities of the nation while engaged in the war for
-the preservation of the Union. These very men, who had not the courage
-nor patriotism of the commonest soldier who shouldered his musket at
-Abraham Lincoln’s call, and vindicated on the field of battle the right
-of the people, in a republic, to equality, and to the control of the
-government by the majority, who are beneficiaries of Protection and
-the exigencies of the nation, would assume a superiority over that
-common soldier whose courage and patriotism led him to risk his life in
-preserving the Union--for the fighting soldiers of “’61” were of the
-“Common People.”
-
-Society is not only no longer uncertain that it is a genuine article,
-but it _knows_ it is a sham and a fraud, and seeks to make up by
-impertinence, insolence, and arrogance what it lacks of the genuine
-article. It _does_ swagger; it does produce an effect upon the outer
-world, and that effect was evident by the overwhelming vote of the
-people, who said to it and to its successors in office, November 8th,
-last: “Thus far and no farther thou shalt go.” It abases itself in such
-a disgusting manner before that peerage of Great Britain, as to cause
-feelings of indignation and contempt to arise in the bosoms of the
-descendants of those old Continental soldiers, who, more than a hundred
-years ago, said to Great Britain and her aristocracy: “We have had
-enough of you. This shall be a land of freedom, equality, and liberty;
-though it should cost the last drop of blood in our veins.” And how
-effectively they demonstrated their determination to produce such a
-result, many a lord and lordling now mouldering in his grave, who
-sought these shores to impose the yoke of “caste” upon the colonies,
-could attest.
-
-The tuft-hunting, and absolute courting of English titled adventurers,
-by the inheritors of the wealth taken from the people, has filled with
-disgust the breast of every manly and womanly citizen of this country.
-The people are not Socialists. Mrs. Hammersley is entitled to all
-that she inherited. Her right to it would be protected and defended
-by every good citizen of the Union, and there are few, very few, who
-are not good citizens, among the people. She may marry whomsoever she
-will. It was her privilege to select (or be selected by) the Duke of
-Marlborough, descendant of--not the over-honest, but original--soldier
-of fortune. She had a perfect right to prefer the position as wife
-of a divorced duke. She could take the money amassed in America and
-refurnish Blenheim, for the benefit (after the death of her divorced
-duke) of his first wife, who was still living, and will now be enabled
-to enjoy the fruits produced by the waters of American dollars poured
-upon the somewhat decayed and degenerate house of Churchill.
-
-Mrs. Hammersley has the right to utilize the fortune of her deceased
-American husband under the wise provisions of his will (clever American
-he must have been!) as she chooses; but when she and her acquired (by
-purchase or otherwise) title is flaunted in the faces of American men
-and women, as something which entitles her to a more eminent position
-than she possessed as an American woman, the “Common People” object.
-Every time that the lady was spoken of, or written of, as “the American
-Duchess,” as “Our Duchess,” it aroused resentment. We have no American
-Duchess.
-
-As an American wife, Mrs. Hammersley was a queen; as a duchess, by the
-exertion of great pressure and influence, she gained the privilege of
-kissing the hand of another, _called_ Queen, because of the accident of
-birth.
-
-Doubtless, Mrs. Hammersley was not responsible for being dubbed “the
-American Duchess” by the newspapers; but men of the Ward McAllister
-stamp, and the “smart set,” indicated so plainly the kind of desire
-that seems to pervade the members of the sham aristocracy, to acquire
-by some method, and at any price, a title, that it was pardonable
-that the newspaper men assigned the peculiarly objectionable title of
-“the American Duchess” to one of America’s daughters. The columns of
-our papers, day by day mirroring, as they do, the prevalence of this
-servile abasement of the dignity of the American woman in the “smart
-set” seeking alliances with a degenerate and unworthy offspring of a
-decayed and odoriferous aristocracy existing in Europe, have brought
-the subject to the attention of the people all over the land.
-
-What a relief it is to manly Americans to turn from a picture like that
-presented by the coroneted “Duchess,” whose title and coronet have been
-purchased by the wealth of a common American citizen, an account of
-which is here printed, taken from the New York _World_ of November the
-13th:--
-
-
-     “A fine old illustration of the Duke’s financial ability was
-     shown in the way he obtained a _dot_ of $500,000 with his wife.
-     He made the Duchess borrow this sum in England and, to secure it,
-     insure her life to that amount. She then returned with him to this
-     country and here confessed judgment to her London creditors for
-     the amount mentioned. They took the matter into the court, which
-     directed that the trustees set aside annually from the Duchess’
-     income $50,000 a year to pay the interest on the debt she had
-     incurred in England and the principal. This money the Duchess gave
-     to her husband. She also bought and gave him a house in London.”
-
-
-And then to gaze with admiring glances upon that model of the American
-wife and mother, the late Mrs. Benjamin Harrison. To read of her, in
-the columns of a paper like the New York _Herald_, politically opposed
-to the party represented by President Harrison, that this good woman,
-Mrs. Harrison, representing that which is most queenly to the minds of
-the “Common People” of America, “was a model wife and mother;” that
-“during her husband’s early struggles she helped him in many ways, and
-her wise counsel was often a great service to him.” “She reared and
-educated her children thoroughly and sensibly, and made their home
-always attractive to them. * * * * She was also a skillful housekeeper,
-and few women were more adept in the art of domestic economy. * * *
-To do good works was her delight, and she was for many years one of
-the managers of the Indianapolis Orphan Asylum. * * * * At no time a
-woman of fashion. * * * In all the honors that came to her husband, she
-remained just the same consistent, helpful woman that she was the first
-day they were married. * * * * The domestic life at the White House
-has been something that all the world might be better for knowing of.
-Mrs. Harrison was the queen and centre of it all.”
-
-Of this good wife and mother, endeared to the hearts of the “Common
-People,” by the possession of those same qualities and virtues that
-make the helpmates of the poor and lowly so dear to them, was said,
-in the editorial columns of the New York _Herald_, October 25th, the
-following:--
-
-
-     “In this hour of his affliction, the sympathy of the entire nation
-     will go out to President Harrison and his household.
-
-     “The people of the country had only to learn of her worth to
-     recognize and appreciate in Mrs. Harrison the virtues and graces
-     of a noble womanhood. As mistress of the White House, she won the
-     affection of all, as she endeared herself to her home circle by
-     her qualities as wife and mother.
-
-     “Her brave and serene spirit through long suffering, and the
-     President’s tender devotion, have touched the heart of the
-     country. Her death will be mourned as the loss of a good, lovable
-     woman.”
-
-
-[Illustration: MRS. BENJAMIN HARRISON.]
-
-The sorrow occasioned by her death inspired even poets to place a
-wreath woven by their art, upon her tomb. It is well for the country
-that the President’s wife should have been one furnishing such a
-noble example to the women of America, that of her could be written
-what James Whitcomb Riley wrote of Mrs. Harrison:--
-
-
-     Now utter calm and rest,
-     Hands folded o’er the breast,
-     In peace the placidest,
-       All trials past,
-     All fever soothed; all pain
-     Annulled in heart and brain,
-     Never to vex again,
-       She sleeps at last.
-
-     She sleeps, but, oh, most dear
-     And best beloved of her,
-     Ye sleep not, nay, nor stir,
-       Save but to bow
-     The closer each to each,
-     With sobs and broken speech
-     That all in vain beseech
-       Her answer now.
-
-     And lo, we weep with you,
-     Our grief the wide world through,
-     Yet, with the faith she knew,
-       We see her still,
-     Even as here she stood,
-     All that was pure and good
-     And sweet in womanhood,
-       God’s will her will.
-
-
-The sympathy of the whole nation went out to President Harrison when he
-sustained the loss of that example of virtue and womanly excellence in
-the death of his wife. It was so deep and strong, that had the “Common
-People” not seen the party he represented through a glass clouded by
-the smoke and soot of sham aristocracy, he would have been re-elected.
-
-By that bedside, the people saw the chief of their nation with bowed
-head, shedding tears for that lost love who had shared with him his
-joys and sorrows, his hopes and disappointments, ambitions, and his
-failures. No tenderer sympathy or kindlier feeling ever filled and
-moved the hearts of the American people than that felt for that good
-husband, good patriot, good citizen, Benjamin Harrison. He was bereft
-of a helpmate who by his side had fought the battle of life, the early
-struggles in Indianapolis when he was a young lawyer, hewing his way
-through the forest of difficulties, which, like the forests of Africa
-that surrounded Stanley, in American life present themselves before
-the struggling, ambitious men of our land. And when, at last, bursting
-through the maze and underbrush of obstacles, like Stanley, he came
-upon the open plain of success, her voice had been first to join his
-in a prayer of thanksgiving. The bowed head of the aged chieftain of
-the nation, upon whom the heavy hand of sorrow had been laid, was an
-object to occasion even the most partisan political opponent to pause
-and shed one sympathetic tear. How full must his mind have been of the
-recollection of the hours anxiously spent by this loving American wife
-and mother, while he was exposed to hourly danger in defence of the
-American Union. How each sad hour must have been recalled to him, and
-how slight had been the recompense, accorded in the harvest of time to
-the faithful heart that had beat in rhythmic accord with his.
-
-[Illustration: BENJAMIN HARRISON.
-
-President of the United States, 1889-93.]
-
-The sympathy of the nation was deep, broad, and strong; and had
-Benjamin Harrison represented anything else but what the people knew
-was the aristocratic party, on the flood-tide of that sympathy he would
-have been carried into office by an overwhelming majority. Let those
-who would excuse their own errors and the errors of their _class_, let
-the would-be astute politician and the abashed assumed barons ascribe
-the defeat of the Republican party to the lack of personal magnetism
-of their candidate, but the great heart of the people will feel that
-that charge was as false as the claim of the “Four Hundred” to social
-superiority.
-
-Benjamin Harrison will long be remembered as an exemplary President,
-if patriotism and the performance of those pledges made to the people
-who elected him, entitle a President to remembrance. Great as we all
-recognize the personal magnetism of that magnificent statesman, James
-G. Blaine, to be, it could not have exerted the influence over the
-minds of the masses that the death of Mrs. Harrison in the White House
-did. Death robbed the President of the position of the First Man in
-the Nation. He became at once the husband, the father, and the man;
-and had the issue been alone to be decided by personal magnetism,
-sympathy of the people, the outburst of approval and approbation would
-have been in favor of Benjamin Harrison. But he and the party whom he
-represents, justly or unjustly, had become accursed with the crime of
-“caste” in our country. He was defeated by those who, to a man, bowed
-their heads in sorrow with him, and shed tears of sympathy at his great
-loss as a fellow-man and citizen, but could not give him their votes as
-representing what to them became the party of sham, affected, foreign
-aristocracy.
-
-Another picture that rises simultaneously before the eyes of the masses
-as representing those queens in America, to whom more ready homage
-is paid than was ever accorded to a coronet or crown, is our Frances
-Cleveland. Ours, because the “Common People” claim her, as only an
-ordinary, sweet, lovely, modest American woman.
-
-That picture made more votes for Grover Cleveland than any political
-chicanery could have accomplished. With her baby in her arms, she
-represents American womanhood, motherhood, and simplicity; that which
-is best, purest, and dearest to the hearts of all of us, the “Common
-People.” No higher place is it possible for woman to attain than that
-she occupies with her babe on her bosom.
-
-[Illustration: THE AMERICAN QUEEN.]
-
-[Illustration: THE AMERICAN DUCHESS.]
-
-She had gone into the White House a young, guileless, average, common
-American girl; she had represented, in the high position accorded to
-her by the hearts of the people, the first lady of the land, with a
-simplicity and dignity pleasing to every American woman from Maine
-to Texas. She had welcomed the friends of her girlhood, before, as
-wife of the President, she became the most prominent female figure
-in the land, with the same cordiality that as Miss Frances Folsom
-she had exhibited towards them. The unassuming air with which she
-occupied her high position as sharer of the honors of the Chieftain
-of a free people, endeared her to the hearts of the mass of us,
-“Common People.” The farmer’s wife in Illinois, the mechanic’s wife
-at Homestead, Pa., the banker’s wife at Philadelphia, the railroad
-president’s wife in New York, felt a ray of sunshine warming that
-spot in woman’s heart, which is the Holy of Holies with them, young
-wifehood; and when Time, the great scene-shifter, had rearranged the
-setting of the stage, and presented to us the picture of the young
-mother, she became as interesting an object as the President himself.
-She had given to America another American. She had set an example for
-the women of our land which it would be well, my lady in your palace
-on Fifth avenue, to follow. Do not leave the future generations,
-who will rule the destinies of this nation, to be the offspring of
-foreigners; forego your balls, receptions, entertainments, and your
-trips to Europe; endure the inconvenience and annoyance of the nursery.
-Let us have some American children born. The prattle of the baby’s
-tongue will be sweeter music to your ear than the lisping flattery of
-some foreign duke. You may have the honor of being a mother of some
-future Jefferson, Jackson, Webster, Clay, Calhoun, Lincoln, Garfield,
-Cleveland.
-
-God bless you, Frances Cleveland, for the example you have set!
-Thoughts of you and sweet memories of the past, as dear even to the
-poorest woman as to the Queen of Great Britain and Empress of India,
-make Democrats of the hard-worked, poor old wife and mother in the
-little farmhouse of Illinois and Indiana. There is no scene in Grover
-Cleveland’s career to-day so embalmed in the hearts of the people as
-that wherein he is described as refusing to talk politics with one of
-the political satellites that ever hover round planets of the political
-firmament, putting them aside that he might watch the tottering
-footsteps of baby Ruth. It was just like any other man of the people,
-and the people recognized, as they did in the life and acts of Abraham
-Lincoln, that Grover Cleveland is one of us.
-
-When some member of the “smart set,” who allies herself with the
-effete nobility of Europe, gives to the world a sample of what a man
-should be, as did the humble American wife, Nancy Lincoln, then the
-“Common People” will forget their wrath at the absurd assumption of
-the worshipers of the British peerage. Women like Martha Washington,
-Nancy Lincoln, Carrie Harrison, and Frances Cleveland, will ever be
-contrasted with those samples of the “smart set” who seek the society
-of the snobs and swells of foreign nations. The wrath of the people
-will ever be aroused at the arrogant assumption of snobbery and sham
-aristocracy upon the part of the successful searchers after titles.
-
-The saying, by the “smart set,” that the “Common People” have nothing
-to do with them or their actions, or with how they dispose of their
-wealth, is quite true; but the unwise exhibition of an attempt to
-create class distinctions, can arouse such gusts of anger that that
-wealth, which is held only by paying such taxes as the “Common People”
-may decree (being, as they are, the majority), that much-prized wealth
-may be swept away, as a handful of dust, before the storm of the
-people’s anger.
-
-The correspondent of the New York _World_ hastens to vindicate the
-just censure written, from any suspicion of prejudice concerning New
-York’s “Four Hundred”; but, in the attempt to vindicate, gives evidence
-enough of the thought of the people with regard to the morals of any
-“smart set” possessed of unlimited millions, totally idle, selfish, and
-luxurious:--
-
-
-     “To vindicate my censures from any suspicion of prejudice, let me
-     hasten to add that the tone of New York’s ‘Four Hundred’ is better
-     than that of any corresponding set in the world. Comparisons are
-     not satisfactory, because the society of Paris is the society of
-     all France, and the society of London is the society of the whole
-     British Empire. Compared with these, the social aristocracy of
-     New York is merely a little clique. It is only just to say that
-     it has not yet reached the coarseness of that fast set in London,
-     which it aspires to imitate, and, if it lacks the refinement
-     which centuries of courtly teaching have given to even the most
-     unruly elements of French aristocracy, it also falls short of that
-     cynicism which ignores all moral influences. Perhaps the present
-     lowered tone of society may be only a passing malady. Perhaps
-     things may get better before they get worse. Who knows? We can
-     only say that unlimited millions, total idleness, and selfish
-     luxury, are conditions not usually conducive to the elevation of
-     morals.”
-
-
-What the people meant by the exhibition of their wrath last November,
-in the vote that they cast against what they deemed the party of the
-“smart set,” was the creation only of pictures in future, so sweetly
-pure as that with which the _World_ correspondent winds up the
-article:--
-
-[Illustration: JAY GOULD.
-
-DIED DECEMBER, 1892, WORTH $70,000,000.]
-
-
-     “What a different social vista is presented to us when we turn
-     to look back on the long and peaceful life of _Emerson’s widow_,
-     who died last week at the ripe age of _ninety_. Although she made
-     no claim on the world’s regard, we catch pleasant glimpses of
-     her personality along the path of the great philosopher’s life,
-     like the sunshine showing through the leaves of the Concord elms.
-     Beside the simple dignity of a life like hers, how unsatisfactory
-     appears the career of an over-dressed, over-fed, over-rich woman
-     of fashion, worn out in the scramble and struggle to keep up with
-     the procession.”
-
-
-The people desire, and have so expressed themselves, by the mighty
-voice of the majority, a return to the simple, natural condition of
-social life in America, wherein “caste” has no place, from which social
-distinctions disappear; the simple, homely, every-day, virtuous life of
-the mothers, wives, and daughters of those who made the Republic.
-
-The “Common People” have recorded their protest against snobbery, sham
-aristocracy, “smart sets,” Ward McAllister, and multi-millionaires, who
-assume to be better, either by “divine right” or otherwise, than the
-ordinary American citizen. They have taught, by the lesson preached
-in the tremendous majorities for that party whom they deemed least
-tainted with this repugnant crime, that wealth, arrogance, assumption,
-and snobbery may have obtained an undue amount of influence,
-disproportioned to its merit, but that, thank God, on election day,
-every citizen of the Republic enjoys an equal right to the franchise,
-and that, by the voice of the majority, he will create such laws as to
-eradicate the insidious disease of “caste” from the wholesome body of
-the nation.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER VI.
-
-THE ARISTOCRATIC “CHAPPIE” _vs._ ABRAHAM LINCOLN.
-
-
-As that satellite of McAllister, that scion of the line of
-“Patriarchs,” parades Fifth Avenue, creating by his presence an
-aristocratic atmosphere for the poor, Common People to enjoy, what a
-picture he presents! How admirable and worthy of emulation!
-
-How the mind naturally recalls specimens of the _genus_ Chappie when
-the subject of the young male aristocrat recurs to us! This descendant
-of a half-dozen fur traders, ferrymen, or land speculators, has become
-elongated and attenuated by the non-exercise of the muscles of his
-feet and legs in the long tramps that his forefathers used to take to
-barter for the peltries of the untutored Indian, exchanging rum and bad
-muskets therefor.
-
-We will begin with Chappie’s lower extremities, because of the greater
-importance of that part of his anatomy. The pimple which surmounts
-his structure is hardly worthy to be called a head, and is the least
-important part of his makeup. Around the thin shanks of his lower limbs
-are imported striped trousers, in imitation of his English model; these
-are turned up when it rains in London. His narrow, chicken-like bosom
-is covered by a hand’s breadth of imported material. (There’s no heart
-in his bosom, nor other organs worthy of naming within his whole body;
-hence, a little cloth will cover his trunk.) From sloping shoulders
-that would have done credit to a belle of the First Empire of France,
-hangs, in badly wrinkled folds, the latest thing “from Poole’s, of
-London, y’ know!” Rising from the apex formed by the slopes of his
-shoulders is a thing through which he breathes, and which he calls a
-neck; around which, to fence it from the cold blasts of heaven, he has
-had built a structure which he calls a collar, modelled absolutely
-after that of “our late lamented Prince Clarence.” Above that thing
-he calls a neck is nothing; for that which in a human being would
-represent a face, in this creature is but a simpering mask of idiocy,
-arrogance, sensuality, intemperance, and licentiousness.
-
-That thing he calls a face, with assured presumption and insulting
-attitude, he thrusts before the gaze and upon the attention of the
-daughters of the poor but honest workmen, whose children, not having
-a fur trader for a grandfather, have to labor. This _thing_--this
-“Chappie”--would assume the same privileges as one of the new nobility,
-the creation of men like McAllister and the “Patriarchs,” as those
-assumed by the curled and perfumed darlings of the court which
-surrounded the licentious Louis XV. That which from fear he would not
-dare to do or say among the “smart set,” he feels at liberty to do or
-say when thrown among the children of the poor and defenceless on a
-public street. It is nothing to him to insult the poor shop girl; he
-would say, “That is one of the evidences that I am of the upper class.
-It should be an honor to be spoken to by me.”
-
-It was ever one of the idiosyncrasies of the upper classes, wherever
-people have allowed them to exist, to insult innocence and outrage
-honor. History teems with it, and “Chappie,” by tradition, thinks
-that necessarily he must act it, to be of the “Prince’s set.”
-“Chappie” thinks that the scandal of Cavendish Square was but a little
-episode--nothing, in fact, because the children of the poor were the
-only ones contaminated; for the brutes who led to these orgies in
-Cavendish Square had already become decayed and rotten morally.
-
-“Chappie” in his exalted position sees in every unprotected woman (and
-he’ll make sure she’s unprotected) a victim upon whom to exercise
-his wiles, and if, God help her! through weakness, love of dress,
-finery, or pleasure, she allows herself to be led to lean upon his
-honor, she’ll fall! For “Chappie’s” honor exists only as aristocracy in
-America, that being a sham and a fraud, as is Chappie’s honor.
-
-This outgrowth of accumulated wealth, this polluting toad in the pure
-water of public life, never has and never will, nor can he, give one
-atom of return to the Republic for the honor of living in it. He whose
-life is spent in idleness, debauchery, and sensuality regards his
-valet, coachman, cook, clerk, tailor, hatter, merchant, banker, as his
-social inferior. And he is always attached, like a barnacle, to the
-good Republican Ship built by Abraham Lincoln.
-
-Is it a wonder that the people said, in November last: “We’ll burn the
-ship rather than endure such barnacles?”
-
-This thing, so amusingly written of by that most excellent comic paper,
-_Life_, so ridiculed by _Puck_ and _Judge_, held up for derision by the
-whole newspaper fraternity, is responsible for the loss of thousands of
-votes to the Republican party. Indignant wives, sisters, and daughters
-have returned with flaming cheeks to humble yet honest homes, and told
-the story of the insults offered them on the streets of this and other
-good cities in the Union by “Chappie” and those creatures of his kind;
-and in their telling of the story have made more votes, more Common
-People’s votes, than have been made by all the newspapers ever printed
-in the interests of the Democratic party. Each tear that was shed upon
-the bosom of the poor man by an honest working daughter became a nail
-in the coffin of the Republican party. Justly or unjustly, such is the
-case. The Grand Old Party had descended, in the People’s opinion, to
-the level of enduring representation of it by such as “Chappie.” “How
-have the mighty fallen!”
-
-“Chappie,” with his vacant semblance of a head, with his trousers
-carefully rolled up, with his insidious smile, insinuating manner,
-his suggestive gestures, and ogling glances, has proven himself a
-valuable assistant to Mr. Harrity, Chairman of the Democratic National
-Committee. Steadily he has increased the waters of wrath in the
-reservoir of the poor man’s heart, until, bursting all barriers, it
-swept away “Chappie,” his “smart set,” and all, November 8, 1892.
-
-“Chappie,” after his late and dainty breakfast and stroll down Fifth
-Avenue (every city has its Fifth Avenue or something like it), enabling
-the daughters of the poor to gaze upon his charming proportions;
-delighting their fancy with the possibility in the shape of finery
-that might be theirs would he only condescend to beckon to them; with
-a few chosen spirits similar to himself--all of the “smart set,”
-y’ know!--seeks that most discriminating and select of saloons,
-Delmonico’s. (And every city has its Delmonico.) There, after tickling
-his palate and tempting his satiated appetite with delicacies so rare
-and difficult of procurement that the cost of each one of such dainties
-would feed some poor man’s family for a fortnight; forgetting that
-early grandfather, the fur trader, who considered pork a feast, leans
-back in his chair and lisps in affected imitation of the English,
-“Where shall we g-o, deah boys?”
-
-Now let us draw the veil over where “Chappie” spends his evenings.
-“Chappie’s” pleasures and “Chappie’s” unnatural amusements would cause
-a blush of shame to redden the face of the humblest horny-handed son
-of toil. “Chappie’s” exhausted nature has ceased to realize sensations
-natural to _men_ and sons of God. “Chappie” is much poorer than his
-progenitor, the old fur trader; for the old fur trader was rich in
-all the natural inclinations and appetites created by a natural
-and vigorous manhood. The old fur trader had no coat-of-arms; but,
-“Chappie,” that old fur trader would blush at the decadence of his own
-descendant! When the historian, “Chappie,” shall make up the records
-of this great nation, that old fur trader, though he swindled the
-Indians and debauched them with rum, had that which you, “Chappie,”
-lack--manliness, courage, and character, even though the character was
-of a peculiar kind.
-
-You have no character, “Chappie.” The Common People have found you a
-tumor, an excrescence upon the body politic. They have taken their
-knife to amputate, from wholesome Americanism, a foreign infliction. Be
-careful, “Chappie,” that the amputation does not include the severance
-of that semblance of a head that you carry on your sloping shoulders.
-Be warned in time; you and yours have wealth, luxury, influence, and
-obedience upon the part of those you dominate. You have all that wealth
-will buy--villas at Newport, yachts, palaces. You revel in banquets,
-balls, and glittering assemblages. The poor man’s home is illuminated
-alone by the light shed by honor. He who would steal or deprive him
-of that one light, takes all from him that makes his life worth the
-living. The poor man’s honor is the honor of his wife and children.
-Your immoralities have increased, like appetite, by what they fed upon.
-It is not after you, the deluge, but it is around you, the deluge. It
-is in the air, because it is in the hearts of the Common People.
-
-It is no exaggeration to say that the assumed license which young men
-of the “Chappie” class exhibit in their lives, morals, and manners, has
-done much to disgust the large mass of the people. The oft-repeated
-expression, that “virtue and honesty in England is confined to the
-great middle classes,” is reiterated by those of the “Chappie” class in
-America as an excuse for their own misdemeanors. The flagrantly sinful
-lives, filled with debauchery, which they lead, is an evidence, to
-their poor intellects, of their being members of the sham aristocracy
-with which America is cursed. The society of the kind composed of
-“Chappies” is so objectionable to the decency and intelligence of the
-Common People that its exclusiveness would be almost a virtue.
-
-The Common People of respectability would never seek “Chappie’s”
-society, and their hearts are filled with resentment at his
-supercilious manner and ignoble intentions when seeking the society of
-the Common People.
-
-[Illustration: ABE, THE RAIL-SPLITTER.--The “Common People” Made Him
-President.]
-
-[Illustration: “Chappie” on Fifth Avenue.--The Worthless Product of
-“Caste” and Sham Aristocracy.]
-
-To some it will appear ridiculous to have devoted so much space in this
-volume to such a nonentity. If we could confine the “nonentity,” like
-an ape, in the Zoological Garden in Central Park, it is true so much
-space would be wasted as he occupies in this volume. But, the fact is,
-he is allowed to run at large, and in his peregrinations around
-the country he creates a feeling of disgust among the Common People for
-that political party to which he proudly asserts he belongs; claiming
-it to be the “only respectable party.” Were he not, as a “sandwich
-man,” a walking advertisement of the worst element that has become
-attached, like an octopus, to the Republican party, “Chappie” would be
-unworthy of the attentions he has here received.
-
-But, in seeking for the true cause of the decisive and overwhelming
-overthrow of Lincoln’s “Grand Old Party,” it is necessary to mix even
-this worthless ingredient into the porridge of defeat with which the
-leaders of the Republican party have been fed.
-
-It is a relief to turn from the despicable object of “Chappie,” and
-regard and compare in our minds with him the men who have “left
-footprints on the sands of time” in the history of our nation.
-
-What a contrast is presented when we shift “Chappie” from the scene of
-our mental vision and bring forth the loved “Harry” Clay, the miller’s
-boy. That barefoot boy, on a bony, ill-bred horse, with shaggy mane
-and tail; holding a bag of corn in front of him, on his journey to the
-mill for his widowed mother, is a more inspiring picture, decidedly,
-than “Chappie” on his well-bred English cob whose coat is soft as fur
-from constant currying, whose tail is cropped off _a la_ the fashion
-for riding-horses in London. As “Chappie” sits on his little imported
-English saddle, and daintily holds an imported English riding whip,
-prepared for a ride, to give the “Common People” an exhibition of the
-beauty, gallantry and horsemanship of the scion of sham aristocracy;
-with all his glory, backed with all of his millions, “Chappie” does
-not warm the hearts of the “Common People” like the picture of that
-miller’s boy, Henry Clay, the great Commoner of Kentucky.
-
-Daniel Webster, struggling as district school teacher in New England,
-clothed in ill-fitting garments, would somehow furnish a better model
-for the sculptor or painter who would make a statue or picture or a
-head of him who was, indeed, a mighty man.
-
-The music of the voice of grand old Daniel Webster, even though he did
-not drawl in delightful imitation of the English, would give greater
-delight to the “Common People,” plebeian as they are and unrefined,
-than “Chappie’s” lispings.
-
-There remains another figure, called to mind by the Common People
-when they view “Chappie,” by reason of the vast difference between
-the figure of “Chappie” and the “rail-splitter” of Illinois. The
-long, uncouth, gangling, ungainly figure of a boy sprawled on his
-back, lying on the floor of a humble log-cabin, seeking knowledge
-in a well-thumbed book, by the light of a flickering fire, presents
-something that speaks more eloquently to the hearts of the Common
-People than “Chappie’s” gorgeous appearance and apparel; for they know
-that the name of the lad before that fire was ABRAHAM LINCOLN, and that
-from that uncouth figure, and by the aid of that difficultly-acquired
-knowledge, resulted the production of that man who, as representative
-of the Common People as their President, stood as the Rock of
-Gibraltar when the fierce waves of fratricidal war swept over our
-land; immovable, firm and unchangeable as that rock itself in the
-determination that the Union should be preserved, and that the Stars
-and Stripes should float over every inch of ground of the United States
-of America. While others lost hope and many were downcast, groping for
-support in the hour of gloom and peril to the national existence of our
-country, that man, who was the outcome of the ungainly figure by the
-fire, led the people of the nation as the pillar of fire of old led the
-hosts of Israel.
-
-While men like Jefferson, Jackson, Clay, Webster and Lincoln present
-types which, to the minds of the Common People of America, are best
-and greatest, the picture of “Chappie,” in all of his splendid
-apparel, peculiar pronunciation, abnormal immoralities, will sink
-into insignificance beneath the flood of the people’s contempt and
-disapproval; just as the party to which “Chappie” had allied himself
-were swept away and submerged, November 8, 1892.
-
-[Illustration: ANDREW CARNEGIE.
-
-A “Self-Made” Man. A Multi-Millionaire. Made $20,000,000 in America;
-Lives in Scotland.]
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER VII.
-
-HON. JOHN BRISBEN WALKER, ON HOMESTEAD.
-
-
-It is the good fortune of only a few to be possessed of the remarkable
-genius and imbued with the spirit of prophecy to predict coming events
-with the certainty and accuracy of the Hon. J. Brisben Walker, who,
-in an article published in the _Cosmopolitan_ for September, 1892,
-foretold, with wonderful force, the rock upon which the Republican bark
-was drifting. It was not until the manuscript of this volume was almost
-completed that attention was called to Mr. Walker’s article. To the
-credit of journalists, and writers generally, be it said that no class
-or profession are as willing to recognize the ability of their brothers
-as are the members of that profession whose aim it is to foretell the
-future, to weigh the evidence of public opinion, prognosticate as to
-the result thereof, and record the events that transpire, either in
-accordance with their prophecies or contrary thereto. To Mr. Walker be
-accorded the honor of justly appreciating the suppressed indignation
-of the people, and of sounding the warning note to the wealthy, prior
-to November 8, 1892. To the writer of this volume little credit is due
-for merely recording that which, since the result of the election is
-known, is perfectly apparent. Had Mr. Walker looked into the future
-and been blessed with prophetic vision, he could not have told, more
-clearly than he has, the forces that were operating in September, and
-which produced the results so surprising to many in November.
-
-[Illustration: HENRY C. FRICK,
-
-MANAGER CARNEGIE WORKS, HOMESTEAD, PA.]
-
-While Mr. Walker has taken Homestead for his text, the application of
-his article to the condition of the people of the Union generally is
-so apparent that each man for himself may shift the scene and make
-it applicable to his own little community. In every village, town,
-city, or county in the Union, is some one man, or some set of men,
-who arrogate to themselves a certain superiority resulting from the
-accumulation of wealth in their hands; this accumulation, having arisen
-from the inequality in the distribution of the increased wealth of
-the nation, being in many cases purely accidental, and in others the
-result of the phenomenal development of the resources of this country,
-coupled with the wonderful spirit of invention shown in the land in
-the last thirty years. Mr. Walker takes Carnegie and Frick as types of
-the class to which the people object so strenuously. The building of a
-church, or the founding of a library, is but a small price to pay, in
-the opinion of the American people, for the right to assume privileges
-detrimental to the growth and continuance of that doctrine so dear to
-the hearts of the masses--the equality of man. Mr. Walker entitles his
-article, “The Homestead Object Lesson,” and begins by saying:--
-
-
-     “An affair like that at Homestead educates the public mind
-     rapidly; more rapidly in a month than ten years of books and
-     pamphlets. In the face of death, men stop to think. What led to
-     this? What does it mean? What is the remedy? And when the daily
-     journal gives in one column the picture of Cluny Castle, or the
-     magnificent pile from which the Lyttons have gone out to admit
-     partner Phipps from the Homestead mills, and in another sketches
-     showing the dead and dying upon the banks of the Monongahela, the
-     contrast is so sharp that one draws a quick breath of discomfort,
-     and even the most conservative, whose manhood is stronger than his
-     love of dollars, admits that something is wrong.”
-
-
-If a man in the walk of life of Mr. Walker shall “draw a quick breath
-of discomfort” at the scene he pictures, because his “manhood is
-stronger than his love of dollars,” how utterly obvious it ought to
-have appeared, and should now appear, to those possessed of wealth,
-that an appeal for the support of that class who, as American citizens,
-not only possess an abundance of manhood, but, in addition thereto, are
-sufferers by the wrongs or conditions written of by Mr. Walker, was and
-is useless.
-
-
-     “Lovers of the Republic may well tremble at this exhibition, so
-     closely resembling the evil days when rich Romans surrounded
-     themselves by hired bands of fighting bullies. True, our
-     modern rich man does not parade the streets, surrounded by his
-     gladiators. He sits in a secret office, removed from danger,
-     and, in communication with the telegraph wires, orders his army
-     concentrated from many States by rapid transit, and moves it
-     unexpectedly upon his private foes. There is lacking that personal
-     courage which gave a half-way excuse to the Roman who, sword
-     in hand, shared the dangers of the fight. But the risk to the
-     Republic is all the greater from these modern methods. For, if a
-     man may hire 300 poor devils ready to shoot down their brothers in
-     misery, there is no reason why he may not hire 10,000.”
-
-
-There are not a few of us who will recall the natural indignation
-aroused in our bosoms while witnessing that noble impersonator of
-_Virginius_, John B. McCullough; the idea of the degradation to
-which we were drifting, by the possibility of the existence of an
-aristocracy, whose hired bullies and parasitical clients acted as
-panders to the worst passions of man. If it be possible to adopt the
-old Roman method of hiring bullies and assassins, and maintaining paid
-private armies, how very possible to come to a condition similar to
-that so powerfully portrayed in _Virginius_! Lovers of the Republic,
-of honor, and virtue, may well tremble, at the bare possibility,
-vaguely imagined, but evidently more vivid to the minds of the masses,
-than was contemplated by those autocratic gentlemen who ordered their
-mercenaries to Homestead.
-
-
-     “There is another side to this matter. Raised up under the system
-     which declares that any man has a right to control, without limit,
-     the earth’s surface and its productions, or the labor of his
-     fellow-men, Mr. Frick, doubtless, feels that he is performing a
-     sacred duty in protecting his property at Homestead, by any means
-     that the law permits. Thousands of good men held the same thought
-     regarding their slaves, before and during the war. It really
-     seemed to them a divine right of property, and all classes of the
-     community to-day--learned ministers and professors, intelligent
-     merchants, and high-minded men of all professions--hold that our
-     system of distribution is not only legal, but fair, and authorized
-     by the teachings of the Gospel.”
-
-
-In the most lucid manner, Mr. Walker continues to give the causes of
-the existence of conditions conducive to the results which have been
-produced by the accumulation of wealth, and, in consequence, assumption
-of a superior social position by the possessors thereof:--
-
-
-     “Less than half a century ago the people of the United States were
-     comparatively poor and the wealth of the country distributed with
-     a near approach to equality, less than a dozen individuals having
-     fortunes approaching the million mark. The laws had been made
-     for the existing conditions of labor, and were, as a whole, of a
-     satisfactory character. No one had yet dreamed of the marvelous
-     inventions and discoveries of natural wealth which were to upset
-     all the conditions of production, and make the succeeding fifty
-     years a wealth-giving period, unprecedented in the history of the
-     world. Anthracite and bituminous coals, petroleum, the cotton gin,
-     the reaper, steam and electricity, with their thousand marvels,
-     were suddenly emptied upon a community whose laws had been made
-     for conditions the very opposite of those now existing.
-
-     “It is not to be wondered at that the American mind should seize
-     upon the possibilities which old laws gave to individuals for
-     grabbing these newfound treasures. They would have been more than
-     human if they could have resisted the temptation, and besides,
-     it must be recollected that the Christianity practised was of a
-     perfunctory character, formal and nominal rather than real, and
-     civilization just beyond the period of wild beast skin wearing.
-     In fifty years the creation of wealth has become prodigious; the
-     distribution of wealth has become frightful in its inequalities.
-     The laws, which were beneficent for an agricultural and pastoral
-     people, worked degradation and infamy in a manufacturing
-     community. They permitted the few to grab the greater part of
-     this new wealth. With great fortunes are coming upon the scene
-     an unparalleled luxury upon the one hand, and a poverty upon the
-     other, scarcely surpassed in the days when production did not
-     equal one-tenth the present output. In the strife for wealth
-     the law-making power was found to be a useful auxiliary. Judges
-     were bought, senatorships were sold in the interests of railways
-     and the great corporations; and within the last ten years we
-     find wealth--not contented with the advantages which the laws,
-     confessedly in its favor, give it--hiring private armies to give
-     force to edicts allotting to the laborer a lesser share of the
-     product.”
-
-
-Experience and observation force the conviction upon our minds, that
-Mr. Walker is correct in his assumption that even the ministers believe
-that the distribution of wealth among the masses is not only legal, but
-fair, and authorized by the teachings of the Gospel. A little strange,
-however, is it for the teachers of the doctrine of Christianity to
-maintain principles so utterly at variance with those expressed by
-their divine Master: “If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou
-hast, and give to the poor.”
-
-
-     “There is only one class to dispute this proposition. They are the
-     toilers, whose labor is the immediate cause of the production of
-     our wealth. We may say that there must be intelligence to direct,
-     and that to the intelligence which takes advantage should come
-     the gains. But Mr. Carnegie and Mr. Frick are proofs that in
-     the ranks of labor itself there is intelligence to direct. Many
-     Carnegies and many Fricks would spring up to-morrow if opportunity
-     permitted. If one would study the justice of a system of political
-     economy, let him surrender his vested rights of property and take
-     his place among those whom the system crushes, whose labor it
-     devours, and whose reward for labor is a bare, joyless existence.
-     We who have the money can reason speciously regarding the justice
-     of our laws, the excellence of our system of government. The
-     laboring man can only groan in spirit. He has not hitherto had
-     the power of his vote, notwithstanding our boasted representative
-     government, because his brothers, in the agony which poverty
-     brings, in their effort to relieve the hand-to-mouth miseries of
-     their existence, have sold at each election this birthright for
-     the merest taste of pottage.”
-
-
-Fortunately, under the Australian system of voting, it was
-impracticable to buy Esau’s birthright with a delusive mess of pottage
-held out by the protected, wealth-accumulating, sham aristocrats.
-
-
-     “Everyone knows that this has been true, that the labor vote has
-     never been a unit, that its purchasability has been one of the
-     well-understood factors in ward politics, that there has been
-     no combination, no united effort, no intelligent direction, no
-     willingness to submit to leadership, and that there is to-day no
-     probability of the vote of these people being cast at an early
-     election for the objects in which they are so deeply concerned.
-     The issues that are before the public in either of the great
-     political parties for whose candidates the votes will be cast,
-     are very largely those which concern the people of means and
-     influence. Platforms are dictated with reference to Wall street,
-     and the great corporations and the rich men who supply the sinews
-     of political war.”
-
-
-Fortunately, Mr. Walker’s prophecy has proved incorrect. There was a
-time in the very near future when the objects so sacred to them would
-outweigh any possible advantage that might accrue to their pocketbooks
-by voting with those who would impose the yoke of a class distinction
-upon our country. It was nearer the day of retribution than even Mr.
-Walker, farseeing as he has demonstrated himself to be, supposed.
-The 8th of November was to witness the vindication upon the part of
-the workman of his inherent right to exercise his prerogative as an
-American citizen, uninfluenced by mercenary motives. Almost without
-an error has Mr. Walker gauged the public feeling. It is pardonable,
-in one who is so much nearer right than the majority, to make one
-single error. None of us appreciated how full were the hearts of the
-workingmen, the poor, and those oppressed by wealth and stung by an
-attempted exhibition of the privileges accorded to “caste.”
-
-
-     “Nevertheless, there is a ground-current steadily moving
-     across the continent. Workmen, who were wholly ignorant thirty
-     years ago, are partly educated to-day. Within fifteen years,
-     a highly-intelligent class has sprung up among the workmen
-     themselves, and there are a few really able men who have been
-     making efforts for their advancement. That man Powderly, for
-     instance, is a statesman of a high order. He has capacity for
-     organization, he has singleness of purpose, he has determination,
-     and he has courage. And he is only one of a number. They have been
-     educating their followers, and teaching them to unite upon certain
-     simple propositions. It is like the fencing-master, who puts in
-     the hands of his pupil the single-stick, before he confides to
-     him the glittering rapier. There is talent enough among them to
-     organize a movement more formidable than that of Spartacus. Thank
-     God, they are men who love the Republic, and who hope for the
-     elevation of their people through the evolution of the law.”
-
-
-Mr. Walker could have gone on and called the attention of the wealthy
-to the fact that, while these men loved the Republic, they did not love
-the foreign spirit that pervaded the would-be upper classes. It is well
-that a man of Mr. Walker’s position should feel it incumbent upon him
-to compliment, or, more properly speaking, to duly appreciate, a man
-like Powderly. Mr. Powderly, were he not a statesman and a patriot,
-is possessed of dangerous powers; were it not for the great amount of
-virtue, honesty, and common-sense that resides in the bosoms of the
-masses, some dangerous, daring, and magnetic leader might spring into
-prominence and cause the overturning which Mr. Walker so ably depicts
-later in his article. Mr. Powderly, and men of his kind, have ever
-acted as the governing-power on this tremendous engine, called Labor,
-in this country. They have exhibited a degree of conservatism and
-consideration for the rights of the wealthy, as well as the rights of
-the laborer, which entitles them to the respect of all sound-minded
-Americans.
-
-
-     “Two things must always be borne in mind: First, that the laboring
-     men have the majority, if they choose to exercise it, not only of
-     votes, but of physical strength. Intelligence and cunning were,
-     once upon a time, factors upon which the few rich could count to
-     keep in subjection the many poor. The time is rapidly approaching
-     when these will no longer avail. There is a prevailing thought
-     that this must be a Republic, indeed, where all men shall be equal
-     before the law; where the law will carefully guard the industrious
-     man against the greedy man; where cunning will not place labor at
-     the greatest of disadvantages; where labor will become honorable,
-     and idleness contemptible; where effort will be expected from
-     every citizen in the direction of his best talent, and where
-     the needs of the unfortunate, through disease or inheritance,
-     will be respected; in a word, the model government in which a
-     near approach to the ideal Republic will be attained, an example
-     set which the countries of Europe may well imitate. We have the
-     opportunities here, with our rich territory, our great natural
-     resources, and our population yet uncrowded, to do this. If we
-     fail, the idea of a Republic may well be abandoned for the next
-     2,000 years.”
-
-
-Forcefully is it called to the minds of the fortunate possessors of
-wealth, by Mr. Walker, that the poor are in possession of a superior
-physical force. It would be well for those who enjoy the protection
-accorded to them and their property by this vast population, made up
-largely of the laboring classes, to consider what a small percentage
-the “wealthy” represent in the mass of 65,000,000 people. Their
-pronounced minority becomes apparent whenever they oppose the will of
-that great majority, the “Common People.” Should it ever be necessary
-to arbitrate any question of difference by physical force, how
-absolutely unequal are the contending elements! Men like Mr. Powderly
-have ever sought to cast oil upon the turbulent waters occasioned
-by too much arrogance upon the part of the wealthy. It is not only
-equality before the law which the poor man prizes, but that equality
-which is rather of a sentimental than a legal nature. He recognizes no
-inequality as existing between the woman whom he honors as his wife
-and the woman whom men like Messrs. Carnegie and Frick may clothe in
-seal-skins and laces, and bedeck with jewels. It is not only before the
-law that the poor man desires to be equal. The sentimental portion of
-his nature is moved to create a difference, socially, resting only upon
-those natural inherent qualities, worth, merit, and virtue, and not
-that which has its foundation in the possession of wealth alone.
-
-
-     “That was a curious interview between the commandant of the
-     militia, the gentleman born and bred--with an inheritance of
-     belief regarding the rights to accumulate property, even if
-     in so doing one crowded one’s fellow-mortal to the wall--and
-     the iron-workers who constituted the Homestead committee.
-     Gold-spectacled, practised in the art of snubbing and sure of the
-     physical strength at his back, the officer was more than a match
-     for the laborer, who in his turn was awed by his inherited respect
-     for wealth and power. Chilled and overawed, the representatives of
-     labor went down the hill from this unequal interview. The general
-     in charge had neither the grace nor the will to recognize a labor
-     association which embraced a membership large enough, if properly
-     organized, to sweep out of existence the entire army of the United
-     States. They must have reflected, as they went down the hill,
-     these representatives of labor, that if a militia organization
-     carried such weight, permitted such freezing dignity upon the
-     part of a citizen towards other citizens, it might possibly be
-     well for their interests to have a few thousand of their own men
-     enrolled in this same militia. There is nothing to prevent a body
-     of American citizens from organizing themselves as a militia
-     organization with proper arms and equipments. There are enough
-     workmen in Pittsburg and vicinity to give a hundred regiments of
-     the full complement of ten companies of seventy men each, with as
-     many more left over for onlookers at parades. Six months of hard
-     drill such as the enthusiasm of these men would permit would leave
-     them equal to the best of the Philadelphia troops. Does anyone
-     believe for an instant that if there had been a hundred such
-     regiments among the workingmen of Pittsburg, General Snowden would
-     have declared that he could not recognize the existence of such a
-     body of men as the Amalgamated Association?”
-
-
-We will assume, with Mr. Walker, that the commandant of the troops
-sent to Pittsburg by the Governor of Pennsylvania, was a “gentleman
-bred.” About a man being _born_ a gentleman, we may hold opinions at
-variance with Mr. Walker. Horses may exhibit the fact that they are
-thoroughbred, when intelligence in the shape of a jockey is perched
-upon their backs; but born gentlemen in America have never, as a rule,
-by their scintillating genius and danger-defying patriotism, carved out
-names upon the eternal monuments of the nation to rival the names of
-Clay, Webster, and Lincoln. We hope that the man put in command of the
-Pennsylvania militia was a “gentleman bred,” but the exhibition that he
-made of himself, while clothed with that brief authority, would not be
-conducive to the formation of such an opinion.
-
-In his meeting with the citizens of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania,
-who were contributing towards the payment of the taxes from which the
-expenses incurred by the State were to be defrayed, he did not conduct
-himself in a manner such as to make a shining example for those who
-shall command, in the future, the citizen-soldiery of the Republic. He
-seemed utterly oblivious to the fact that he came, not as a conquering
-hero, but as a private citizen, invested with a brief and circumscribed
-authority exercised for the greatest good to the greatest number in
-the prevention of lawlessness and violence and the peaceful solution
-of a local difficulty with which the Sheriff of the county appeared
-to be unable to contend. The arrogance assumed by this “gentleman
-bred” was not calculated to create any great amount of good feeling
-in the breasts of his fellow-citizens, to pacify whom he was sent
-by the Governor of his State. There would have been but slight loss
-of dignity upon his part to have allayed their anxiety by a little
-exercise of that “good breeding,” patience, and consideration for the
-feelings of others, which are supposed to be characteristics of the
-gentleman the world over. General Ulysses S. Grant, commander of the
-armies of the nation, as victor in a contest of four years’ duration,
-has set a magnificent example in the treatment of his vanquished but
-great opponent, Lee, by his courteous, kindly, and magnanimous behavior
-toward Lee and his vanquished legions whom Grant had so long faced and
-at last vanquished.
-
-
-     “I choose to ask this question as a _reductio ad absurdum_, in
-     the hope that it will cause my own class, who have power and
-     authority, to stop and reflect that perhaps it will be best to
-     concede something in the way of law, to regulate this one-sided
-     distribution of wealth, lest it should be regulated through
-     bloodshed, or, what is more horrible still, should throw into
-     power, through sheer brute force, elements which will bring our
-     Republic to anarchy. If there could have been pointed out to the
-     nobles of Louis XVI. the things which were liable to follow their
-     arrogance, the children of these French rich would have cause for
-     congratulation to-day.”
-
-
-Mr. Walker says that he chooses to ask this of men of his class. He
-hardly means that. Men of his class, like himself, would have brains
-enough not to require the question. Mr. Walker doubtless refers, in
-speaking of men of his own class, to the wealthy, and to them it is
-well addressed and worthy of their careful attention. France had its
-14th of July, which should have taught Louis XVI. and his nobles the
-lesson which it is hoped has been learned thoroughly by the rich of
-this country, as taught in the result of the election of November 8,
-1892. These are but the premonitory symptoms of a terrible scourge that
-might sweep over our country. The poor may be robbed with impunity;
-the “Common People” will good-naturedly submit to a lot of snubbing;
-but it would be well for men accustomed to exhibit their impudence and
-assumption, to forego the snubbing process when brought in contact
-with the people, as General Snowden was, while commanding the military
-power of the State, as he did at Homestead. General Snowden might well
-be taken as a type of the “smart set” of Philadelphia, imitating the
-manners of the McAllister “smart set” of New York.
-
-
-     “The fact is, we have two separate worlds in this country. The
-     man who lives in what is known as the world of society has no
-     conception of what the world of labor is thinking. Their worlds
-     are almost as distinct and as completely cut off from each other
-     as if one had its capital at Kamtchatka, and the other at Terra
-     del Fuego. The poor do injustice to the kindly-hearted people
-     whose minds have been warped by the teachings of inheritance
-     and by their environment of wealth; and the rich do not dream
-     of the thoughts which fill the minds of the poor. It is a
-     dangerous ignorance. These two factors are like the nitre and
-     charcoal of gunpowder. Any stray spark may produce disastrous
-     results. The laborer believes now that the law is gradually being
-     altered to suit what he considers the equities of his position.
-     Let him become fairly convinced that the government is for the
-     few, that the military is but a means of carrying out schemes
-     of aggrandizement by the rich, and that votes are bought or
-     majorities counted out in the same interest, and the crucial hour
-     of the Republic will at once have arrived.
-
-     “Can science do nothing towards the solution of these
-     difficulties? Statistics show us that if we were all to labor,
-     no one would want for anything, neither the necessities of life,
-     nor reasonable pleasures, nor enjoyments. Again, is there any
-     intelligent rich man, who would not wish his sons to labor? Who
-     does not believe that labor, in moderation, brings happiness, if
-     only that it gives a keener zest for recreation? Who does not
-     believe that idleness brings mental and physical injury? Who,
-     then, would wish for his children existence in a community where
-     idleness is to be their lot? Is there any thinking man who can
-     feel reasonably comfortable, when only a few blocks distant,
-     thousands are eking out a dark existence by labor that extends, in
-     many cases, over double the allotted number of hours, who have few
-     pleasures, and fewer still of what we call the comforts of life?”
-
-
-It is not simply that those not possessed of wealth may live within
-a few blocks of those who are possessed of wealth; it is not that
-their lives may be eked out in darkness; it is the crushing shame to
-them that their miserable existence is made still more hard to bear
-by the flaunted superiority, socially, of the possessors of wealth,
-who live a few blocks away. Poverty, when accompanied by none of the
-other and more objectionable features, is not so hard to bear. The
-poor man believes in the dignity of labor. He does not feel degraded
-by the fact that he may toil with his hands. He only feels a sense of
-shame, and his bosom only swells with wrath, when the disdainful dames
-of the wealthy class presume to snub or insult his wife, the sharer of
-his toil and privations. She is to him the light and life of even his
-miserable hovel, only a few blocks away from the wealthy; hence, the
-keener pang that he experiences when the one bright spot in his life,
-sacred to him, is invaded by snobbery and pretended class distinction.
-
-
-     “Yet wise laws could regulate much of this in the brief period of
-     one generation. Lighten the burdens of taxation upon the poor,
-     by letting those whose wealth is protected by the State chiefly
-     furnish the means of subsistence for the State, at the same
-     time offering a discouragement to the amassing of great wealth.
-     The well-known expedient of income-tax would be a step in this
-     direction. Take out of the control of private individuals the
-     power to amass great fortunes, at the expense of the public,
-     through the management of functions like railway, express, and
-     telegraph, which are purely of a public character. Establish a
-     system of currency, self-regulated, by means of postal savings
-     banks; tax highly the unimproved properties which are held for
-     purposes of speculation. Finally, let it be a recognized principle
-     that when men employ many laborers, their business ceases to be
-     purely a private affair, but concerns the State, and that disputes
-     between proprietor and workmen must be submitted, not to the
-     brute-force of so many Pinkerton mercenaries, but to arbitration.”
-
-
-The espousal, by Mr. Walker, of a doctrine which, to most of the
-wealthy, is rank heresy,--an income tax,--is a step in the right
-direction. A graduated tax, to be regulated by the amount of income
-received and enjoyed by the taxpayer, would furnish a speedy,
-practicable, and just means, not only of preventing these vast
-accumulations in the hands of individuals, by accretions resulting from
-that part of their income which they are unable to spend, but it would
-also furnish a means whereby the Federal Government might be supported
-without the imposition of even the existing internal revenue tax, and
-only such protective tariff tax as would prove absolutely necessary to
-sustain our manufactures. It was a great step in the right direction,
-for the owner of such a prosperous magazine as the _Cosmopolitan_, the
-possessor of much of the world’s goods, to propose such an expedient
-for the relief of the people; especially when coupled with the
-suggestion that corporations, like those of the railroads, telegraph,
-_et al._, should not be controlled and managed for the profit of
-individuals. We should have fewer strikes, and much less labor trouble,
-if the Government controlled the great corporations who employ large
-numbers of laboring men.
-
-This article is given prominence and so liberally quoted from--not
-alone from the intrinsic merit of the article and discernment of the
-writer in predicting the overthrow of plutocracy, and warning the rich
-against their insolence to those less-favored brothers, as far as
-worldly wealth is concerned,--but also, because of the position of the
-writer of the article; a man of brains, enterprise, energy, and wealth.
-
-[Illustration: THE MISTAKE AT HOMESTEAD, PA.--JULY, 1892.]
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER VIII.
-
-SURRENDER AT HOMESTEAD.--ORGANIZED LABOR DEFEATED.
-
-
-It is fitting to follow the chapter composed so largely of what Mr.
-Walker has written concerning the condition of affairs at Homestead,
-with an account of the surrender. Carnegie, the owner of castles
-and coaches in Scotland, the many times millionaire, and Frick, his
-representative, living in luxury and attempted social superiority, have
-vanquished the forces of organized labor. They have won the battle.
-
-Some victories are more disastrous than defeats, and this victory, at
-Homestead, of capital, wealth, sham aristocracy, against the people,
-will teach the people to seek other methods by which their wrongs
-may be righted. It will show them, coming as it does just after the
-exhibition of the great power of the people, November 8, 1892, that
-their plan of action must be changed; that the effective missile to
-be used against the autocratic aristocrat is not the bullet, but the
-missive called the “ballot.”
-
-The plan of campaign of the poor “Common People” must be changed.
-Their defeat at Homestead will be the precursor of a long line of
-victories yet to be recorded. Organizations of _voters_ will spring
-into existence, instead of Knights of Labor. The nation will give birth
-(as it ever has, when necessity has demanded) to men of organizing
-abilities. The Carnegies and Fricks will find the ballot of organized
-voters more effective in preventing encroachment on the rights of the
-people than the bullets of the strikers at Homestead hurled at the
-hirelings of Pinkerton. As Mr. Walker so ably says, in a conflict of
-physical force, the people--that is, the poor--are superior; when,
-according to law, they deposit their ballots, they will enforce the
-election of the chosen of the majority in spite of all the private
-armies of the Carnegies and Fricks. And, should that occasion arise,
-the militia and General Snowden will be found acting _with_ the people
-in defending the rights of the people. There will be no insolence
-and arrogance then upon the part of the commander of the militia;
-for, after an election wherein the people have legally chosen their
-representatives and legislators, not one militiaman would obey the
-orders of the “well-bred” gentleman of Philadelphia, if such orders
-were contrary to the will of the majority as expressed at a legal
-election.
-
-The representatives of the first grade of “caste” have won at
-Homestead! In their “well-bred” bosoms, exultation may be the feeling
-of the hour. Enjoy the brief respite in the fullness of selfishness;
-but the hour is at hand when, according to the laws as enacted by
-legally-elected representatives, the people of the Union shall fill
-your “well-bred” bosoms with a sorrow and disappointment occasioned
-by your arrogance, selfishness, and disregard of their claim for
-respectful treatment upon your part of their representatives of
-organized labor. When their representatives, as _organized voters_,
-issue their mandates, no supercilious commander of militia, blessed
-with a little brief authority, will dare resist them.
-
-Organized labor is defeated at Homestead. Organized labor, organized
-in heart and spirit, if not by an expressed Association, won a great
-battle November last. The victory of the sham aristocracy at Homestead
-was but a skirmish. The victory at the polls in November was a
-Waterloo and Gettysburg rolled into one. The commander-in-chief of the
-victorious army is Grover Cleveland. In his hands the people place the
-power of their support--the great majority. He represents the choice
-of the “Common People”--not because he’s a Democrat--not because the
-people have become Democratic, in the narrow sense of the word, but
-because Cleveland represents to their minds the opposition to sham
-aristocracy, “caste.”
-
-Grover Cleveland is an exponent of that sentiment that made Abraham
-Lincoln President in ’61; Jackson, President in ’28; Jefferson,
-President in 1800. Call the party by whom he was nominated any name
-that best suits the fancy of the speaker. It’s the same grand old,
-broad party of the people; triumphant now as it ever will be, God
-grant, in this Republic! We want no Republic in America like that of
-Venice. The people have entrusted Grover Cleveland with the executive
-power of the nation. At his hands they will expect the righting of
-those wrongs which these petty tyrants, sham aristocrats, believers in
-social distinction and “caste,” have inflicted upon the people. They
-have chosen representatives in Congress who control both branches of
-the legislature, through whom the people shall express their will and
-pleasure; and the people will expect of Grover Cleveland, as they did
-of Abraham Lincoln, Jackson, and Jefferson, the execution of their
-wishes. The people have never been disappointed by the actions of their
-former chieftains in this matter. When made chief magistrate of the
-nation, every former leader of the people has executed the will of the
-masses, according to the laws as enacted. No former chief magistrate
-has ever presumed to use his power of veto contrary to the will of the
-people as expressed by a majority of their representatives.
-
-The eyes of the nation are upon Grover Cleveland. In return for the
-defeat in their skirmish at Homestead, the people will expect to
-reap the fruits of their victory in the great battle of ballots last
-November. Long have they suffered, and now that the golden opportunity
-has arrived, the people are not to be thwarted. With kindly but
-scrutinizing gaze, the people regard their new leader, Grover Cleveland.
-
-The New York _Sun_, of November 20th, in an account of the defeat of
-the Amalgamated Association, prints the following:--
-
-
-     “A prominent member of the Association was seen at his house
-     this afternoon. His grate was piled high with burning pamphlets.
-     Pointing to them, he said:
-
-     “‘I have no more use for them. They contain the laws and rules of
-     the Amalgamated Association, and I have taken this means to be rid
-     of them. I hardly think the Amalgamated lodges will be continued
-     here, as nothing can be derived from membership in it. A potent
-     fact in losing the strike was that too many of our men returned to
-     work, and this helped the company to get its mills into working
-     order. It was not the company, but our own men, that lost the
-     strike.’”
-
-
-This prominent member of the Association, who was engaged in burning
-the laws and rules of the Amalgamated Association, was inadvertently
-acting in accordance with the unexpressed thought that the people had
-found a surer means of righting their wrongs than that furnished by
-associated labor. They had learned that their power, when opposed to
-the rich and aristocratic, was better utilized in the exercise of the
-ballot than when expressed through associated labor and associations
-of crafts and certain kinds of labor. If the Carnegies and Fricks were
-wise, they would view with fear and trembling the disruption of this
-thing called organized labor, which has been a toy by which the people
-have been amused and entertained and diverted from the use of their
-most effective weapon, the ballot.
-
-Organized labor and association have proved a pretty tin toy sword,
-which was attractive to gaze at upon a holiday parade, but utterly
-valueless in actual warfare. Its absolute inefficiency was never more
-clearly demonstrated, because it had never been so thoroughly tested in
-any previous contest of labor, as at Homestead.
-
-Here is given concisely--as that most excellent journal, the New York
-_Sun_, always presents all matters of public interest--an account
-of the cost of the strike to the laborers, to the capitalist, and
-to the State of Pennsylvania. Even the most careless reader and the
-most superficial inquirer after truth will read in this statement the
-evidence of the brave and valiant battle made by labor, which was
-defeated because the very sword it fought with was not of the kind of
-metal for actual warfare. The Ballot! the Ballot! the Ballot! is the
-weapon of the future:--
-
-
-     “It is almost impossible to give figures at this time on the
-     cost of the strike, but conservative estimates place it at about
-     $10,000,000. Of this, about $2,500,000 were in wages to the men.
-     The firm’s loss is thought to be two or three times that. The
-     direct cost of the troops was nearly half a million. The indirect
-     loss has been very large indeed.
-
-     “This contest was brought on by a demand for a reduction of wages
-     of about 33-1/3 per cent. on certain classes of work in the open
-     hearth departments, Nos. 1 and 2 mills, and in the 119-inch and
-     32-inch plate mills. This reduction directly affected only about
-     325 out of the 3,800 men in the works, but the others took up the
-     matter as a common cause through sympathy, and agreed to stand by
-     the men interested in case of a strike.
-
-     “The scale expired under which they were working on June 30th.
-     The company wanted the Amalgamated Association, which controlled
-     the workmen in the mills, to sign the scale at the reduction. The
-     scale was to be renewed on January 1st, instead of July 1st. The
-     Association refused, and the men threatened to strike should the
-     request for the existing scale not be granted before July.
-
-     “On June 30th, the company locked out all men before they had the
-     opportunity to strike. The wages question was soon lost sight of,
-     and the contest for the recognition of organized labor followed.
-     On the dawn of July 6th, the famous battle took place between the
-     workmen on the mill property and the Pinkerton force attempting to
-     land and take possession of the mill.
-
-     “Then followed the trying times at Homestead, the reign of the
-     Advisory Board, the scenes of lawlessness, the calling out of
-     the troops, their long and trying stay, the shooting of Mr.
-     Frick by Berkman, the departure of the troops, the arrest of the
-     Homesteaders, the beginning of their trials, and now the ending of
-     the strike.
-
-     “According to Superintendent Wood, of the Homestead works, not
-     more than 800 or 900 of the total number of old employés will be
-     able to secure employment. Before the break of last Thursday,
-     there were left in Homestead about 2,800 of the original 3,800 men
-     who were locked out. Of these 2,800 men, 2,200 were mechanics and
-     laborers and 600 Amalgamated Association men.”
-
-
-If Carnegie, Frick, son-in-law W. Seward Webb, of the New York Central
-Road, and men of that class can find any comfort in this evidence that
-the “Common People” have at last realized the utter lack of merit
-in their weapons, called “Organizations and Associations of Labor,”
-then most heartily are they to be congratulated. Let them enjoy for a
-brief period their dreams of autocratic power; for there will be a sad
-awakening as the result of the realization upon the part of the people
-that the ballot-box is the place for effective battle, and not the
-lodge rooms of Associations and Organizations.
-
-Grover Cleveland is the Grand Master of the great Organization of the
-Associated People, who legally will now enforce the demands of the
-“Common People.”
-
-The defeated laborer, mechanic, and workman of Homestead has a prospect
-before him, so full of hope and promise, presenting a picture so
-pleasing to his oppressed soul, that the scene of his disastrous defeat
-becomes obliterated. Let him turn from those days of suffering, so
-vividly portrayed by the _Herald_ of November 25th:--
-
-
-     “There were dozens of tables in Homestead to-day where the
-     Thanksgiving Day bird was absent, and on many of these tables
-     hunger was the only sauce in sight.
-
-     “To-day while plenty ruled in American homes, starvation and cold
-     were closing their grip on the families of the Homestead strikers.
-     While the horn of plenty unrolled its golden store into the hands
-     of the nation, there were children in Homestead crying for bread,
-     with weeping mothers and despairing fathers.
-
-     “While well-clothed citizens were going to highly respectable
-     churches to return thanks, there were people in Homestead
-     shivering over scant fires, wondering where the next meal would
-     come from. There were men with shoes so full of holes and clothes
-     so ragged as to barely cover them.
-
-     “The present sufferings of these men, women, and children were
-     made all the keener by their forebodings of the future; of a
-     winter without work, to be passed at the gates of starvation; with
-     no work to be had at the Carnegie mills or any other mills on
-     account of the terrible blacklist.”
-
-
-The question will arise in the mind of the poor man, when recalling
-HIS Thanksgiving dinner, With what did Andrew Carnegie and H. C. Frick
-feed their families that day? With what kind of conscience did they bow
-the knee and raise their voices in their costly churches and address
-the throne of the lowly Jesus, who left in the records of His life,
-utterances like these:--
-
-“If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, and give to the
-poor.” “Sell that ye have, and give alms.”
-
-The answer which will force itself upon the minds of the “Common
-People” will not be such as to lessen or moderate the demands which
-they will make for the fruits of their victory in November.
-
-They have endured much; they have starved at Homestead; they have been
-cold and hungry; they have been led astray by false gods; but the Land
-of Canaan is now spread before them. The ballot-box has become their
-guiding star and hope. The bitter experience endured that Thanksgiving
-Day will prove a benefit to them in removing from them the danger of
-relying upon the tin sword in future. Every line of this article in the
-_Herald_ is full of danger to the insolent power of the rich, arrogant,
-sham aristocrats. It is brimming over with a lesson that the blindest
-is bound to read by the light of the recently-achieved victory of the
-people:--
-
-
-CANNOT LEAVE HOMESTEAD.
-
-     “Dozens there are who cannot leave Homestead or its vicinity. They
-     are under heavy bonds to appear in the Allegheny County courts on
-     charges of murder, treason, and riot. To stay means starvation,
-     because here they will find little or no work. To go means to be
-     sent to jail, because bondsmen are fearful and do not relish the
-     idea of forfeiting thousands of dollars.
-
-     “Most of the storekeepers in Homestead have ceased to give the
-     locked-out men credit. If they did, it would mean bankruptcy.
-     All of them are already creditors for hundreds and in some cases
-     thousands of dollars, with poor prospects of getting any of it
-     back for months, possibly years.
-
-     “The last strike benefits that will be paid by the Amalgamated
-     Association have been received by the idle men. Right here be it
-     said that these benefits were by no means as reported during the
-     strike. Not one-half of the men got $4 a week, and the majority
-     received about $2 a week.
-
-     “The Homestead steel-workers and their families are in need of
-     almost everything that goes to make life comfortable. All need
-     clothing more or less. One man I met to-day was trying to prevent
-     the biting wind from sweeping a well-ventilated straw hat from his
-     head.
-
-     “Then there is fuel. There is hardly a street or roadway in
-     Homestead on which there did not stand a house or several of
-     them in which the cold stoves made the temperature more frigid
-     by contrast. Those families that did burn coal or wood did so
-     through the kindness of the neighbors or the good-will of the fuel
-     merchant.
-
-
-     PLAYING THANKSGIVING.
-
-     “In walking through Homestead to-day I passed a vacant lot on
-     Fourth avenue, in which a fire was burning. The fuel consisted of
-     logs dragged from the river. Surrounding the fire were ill-clad
-     boys and girls. They were keeping warm and roasting potatoes. One
-     of the boys told me that ‘Maw hadn’t much for dinner at home, and
-     we are playing Thanksgiving.’
-
-     “This was their feast; they were children of the strikers, who
-     lived in a clump of shanties near by.”
-
-
-Playing Thanksgiving! God of justice! look down upon such a picture.
-Playing at praying! Absolutely making a game and jest of thanking Thee!
-So cynical has become the hearts of even these children, caused by the
-oppression and injustice of the oppressor, that they would make a game,
-a jest, of giving thanks to the Giver of all good things! because the
-good things were on the tables of Carnegie, Frick, Webb, and others,
-while they, somebody’s children--poor, “Common People’s” children,
-perhaps--were cold, ragged, and hungry; making a feast of half-burned
-potatoes, veritably, in a spirit of irony. So hard and desolate has
-become the destiny of the poor of our land that the children cease to
-be natural, loving, gentle, and sincere, and have become ironical,
-sarcastic, holding so lightly the respect due to the God of all men,
-that they make a jest of the day consecrated to rendering thanks to the
-Giver of all good things of life!
-
-A picture like this, for which the sham aristocrats are absolutely
-responsible, does more to arouse a feelings of socialism and anarchism
-in the breasts of even the best citizens, than all the ravings of
-crazed nihilistic leaders. Stop such scenes now! Socialism and
-anarchism have no foothold in America. Don’t allow these dangerous
-“isms” to form an entering wedge. Such scenes as those poor children,
-playing Thanksgiving, are the greatest allies of the socialists and
-anarchists.
-
-The gentleman (?) known as Ollie Teall should receive, at the hands
-of the disciples of anarchy and socialism, a medal for his valuable
-services in attempting to present a picture to the delectation of the
-assembled “Four Hundred,” of the children of the poor feeding (as
-animals, poor creatures!) in Madison Square Garden, last Christmas.
-This man, Teall, may have no qualities to recommend him other than
-this, that he is a superlative example of those who would create a
-state of anarchy in this country.
-
-It was his proposition, so it appears from the newspapers, to make
-a kind of horse-show at Madison Square Garden, wherein the children
-of the poor should perform the part of the horses, the animals. It
-was proposed to sell boxes to the rich, that they might sit around
-and behold the exhibition of the animals! To the originators of this
-novel exhibition is due the thanks and praises of the anarchists, who
-have sought a haven here, for they played into the hands held by the
-anarchists with wonderful precision.
-
-We must all respect the courage and manliness of one man who, justly
-conceiving his duty as a teacher of the doctrine of his Master, arose
-and protested. Yes, and he was worth more than a brigade of soldiers in
-quieting the wrath of the people, the Rev. Dr. Rainsford, of St. George
-Episcopal church, in Brooklyn, and let his name be remembered for his
-courage in denouncing the most damnable exhibition of the tendency of
-the “Four Hundred” of New York. The name of the Rev. Dr. Rainsford, of
-the St. George Episcopal Church, will ever be remembered by the poor as
-that of a man, a Christian, an American, and a gentleman. Vigorous was
-his denunciation of the spectacular exhibition of the feeding of the
-poor like so many cattle.
-
-Yes, fair “Four Hundred,” as the nobles of France told the peasants to
-“eat grass” and were amused at their attempts of the performance, so
-you would feed a lot of poor children in Madison Square Garden, and
-take stalls and boxes to look on at the peculiar performances of the
-hungry eating! You know that each child is but the coming American man
-or woman. You would make a Roman holiday to exhibit the necessities
-of the People, who are your rulers. Delightful entertainment for the
-exclusive “Four Hundred,”--to sit around with their many millions and
-gaze at the ravenous appetites exhibited by the children of the poor.
-It was a holiday like the holidays in Rome, when the nobles assembled
-to see the persecuted Christians torn and mangled by every form of
-beast that, by research, could be brought to the Roman arena. Dr.
-Rainsford, thou art “a man for a’ that.”
-
-Do you wonder, millionaires, why the people whose children you would
-exhibit to create a carnival for you, did not vote with you November
-8, 1892? Of the purchasers of the boxes at Madison Square Garden for
-this unique performance, ninety per cent. were Republicans. Shades
-of Abraham Lincoln, look down and see the strong oak of thy creation
-benumbed by this parasite entwined around it! Imagine the creator, the
-originator, the father of the Republican party, this high priest in
-the hearts of the “Common People,” Abraham Lincoln, at such a scene.
-He would have been down with the children. In his loving arms he would
-have held the children of the poor. And these “Four Hundred,” a little
-better than the “Common People,” would look on at the feeding of the
-“common folks,” and, from their assumed exalted position, view the
-performance gotten up by their money, and would have had a sensation
-of almost hunger aroused where abundance had produced satiety. The
-proposition to hold such an exhibition as the feeding of the poor
-children in Madison Square Garden was in itself an insult to every
-American citizen. Imagine, fair lady, as you loll in your carriage
-drawn by your high-priced bays on Fifth avenue, how pleasant it would
-be to have your little curled and perfumed darling, left at home under
-the watchful eye of some imported French _bonne_, exhibited as a freak
-in a dime museum. Think of the tears that should be shed on a mother’s
-bosom, being paraded before the public as an object of amusement. A
-child’s sorrows and its joys are as sacred as the law of God delivered
-to Moses on Sinai, for a child has more of God in it; and you would
-make of the children of the poor, and their wants, and needs, and
-appetites, a spectacle that you may pay so much money and see?
-
-The lisped prayer of the child of the poor ascends to the throne of God
-as surely, though it proceed from a hovel or the gutter, as that from
-the downy couch of the ease of luxury in the palace on Fifth avenue. Do
-not the poor love their children with the same earnestness and fervor
-as the rich? Have you to learn this lesson anew? Need you wonder, you
-people who seem astonished at the result of election, why the mighty
-voice of the people should be raised against you? You who wonder why
-the party of you, “the respectable,” should have been so overwhelmingly
-defeated, recall to mind the contemplated carnival you would have
-held in Madison Square Garden, feeding like pigs, the children of the
-poor, and thank God that the volcano upon which in seeming security
-you rested found a vent without tossing you heavenward. There would
-have been rivers of blood instead of lava; the ballot of 1892 was your
-salvation.
-
-Slumbering wrath was in the breasts of the people. One Robespierre or
-Danton would have set aflame this feeling, and the “Common People”
-only need a leader, an organizer who will teach them under form of law
-that their mighty voice is paramount, and the sham aristocracy will be
-crushed and annihilated, as was a better aristocracy in France in the
-latter part of the eighteenth century. Don’t let history repeat itself.
-
-Can such pictures as depicted in these few lines of the _Herald_ about
-those poor children’s Thanksgiving dinner, the feast proposed by the
-“Four Hundred” at Madison Square Garden, be accurate and represent
-scenes in free America, the richest, freest, best country on earth?
-or are these some occurrences seen in poor, starving, Czar-ridden
-Russia? A bow of promise was in the sky that Thanksgiving Day,
-however. The people had spoken a few days before. They had selected
-their representatives to make laws relieving them of the presence of
-such scenes as above described. They had selected an Executive of
-unquestioned honesty, who will execute such laws as will emanate from
-the representatives of the people.
-
-The people had given no sign, but in silence had been thinking of
-scenes like that proposed at Madison Square Garden. They had voted
-November the 8th in silence.
-
-Silence is often more dangerous than utterance. The deadly cobra gives
-no signal before he strikes. “General apathy” and the silence of the
-people was deadly earnest, and you know whether it was forceful or not.
-And if the party that the people have put in power will not do the will
-of the people, then the people will put some other party in power which
-_will_ execute the desire of the masses. It is a quicksand that the
-rich tread upon. So accustomed have the rich become to the patience,
-long-enduring suffering of the poor, that they deem it impossible that
-any condition could exist other than the present. Only remember that
-Charles Stuart, Louis XVI., Tarquin, all thought it was impossible
-that aught could interfere with the set order of things; but righteous
-indignation, the wrath of the people, like a whirlwind may obliterate
-the little edifices of dust built upon the past.
-
-The rest of the story, so vividly portrayed by the _Herald_, is worthy
-of consideration and attention:--
-
-
-     “I visited the house of J. W. Grimes, a striker, on the hillside,
-     above the mill. He had a pair of rubbers on his feet. The rubbers
-     were worn away and had been sewed together with twine. ‘You see,
-     my shoes are so bad,’ said the mill-man, apologetically, ‘that I
-     have to wear these rubbers. Jim Sweeney threw them away, but I
-     found them and sewed them up,’ and he exhibited a shoe that would
-     almost have fallen from his foot, but for the rubber which held it.
-
-     “Grimes was doing the family washing when I met him. His arms were
-     covered with soapsuds. He told me his wife was very sick. He had
-     been injured in the mill before the strike and had been able to
-     save but little. Since the strike he has been able to get only a
-     few days’ work, and his wife took in washing and did scrubbing to
-     keep the family in bread. Now she is near death’s door, a mere
-     apparition, while her husband has no work and there is little in
-     the house.
-
-     “I went to the house of Bridget Coyle, who, during her testimony
-     in the Critchlow case the other day, said she would not tell a lie
-     for all the money Carnegie is worth. Two of her boys worked in the
-     mill; one has secured work in another city, but is making barely
-     enough to keep himself. Another son is at Homestead, and idle.
-     ‘We have enough in the house to keep us another week,’ said Mrs.
-     Coyle, ‘but after that the Lord knows what we’ll do. I just got a
-     little coal on trust, and do wish I had a pair of shoes.
-
-     “‘We own this little house; my son paid the last on it just before
-     the strike.’ She had rented, out a couple of rooms to Joshua
-     Bradshaw, a mill-man, with his wife and four children. ‘They owe
-     me six months’ rent, but Lord, I know they can’t pay it, so I
-     don’t ask them. They are poor people, and the missus is badly
-     sick.’
-
-     “Patrick Sweeney, another ex-striker, who can’t get work in the
-     mill, and who lives on Sixteenth street, has been hunting for a
-     pair of shoes for several days. Those he has were shoes once, now
-     they are tatters. Sweeney, like dozens of the other men, has paid
-     no rent for several months, and lives in daily dread that his
-     family will be evicted. Being blacklisted, he cannot find work in
-     Homestead or elsewhere.
-
-     “William Davis, of Fourteenth street, told me there wasn’t a
-     pound of coal in his house, and a little less in the house of his
-     mother, who lives alongside of him.”
-
-
-     AN APPEAL FOR AID.
-
-     “The instances mentioned are only an index to the suffering.
-     Through personal pride most of the misery in Homestead is hidden
-     as yet. When winter sets in, dozens of cases will come to light.
-
-     “On Saturday a meeting will be held to issue a call for aid. It
-     has been called by Elmer Bales and John Wilson.
-
-     “Mr. Bales said to-day: ‘There is positive suffering in Homestead
-     from lack of food, fuel, and clothing. The sufferers will not
-     speak of their distress to you or any other outsider, but we who
-     live here know of it only too well. In a week or two it will be
-     much worse.’
-
-     “Hugh O’Donnell did not eat any turkey in the Allegheny county
-     jail. There was no observance of Thanksgiving in his case. He was
-     compelled to put up with the regular prison fare, which is not
-     fattening to those who have tried it.”
-
-
-Capital has vanquished labor at Homestead; but the skirmish left
-scars which will long remain unforgotten. Labor suffered, and learned
-that the power of the people resided in their presence at the polls
-on election day, when Carnegie, Frick, Webb, and others of the sham
-aristocrats and believers in “caste,” became of no more importance than
-each poor laborer, workman, mechanic, clerk, shopkeeper, or farmer, to
-whom on other days they assumed an air of superiority. The learning
-of the lesson was worth all the suffering that it cost the “Common
-People,” as represented by the workmen and strikers at Homestead, Pa.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER IX.
-
-POSSIBLE FRUITS OF VICTORY.
-
-
-We have considered, and we hope with charitable eyes, the scenes
-resulting from the victory in that skirmish at Homestead, between
-Carnegie, Frick, and the Common People; we have thought of the
-result of the picket fire at Buffalo between organized labor and the
-combination of capital represented by the New York Central Railroad;
-both of which engagements, while only out-post encounters of the
-on-marching army of the Common People, were decisive victories for the
-capitalists, the sham aristocrats, believers in “caste.” In the name
-of law and order (so dear to the American heart) they had appealed to
-the power of the State to protect, with militia, their property, and
-that militia, ever loyal and truly American, had responded to the call
-of the Executives (both Democrats) of the two most powerful States in
-the Union. That militia, largely composed of poor men, and men of the
-people, absolutely abhorring anything like the disregard of established
-laws, had responded to the call of the Governor of each respective
-State, New York and Pennsylvania. Law and order were re-established by
-the people of which the militia is but part. Two Democratic Governors,
-like patriotic citizens that they are, had bowed their heads before
-enacted laws--no matter what their personal feeling may have been upon
-the subject--and granted protection to the property of the capitalists,
-who, as citizens of each State, were entitled thereto, no matter by
-what means the capitalists and sham aristocrats may have acquired
-that property. The result of the action of these two Governors, and
-the acquiescence by the people and the support of the militia, is
-incontestible evidence that Socialism and Anarchism have no home in
-America.
-
-The people accepted the result, as did the people of Homestead
-starvation and distress, because its presence at every hearth became
-a matter of trifling consequence; each hearth of the poor “Common
-People” of America is illuminated and warmed by the patriotic fires
-lighted thereon by our forefathers in 1776. The law must be obeyed!
-As long as that law exists, unrepealed, unmodified, or unamended, it
-must be obeyed! And the might of the people, the “Common People,” the
-Abraham Lincoln party, the Andrew Jackson party, the Thomas Jefferson
-party, and the Grover Cleveland party, all guarantee the enforcement
-of every law upon our statute-books. And the chiefest of these is the
-Constitution of the United States of America, wherein is guaranteed
-the franchise of every citizen; wherein is declared that the “majority
-shall rule in America.” The poor, the “Common People,” have suffered
-defeat in their strikes and attempted resistance to the claim of social
-difference existing in our country. They have borne the arrogance,
-insults, and wrongs inflicted by a sham aristocracy. All attempts at
-correction of the evil have proved abortive.
-
-On November 8, 1892, the “Common People” resorted to that most
-efficacious of remedies in this great Republic, the ballot-box; and
-their victory was as great and pronounced as their suffering had
-been severe in the past. As the fruit of their victory, as in 1860,
-they will place in the Presidential chair at Washington a MAN OF THE
-PEOPLE--Grover Cleveland--whom they believe to be honest, as they
-believed that Abraham Lincoln was honest, in 1860. They have elected
-the men of their choice, men representing the “Common People,” to both
-branches of the Legislature of the National Government. They have
-selected those who will express the sentiments of the “Common People”
-in the legislative halls of the nation. They, the “Common People,” will
-be heard through their representatives in the Congress of the Union.
-
-From the sad picture of unsuccessful strikes, starvation, and
-destitution, let us turn to the more pleasing picture of the
-possibilities offered by this exhibition of the POWER OF THE PEOPLE.
-
-Carnegie, Frick, Webb, and others, have enjoyed a transient, delusive
-dream in which the delights of victory were enjoyed for the moment. Now
-comes the time of the people! They have learned that their power does
-not lie in associations, amalgamations, and organization. It lies in
-the selection by the majority, at the ballot-box, of representatives
-who will express the will of the people in making the laws of the
-land, such laws as will enforce and insure equality, the extinction of
-“caste,” and the protection of the poor men, who constitute the larger
-portion of the population of our country, and are therefore greater,
-being the majority on election day, than the rich, sham aristocrats,
-who have insulted, jeered, and snubbed the poor during the past
-twenty-five years.
-
-Now will come the crucial test of the honesty and fidelity reposed, by
-the people, in the administration and legislative bodies elected by
-them. Should they prove recreant and traitors to the trust reposed in
-them, it would be the first time in the history of the nation (with
-possibly the single exception of John Tyler, who became President by
-the death of William Henry Harrison). Then, should the will of the
-people become manifest through the agency of their representatives, in
-Congress assembled, whereby the present laws be repealed; if it become
-evident that it was the will of the people that the Constitution of the
-United States should be amended, so as to be in accordance with the
-laws the enactment of which the people demanded, the legislators would
-be obliged to so amend and change the Constitution of the United States
-to make it consistent with the will of the people. Rock and foundation
-of the edifice of the Federal Government, the Constitution as it is,
-that which is more powerful than even the Constitution is the will of
-the people, the majority of the citizens of the Union, irrespective
-of wealth or assumed social position. It has been demonstrated that
-by some peculiar kind of method the wealth of the nation is becoming
-centralized in the hands of a few families and persons who render
-possible the construction of an oligarchy similar to that existing in
-the Republic of Venice.
-
-Suppose that the people should demand and insist upon the passage of
-an income tax for the support of the Federal Government, which would
-relieve them, the “Common People,” from paying for the privileges
-enjoyed by the rich, of living in a Republic and the security which
-their property there enjoys.
-
-And, suppose that the sham aristocracy should cry, “Inherent Rights,”
-as they would; the people might respond that it is not a question as
-to the Inherent Right of Mr. Astor, Mr. Vanderbilt, Mr. Rockefeller,
-_et al._, to possess, under the present system of laws, any amount of
-property. It is a mere question of the Will of the People. Many good,
-learned, and great Constitutional lawyers have argued, and with much
-apparent truth, that the federation of States prior to 1865 was but a
-mutual copartnership entered into by the sovereign States, springing
-from the original thirteen colonies, constituting but a copartnership,
-surrendering no right to the firm or copartnership except such rights
-as had been specifically named in the Federal Constitution.
-
-Without entering into the legal aspects of the case, as to whether
-these claims be just or not; without assuming to know whether the
-nullification proposed by John C. Calhoun was legally sound; without
-discussing the question whether South Carolina and the other States of
-the South had a _right_ to secede and disintegrate the Union; assuming
-that they had the right, inherently, and to draw a parallel to the
-assumed Inherent Right of the rich of America under the laws and the
-Constitution as they now exist, their attention might be attracted
-profitably to the lesson that was taught the minority in the South when
-they assumed to exercise Inherent Rights contrary to the wishes of the
-majority. 2,800,000 bayonets, with the flag of the Union floating over
-them, was conclusive argument that the Inherent Rights claimed by the
-Southern States were actually Wrongs in a Republic.
-
-“Vox populi, vox Dei.” The voice of the people, the majority, is the
-voice of God in a Republic, from which there is _no appeal_. Seek it,
-as the South did in 1861, and the result will be the same. THE MAJORITY
-WILL RULE.
-
-Suppose that the Common People should demand a repeal of all the
-revenue laws, a repeal of all tariff duties and protection which
-did not result in direct benefit to them; suppose that they should
-insist that, except so far as protection benefited them (the “Common
-People”) by an increase of wages, which should be arrived at by a
-fair adjustment of the conflicting interests of capital and labor,
-adjusted by a board of arbitration selected by them, the Common People;
-suppose that the people should demand that these tremendous incomes
-enjoyed by the Vanderbilts, Astors, Goulds, Carnegies, Fricks, and
-others, should pay the pensions of the Federal soldiers who fought
-for the preservation of the Union; suppose the people should demand
-that the expenses of the Federal Government, instead of being levied
-upon _them_, should be levied upon the incomes of those who remained
-at home in safety during the four years of the Civil War; who, while
-far away from the field of battle, have speculated upon the necessities
-and needs of the nation, who have utilized that protection, born in
-a spirit of patriotic desire to furnish means for the support of the
-defenders of the Union, emanating from patriotic principles of the
-Abraham Lincoln Republican party; suppose that the people should
-demand that they--not out of the accumulated mass, but out of the
-interest upon the amount accumulated under existing laws--which said
-laws the people, through their representatives, shall deem wise to
-change--requiring that in the future these masters of immense wealth
-shall contribute a share to the defraying of the expenses of the
-Government commensurate with the advantages they have derived, from the
-load of debt, in the shape of pensions and otherwise, occasioned by the
-Civil War, wherein the Union was preserved.
-
-Let us imagine a scale of income tax for the people of America:
-$5000 and under, untaxed; $5000 and over, to be taxed. If the chosen
-representatives of the people, selected by them last November and to
-be selected by the various State Legislatures elected by the people
-within the near future, refuse to make such an enactment as an income
-tax upon all incomes of more than $5000; suppose the people organize
-themselves, and call upon the country in a general election; gentlemen
-of aristocratic proclivities, where will you be? Of the mass of
-freeborn American citizens (quite as good as the sham aristocrats) not
-five per cent. enjoy an income as great as $5000. Would you resort
-to physical force? The Hon. J. Brisben Walker, in his article in the
-_Cosmopolitan_, indicates the true position that you would occupy.
-Consider the possibility. Yell “Unconstitutional.” Proclaim that it is
-illegal. The people would change the Constitution. By the voice of the
-majority, they would change the laws.
-
-What have you to offer to stem this tide of indignation that you have
-provoked? Do you say, “Capital would leave the country?” Well, you
-can’t carry the railroads, the factories, the soil, the buildings from
-America. You may have your castles in Scotland, but we have your plants
-of machinery, your buildings, and that upon which your security depends
-and is founded is in our power in America. Would you secede, as the
-Plebeians proposed to do from the Patricians at Rome, and found a
-city on the Sacred Hills of your sham aristocracy? The Plebeians, the
-Common People, would never seek you with the olive branch of peace and
-promise offers of compromise, as did the Patricians of old seek the
-Plebeians, but they would recall to your attention in forceful manner
-the lesson taught to the Southerners in 1861, when the “Common People,”
-the majority in America, by their might, overpowered and overturned the
-seceders who, when they found that the minority, even though blessed
-with an attempted social superiority, could not rule in the American
-Republic, sought to secede.
-
-The Carnegies, Vanderbilts, Astors, Fricks, and others, would be as
-helpless in such a struggle, and never as brave and earnest, as was
-Lee’s decimated army at Appomattox.
-
-What the people _should_ or _will_ do, it does not interest us to
-discuss. What they _can_ do is to require that the payment of the taxes
-for the support of the nation be derived from those sources which
-have become hateful and oppressive to the people; and, at a general
-election, the men who form the majority would be those whose incomes do
-not exceed $5000--no, not even $2000 per annum.
-
-Then, let us establish for the fancy of our sham aristocrats a picture
-for those who believe in the crime of “Caste” in our country, to dwell
-upon. The victors at Homestead and at Buffalo would do well, while
-imbibing the sweet draughts of victory, to consider the bitter cup of
-hemlock that the people can require them to partake of. Anything is
-possible in a Republic, by the votes of the majority.
-
-_All incomes less than five thousand dollars to be entirely exempt from
-taxation; from five to ten thousand, a tax of five per cent.; from ten
-to twenty thousand, ten per cent.; from twenty to fifty, twenty per
-cent.; from fifty to a hundred, forty per cent.; from a hundred to two
-hundred, fifty per cent.; from two hundred thousand to half a million,
-seventy-five per cent.; from half a million and onward, ninety per
-cent._
-
-There is no pretence in this scale to be equitable or just. That could
-be arrived at by the statistician and the legislators. It is merely an
-example of what the people CAN AND MAY DO. The fund thus derived would
-more than defray all the expense of the Federal Government, pensions
-included, and increase the pensions besides.
-
-What is to prevent the enactment of such a law, if the majority should
-demand it?
-
-You may say, Gentlemen of the Privileged Classes, “It is contrary to
-the spirit of the Republic. It will amount to confiscation.” To men
-of the Carnegie, Frick, and Webb stamp the people might reply, “Was
-the hiring of armed bullies, outcasts, and residents of other States
-consistent with the spirit of the Republic? When you have formed those
-hirelings into a private army to do your bidding against the lives of
-your fellow citizens, is it not late in the day for you to call up
-‘the Spirit of the Republic’? You have gloated in triumph over your
-victories and the wants of the people. You have seen us surrounded by
-starvation and destitution. You, professing Christianity, have made us
-objects of your contempt and insult. Our daughters have not been safe
-from the contaminating gaze of your weak, puerile progeny. You have
-adopted crests, castes, social distinctions, sham aristocracy. You have
-bowed the knee before the degenerate British peerage. You have taken
-the money earned by our labor to purchase alliances with the decayed
-aristocracy of Europe. Is it not _late_, good my would-be lords and
-barons, to call up the Spirit of 1776?”
-
-And, even should it come, like the spectres of the dream of Richard
-III., would it not make you quake and quiver, so contrary are your
-wishes to the spirit of the founders of the Union?
-
-“Impracticable, the collection of these taxes,” is one of the excuses
-for their non-imposition. The people have trusted Grover Cleveland
-with the power of executing the laws of the nation. The people believe
-that, as Lincoln, Jackson, and Jefferson, he will not be recreant to
-the trust reposed in him. He will collect the taxes; he will seize
-the property of the corporations; he will imprison the perjurers. He
-will perform the duties imposed upon him, in the high office of the
-nation to which the will of the people has called him. He will see that
-the mandates of the people are obeyed. This tremendous accumulation
-of fortunes must cease! A Vanderbilt leaves a hundred million to one
-son! At five per cent. per annum, the income is five millions each
-year. It is impossible for him to spend it. The difference between his
-expenses and his income is added to this mighty mass of money, which
-is concentrating each year more and more, compounding the interest
-thereon, in the hands of a few citizens of the Republic. Mr. Gould
-dies and leaves a hundred millions. If evenly distributed between his
-children, it would be impossible for the income to be spent, and it
-would simply accumulate, generation after generation. The Astors have
-adopted a habit, like most of the rich men of the nation, in imitation
-of English entailment, of leaving the bulk of their property to the
-eldest son, while apportioning off the younger children with a million
-or two. The impossibility of that elder son spending the income is
-perfectly apparent. The object is to accumulate, in the hands of a few
-families, the wealth of the nation. The tendency is exactly in that
-direction.
-
-Not only is it un-American, but especially obnoxious to the people
-generally, as it tends toward the accumulation of wealth, not only
-to an unwholesome but to an alarming degree, in the hands of the
-eldest sons of these families. It is practically the entailment of the
-estate, without so announcing it. Let us take, for example, the Goulds,
-Vanderbilts, or Astors, and let this peculiar kind of distribution of
-their property continue, apportioning out the younger members of the
-family with a comparatively small sum, but leaving the bulk to the
-first son. Is it not concentrating wealth in the hands of one man, the
-income of which it is impossible that he should spend? The accumulation
-still goes on from generation to generation until, practically, the
-money power of our land lies within the grasp of the representatives of
-a few families. Let us imagine the condition of affairs a few hundred
-years hence, if we allow the Vanderbilts, Goulds, Rockefellers and
-Astors to apportion off, from generation to generation, the younger
-sons and daughters of the family, concentrating the vast accumulation
-from the interests of their tremendous fortunes in the hands of one
-representative of the family. Some dozen men of this great Republic,
-by a combination, could then practically control at all times the
-financial situation of the nation. There is no possibility of an
-equalizing process and the scattering of the wealth and accumulations
-of these families. From generation to generation, under this peculiar
-method of distribution and disposal adopted by our would-be nobility,
-there would be created a condition exactly similar to that existing in
-the pre-eminently commercial Venice, from which thraldom the Common
-People were only relieved by a foreign conqueror, Napoleon, whom they
-welcomed with unpatriotic joy because he brought relief from the
-discriminations with which the masses were cursed.
-
-No one will deny that, under the existing laws, Mr. W. H. Vanderbilt,
-the gentleman (?) who so forcefully and elegantly expressed himself in
-the utterance of his sentiments, “The public be damned,” had a perfect
-right, under the laws as they now exist, to leave the bulk of his
-property to his eldest son. Nay, he might have called him the Duke of
-Vanderbilt, if he pleased. By the pleasure of the people, he had the
-right to dispose of his possessions as to him seemed best.
-
-[Illustration: WM. H. VANDERBILT,
-
-AUTHOR OF THE FAMOUS SPEECH, “THE PUBLIC BE D----D.”]
-
-This is all perfectly within the bounds of and consistent with the laws
-that the people have made; but remember, that these people who made
-these laws can UNMAKE them; they can require that a man’s property
-shall be equally divided among all of his children; they can tax it so
-that this infernal and ever-increasing income shall not create such
-an accumulation as to present a danger to the life and existence of
-the Republic. And this is not against the law. Good my lords, as the
-barons, the Common People will kill this “caste,” not by the headsman’s
-axe that decapitated the Stuart, not by the guillotine that drank the
-blood of a Bourbon; but they’ll do it with legislation, more peaceful,
-more quiet, and with more “general apathy;” but the result will be just
-as efficacious.
-
-Now that the nation, composed of the Common People of America, has
-suffered the assumption, upon the part of these few families, of a sham
-aristocracy and attempted “caste” in this country; suppose, when the
-people have felt the power that lies in them, that they should rise in
-their might and decree that the support of the Federal Government shall
-come from that surplus income, instead of permitting it to accumulate
-in the hands of each succeeding generation of a few families in
-America. What, again it may be asked, can the sham aristocrats do about
-it?--you people of the Carnegie, Astor, Vanderbilt class. The people
-decree it, and you must bow your heads to their will.
-
-The people are not socialistic. They do not believe in the division
-of property. Men like Dolan, at the Clover Club in Philadelphia, and
-others of his kind, deliberately libel and traduce the Common People
-when they pretend to explain the defeat of the Republican party upon
-the ground of a socialistic tendency in the people of this nation. The
-lie is apparent by the action of the militia, composed of the Common
-People, both at Homestead and Buffalo. The people are for law and order.
-
-The poor man’s morals are quite as good or better than the morals of
-the rich. His home is as sacred, and the slimy serpent of Nihilism is
-as objectionable in his home as it would be to the millionaire in his
-palace of grandeur. The little holdings of the poor man, his farm, his
-tool chest, and his furniture, are his; and he holds the right to own
-them as dear as Astor holds his right to his property in many hundred
-houses. The poor man, the Common People, nowhere in this broad Union
-wants anarchy. He’ll stamp it out, as he did in Chicago, and it is a
-libel upon him and the nation, for the rich and those who would impose
-the yoke of “caste,” to attempt to wave the bloody shirt of Socialism
-by their speeches on this subject.
-
-But this accumulation of property in the hands of the few, to the
-detriment of the nation, has become so pronounced and overwhelming in
-its productiveness of evil that, suppose the people should--for they
-could, by means of an income tax--decree that it should cease. Now,
-men of a sham and wealthy aristocracy, what would you do about it?
-You would be obliged to drink your cup of hemlock, as the striker at
-Homestead was obliged to partake of his draught of defeat.
-
-Gentlemen, who assume to be better every other day in the year, but who
-realize on election day that your votes are no better, and count for no
-more, than the laborer’s, mechanic’s, and the poor man’s all over our
-land, what are you going to do about it? It is a condition so pregnant
-with possibilities that it should occasion you to take thought. Do not
-arouse the resentment of your fellow-citizens; poor they may be, but
-rich in their rights as freemen. By the exercise of their franchise
-they can make legal that which would demand a division of some of
-your ill-gotten gains for the support of the Federal Government, thus
-lightening the taxes upon those who can least afford to pay them.
-
-[Illustration: W. SEWARD WEBB,
-
-VICE-PRESIDENT OF THE NEW YORK CENTRAL R. R.]
-
-The poor have learned; the workman has been taught by sad experience;
-the laborer has had it forced down his throat, by the point of the
-bayonet in the hands of the militiamen, that he cannot hope to
-win in the battle against capital by strikes or organized labor.
-Homestead, and the wretched condition of the people there, is fraught
-with significance, to the laboring man, of the consequences of his
-ineffectual battle against capital. He knows that to resort to
-violence, mob law, dynamite, is against the spirit of the people of
-America. In his heart of hearts his home is as dear to the workman as
-yours is to you, Mr. Carnegie. He does not believe in anarchy, and the
-dissolution of law, order, and the morals of the people any more than
-you do. He doesn’t believe, any more than you do, Mr. Son-in-law Seward
-Webb, in the destruction of property. He feels oppressed; he feels
-that the burden has been laid too heavily upon his shoulders; he is
-irritated at the load he is carrying; no longer will he resort, as the
-acme of his hopes, to a strike or a labor organization; he has learned
-in the election of 1892 that the power to correct these evils is his;
-that on election day, at the polls, he may right these wrongs. Be you
-warned, who count your millions, that the bandage which has blinded
-the eyes of the poor, making them fight at shadows, has been removed
-from their eyes, and that they will make such a vigorous and effectual
-onslaught upon your cherished bulwarks of bullion that the equalizing
-process may become so rapid and effectual as to demolish your cherished
-fortresses of wealth.
-
-It is not to disorganize society; it is not to overturn religion, or
-resort to Nihilism, that the tendency of the workingman’s mind leans.
-It is your presumption, arrogance, and overwhelming self-esteem that
-has offended him. A baby’s finger may touch the spring holding the bar
-by which is caged the lion. The lion once uncaged, and a hundred men
-cannot restrain its freedom. A little stream of water, flowing over the
-top of a dam, might have been stopped by a handful of mud in the hands
-of a child; increasing, the stream weakens the barrier; the dam has
-gone, the flood has come.
-
-There’s a little stream of truth trickling over the dam that holds back
-the flood of the resentment of the people; silently, softly, with an
-appearance of “apathy,” it began to move, until the rich received the
-first spray, notifying them of its approach, November the 8th, 1892.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER X.
-
-THE CAUSE OF BULLETS, ’61; BALLOTS, ’92.--ABRAHAM LINCOLN, THE PEOPLE’S
-CHOICE IN ’60.
-
-
-Of political parties in America, De Tocqueville declared that
-“Aristocratic or democratic passions may easily be detected at
-the bottom of all parties, and although they escape a superficial
-observation, they are the main point and soul of every faction in the
-United States.”
-
-That greatest conflict of American history, the military and political
-struggle between the forces of slavery and the forces of human freedom,
-was no less a conflict between aristocracy and democracy. In the
-South, which President-elect Cleveland only the other day termed--with
-undoubted historical accuracy--the cradle of American liberty, there
-had been developed a social and political aristocracy as distinct and
-powerful as almost any the world has seen.
-
-To this development, which did not become marked until after the early
-part of the present century, many causes contributed. The industry of
-the South had become centralized in the hands of large land owners
-who cultivated extensive plantations with slave labor. The tremendous
-growth of slavery exerted a depressing effect upon the manufacturing
-spirit; the artisan, the mechanic, and the trader came to be regarded
-as socially inferior. The planting of rice, sugar cane, and especially
-cotton, which was found to be the most profitable business, was also
-the most esteemed; and the South became an almost purely agricultural
-section.
-
-Lorin Blodget lays it down as an accepted rule that “the country wholly
-devoted to agriculture necessarily tends to aristocratic despotism,
-or some form of enslavement of the masses;” and he quotes similar
-expressions from Adam Smith, Buckle, and other recognized authorities
-on political economy.
-
-Nor are reasons hard to find. De Tocqueville points out that the great
-guarantees of popular liberty in America are universal education and
-the general division of landed property. Now, in a purely agricultural
-country the education of the people is certain to be defective.
-The population is necessarily dispersed, for where there are no
-manufactories there can be few towns; and where there are few towns
-there are fewer and less efficient schools, and libraries and lyceums
-are practically unknown. Harrison’s “History of Virginia” states that
-that State had, in 1848, 166,000 youths between seven and sixteen years
-old, of whom only 40,000 attended any school.
-
-Landed property had naturally tended to fall more and more into a few
-hands. As John Stuart Mill said of ancient Rome: “When inequality
-of wealth once commences in a community not constantly engaged in
-repairing, by industry, the injuries of fortune, its advances are
-gigantic; the great masses swallow up the smaller. The Roman Empire
-ultimately became covered with the vast landed possessions of a
-comparatively few families, for whose luxury, and still more for
-whose ostentation, the most costly products were raised, while the
-cultivators of the soil were slaves or small tenants in a nearly
-servile condition.” The description is closely applicable to the landed
-aristocracy of the South in the years immediately before the war.
-
-It is a mistake--a not uncommon mistake--to suppose that the
-_ante-bellum_ South was poor. It was rich--considerably richer than the
-North, in proportion to its population. In 1860 the South had much more
-than its share of the assessed wealth of the nation. The total value
-of property in the Union was $12,000,000,000, and of this the Southern
-States, with only one-third of the country’s population (and less than
-one-fourth of the country’s _white_ population), had $5,000,000,000, or
-more than forty per cent.
-
-But in the agricultural South wealth was far more unevenly distributed
-than in the manufacturing and commercial North. In the latter great
-fortunes were made, but were almost sure to be distributed among
-several heirs, or lost in the fluctuations of trade, while the
-prevalence of the industrial and inventive spirit opened the path of
-advancement to those born at the bottom of the ladder. In the former,
-large landed properties were handed down from father to son, and tended
-to grow larger by accretion, as is the rule with great estates. The
-small land owner could not compete with them. The peasant, whose only
-calling was the tilling of the soil, had little prospect of bettering
-his condition.
-
-“The Southern planter,” says a member[2] of one of the old landed
-families, who is now well known as the self-appointed manager of
-New York society, “was a born aristocrat. He had literally as much
-power in his little sphere as any old feudal lord. His slaves were
-the creatures of his caprice and pleasure. The work of their hands
-supported him, gave him his position and influence. I have lived on a
-plantation with twelve hundred slaves, all devotedly attached to their
-master, evidencing as much loyalty and fealty as an Englishman to his
-sovereign, and taking great pride in their master and mistress.”
-
-The planter’s life was one of patriarchal magnificence. His
-entertainments, according to the same authority, “would be appreciated
-in the old Faubourg at Paris;” his wines were old and abundant; his
-songs were the ballads of his historical prototype, the mediæval baron
-of England:
-
-
-     “Lord Thomas, he was a bold forester,
-       The keeper of the King’s deer;
-     Lady Eleanor was a fine woman,
-       Lord Thomas he loved her dear.”
-
-
-Political power within its own commonwealths was of course practically
-monopolized by this land-owning caste. Of power in national politics it
-wielded a tremendous share. It had taken advantage of that feature of
-the Federal Constitution which, when it was first framed, Patrick Henry
-attacked when he prophesied that “an aristocracy of the rich and well
-born would spring up and trample upon the masses.” Outnumbered in the
-House of Representatives, it had firmly intrenched itself in the United
-States Senate.
-
-In that body, up to the time just before the war, when it was no longer
-possible to create a new Southern State to offset each Northern
-State, it held half the seats and votes--a position that gave it
-complete control of all Presidential nominations to office. Through its
-possession of this unassailable veto power on appointments, it had come
-to pass that, as Mr. Blaine observes in his “Twenty Years of Congress,”
-“the Courts of the United States, both Supreme and District, throughout
-the Union, were filled with men acceptable to the South. Cabinets were
-constituted in the same way. Representatives of the government in
-foreign countries were necessarily taken from the class approved by
-the same power. Mr. Webster, speaking in his most conservative tone in
-the famous speech of March 7, 1850, declared that from the formation
-of the Union to that hour the South had monopolized three-fourths of
-the places of honor and emolument under the Federal Government. It was
-an accepted fact that the class interest of slavery, by holding a tie
-in the Senate, could defeat any measure or any nomination to which its
-leaders might be opposed; and, thus banded together by an absolutely
-cohesive political force, they could and did dictate terms.”
-
-Such was the land-holding, slave-holding, office-holding aristocracy,
-against which the first directly and avowedly antagonistic movement was
-that of the Republican party. Young and weak in its first Presidential
-contest of 1856, the new organization gathered strength steadily; and
-when, on April 29, 1860, the Democratic Convention at Baltimore was
-rent asunder by the Secessionists, it became clear that the Republicans
-would have to face the threatened disruption of the Union.
-
-The Republican Convention met at Chicago and chose, in preference
-to the able and experienced Seward, Abraham Lincoln, of Illinois, a
-man who, then comparatively unknown, was to take rank as perhaps the
-noblest and greatest of all America’s sons.
-
-Lincoln, when asked for an account of his boyhood, said that it
-might be summed up in Crabbe’s famous line: “The short and simple
-annals of the poor.” J. G. Holland thus reviews the career of the
-man who led the struggle that began in 1860: “Born in the humblest
-and remotest obscurity, subjected to the rudest toil in the meanest
-offices, achieving the development of his powers by means of his own
-institution, he had, with none of the tricks of the demagogue, with
-none of the aids of wealth and social influence, with none of the
-opportunities for exhibiting his powers which high official position
-bestows, against all the combinations of genius and eminence and
-interest, raised himself by force of manly excellence of heart and
-brain into national recognition, and had become the local center of
-the affectionate interest and curious inquisition of thirty millions of
-people.”
-
-To the end of his life, Lincoln was the very incarnation of democratic
-simplicity. He was never at home in a drawing-room; he never could
-dispose gracefully his hands and feet--appendages whose size was
-proportionate to his huge stature. After his nomination for the
-Presidency, he used to answer his own bell at his little house in
-Springfield, Illinois.
-
-The people’s man of 1860, ABRAHAM LINCOLN! The pulse of patriotism
-quickens at the pronunciation of the name. The people’s plain Abe
-Lincoln; one of them, a commoner, of them, with them, like them.
-To foreign nations, he may have appeared as “President Abraham
-Lincoln, Chief Magistrate of the United States.” He may have been
-“Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy,” in the minds of his
-subordinates in those two important branches of his administration
-from ’61 to ’65. History may record him as the “wise, able, and
-philanthropical.” But his memory will last enshrined in a temple more
-lasting than bronze or stone--the hearts of the people.
-
-To them he was Abe Lincoln--one of them, feeling their sensations,
-a common bond between him and them. He was a democrat by birth, by
-experience, by sentiment, reason, and patriotism. He was a President
-of the masses, and how well and loyally did they love him! His homely
-ways and phrases, his unadorned and vigorous speeches, were the ways of
-the people, speeches of the people; loved by the people for the very
-enemies he had made, for his enemies were the enemies of the people.
-Every caricature of Lincoln was a caricature of the people; every
-attack upon his personality was an attack upon the personality of the
-“mudsills” of the people, and his call to arms was their call to arms,
-and they sprang forward, responsive to his appeal, recognizing in it
-their appeal, as no sham aristocrat or autocrat can ever hope to have a
-nation do.
-
-His memory will not remain green in the minds of the masses by his
-martyrdom; but dear will the picture be, from generation to generation,
-of the boy studying by the light of a flickering fire, and splitting
-rails for daily bread; fighting his way onward and upward without
-wealth, or powerful friends, until at last, in the supreme hour of the
-people’s need, he comes to bear their standard in the battle which
-they waged against “caste.” He did not come to the contest as a hired
-soldier, but as a volunteer, feeling all that was felt by the common
-soldier. It was _his_ battle, for he had felt the sting of class
-distinction, as did every private soldier of his army.
-
-Loving, loyal, faithful Abe Lincoln! May your name never be belittled
-by any of your descendants adopting a crest or coat-of-arms. Your
-coat-of-arms is engraved in figures as lasting as the eternal hills of
-America upon the minds of the people. Should a degenerate descendant
-seek a coat-of-arms, let him make it an axe and rail, surrounded
-by the laurel wreath bestowed by the loving, trusting people; for
-Abe Lincoln was best and only loved by the very term by which the
-aristocrats attempted to disparage him--“the rail-splitter.” After
-the election of Abraham Lincoln, while he remained at Springfield,
-the chosen representative of the people, he was the most approachable
-man in America; even though at that time he must have felt the heavy
-weight of responsibility thrust upon him, viewing as he could the mass
-which, like a snowball, was increasing as it progressed under the weak
-administration of his predecessor. Think of the anxious hours that
-this man spent, knowing what the people expected of him, and seeing
-the number of his difficulties being added to, day by day, while
-those who had the burden to bear were obliged, until the fourth of
-the succeeding March, to sit still and watch the accumulation. Yet
-in those anxious hours, while receiving counsel of the mighty of the
-political world, many of whom were strangers to him and to whom he was
-a stranger, yet, still, while watching thus, the pillar of the Union,
-stone by stone falling away; while thus counselled, advised by those
-he knew not whether to trust or not; while his mind must necessarily
-have been weighed down with the thought of his own possible inability
-to meet the expectations of his friends, the people, in that great
-new sphere to which they had called him, Abe Lincoln still had time
-to grasp the hand and wish good cheer to an old friend, neighbor, or
-one of the people. From birth to death, his life will form a lesson
-that the new Chief of the people whom they have called to be President
-of the United States, Grover Cleveland, could well study, and Abe
-Lincoln’s example emulate, if he would hold the love of those who, by
-their votes, put him into the Presidential chair.
-
-This man, Abraham Lincoln, represented that class of people who had
-been dubbed “mudsills” by the orators who represented the believers
-in “caste” in the South. He stood as the very personification of
-“mudsillism,” which, read in the light of recently written history,
-meant the Common People--that is, the majority; and the majority ruled
-after his election in 1860, even though it required the use of bullets
-against the aristocratic class, just as the majority will rule in 1892,
-after the election of Grover Cleveland as representative of the Common
-People.
-
-The South sought by secession to absolve itself from the domination of
-the masses. It was like the patricians of Rome seeking the Sacred Hill
-to build a new city. It failed, as will ever the minority, representing
-a false idea of American society and a false conception of the spirit
-with which every American is imbued, do in the future. But, be it
-said to the credit of the believers in aristocracy in 1860, that they
-had the courage of their convictions, and they fought a manly battle
-to establish that which is impossible in America. The history of the
-Southerners’ sufferings and dangers, endured uncomplainingly, forms a
-bright and shining exception to the conduct of the typical believer in
-“caste.” Sham aristocracy, which has disregarded the rights and wounded
-the feelings of the people for the past twenty-five years, that sham
-aristocracy which is a direct outgrowth resulting from the suppression
-of the Southern aristocracy, if tested as the Southern aristocracy
-has been, would be found deficient in those qualities of courage and
-determination which made even the Southerners’ false ideas respected
-and respectable.
-
-The sham aristocracy of to-day, unlike the false aristocracy of 1860,
-would hire bullies, outcasts, and vagrants to do their fighting, as did
-those magnificent illustrations of “caste” in our country, Carnegie and
-Frick, at Homestead, and Son-in-law Webb at Buffalo.
-
-The advocates of “caste” in 1860, the Southerners, not alone possessed
-courage and determination, but, accepting the result of the conflict,
-have exhibited since the days of Reconstruction that wonderful
-degree of political acumen for which they have ever been famous.
-Early recognizing that in their struggle for an independent national
-existence, the Southern Confederacy, they had been defeated--not by
-the aristocracy of the North and West, but by the Common People; that
-is, the most powerful portion of the population of the Union--the
-Southerner, the secessionist, the aristocrat of 1860, submerged himself
-in the ocean of the Common People, the great majority, the democracy!
-The Secessionist, who opposed Abraham Lincoln’s administration in 1860
-and used bullets to express his opposition in 1861, had firm conviction
-carried to his hesitating heart by the events that transpired between
-1861 and 1865, that the “Common People”--the majority--must rule;
-and that with the freeing of his slaves he had lost the only possible
-foundation upon which he could rest his claim of social superiority
-in this country. Therefore, as the wise man that he has demonstrated
-himself to be, the aristocrat of 1860 has become the most earnest
-and patriotic member of a broad democracy in 1892; realizing from
-experience that upon that rock alone he can build the edifice of
-prosperity in his section of the country; also realizing from a sad
-experience that the Common People, democracy (though it was called
-Abraham Lincoln’s Republican party), was the crag upon which his bark
-of Secession was shivered in 1865.
-
-[Illustration: ANDREW JACKSON.
-
-The “People’s” President, 1828.]
-
-FOOTNOTE:
-
-[2] Of course I mean Ward McAllister. This is not from his book, but
-from a recent article of his published in the New York _World_.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XI.
-
-ANDREW JACKSON, 1828.
-
-
-Jackson was in truth a popular idol. Hickory poles, the emblem of
-devotion to “Old Hickory,” stood in every village throughout almost
-every State, and at the street corners of many a city. In his own
-Tennessee, less than three thousand votes were cast against him in the
-entire State, and in many precincts he received every ballot.
-
-The story is told of a stranger who visited a Tennessee village on the
-afternoon of the election, and found its male population turning out
-with their guns, as if for a hunt, and in a state of great excitement.
-On inquiring what game they were after, he learned that they were
-starting in pursuit of two of their fellow-citizens who had had the
-audacity to vote against Jackson, thereby preventing the village from
-casting a solid vote for “Old Hickory.” The miscreants had avoided a
-tarring and feathering only by taking to the woods.
-
-The result of the campaign was a triumph for Jackson. New England was
-the stronghold of Adams, who received all its electoral votes except
-one from Maine. The National Republicans also carried New Jersey and
-Delaware, and New York and Maryland were divided. Every other State
-declared solidly for Jackson, whose total vote was 178, to 83 for Adams.
-
-During that campaign, the same question appeared on the surface as
-that presented in the campaign of ’92. The Whig party represented
-apparently higher tariff, and the Democrats were opposing the increase
-of duty; but the fact remained that John Quincy Adams represented the
-aristocracy of New England, and the Whig Party had become encrusted
-with the same false stucco of “caste” that concealed the merits,
-worth, and virtue of Lincoln’s Republican party in 1892. E’en the most
-wonderful orator that America has ever produced, the great and honored
-Daniel Webster, with all of his personal magnetism, magic of speech,
-and logic of argument, could not boost the aristocrats of the Whig
-party into power; even though the bill for a higher tariff had passed,
-the cry was kept up, and was made to appear as one of the issues of the
-campaign of 1892.
-
-Andrew Jackson represented, in his person, the people, the masses.
-By birth, education, and mode of living, Andrew Jackson was
-identified with the Common People, and, as we are all common, with
-all of the people. Like Abraham Lincoln, the masses saw in Andrew
-Jackson a champion, ready and brave enough to resent the attempted
-differentiation sought to be foisted upon the people of America by
-the then Whig aristocracy--the claimed parent of the Republican
-party. However, Abraham Lincoln’s Republican party was not a progeny
-of the aristocrats of the Whig party. Andrew Jackson, in his person,
-represented the purest type of the western pioneer, patriot, and
-soldier, and such men in America will only be found in the ranks of the
-people.
-
-In 1828, John Quincy Adams, and his party of the would-be “Four
-Hundred,” received at the hands of the people the same punishment and
-rebuke that was administered to Benjamin Harrison and the Republican
-party, which, just like the Whig party, had become hidden from the view
-of the people by the glamour of wealth and would-be aristocracy that
-was thrown over it. In Andrew Jackson, the people elected as their
-chief one possessed of great firmness and decision of character, one
-who was honest and true; not always correct in judgment, but when he
-erred the people were ready to forgive him, because the error was one
-of judgment and not of intention. He was of them, and like them, as
-Abraham Lincoln was in 1860, and the people’s love and trust in him
-erased from their memory mistakes that in another would have been
-judged with a critical eye. He was often rash in expression and action,
-but his very rashness was the rashness of a man untrained in duplicity.
-He was not a diplomat. The people are not diplomatic, and he, as one
-of them, could not be expected to possess characteristics other than
-those of the mass. His actions were as a mirror in which the people saw
-themselves. How the chord he struck, when he threatened to hang John
-C. Calhoun and the nullifiers, finds a responsive echo in many of the
-utterances of Abraham Lincoln! What two men so nearly resemble each
-other to the people?
-
-The mere idle calling one a Democrat and the other a Republican is, as
-Hamlet says: “Words, words, words.” There is no significance in the
-mere word Democrat and Republican. Both were men of the people, elected
-as the choice of the masses, in the constant battle that the masses
-wage against the crime of “caste.” The similarity in the characters of
-Lincoln and Jackson is nowhere more forcibly illustrated than in that
-both were patriots of the purest stamp.
-
-Andrew Jackson took up the administration of the government with
-fearless energy, feeling confident that he had the unalloyed loyalty
-of the people to support him. Let us hope that Grover Cleveland,
-with the same fearless courage, will wage war upon those things
-objectionable to the people who have placed in his hands the weapons
-with which to do battle.
-
-The distinguishing act of Jackson’s first term was his veto of the
-bill to re-charter the United States Bank--the boldest defiance that a
-President ever cast to the money power of the country. “When President
-Jackson attacked the Bank,” De Tocqueville notes, “the country was
-excited and parties were formed. The well-informed classes rallied
-round the bank, the Common People round the President.” It is a
-commonplace of history that, in such cases, the “Common People” are
-more often right than those who claim superior information. Jackson’s
-veto is regarded by most observers as a remarkable popular victory over
-a great capitalistic monopoly.
-
-In none of the six Presidential campaigns between the time of Jackson
-and that of Lincoln was the question of popular sovereignty _versus_
-class pretensions brought into the contest as an issue, although events
-were gradually shaping themselves for the great struggle in which the
-period ended. Yet, in 1840, the Democratic personality of General
-William Henry Harrison, the Whig candidate, contributed not a little
-to his success. The veteran soldier, statesman, and frontiersman had
-spent most of his life in a log house beside the Ohio River, at North
-Bend, Indiana. A log cabin was chosen by his political followers as
-the symbol of his plain and unpretentious way of life, and a barrel of
-cider as an emblem of his simple but generous hospitality. During the
-“log cabin and hard cider” campaign all over the country, in cities,
-villages, and hamlets, log cabins were erected as rallying places for
-Harrison’s partisans, who met there to toast their champion in abundant
-glasses of cider.
-
-[Illustration: THOMAS JEFFERSON.
-
-The “People’s” President, 1800.]
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XII.
-
-THOMAS JEFFERSON, 1800.
-
-
-In 1800 Adams was a candidate for re-election, and fully expected to
-be successful. But the Democratic-Republican party, as the opposition
-was now called, defeated him, and elected to the Presidency its great
-leader, Thomas Jefferson.
-
-At a glance, it will be seen that the Republican of 1800 was the
-father of the Democratic party, the canonized Thomas Jefferson. The
-people, even thus early in the history of our nation, had begun to give
-evidence of that discontent at the aristocratic tendencies that even
-“The Father of his Country,” George Washington, and his successor, John
-Adams, displayed.
-
-It would be considered almost sacrilege were we to republish here the
-many attacks that were made upon George Washington, when President of
-the United States, on account of the odor of aristocracy with which
-he had become so strongly impregnated before the Revolution, and
-which clung to him like the scent of the roses to the shattered vase.
-While there can be no doubt, of course, in the minds of us all, that
-Washington was pre-eminently a patriot, with a firm and steadfast faith
-in the doctrine of the rights of the people; still, he belonged to a
-section, to a State, that had been settled by Cavaliers who believed
-that they were somewhat better by birth than the Pilgrims of New
-England. And, having been born and educated in that atmosphere, it is
-small wonder that his character should have been somewhat attainted by
-his surroundings.
-
-Upon Washington’s elevation to the Presidential chair he surrounded
-the executive mansion with more of the air of ceremony and evidences
-of “caste” than were pleasant to the mass of the people. He was
-attacked, during his first and second terms, by pamphleteers, who, in
-most scurrilous articles, wrote of him as one designing to perpetuate
-aristocracy and “caste” in our country. The debt of gratitude which
-the new Republic and the people thereof owed Washington was too great
-for any effect to be produced similar to the revolution in 1892.
-However, an impression was made; reluctantly, John Adams, Washington’s
-Vice-President, was elected as second President of the Union. This
-reluctance became apparent by his failure to be re-elected four years
-later.
-
-A Minister from the United States to England always seems to become a
-suspicious object in the minds of the people of America. No man ever
-added to his popularity by being sent as Minister to the Court of St.
-James. John Adams, who was our first Minister, was but the beginning of
-a long list of unfortunates. In fact, the American people will heartily
-endorse the opinion of that great statesman, James G. Blaine, which is
-being so vigorously advocated by the New York _Herald_, that foreign
-Ministers are expensive and useless appendages of this Republic. The
-election of John Adams was occasioned more by the reflected glory of
-Washington and the gratitude of the people, which, like the rays of
-the declining sun, became diminished as it sunk behind the horizon of
-time. In Thomas Jefferson, the people, even thus early in the history
-of our nation, saw _their_ friend. His simplicity of life, purity of
-character, and honesty of purpose, surrounded his name with the same
-halo, in the sight of the people, as that with which the names of
-Jackson, Lincoln and Cleveland have since been made luminous. Though
-Jefferson was called a Republican, still, to the people, he was a
-Democrat in the sense that democracy means equality.
-
-Never was there a statesman more thoroughly imbued with the principles
-of popular liberty than Jefferson. “Rebellion to tyrants is obedience
-to God”--Oliver Cromwell’s saying--was the motto engraved on his seal.
-He had taken a leading part in the colonies’ struggle for freedom.
-He was a member of the Continental Congress, Governor of Virginia
-during the war, and--a yet greater title to immortality--author of the
-Declaration of Independence. After the war he had been sent as American
-Minister to France, where he sympathized warmly with the revolution
-against Bourbon tyranny.
-
-Jefferson’s election to the Presidency was universally regarded as a
-great popular triumph. He was hailed everywhere as “the Man of the
-People,” and the day that saw him inaugurated was celebrated with such
-rejoicings as had not been witnessed since the news of peace came, in
-1783. No business, no labor was done on the 4th of March, 1801. It
-was a day of powder and parades, of church services, of bell-ringing,
-of speeches, and illuminations. The country’s satisfaction seemed
-unanimous.
-
-“The exit of aristocracy” was a toast drunk at one great banquet that
-evening; and when it had been duly honored, the band appropriately
-struck up the “Rogue’s March.”
-
-The inauguration itself was a simple affair enough. It has, indeed,
-been asserted that Jefferson rode up Capitol Hill without a single
-attendant, tied his horse to a picket fence, and walked alone into
-the Senate chamber to take the oath of office. Professor McMaster
-offers evidence to prove this story inaccurate. Jefferson was not
-surrounded, on his induction into the Presidency, by such throngs as
-attended the inaugurations of Washington and Adams in New York and
-Philadelphia. But he went to the Capitol in the midst of a gathering of
-citizens, with the accompaniment of drums, flags, cannon, and a troop
-of militia. His dress was, as usual, that of a plain citizen, without
-any distinctive badge of office. On taking the oath of office he said,
-in a brief speech to the Senate: “I know that some honest men fear that
-a republican government cannot be strong--that this government is not
-strong enough. I believe this, on the contrary, to be the strongest
-government on earth.”
-
-Jefferson’s administration--so economical, business-like, and
-democratic as to have made “Jeffersonian simplicity” a proverb--met
-with such approval that when he was re-elected in 1804 only fourteen
-votes were recorded against him. Only in one State--Massachusetts--was
-there any excitement in the campaign.
-
-The supremacy of the Democratic-Republican party lasted practically
-unchallenged until John Quincy Adams was elected, under peculiar
-circumstances, in 1824. There were in that year three leading
-candidates for the Presidency--Adams, Clay, and Jackson. As neither
-of them commanded a majority of the Electoral College, the question
-was referred to the House of Representatives, which selected Adams as
-being, in a measure, a compromise candidate.
-
-John Quincy Adams was at that time acting with the Democratic party,
-but he was, as James Parton points out in his “Life of Jackson,” “a
-Federalist by birth, by disposition, by early association, by confirmed
-habit.” And it soon became clear that Federalism, long supposed to
-be dead, was “living, rampant, and sitting in the seat of power.”
-Federalists were appointed to office--notably Rufus King, the most
-conspicuous survivor of the original Federalists--who was sent as
-minister to England. Adams was for stretching the Constitution, as the
-old Federalists were. In his first message to Congress he advocated
-government roads and canals, a government university and observatory,
-government exploring expeditions, and the like.
-
-His personality and manners revived the aristocratic traditions of his
-father. In the state he maintained at Washington he was said to go
-beyond the first President Adams. He refurnished the White House on
-a grand scale, and shocked the frugal taste of the day by placing a
-billiard table in it. The East Room, in which his excellent mother had
-hung clothes to dry, was now a luxuriously fitted apartment.
-
-“John II.” was the name that John Randolph of Roanoke bestowed upon
-the son and heir of the “Duke of Braintree.” Randolph had hated the
-Adams family since an incident that occurred on the day of Washington’s
-inauguration, which he recalled long afterwards in one of his speeches.
-“I remember,” he said, “the manner in which my brother was spurned by
-the coachman of the Vice-President--John Adams--for coming too near the
-vice-regal carriage.”
-
-Even Mr. Blaine, who in his “Twenty Years of Congress” shows himself a
-kindly critic of the Federalist ideas and Federalist leaders, admits
-the “general unpopularity attached to the name of Adams.”
-
-During John Quincy Adams’ administration the mutterings of a coming
-political upheaval began to be heard. It began to be said that the
-Presidency was growing too much like an hereditary monarchy. It was
-becoming too settled a practice for each incumbent, after eight years
-in office, to make his Secretary of State his political heir. It gave
-the President what was almost equivalent to the power of appointing his
-successor. John Quincy Adams, it was said, counted confidently on the
-usual double term, and upon seeing his friend Clay, to whom he had
-given the chief post in his Cabinet, elected to succeed him.
-
-“The issue is fairly made out: Shall the government or the people
-rule?” asked Andrew Jackson, and on that issue he appealed to the
-country in his memorable electoral campaign against Adams, in 1828.
-That was the bitterest Presidential contest that had ever been fought.
-Jackson was attacked with unexampled ferocity. One day at his Tennessee
-home, the Hermitage, his wife found him in tears. “Myself I can
-defend,” he said, pointing to a newspaper which he had been reading;
-“you I can defend; but now they have assailed even the memory of my
-mother.” And it was, in great part, her distress at the invective that
-was heaped upon her husband that caused the death of Mrs. Jackson just
-after the election.
-
-It was a pitched battle between the “classes” and the “masses.” As
-James Parton says, in his biography of Jackson: “Nearly all the talent,
-nearly all the learning, nearly all the ancient wealth, nearly all the
-business activity, nearly all the book-nourished intelligence, nearly
-all the silver-forked civilization of the country, united in opposition
-to General Jackson, who represented the country’s untutored instincts.”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XIII.
-
-THE REVOLUTION IN 1776.
-
-
-Revolt from aristocracy and detestation of “caste” in politics, in
-religion, and in society, have been the key-notes of the whole history
-of the Anglo-Saxon race in America. They were the incentives that first
-led men of that race to seek homes beyond the Atlantic, and have ever
-been the cardinal principles of the nation those pioneers founded.
-
-The westward movement began with that era of English history marked by
-the intolerable pretensions, in matters both of Church and State, of
-the Stuart monarchs. The doctrine of the “divine right of kings,” which
-cost Charles I. his head, was, with all that it meant, the grievance
-that drove from England the settlers of the American colonies.
-
-When James I., soon after his accession, was petitioned to allow
-liberty of assembling and of discussion to all classes and sects of his
-subjects, he replied that such a privilege “agrees with monarchy as
-well as God and the devil. Then Jack and Tom and Will and Dick shall
-meet, and at their pleasure censure me and my council and all our
-proceedings. Then Will shall stand up and say: ‘It must be thus;’ then
-Dick shall reply and say: ‘Nay, marry, but we will have it thus;’ and,
-therefore, here I must say: ‘The king forbids.’”
-
-The king forbade, but the native spirit of English liberty did not
-acquiesce without a murmur. There were mutterings of the storm that
-was to burst upon his son and successor in the full fury of rebellion.
-The subservient Wentworth complained that “the very genius of this
-nation of people leads them always to oppose, both civilly and
-ecclesiastically, all that ever authority ordains for them.”
-
-Most outspoken in opposition to royal encroachment were the
-Puritans--those stern disciples of Calvin, who had furnished England
-her first Protestant martyrs, Hooper and Rogers, and who, in the early
-seventeenth century, were, as Hallam says, “the depositories of the
-sacred fire of liberty.”
-
-Many Puritans preferred to leave their native country rather than
-submit. In 1607, a company of them were about to take sail for Holland
-from the Humber, when they were arrested and forced to return to their
-homes. In the following spring, they again attempted to escape. They
-reached the Lincolnshire coast, and were embarking, when soldiers, who
-had been dispatched in pursuit, rode down to the shore, and seized some
-of the women and children. As the only fault of these prisoners was
-that they had followed their husbands and fathers, they were afterward
-released.
-
-The fugitives, whose leaders were John Robinson, their minister, and
-William Brewster, their ruling elder, first tarried at Amsterdam, and
-the next year settled at Leyden. There they lived for eleven years--a
-body of exiles, who did not fraternize with their Dutch neighbors, and
-who gradually formed a plan of migrating to the new country beyond the
-Atlantic, where they might be under their old flag, and yet hope for
-civil and religious liberty.
-
-In 1617, they sent two of their number to England, to secure for their
-project the consent of the London Company, to which James I. had
-granted proprietary rights over Virginia--then the general name of the
-North American coast. The two embassies received a permit, although
-they put no great trust in it. “If,” said they, “there should afterward
-be a purpose to wrong us, though we had a seal as broad as the house
-floor, there would be means enough found to recall or reverse.” They
-did not foresee their future strength against oppression.
-
-Thus it was that in the August of 1620 the Pilgrims set sail from Delft
-Haven, and in November landed on the shores of Massachusetts--forty-one
-families, numbering in all a hundred and two souls. Before they
-landed, they signed a mutual agreement, covenanting “to enact,
-constitute, and frame such just and equal laws as shall be thought
-most convenient for the general good of the colony.” The agreement
-was loyally kept in the face of hardship and danger from within and
-without. The colony they planted grew in the spirit of popular liberty
-as it grew from penury to prosperity.
-
-Bancroft remarks that “in the early history of the United States,
-popular assemblies burst everywhere into life, with a consciousness of
-their importance and immediate efficiency.” This development of freedom
-was attained in Virginia even earlier than in Massachusetts.
-
-Virginia’s first struggle against usurping pretension was in 1624,
-when James I. sent out royal commissioners with orders “to enquire
-into the state of the plantation.” The colonists protested against the
-commissioners’ proposal of absolute governors, and demanded the liberty
-of their Assembly; “for nothing,” they said, “can conduce more to the
-public satisfaction and public utility.” And the Assembly succeeded in
-retaining its rights.
-
-Thirty years later, a domestic attempt at usurpation was met with equal
-firmness. Samuel Cotton, the elected governor of the colony, had a
-quarrel with the Assembly, and arbitrarily proclaimed it dissolved.
-The representative defied his authority, and speedily forced him to
-yield. For even in that colony in America, where existed more of the
-inclination to class distinction than in many other of the colonies,
-the same spirit of hatred to “caste,” and the exercise of any assumed
-superiority was deep-rooted, and thus early gave evidence of its
-presence.
-
-At the foundation of Virginia’s sister colony of Maryland, the king
-expressly covenanted that neither he nor his successors would lay any
-imposition, custom, or tax upon the inhabitants of the province. The
-proprietors had the right to establish a colonial aristocracy, but
-it was never exercised. “Feudal institutions,” says Bancroft, “could
-not be perpetuated in the lands of their origin, far less renew their
-youth in America. Sooner might the oldest oaks in Windsor forest be
-transplanted across the Atlantic, than antiquated social forms. The
-seeds of popular liberty, contained in the charter, would find in the
-New World the soil best suited to quicken them.” One of the early acts
-of the Provincial Assembly of Maryland was the framing of a declaration
-of rights. And yet, it was in Baltimore, the metropolis of the State
-of Maryland, that the first resistance was offered to the soldiers of
-the people, who were going to enforce the will of the majority upon the
-minority. Maryland, while, from proximity to the Federal capital, was
-less inclined toward the secession movement, was still sufficiently
-influenced by the aristocratic slave-holding part of her population
-as to be the scene of the first actual resistance to the will of the
-people in 1861.
-
-The same spirit animated the pioneers of Connecticut, where Hooker
-declared that “the foundation of authority is laid in the free consent
-of the people.” When John Clark and William Coddington founded the
-settlement of Newport, it was “unanimously agreed upon” among their
-people that the body politic should be “a _Democracie_ or popular
-government.” The colonization of Pennsylvania--“the holy experiment,”
-as Penn called it--was inaugurated by its great leader with a solemn
-pledge of “liberty of conscience and civil freedom.” And similar
-incidents accompanied the birth of nearly every new colony.
-
-As Massachusetts grew to be the most prosperous of the northern
-colonies, she “echoed the voice of Virginia like deep calling unto
-deep. The State was filled with the hum of village politicians; the
-freemen of every town on the Bay were busily inquiring into their
-liberties and privileges.” [Bancroft.] The American spirit, which was
-to leaven the world with a new ideal of liberty, found its philosophers
-and statesmen in the farms and hamlets of the young and simple
-community. It found, of course, its critics and its doubters. Lechford,
-a Boston lawyer, prophesied that “elections cannot be safe long here,”
-where manhood suffrage was the rule. John Cotton spoke against the
-accepted principle of rotation in office; but neither could stem the
-current of democratic doctrine, because the early settlers of America
-still retained the scars of their recent conflict with the aristocrats
-of Europe. Their arrival in the then wilderness of America had been too
-recent to obliterate the impression made on their minds by “caste” in
-Europe.
-
-In 1635, there was a short-lived possibility that the aristocratic
-system of Britain might be transplanted to Massachusetts. Henry Vane,
-younger son of a titled English family, emigrated to the colony, where
-he was kindly received, and elected governor a few years after; and two
-noblemen, Lord Brooke and Lord Say-and-Seal, expressed their intention
-to follow him if the colonists would agree to establish a second
-chamber of their legislature and constitute them hereditary members of
-it. But the burgesses, easily perceiving the trend of such a proposal,
-declined it, courteously but decidedly.
-
-Aristocracy never found a foothold in any of the colonies. The only
-approach to it was the privileges accorded in some of them to the
-“proprietors,” and these were, while they lasted, regarded with some
-jealousy. For instance, when Pennsylvania, after Braddock’s defeat at
-Fort Duquesne, decided to raise £50,000 for self-defence by an estate
-tax, the proprietors--heirs of William Penn--claimed exemption from
-the levy; but, though Governor Morris approved the claim, the Assembly
-refused it.
-
-Bancroft thus characterizes the elemental beginnings of the American
-nation: “Nothing came from Europe but a free people. The people,
-separating itself from all other elements of previous civilization;
-the people, self-confident and industrious; the people, wise by all
-traditions that favored its culture and happiness--alone broke away
-from European influence, and in the New World laid the foundations
-of our Republic.” And periodically, as we see from the records of
-our nation, the might of the majority has been exercised to suppress
-anything like the attempted institution of “caste” in our country. This
-often-recurring crime begins to upraise its head, slowly at first,
-after each defeat, but eventually its growth becomes sufficiently great
-to attract the attention of the “Common People,” and, as a result,
-receives its punishment, so justly due.
-
-And the same historian adds: “Of the nations of Europe, the chief
-emigration was from that Germanic race most famed for the love of
-personal independence. The immense majority of American families were
-not of ‘the high folk of Normandie,’ but were of ‘the low men,’ who
-were Saxons. This is true of New England; it is true of the South.”
-
-It is true of the South, in spite of the fact--influential throughout
-the history of that section--that its population contained an element
-drawn from the wealthier classes of the mother country. It has indeed
-been said that Virginia was “a continuation of English society.”
-The seeds of privilege may have existed in the Old Dominion, but,
-nevertheless, in no colony was the spirit of personal independence
-more signally evinced. “With consistent firmness of character,” to
-quote again from Bancroft, “the Virginians welcomed representative
-assemblies; displaced an unpopular governor; rebelled against the
-politics of the Stuarts; and, uneasy at the royalist principles that
-prevailed in their forming aristocracy, soon manifested the tendency of
-the age at the polls.”
-
-With the aims of the English rebellion against Charles I., the American
-colonies were in full sympathy. Immediately after its outbreak, the
-general court of Massachusetts directed the governor to omit the oath
-of allegiance to the king, “seeing that he had violated the privileges
-of Parliament.” But the civil war had no effect upon the colonial
-governments. In England, the monarchy, the peerage, and the prelacy
-were at swords’ points with the people; in America, there was neither
-peerage nor prelacy, and monarchy was rendered remote by the Atlantic,
-so that there were no two parties to join battle.
-
-The Restoration opened a new era in the history of the colonies--a
-period of conflict between royal usurpation and aristocratic oppression
-on the one hand, and popular liberties on the other; a period that,
-after many years of difficulty and struggle, culminated in events that
-gave rationality and independence to the greatest democracy the world
-has ever seen.
-
-It was a period marked in England by the political ascendency of the
-aristocracy. At the Restoration, the nobility resumed possession of
-the hereditary branch of the Parliament. Through their influence
-over elections, they, to a great extent, controlled the House of
-Commons--and through it the crown, over which the Commons had given
-recent and striking proofs of power. It was the aristocratic element
-that dictated the policy which goaded the colonies into secession from
-the mother country. It supplied the office-holders--“carpet-baggers”
-they might have been termed in modern political slang--whom the home
-government quartered upon the colonials by an official system tainted
-with nepotism and corruption. Its foe--Pitt, the great Commoner--was
-the friend of America, and one of her few champions in Parliament.
-
-Equally the friend of America was the English democracy--politically
-far less powerful during the century after the Restoration than in the
-preceding and the subsequent periods. When the hated Stamp Act was
-repealed, the “Common People” of London lit bonfires and illuminated
-the streets, rang the historic Bow Bells, and decked the shipping in
-the Thames with flags.
-
-But the House of Commons, before whom came the critical measures of
-legislation for the colonies, reflected the feeling of the aristocracy
-and not that of the populace. “The majority,” said a member, during
-a debate on American affairs in 1770, “is no better than an ignorant
-multitude.” Sir George Saville, a man of rare independence and
-integrity, replied in strong words. “The greatest evil that can befall
-this nation,” he declared, “is the invasion of the people’s rights by
-the authority of this house. I do not say that the members have sold
-the rights of their constituents; but I do say, I have said, and I
-shall always say, that they have betrayed them.” But his protest was
-shouted down as treason, and Parliament blindly pursued its course of
-usurpation.
-
-Long before that time, there had been in America thoughts of
-independence as a refuge from usurpation. The colonists cherished a
-genuine loyalty to the old flag, and a strong pride in the Saxon
-blood, whose latest and, indeed, most typical product they themselves
-were. Yet, as far back as 1638, when Charles I. tried to revoke
-the original patent of Massachusetts, the settlers threatened to
-“confederate themselves under a new government for their necessary
-safety and subsistence.”
-
-In 1698, Governor Nicholson, of Virginia, reported that “a great many
-in the plantations think that no law of England ought to be in force
-and binding upon them without their own consent.” Three years later, a
-public document noted that “the independence the colonies thirst after
-is now notorious.”
-
-The sentiment grew gradually during the reigns of the Georges, slowly
-overcoming the strength of the old attachment to the mother country.
-Every encroachment attempted by royalty or officialism aroused a
-hostility that reinforced the spirit of liberty. For instance, when
-Samuel Shute, Governor of Massachusetts in 1719, tried to prevent the
-publication of the Assembly’s answer to one of his speeches, claiming
-power over the press as his prerogative, he only succeeded in evoking a
-vigorous resistance, that finally disposed of his pretension, and gave
-the press untrammeled freedom.
-
-And thus it was that a generation later the patriotic Otis, of Boston,
-the man “who dared to love his country and be poor,” spoke so boldly
-in reply to Hutchinson, who summed up his aristocratic preferences in
-the odious Horatian maxim, _Odi profanum vulgus_, and who avowed his
-dissatisfaction that “liberty and property should be enjoyed by the
-vulgar.”
-
-“God made all men naturally equal,” said Otis. “The ideas of earthly
-grandeur are acquired, not innate. No government has a right to make
-a slave of the subject.” And again, “to bring the powers of all into
-the hands of one or some few, and to make them hereditary, is the
-interested work of the weak and wicked.”
-
-Such was the philosophy that was daily preached among the burghers of
-Boston. Such was the doctrine that Patrick Henry came from the Virginia
-backwoods to voice with his burning eloquence. Such was the spirit that
-was everywhere animating the colonies, while Parliament enacted one
-unjust and oppressive law after another. “The sun of American liberty
-has set,” Ben Franklin wrote from Europe to a friend in America, when
-he heard of the enactment of the ill-fated Stamp Act; “now we must
-light the torches of industry and economy.” “Be assured that we shall
-light torches of another sort,” replied his friend.
-
-The torches were lit; they blazed forth in the shots fired at
-Lexington, and on Bunker Hill, and in the Declaration of Independence,
-at Philadelphia; and they were not put out until Parliamentary
-oppression had been forever ended, and a new nation--a plebeian
-democracy--took its place by the side of the proudest of earth’s
-empires.
-
-The war was fought and won by the “Common People,” in the face of the
-armed force of the foreigner, and the treachery, active or passive,
-of not a few colonists, whose aristocratic connections or pretensions
-held them aloof from the movement for liberty. Even in the darkest
-days of the struggle, when Washington, driven from New York, was
-retreating before Howe’s advance, and many men of prominence were
-giving up the patriotic cause as hopeless--Joseph Galloway and Andrew
-Allen, of Pennsylvania, Samuel Tucker, of New Jersey, John Dickinson,
-of Delaware, and others--even then the Commander’s wonderful faith and
-courage was reflected in the fidelity of the populace. That alone made
-possible the final triumph.
-
-“When the war of independence was terminated,” remarks DeTocqueville,
-in his famous study of “Democracy in America,” “and the foundations
-of the new government were to be laid down, the nation was divided
-between two opinions--two opinions which are as old as the world, and
-which are perpetually to be met with under different forms and various
-names, in all free communities--the one tending to limit, the other to
-extend, indefinitely, the power of the people. The conflict between
-these two opinions never assumed that degree of violence in America
-which it has frequently displayed elsewhere. Both parties were agreed
-on the most essential points, and neither of them had to destroy an
-old constitution, or to overthrow the structure of society, in order
-to triumph. In neither of them, consequently, were a great number of
-private interests affected by success or defeat; but moral principles
-of a high order, such as the love of equality and of independence,
-were concerned in the struggle, and these sufficed to kindle violent
-passions.”
-
-The party that sought to limit the power of the people was that of
-the Federalists; its opponents took the name of Republican, which
-afterwards became Democratic-Republican, and finally, under Andrew
-Jackson, Democratic. In view of the fixed bent of the American national
-character, it is not difficult to discern the inevitable result of the
-conflict between them. The Federalists were certain to be ultimately
-overcome. America is the land of democracy, and the anti-democratic
-partisans were always in a minority.
-
-Thus for the brief period succeeding the Civil War, while the wounds
-of the conflict were still fresh upon the body politic, the party of
-the aristocracy--for such had the Republican party become--utilizing
-the soreness still existing as the result of the conflict, succeeded,
-by the clamor of sectionalism, in diverting the attention of the masses
-from the tendency towards social superiority and “caste,” which the
-continuance of the Republican party in power was creating.
-
-This brief ascendency during the first twelve years of the republic
-was due to several temporary causes. Most of the great leaders of the
-war for independence believed in a strong, centralized government,
-and therefore ranked themselves with the Federalists. The failure of
-the first attempt at federal control--the Continental Congress--and
-the local disorders that arose after the war, had inspired the people
-with a dread of anarchy. They were willing to accept, for a time,
-restrictive political theories, which it soon became safe to throw off.
-
-The Federalist leaders were more than suspected of aristocratic
-tendencies. Elbridge Gerry, of Massachusetts, declared in the
-Constitutional Convention of 1787, that “the ills of the country come
-from an excess of democracy. The people do not want virtue,” he added,
-as if in apology, “but are the dupes of pretended patriots.”
-
-Sherman, of Connecticut, said at the same time and place that “the
-people should have as little to do directly with the government as
-possible.”
-
-John Adams repeatedly advocated, in his writings “a liberal use of
-titles and ceremonials for those in office,” and the establishment
-of an upper legislative chamber to be filled by “the rich, the
-well-born, and the able.” The words, “well-born,” gave intense offence.
-Their inconsistency with the grand democracy of the Declaration of
-Independence was bitterly commented on. The whole Federalist party was
-sarcastically called “the well-born”--a fatal appellation!
-
-The expression “well-bred,” as describing the commander of the
-Pennsylvania militia at Homestead, will be recalled by the mass of the
-people long after every vestige of the militia’s visit to Homestead
-has departed. To the American mind such expressions as “well-born” and
-“well-bred” present an absurd attempt at class distinction.
-
-Hamilton shared the same theories. He was openly accused by Jefferson,
-while both men were members of Washington’s cabinet, of a desire to
-overthrow the republic. He was closely connected with the rising
-financial power of New York. The people, while they admired his able
-and amiable personality, never quite forgave him for the part he took
-in defending one Holt, a rich Tory of New York, in a suit for redress
-brought by a poor widow whose house he had seized during the British
-occupation.
-
-George Washington himself, who was a Federalist so far as he belonged
-to any party, was a man of ceremony and _hauteur_. He never forgot that
-he had descended from a titled English family, and belonged to the
-wealthiest class of Southern landed proprietors. When he assumed the
-Presidency, he established an almost courtly etiquette. On Tuesdays
-and Fridays he gave stately receptions to visitors; on Thursdays,
-Congressional dinners. While New York was the Capital of the Union,
-he had a Presidential box at the theatre (the only theatre the city
-then boasted), elaborately decorated, and whenever he occupied it,
-the orchestra played the “Presidential March” (now known as “Hail
-Columbia”).
-
-At his inauguration, the House of Representatives addressed him simply
-as “President.” The Senate, probably cognizant of his personal wishes,
-sought a more high-sounding title. “His Excellency” was rejected as too
-plain, and after some debate the Senators decided upon “His Highness,
-the President of the United States, and Protector of their Liberties.”
-
-The Senate’s suggestion was referred to the House, where it aroused no
-little opposition. Congressman Tucker, of South Carolina, inquired:
-“Will it not alarm our fellow-citizens? Will they not say that they
-have been deceived by the Convention that framed the Constitution? One
-of its warmest advocates--nay, one of its framers--has recommended it
-by calling it a pure democracy. Does giving titles look like a pure
-democracy? Surely not. Some one has said that to give dignity to our
-government we must give a lofty title to our chief magistrate. If so,
-then to make our dignity complete, we must give first a high title,
-then an embroidered robe, then a princely equipage, and finally a crown
-and hereditary succession. This spirit of imitation, sir, this spirit
-of mimicry and apery, will be the ruin of our country. Instead of
-giving us dignity in the eyes of foreigners, it will expose us to be
-laughed at as apes.”
-
-So decided was the feeling of the House against the adoption of a
-sonorous title for the chief executive, that the Senate’s proposal was
-dropped. Nevertheless, a more elaborate ceremonial was maintained at
-the Presidential mansion--at first in New York, then in Philadelphia,
-and finally at Washington--during the first twelve years of the
-government, than after Jefferson’s accession in 1801.
-
-Washington’s two elections to the Presidency was the nation’s tribute
-to the splendid personal character and military record of the man
-who, above all others, gave it nationality. When he refused a third
-election, the honor went to John Adams, as his political heir, although
-the Federalists, whose candidate Adams was, had only a bare majority
-of the electoral college--seventy-one votes against sixty-eight for
-Jefferson. It was at that time the almost invariable rule for the
-electors to be chosen by the State Legislatures, not, as now, by
-a popular vote. Had the conflict between Adams and Jefferson been
-waged before the people at large, it is probable that the latter, the
-champion of advanced democracy, would have been successful.
-
-John Adams was a man of decided aristocratic tendencies. He was the
-first American minister to England, and had spent ten years at the
-courts of Europe. He did not conceal his admiration for English
-institutions. While in London he wrote a “Defence of the American
-Constitution,” which proved to be a laudation of the British form of
-government rather than that of the United States. In his “Discourses
-on Davilla,” he advocated a powerful centralized executive and a
-system of titles. He was frequently charged with favoring a monarchy
-and a hereditary legislature like the House of Lords. His political
-opponents nicknamed him “the Duke of Braintree”--Braintree being the
-Massachusetts town where he lived.
-
-Thus early in the existence of the nation was evident the detestation
-on the part of the people at any attempted introduction of “caste” in
-the country. The Stamp Act, and taxes, and unjust discrimination while
-truly expressed caused the revolution in 1776, were only supplemental
-causes. In the record of every colony will be found traces of the
-opposition to “caste,” and the strong objection that existed among the
-people to the introduction of class distinctions among them. While
-the immediate cause of the rebellion on the part of the colonies,
-the revolution, and consequent creation of a nation, may appear to
-be the resistance to the imposition of taxes and therefore a matter
-of pocketbook; still, beneath it all, the foundation upon which
-the strength and duration of the resistance to the British power
-rested, was the strong sentiment in the hearts of the early patriots,
-demanding _equality_, social as well as “equality before the law.” Our
-forefathers endured suffering at Valley Forge, not for the sake of the
-pocketbook, but because they had in their bosoms that ever-present
-sentiment of the Anglo-Saxon people, that all must be equal in every
-respect. It is rather a petty cause to assign for the revolution and
-the exhibition of heroism upon the part of the forefathers of the
-Americans--a matter of taxes.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XIV.
-
-THE FRENCH REVOLUTION.
-
-
-Feudalism, introduced in France a thousand years ago, reconstructed
-society on the only basis then possible. It was a bridge from barbarism
-to monarchy. The invasion of the Northmen, though apparently a
-calamity, was a blessing. They brought fresh, lusty life. Their courage
-and vigor gave the country a new and needed impulse in progress and
-civilization.
-
-William, Duke of Normandy, conquered England in 1066, and proved an
-able and stern ruler.
-
-While many of her nobles were engaged in the Crusades in the East, a
-social revolution was going on in France, full of significance. This
-was the rise of free cities. The feudal bishops became so intolerably
-oppressive that the people succeeded in buying the privilege of
-electing their own magistrates; then the king, for a goodly sum of
-money, confirmed it. Appeal was thus secured from the bishop to the
-king. He encouraged the practice, for it freed him, to a degree, from
-dependence on his nobles, and gave him greater control over the
-cities. The process went on during the eleventh, twelfth, and the first
-part of the thirteenth century.
-
-The result was shown at the battle of Bouvines (A.D. 1214). King John
-of England, in the hope of recovering Normandy and other provinces
-which he had ignominiously lost, attacked France. He formed an alliance
-with the German emperor and with the Court of Flanders.
-
-The army of Philip, the French king, made up of barons, bishops, and
-knights, clad in steel, and a large body of foot-soldiers sent by
-sixteen free cities and towns, gained a complete victory. It was one of
-the most memorable contests of the Middle Ages, for on that hard-fought
-field three great branches of the Teutonic race--German, Flemish, and
-English--went down before the furious onset of “hostile blood and
-speech.” Lords, clergy, and Common People fought side by side against a
-foreign foe, and henceforth were united by a common bond of pride. It
-was the hardy yeomanry of Edward, the Black Prince, who won the battle
-of Crecy (1346), at the beginning of the Hundred Years’ War, against
-three times as many Frenchmen.
-
-It was in 1598 that Henry IV. issued the Edict of Nantes, which
-secured to the long and bitterly persecuted Huguenots the rights they
-demanded. It marked a new era in history. It was the first formal
-recognition of toleration in religion made by any leading power of
-Europe, and anticipated a similar act in England by nearly a century.
-
-The king saw what all have since come to see, that freedom of
-conscience is one of the surest guarantees of national strength.
-
-Henry IV. of France was essentially the people’s king. He was popular
-with the masses to the same extent that Louis XV. was unpopular. To
-the Common People in France, Henry IV. represented as much democracy
-in that age of tyranny as Abraham Lincoln and Grover Cleveland do in a
-better age and country. Henry was murdered on the streets of Paris by
-the fanatic Ravaillac, whose dagger inflicted an almost mortal wound
-upon France herself.
-
-With the aid of Richelieu, the absolute power of the crown was built
-up; then followed the despotisms of Louis XIV. and Louis XV.; the
-revocation of the Edict of Nantes; the disastrous failure of the
-Mississippi Scheme; the struggle between England and France for mastery
-in the New World, and the complete triumph of the former, and the
-preparation for the awful revolution of 1789.
-
-France had materially and powerfully assisted the American colonies in
-their struggle with Great Britain for independence. Many illustrious
-sons of France, like Lafayette and Rochambeau, had joined and fought
-side by side with those sons of liberty who were then creating the
-great republic of America. America was a storehouse of freedom,
-liberty, and concentrated hate of “caste” and class distinction,
-from whence Frenchmen like Lafayette carried to France the spirit of
-freedom. It may fairly be said that the struggle on this continent
-lighted the torch of liberty which has illuminated the world since,
-torn Spain’s oppressed colonies in America from her grasp, and made
-possible the existence of the French Republic, which has now taken its
-place among the most powerful nations of the earth.
-
-The dormant desire had long been present in the breasts of the
-poor of the French nation for equality and liberty. The quickening
-influences and light radiating from the new Republic of the West,
-among whose children the sons of France had served in the struggle for
-independence, soon ignited the fires in the heart of the impetuous
-Frenchman.
-
-Louis XVI. had been more condescending than any of his predecessors;
-he occupied, possibly, a higher position in the hearts of the people
-than any king the French had had since Henry IV. But the time had come
-when, inspired by the example of the Americans, the crime of “caste”
-in France had become unendurable. Louis XVI. was, of all the Bourbon
-kings, probably the least objectionable.
-
-His character, while weak and influenced by the stronger will of Marie
-Antoinette, did not represent the worst phases of the character of
-Louis XV. or Louis XIV. Gradually, but irresistibly by attrition, the
-will of the people had been making marks upon the royalty of France.
-The tyranny, insolence, and arrogance of Louis XIV., in whose presence
-one dared not speak, had been lessened in Louis XV. to the extent that
-one could speak in a whisper; but in the presence of Louis XVI. one
-might speak aloud. With tireless, resistless, sullen determination the
-billows of the sea of humanity, wherein all is equality and fraternity,
-had beaten upon this rock of adamant until these divine Bourbon kings
-had become impressed by its constant, ceaseless energy.
-
-Weak, amiable, and pliable as Louis XVI. was, poor Jacques had been
-so long deprived of one heart-beat of feeling that his bosom could no
-longer restrain the emotions of liberty and equality. The nobles of
-France, more than Louis XVI., retained the impress of the reign of
-Louis XIV., “the Glorious” (?), who had proclaimed that he was a Sun;
-and while the ruling monarch, as the bulwark of royalty, “caste,” and
-social inequality, had received the first shock of the wave and been
-marked thereby; still the nobility, sheltered behind the bulwark of
-the personality of the king, continued to indulge the wild license of
-their privileges and “caste” distinction, gamboling like lambs upon
-the greensward of their delusion, becoming fattened for the knife of
-that butcher that was sure to follow, the guillotine. A more powerful,
-touching, and realistic picture was never drawn of the arrogance and
-presumption of the nobles, privileged classes, “higher caste,” than
-that made by the people’s author, the man who of all others has nearer
-touched the hearts of the Common People, who will be loved and revered
-when others more learned may be forgotten, because he wrote of scenes
-of sensation, emotion, and relations of the Common People--Charles
-Dickens--in the “Tale of Two Cities,” and for our purpose it would be
-impossible to find words more fitting than those used by this master
-delineator of the feelings, thoughts, heart-throbs, and wrongs of the
-Common People:
-
-
-     “What has gone wrong?” said Monsieur, calmly looking out. A tall
-     man in a night-cap had caught up a bundle from among the feet of
-     the horses and had laid it on the base of the fountain, and was
-     down in the mud and wet, howling over it like a wild animal.
-
-     “Pardon, Monsieur the Marquis!” said a ragged and submissive man,
-     “it is a child.”
-
-     “Why does he make that abominable noise--is it his child?”
-
-     “Excuse me, Monsieur the Marquis, it is a pity--yes.”
-
-     The fountain was a little removed, for the street opened where it
-     was, into a space some ten or twelve yards square. As the tall man
-     suddenly got up from the ground and came running at the carriage,
-     Monsieur the Marquis clapped his hand for an instant on his
-     sword-hilt.
-
-     “Killed!” shrieked the man in wild desperation, extending both
-     arms at their lengths above his head and staring at him. “Dead!”
-
-     The people closed round and looked at Monsieur the Marquis.
-     There was nothing revealed by the many eyes that looked at him
-     but watchfulness and eagerness; there was no visible menacing of
-     anger. Neither did the people say anything; after the first cry,
-     they had been silent, and remained so. The voice of the submissive
-     man who had spoken was flat and tame in its extreme submission.
-     Monsieur the Marquis ran his eyes over them all as though they had
-     been mere rats come out of their holes. He took out his purse.
-
-     “It is extraordinary to me,” said he, “that you people cannot take
-     care of yourselves and your children. One or the other of you is
-     forever in the way. How do I know what injury you have done to my
-     horses. See! give him that.”
-
-     He threw out a gold coin for the valet to pick up, and all the
-     heads craned forward that all the eyes might look down as it fell.
-     The tall man called out again, with a most unearthly cry, “Dead!”
-
-     He was arrested by the quick arrival of another man, for whom the
-     rest made way. On seeing him, the miserable creature fell upon his
-     shoulder, sobbing and crying and pointing to the fountain, where
-     some women were stooping over the motionless bundle, and moving
-     gently about it. They were silent, however, as the men.
-
-     “I know all, I know all,” said the last comer. “Be a brave man,
-     my Gaspard. It is better for the poor little plaything to die so,
-     than to live. It has died in a moment without pain. Could it have
-     lived an hour as happily?”
-
-     “You are a philosopher, you there,” said the Marquis, smiling.
-
-     “How do they call you?”
-
-     “They call me Defarge.”
-
-     “Of what trade?”
-
-     “Monsieur the Marquis, the vender of wine.”
-
-     “Pick up that, philosopher and vender of wine,” said the Marquis,
-     throwing him another gold coin, “and spend it as you will. The
-     horses there; are they all right?”
-
-     Without deigning to look at the assemblage a second time, Monsieur
-     the Marquis leaned back in his seat, and was just being driven
-     away with the air of a gentleman who had accidentally broken some
-     common thing, and had paid for it and could afford to pay for it,
-     when his ease was suddenly disturbed by a coin flying into the
-     carriage, and ringing on its floor.
-
-     “Hold!” said Monsieur the Marquis. “Hold the horses! who threw
-     that?”
-
-     He looked to the spot where Defarge, the vender of wine, had stood
-     a moment before; but the wretched father was groveling on his face
-     on the pavement in that spot, and the figure that stood beside him
-     was the figure of a dark, stout woman, knitting.
-
-     “You dogs!” said the Marquis, but smoothly, and with an unchanged
-     front, except as to the spots on his nose; “I would ride over any
-     of you very willingly, and exterminate you from the earth. If I
-     knew which rascal threw at the carriage, and if that brigand were
-     sufficiently near it, he should be crushed under the wheels.”
-
-     So cowed was their condition, and so long and hard their
-     experience of what such a man could do to them, within the law and
-     beyond it, that not a voice or a hand, or even an eye was raised.
-     Among the men not one. But the woman who was knitting looked up
-     steadily, and looked the Marquis in the face. It was not for his
-     dignity to notice it; his contemptuous eyes passed over her and
-     over all the other rats; and he leaned back in his seat again, and
-     gave the word, “Go on!”
-
-
-In vain would we seek for words describing better the horrible
-condition of the Common People, and the tremendous extent of the
-assumption of a superiority upon the part of the nobles, than in
-the foregoing picture so ably portrayed by Charles Dickens. Such a
-condition of the social life in France could produce but one result.
-The harvest was ripe for the sickle. The people had witnessed an
-illustration of the might of the Common People of America when opposed
-to the representatives of “caste” in the British army. That the storm
-should have burst that so long had been hovering over the heads of
-the French nobles is not a matter of surprise, in view of the fact
-that Dickens is historically correct in his picture of the oppressed
-condition of the poor in France. The only wonder to us Anglo-Saxons is
-that brave men, as the Frenchmen are, should have borne so long the
-cruel, heartless oppression of the rich nobility.
-
-Duruy says: “The French Revolution was the establishment of a new order
-of society, founded on justice, not privileges. Such changes never take
-place without causing terrible suffering. It is the law of humanity
-that all new life shall be born in pain.”
-
-When Louis XVI. ascended the throne, in 1774, revolution was in the
-air. The outward splendor of Versailles, as Carlyle intimates, was the
-rainbow above Niagara: beneath was destruction.
-
-There was a general feeling that a crisis was at hand. The spirit of
-free inquiry aroused by the leading writers and thinkers was ominous.
-Government, religion, social institutions, were all burned in the
-crucible, and a new order of things was inevitable. The country was
-hopelessly deep in the mire of debt; the tax agents were brutal, and
-the peasants ground to the lowest depths of misery and suffering.
-
-The power of the nobles over the peasants living on their estates was
-absolute. Large tracts of land were declared game-preserves, where wild
-boars and deer roamed at pleasure. To preserve the game with its flavor
-unimpaired, the starving peasants were not allowed to weed their little
-plots of ground. The nobility and clergy, who owned two-thirds of the
-land, were nearly exempt from taxation.
-
-The peasant must grind his corn at the lord’s mill; bake his bread
-in the lord’s oven, and press his grapes at the lord’s wine-press,
-paying whatever the lord chose to charge. If the wife of the seigneur
-fell ill, the peasants must beat the neighboring marshes all night to
-prevent the frogs from croaking, and so disturbing the lady’s rest.
-
-French agriculture had not advanced beyond the tenth century, and the
-plow in use was the same as that used before the Christian era. The
-picture of rural wretchedness is completed by the purchase and sale of
-150,000 serfs with the land on which they were born.
-
-Louis desired to redress the wrongs of his country, but did not know
-how. Ministers came and went in a continuous procession, Turgot,
-Necker, Colonne, Brienne, and Necker again, tried to solve the problem,
-and gave up in despair.
-
-As a last resort, the States-General, which had not met for one hundred
-and seventy-five years, assembled May 5, 1789, and that day marked the
-opening of the Revolution.
-
-The National Assembly, proving to be the most powerful body of the
-States-General, invited the nobles and clergy to join it, and declared
-itself the National Assembly. Louis closed the hall. The members
-repaired to a tennis-court near by, and swore not to separate until
-they had given France a constitution. The weak king soon yielded, and,
-at his request, the coronets and mitres met with the commons. The
-court decided to overawe the refractory Assembly, and collected 30,000
-soldiers about Versailles.
-
-Four members of that assembly were Lafayette, Count Mirabeau,
-Robespierre, and Guillotine, inventor of the fearful instrument of
-punishment bearing his name.
-
-The Paris populace were infuriated by the menace from the soldiers.
-They stormed the old Bastile and razed its dungeons to the ground.
-The insurrection spread like a prairie-fire. Chateaux were burned,
-and tax-payers tortured to death. Soon a maddened mob surged toward
-Versailles, screeching “Bread! bread!” The palace was sacked and the
-royal family brought to Paris.
-
-Political clubs sprang up like mushrooms, chief among which were the
-Jacobins and the Cordelies, whose leaders, Robespierre, Marat, and
-Danton, advocated sedition and organized the revolution.
-
-The Assembly, in its burst of patriotism, extinguished feudal
-privileges, abolished serfdom, and equalized taxes. The estates of the
-clergy were confiscated, and upon this security notes were issued to
-meet the expenses of the government.
-
-Austria and Prussia took up arms in behalf of Louis, and invaded
-France (1791). This step doomed the monarch and the monarchy. The
-approach of the “foreigners” kindled to unrestrainable fury the wrath
-of the masses. The “Marseillaise” was heard for the first time on the
-streets of Paris; the palace of the Tuileries was sacked; the faithful
-Swiss guards were slain, and Louis sent to prison. The Jacobins were
-triumphant. They arrested all who spoke against their revolutionary
-projects; assassins were hired to go through the crowded prisons
-and murder the inmates. For four days during September the terrible
-carnival of blood raged.
-
-The Prussian army was checked at Valmy, and soon recrossed the
-frontier. Then the Austrians were defeated at Jemmapes, and Belgium
-was proclaimed a republic. The leaders of the French revolution were
-electrified, and the next Assembly established a republic in France.
-The king was arraigned and guillotined. As the bleeding head tumbled
-into the basket the furious crowds shouted “_Vive la Republique!_”
-Europe was horrified, and a league, with England as its moving spirit,
-was formed to avenge the death of Louis. The royalists held Marseilles,
-Bordeaux, Lyons and Toulon.
-
-The Convention appointed a Committee of Safety, which knew neither
-mercy nor pity. Revolutionary tribunals were set up, and the work
-of slaughter began and raged with a ferocity beyond the power of
-imagination to conceive. To charge a person with being in sympathy
-with the aristocrats was his death warrant. Men saved themselves by
-denouncing their neighbors before their neighbors could denounce them.
-Intimate friends suspected each other, and members of the same family
-became mortal enemies.
-
-Marie Antoinette, her head silvered by the awful woe and desolation
-and horror, perished on the same scaffold where her husband had died.
-At Lyons, the guillotine was too slow, and the victims were mowed down
-with grape-shot; at Nantes, boat-loads were rowed out and sunk in the
-Loire. The people were made frantic by their thirst for blood.
-
-Marat rubbed his hands and chuckled with glee at the carnival of
-murder. He showed his admiring friends his reception room, papered with
-death warrants.
-
-But his turn speedily came. Charlotte Corday, a young girl from
-Normandy, gained access to him, and, while he was jotting down the
-names of fresh victims, stabbed him to death, and then walked proudly
-to the guillotine.
-
-Danton expressed a suspicion that the massacre had continued long
-enough, for which he was promptly guillotined, and then for nearly
-four months the appalling Robespierre reigned supreme. His aim was
-to destroy all the other leaders; the axe worked faster and faster,
-but not fast enough to suit the clamoring tigers; the accused were
-forbidden defence, and were tried _en masse_.
-
-Finally, when common safety demanded it, friends and foes united for
-the overthrow of the colossal monster. He was arrested and beheaded
-July 28, 1794. The reign of terror ended with his life. It had lasted
-little more than a year. But what a year of woe, massacre, murder, and
-blood! From the first outbreak of the revolution to its close, it has
-been estimated that 1,000,000 lives were sacrificed.
-
-From this appalling furnace of fire and death emerged the true life of
-France. The revolutionary clubs were abolished; the prison doors flung
-wide; the churches opened, and the emigrant priests and nobles invited
-to return.
-
-But, though the Convention had organized the government of the
-Directory in name, it had yet to fight for its existence. The Royalists
-hoped they might restore the monarchy. The National Guard was persuaded
-to join the monarchical party. In October, 1795, the combined forces,
-40,000 strong, marched on the Tuileries to expel the Convention or
-prevent the establishment of the Directory.
-
-The Convention called on General Barras to defend them. Barras asked
-a Corsican artillery officer of twenty-six, who had distinguished
-himself at Toulon, to act as his lieutenant. He speedily converted the
-palace into an intrenched camp. He had 7000 troops, but he planted his
-batteries with such admirable skill, and used his grape-shot with such
-effect that the advancing hosts were defeated and scattered, and the
-Convention, with its defender, Napoleon Bonaparte, was master of the
-situation.
-
-Thankfulness should fill the hearts of all the citizens of the
-American Republic that the history of our own country will not
-present a duplicate picture of the scenes portrayed in this chapter.
-It certainly is not the fault of the good management of the sham
-aristocrats that these scenes of such monstrous horror, exhibiting the
-birth of liberty in France and the erasure of the word “caste” with
-its most objectionable features from French life, were not reproduced
-in America. Fortunately for the would-be aristocrats, the volcano,
-upon which they slept, had a crater known as the BALLOT-BOX, where
-the pent-up steam of the indignation of the people found a vent-hole.
-November 8, 1892, the safety-valve was opened by the people, and the
-believers in “caste” should be thankful that there existed some means
-of relief; had such not been the case, the pent-up energies and the
-indignation of the people would have caused another explosion, which
-would have rivalled in force, if not in the howling scenes of blood,
-the French Revolution.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XV.
-
-ENGLAND, 1645.
-
-
-The American regards England with more than kindly eyes. Her history
-has been the history of our race. The sterling valor of the Englishman
-early made itself felt in the demands made by him upon the reluctant
-kings who ruled him. At no time in the history of Great Britain,
-from the Norman Conquest, had the peasantry and “Common People” been
-submerged as completely by the power of the privileged classes as has
-been the case in France, and, in fact, as in all of continental Europe.
-When John, known as “Lackland,” the younger brother of Richard Cœur
-de Lion, came to the throne of England (1109-1216), he ruled weakly
-and lost nearly all the English possessions in France. The peasants
-rose against the imbecile monarch and, joined by the barons and feudal
-lords, compelled him to sign the Magna-Charta or Great Charter, at
-Runnymede (1215).
-
-By this immortal instrument the king gave up the right to demand money
-when he pleased, to imprison or punish when he pleased. He was to take
-money only when the barons granted the privilege, for public purposes,
-and no freeman was to be punished except when his countrymen judged him
-guilty of crime. The courts were to be open to all, and justice was
-not to be sold, refused, or withheld. The serf villein was to have his
-plow free from seizure. The church was secured against the interference
-of the king. No class was neglected, but each obtained some cherished
-right.
-
-Thus, early in the history of England, we find the “Common People” of
-that nation from whom we derive our blood and many of our laws--the
-foundation, in fact of all of them--and much of our domestic and
-social conditions and manners, asserting rights for which Americans
-afterwards contended with the parent country, England. The Magna-Charta
-was wrested from King John not by the lords and barons alone--but by a
-union between the nobles and the “Common People.”
-
-Thus early the “Common People” of England learned to appreciate their
-might and strength. And the Americans, as inheritors along with their
-blood of so many of the traditions and characteristics of the English,
-have not failed to possess themselves of that quality which is inherent
-in the Anglo-Saxon heart--the fearless demanding of the right to
-equality.
-
-Pronouncedly did the American people, November 8, 1892, reiterate in an
-unmistakable manner the sentiment of the race who, in 1214, had forced
-from King John of England the Magna-Charta which has been, ever since,
-the foundation of English liberty.
-
-English kings have continually tried to break the Magna-Charta, but
-have ever failed in the attempt. They have been compelled, during
-reigns succeeding that of King John, to confirm its provisions
-thirty-six times. The early assertion of the right to representation
-by the people is interesting as a step onward in the march of the
-Anglo-Saxon toward equality and liberty.
-
-Henry II.’s foolish favoritism to foreigners caused a revolt, under the
-leadership of Simon de Montfort, Earl of Leicester, who defeated the
-king at Lewes. Earl Simon thereupon called together the Parliament,
-summoning, besides the barons, two knights from each county and two
-citizens from each city or borough to represent free-holders (1265).
-From this beginning, the English Parliament soon took on the form it
-has since retained of two assemblies--the House of Lords and the House
-of Commons. Thus, the thirteenth century became ever memorable in the
-history of the English-speaking people of the world, for the granting
-of the Magna-Charta and the forming of the House of Commons--that House
-of Commons, which, as its name indicates, was and is made up of the
-representatives of the “Common People,” and which has ever been the
-bulwark of the liberty of the “Common People” of England, resisting
-every attack of autocratic monarchs upon the rights of the people.
-
-In the reign of Edward III. (1327-1377) the Normans and Saxons were
-fused completely, and created the English nationality; chivalry
-reached its highest exaltation; but the court and the upper classes
-were morally rotten. The laboring classes rose during this reign, and
-compelled their employers to pay them just wages, and rent to fragments
-the despotic edicts that effected them; just as the “Common People”
-will ever do, whether the attempt is made to beguile them by the cry of
-Protection, Free Trade, Force Bill, or other distracting exclamations.
-
-Richard II. (1377-1399) was a tyrant, with neither the capacity nor
-courage of his father and grandfather. He lost all the respect and
-admiration with which the people of England had ever regarded his
-father and grandfather. One of Richard II.’s tax-gatherers insulted
-the daughter of one Watt Tyler, at Dartforth on Kent, in exactly the
-same manner as “Chappie” feels at liberty to do, by his glances, the
-daughters of the laboring men to-day. Watt Tyler, the wrathful father,
-killed the man with one blow, and a formidable revolt sprang at once
-into being.
-
-The shouts of about 100,000 “Common People,” gathered on Black Heath,
-June 12, 1381, reverberated through the valley of Richard II. The vast
-horde poured into London, seized the Tower of London, put to death
-the Archbishop of Canterbury and others, and spared the cowering and
-cowardly King Richard II., only on his promise to abolish slavery and
-grant their demands.
-
-That, my good and would-be lords and barons, is but another evidence
-of the Anglo-Saxon blood and its resentment of insult when offered to
-the female members of the race. Women ever have occasioned, in the
-Anglo-Saxon bosom, just and righteous indignation when insulted. The
-slights, sneers, and snubbing of the women of America by the snobs
-and sham aristocrats produced the reappearance of the same traits
-of character as led Watt Tyler and his horde of peasants to London.
-The women of America had become Democratic, and the result of their
-influence upon the voters of our country was revealed, November 8th, in
-an unmistakable manner.
-
-James I. (1603-1625), the first Stuart to reign in England, was
-stubborn, conceited, weak, slovenly, dissipated, and cowardly. In
-his reign was first heard the prattle about “the divine right of
-kings, and the passive obedience of the subject.” He ostentatiously
-opposed his will to that of the people, and during his reign was in
-constant conflict with Parliament. He was obliged to beg the House of
-Commons for money, and that body adopted the principle, now one of the
-cornerstones of the British Constitution, that “a redress of grievances
-must precede a granting of supplies.”
-
-Charles I. (1625-1649), the son of James I., was more refined and
-held more exalted ideas of his prerogatives; he repeatedly broke his
-promises made to the people; his reign was one long struggle with
-Parliament.
-
-He was not as frivolous and false as his son Charles II., but James
-I., his father, had brought the idiotic doctrine of the divine right
-of kings into England along with the rest of his peculiar Stuart
-eccentricities,--for eccentric it was to the Anglo-Saxon people,
-who had forced from John the Magna-Charta at Runnymede before the
-amalgamation of the Norman and Saxon into one homogeneous race had been
-completed; who, while there still existed internal dissensions and race
-distinction, had been united upon the one great subject for which the
-Anglo-Saxon people, best and bravest representatives of the Aryan race,
-have ever fought--the equality of man in the representation in the
-legislation of the people.
-
-Strange to the ear of the masses was the doctrine of the Stuart, that
-the king was one of the Lord’s anointed and could do no wrong. They
-had seen kings do wrong when cursed with a wrong-doer as king, and
-supported any aspirant to the crown of England, no matter how slender
-may have been the thread of his claim thereto. Richard II. had played
-the autocratic ruler. Englishmen had resisted by espousing the cause of
-the first claimant who appeared upon the field. The assumption by the
-Stuarts of a divine right was the first stab that they gave to their
-own existence as the ruling House of an Anglo-Saxon people. Charles I.
-reaped where James I. had sown. The English people had forgiven before
-the bad faith of their sovereign, as they have since. They have endured
-the waste of their money because the Anglo-Saxon, whence we Americans
-derive the source of blood and laws, has not his tender spot upon the
-pocketbook, but in his heart, his home, his pride, believing himself,
-each man, equal to any other man.
-
-In 1628, Parliament wrested from Charles I. the famous Petition of
-Rights, the second great charter of English liberty. It forbade the
-kings to levy taxes without the consent of Parliament, to imprison a
-subject without trial, or to billet soldiers in private houses. As
-usual, Charles disregarded his promises, and then for eleven years
-ruled like an autocrat.
-
-During that period no Parliament was convoked, a thing unparalleled
-in English history. Buckingham having been assassinated by a Puritan
-fanatic, the Earl of Stafford and Archbishop Laud became its royal
-advisers. The Earl contrived a plan for making the king absolute. All
-who differed from Laud were tried in the High Commissioner’s Court,
-while the Star Chamber Court fined, whipped, and imprisoned those
-who spoke ill of the king’s policy or refused to pay the money he
-illegally demanded. The bitter persecution of the Puritans drove them
-to America. In Scotland, Charles carried matters with a high hand.
-Laud attempted to abolish Presbyterianism and introduce a liturgy. The
-Scotch rose _en masse_, and signed (some of them with their own blood)
-a covenant binding themselves to resist every innovation directed
-against their religious rights. Finally, an army of Scots crossed the
-border into England, and Charles was forced to assemble the famous
-“Long Parliament” (1640), which lasted twenty years. The old battle
-was renewed. Stafford, and afterward Laud, were brought to the block;
-the Star Chamber and High Commissioners’ Courts were abolished, and
-Parliament voted that it could not be adjourned without its own
-consent. Charles attempted to arrest five of the leaders of Parliament
-in the House of Commons itself. They hid in the City of London, whence
-a week later they were brought back to the House of Commons in
-triumph. Charles hastened Northward, and unfurled the royal banner. For
-a time his supporters swept everything before them.
-
-Then arose Oliver Cromwell, a man of the “Common People,” who, with
-his Ironsides regiment at Marston Moor (1644), drove the cavaliers
-pell-mell from the field. Nasby (1645) was the decisive contest of the
-war. Cromwell swept the field, and the royal cause was irrevocably
-lost. Charles fled to the Scots, who gave him up to the Parliament; but
-the army of the “Common People,” led by Cromwell, soon got him into its
-possession, and he was condemned to death on the charge of treason, and
-was beheaded.
-
-Thus, as has ever been the case when the “Common People” have been
-goaded by insult into a furious state of temper, some leader has aptly
-sprung, like Cromwell, from their ranks, and carried them triumphantly
-to victory. In the same way George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Andrew
-Jackson, Abraham Lincoln, and Grover Cleveland have each in turn led
-the hosts of the “Common People” to victory in their battles against
-“divine rights,” injustice, “caste,” and “sham aristocracy.”
-
-England, by the execution of Charles I., was without a king. The
-authority was vested in the House of Commons (diminished by Pride’s
-Purge the expulsion of the Presbyterian minister) contemptuously styled
-“the Rump.” Cromwell, the man of the “Common People,” and his terrible
-army, composed of the “Common People,” were the actual rulers. In
-Ireland and Scotland the Prince of Wales was proclaimed as Charles II.,
-whereupon the grim Ironsides--those representatives of the people, and
-their terrific earnestness when aroused--conquered Ireland as it never
-was conquered before. Crossing then to Scotland, the covenanters were
-routed at Dunbar, and again at Worcester.
-
-Cromwell, while he had the power of a king, like Cæsar, dared not
-take the title. He recognized, what it would be well for the sham
-aristocrats to attentively regard, that the people MAKE and UNMAKE;
-hence, he did not dare offend the “Common People” by assuming the title
-of king, though exercising all the powers of a king. Under Cromwell,
-England’s glory became greater than under Elizabeth. The Barbarian
-pirates were punished; Jamaica was captured; Dunkirk was received from
-France in return for help against Spain; protecting the Protestants
-everywhere, Cromwell compelled the Duke of Savoy to cease persecuting
-the Baudois. The very name of England became terrible to the oppressor
-of the poor in every land. The people, in their might, were ruling
-England; because, even though Cromwell was styled “Lord Protector of
-the Commonwealth,” he still understood that his greatest power rested
-upon the will of the “Common People” as a foundation.
-
-Upon the death of Oliver Cromwell there was no hand strong enough to
-seize the helm of the ship of State. His son Richard, who did not
-inherit the genius of his father, and did not hold the confidence of
-the “Common People” of England, was quickly put aside. And the English
-people--the “Common People”--casting about for an executive to place
-at the head of the nation, selected Charles II., whom they called to
-England to rule them, but not “by divine right;” simply as their king.
-
-The popularity of Charles II., the most profligate, the most licentious
-and immoral ruler that Great Britain has ever had, arose because he was
-the people’s king. They had called him from over the sea; he ruled by
-no divine right, but through the affections of the people. He was to
-them _their_ king, and though he sinned, erred, and wasted the money of
-the nation, he was _of_ the people, and they forgave him. When James
-II. attempted to revive (as the people feared he would, and hated him
-in consequence, even before his succeeding Charles II.) “the divine
-right of kings,” and the privilege of doing anything, the idea that
-nothing that he did could be wrong, the people resented it. It was not
-Catholicism. Dear as religion may be in the heart of man, there is one
-thought that is dearer: it is his right to be a man, and equal to any
-other. Had James II. been a people’s man, as was Charles, his brother,
-it is quite possible that the House of Stuart might now reign in Great
-Britain. William of Orange was beloved by the people, because he was so
-thoroughly a people’s man, that even the proud Anglo-Saxons preferred
-to submit themselves to his rule, joined with a daughter of the House
-of Stuart, rather than to the legitimate successor of Charles II. The
-mighty voice of the people was heard resounding in the selection of
-the Prince of Orange with the same notes that marked the music of the
-march of a triumphant Democracy, on November 8, 1892; like the grains
-of wheat taken from the tombs of the Pharaohs, though gathered in a
-harvest of fifty centuries ago, when planted will produce the same crop
-as to-day.
-
-History repeats itself continually, and nowhere more obvious is the
-repetition than in the record of the Anglo-Saxon race. The same causes
-which occasioned the unpopularity of Charles I., the popularity of
-Cromwell, the popularity of Charles II., were working to create
-Cleveland’s tremendous popularity and the overthrow of the Republican
-party November 8, 1892.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XVI.
-
-THE GERMAN EMPIRE, 1520-1525.
-
-
-Germany does not present a fruitful field for examples of popular
-uprisings and the exhibition of the indignation of the people when
-crushed by the oppressors of the upper classes. Germany to-day, even
-in the last decade of the nineteenth century, presents a picture of
-the only government in Europe which pretends to have a representative
-form of government, where the chief executive, the Emperor, can speak
-of himself, or would dare to do so, as the “war lord,” to whom absolute
-obedience is due by the citizens of the Empire. The Anglo-Saxons,
-while a branch of the great Teutonic race, seem to have acquired, by
-their being transplanted to the British Isles, a greater spirit of
-independence than the other branches of the German race that have
-remained on the continent of Europe.
-
-Otho I., son of Henry I., the mighty Saxon duke, was the founder of
-the German empire (936-973), and remorselessly crushed the rising
-opposition of the princely aristocracy. Mutterings of discontent,
-ominous of coming revolution, began to be heard throughout the whole
-of South and Central Germany, in the early years of the seventeenth
-century. The social position of the peasants was of the most degrading
-character. They were serfs; or, in other words, belonged to the soil on
-which they were born, and through that to the lord who owned the soil.
-
-The miserable peasants had no right to move from these lands; there was
-no appeal from the authority of the lord. When he appropriated for his
-own use the common pasture grounds of the village; when he forbade them
-to fish in the streams, or to hunt in the woods; increased the ground
-rent; tithe socage service, according to his own need, they had to
-submit or revolt.
-
-Thomas Münzer was an earnest, advanced preacher at Zwichfau, in Saxony,
-in 1520 and in 1523. He was expelled from Allstadt by the government,
-and went first to Nuremberg, and then to Schaffhausen, returning
-soon to Thüringia, and settled at Mülhausen. There he succeeded
-in overthrowing the city council and appointing another which was
-completely under his control.
-
-Götz von Berlichingen was a famous German knight, surnamed “The Iron
-Hand.” He was born in 1480, at Berlichingen Castle, in Wurtemberg. He
-lost a hand at the siege of Land Shut, and replaced it with an iron
-one. He was a daring and turbulent subject, continually involved in
-feuds with neighboring barons.
-
-Thomas Münzer and Götz von Berlichingen were the only leaders who took
-part in what is known as “The Peasants’ War,” in Germany. This was
-an uprising of the peasants, which first manifested itself January
-1, 1525, by the capture and looting of the convent of Kempton. This
-served as a signal for general uprising of the peasantry from the Alps
-to Havz, and from the Rhine to the Bohemian frontier. Münzer quickly
-persuaded the whole population in and around Mühausen and Laugensalza
-to rise in revolt, and Götz von Berlichingen hastened to place his
-skill at the service of the infuriated peasants.
-
-Unfortunately, however, the uproarious hordes were without other
-leadership, and lacked discipline and effective weapons. They gathered
-in throngs of from 5,000 to 10,000, and ran hither and thither, with
-clubs, stones, and perhaps a few firearms, burning castles, destroying
-monasteries, plundering villages, towns, and cities, and committing
-ferocious outrages. Before the regular armies, these multitudes were
-scattered like chaff in the hurricane. They fought with the fury and
-courage of tigers, but it availed them nothing; they were routed,
-dispersed, and massacred, and effectually crushed in a few months.
-Münzer was tortured and beheaded. Von Berlichingen was placed under
-the ban of the empire by Maximilian I., his exploits serving as the
-subject of Goethe’s drama of “Götz von Berlichingen.”
-
-While unsuccessful, this uprising of the peasants demonstrates that
-the inherent love of liberty has a place in the hearts of the German
-race, and should furnish to Emperor William a warning note that there
-may be a point where, in spite of the Germans’ love for Fatherland,
-and pride in the glories achieved by the Empire, they may resent
-expression of autocratic authority on the part of their Emperor.
-When the German becomes an American citizen--and there are no better
-citizens of America than the Germans--the spirit of equality, which
-has lain dormant in the Teutonic blood for centuries, immediately
-asserts itself. Under the wise guidance of Bismarck, German unity was
-made possible, and the glory won by united Germany has influenced
-the Germans in Europe to submit to heavy taxation, and the continued
-assumption of social superiority; but the time is rapidly approaching,
-which it would be well for Emperor William to consider, when the German
-people of Europe will exhibit the same love of liberty and equality
-that the children of the German race exhibit as citizens of the
-American Republic. It is to be hoped that the German empire will not
-sustain the severe shock in the latter part of the nineteenth century
-by which the whole social system in the kingdom of France was rent
-asunder, in the latter part of the eighteenth century.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XVII.
-
-SWITZERLAND, 1424.
-
-
-That little dot on the map of Europe, situated among the Alps, called
-Switzerland, has always formed an attractive and pleasing object to
-lovers of freedom and equality. Surrounded by powerful neighbors, the
-mountaineers of these little cantons seem to have imbibed, with the
-purer air of heaven in which they live on the mountains, that degree of
-stern courage, determination, and love of liberty which enables them to
-resist the pressure of the great nations by which they are surrounded.
-Switzerland, like the wedge of steel, tempered by the spirit of
-republicanism, has formed one point of pressure which the monarchies
-around her have been unable to resist. The love of liberty with which
-the Swiss are endowed, and their hatred of “caste,” are best typified
-by “The Gray Leaguers” and their story:
-
-In the green valleys of Eastern Switzerland, on almost every hill
-that juts out from the gray mountain walls of the Alps and commands
-the fertile fields and villages of the upper Rhineland, there stands
-a ruined castle. And in that castle, in the early Middle Ages,
-there dwelt some little local princeling who lorded it with almost
-unquestioned power over the peasantry around him.
-
-These feudal nobles had held sway, with no right save that founded on
-might, for generations, before the subject peasants, weak, scattered,
-and resourceless, were at last driven by the intolerable arrogance
-of this dominant “caste” to combine for mutual defence. Some of the
-leaders of the movement met in the little hillside chapel of St. Anna,
-still standing near the town of Truns, in March, 1424, and took solemn
-oaths to respect their own and all the people’s rights, and to wage war
-upon those who would not respect them.
-
-Johann Caldar--a name revered in his district as is that of William
-Tell in the scenes of his legendary exploits--gave the signal for
-the first attack on the oppressors. Caldar dwelt in the upper Rhine
-valley, not far from the baronial castle of Fardun. The Lord of Fardun
-entered the peasant’s cottage one day at noontide, and in wanton token
-of contempt spat into the soup that was boiling for the midday. Caldar
-seized him, and crying, “Eat the soup thou hast seasoned!” thrust his
-head into the pot, and held it thus until he was choked. Then he went
-forth to bear over mountain and valley the banner of a revolt that
-forever annihilated the nobles’ tyranny and left their strongholds in
-ruins.
-
-For three centuries and a half the Gray Leaguers, as the victorious
-peasants called themselves, met every tenth year in the chapel of St.
-Anna, where their first oaths had been taken, and renewed the pledge of
-popular liberty. At length their territory became the fifteenth canton
-of the Swiss Republic, still retaining, as it does to-day, its old
-name--the Grisons, as it is in French.
-
-The American traveling in Europe may view with delight scenes upon the
-beautiful Rhine; his artistic eye may be delighted by the art treasures
-of Italy; memories made dear to him may be recalled as he visits
-England; but in Switzerland he seems to fill his lungs with kindred and
-familiar air. This little oasis in the desert of monarchies, surrounded
-by worshippers at the temple of “caste,” is to the American an Alabama,
-“Here we rest.”
-
-Until the overthrow of the Third Napoleon and the establishment
-of a republic in France, nowhere else in Europe did the American
-feel himself so much at home as in Switzerland; and to those rugged
-mountaineers of the Alps is due the credit of keeping alive the spirit
-of liberty almost submerged beneath the flood of monarchical ideas
-which inundated Europe. Every republic on earth, and each republican,
-should feel indebted to little Switzerland that the fire of freedom was
-not entirely extinguished.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XVIII.
-
-RUSSIA.
-
-
-At the very name of Russia a kind of horror fills the souls of those
-who love liberty, equality, and detest “caste” and oppression. Russia
-is a veritable blot upon the civilization of the nineteenth century.
-She furnishes an example of all that was horrible under the old
-monarchical governments of Europe. Russia’s social life is honeycombed
-with anarchy, nihilism, and hatred. Beneath the surface, made smooth by
-military despotism, there burns the fierce fires of inextinguishable
-hatred. The people are deprived of those rights and liberties enjoyed
-by the citizens of even those monarchical governments by which Russia
-is surrounded, curtailed though those privileges may appear to the
-free American citizen. Germany, Austria, Hungary, and Italy are almost
-respectable in comparison with Russia. There can be, of course, but one
-end to such a condition--we can hardly call it civilization--in that
-tremendous empire. Revolution and anarchy in its worst form will sooner
-or later drench the soil of Russia with blood.
-
-Unfortunately for the future welfare and happiness of the Russians,
-their autocratic master, the Czar, permits no existence of a vent-hole
-or crater of the volcano upon which the nation slumbers. An election
-like that of November 8th in America relieves the pressure. In Russia,
-the discontent of the Common People, and all expression of it, are
-suppressed by the iron hand that controls the vast horde of soldiers of
-which he is master. Russia’s history and record present not one shining
-spot to relieve the dark picture of crime, ignorance, oppression,
-intolerance, and the suffering of the Common People.
-
-Briefly, Russia contains one-sixth of the land of the entire globe
-and one-quarter of the inhabitants. The government is an absolute and
-strongly centralized monarchy. It is one of the most arbitrary and
-merciless despotisms on the face of the earth.
-
-As the positive and negative poles of an electric battery, or as like
-and unlike attract, there has long been a strong friendship between
-Russia and our country. The two represent the antipodes of government.
-
-From the period of the appenages (small, petty States, 1054-1238) the
-enmity has been in a state of smothered or open revolt. It was overrun
-by the fierce Mongols and held under their iron yoke from 1238 to
-1462. During that period Moscow and many other cities were burned and
-the country devastated.
-
-Ivan III. (1263), during his reign of 43 years, did much to consolidate
-the empire, and introduced the knout as an agent of civilization.
-
-Ivan IV., known as Ivan the Terrible, was a ferocious monster
-(1533-1584), who first assumed the title of Czar (a Slavonic form of
-the Latin Cæsar), committed numerous atrocities, and killed his eldest
-son by a blow in a fit of anger.
-
-Peter the Great (1689-1725) was remorseless in his punishment of those
-who revolted, as in the case of the streltzi; the rebellion of the
-Cossacks of the Don; that of Mazeppa, the hetman of the Little-Russian
-Cossacks; he inaugurated serfdom, and tortured his own son, Alexis, to
-death.
-
-The rule of Paul was intolerable; he was won over by the artful
-diplomacy of Napoleon, and assassinated in March, 1801. In the Polish
-insurrection of 1831 the people were ground to powder.
-
-Alexander II. (1855-1881) emancipated the serfs in 1861. It was freedom
-only in name. Nihilism sprang up and flourished frightfully. Where his
-father daily walked unattended, Alexander was in hourly peril. April
-16, 1866, he was shot at by a Pole; the following year another Pole
-shot at him while visiting Napoleon at Paris; April 14, 1879, another
-Pole attempted to kill him. The same year saw the first attempt to
-blow up the United Palace and to wreck the train upon which the Czar
-was riding from Moscow to St. Petersburg. A similar conspiracy was
-successful, March 13, 1881. Five of the conspirators, including a
-woman, were executed. Alexander ruled twenty-six years, and left Russia
-exhausted by wars and honeycombed by plots.
-
-He was succeeded by the present Alexander, whose reign has been
-characterized by conspiracies and the constant depredations of
-suspected persons.
-
-The mines of Siberia have been the living death of hundreds of
-thousands of patriots. More than 50,000 Poles were transported thither
-after the insurrection of 1863. Since the opening of the present
-century more than 600,000 men, women, and children have been sent to
-Siberia. All are in the depths of utter misery and despair. Out of
-200,000, more than one-third have disappeared without being accounted
-for. From 20,000 to 40,000 are living the life of _brodyaghi_--that is,
-trying to make their way through the forests to their native provinces
-in Russia.
-
-And yet nihilism, socialism, the spirit of revolt, are more powerful
-than ever, and ere long will come the upheaval, when all shall be
-overturned and “the old shall pass away and all things become new.”
-
-The Russian nobility, with the Czar at their head, as the high priest
-of “caste,” are solely and entirely responsible for the spirit of
-anarchy and nihilism which is abroad in the domain of immense Russia.
-It is a fashion and the fancy of the sham aristocracy in this country
-to inveigh against anything like socialism, nihilism, and anarchism in
-America. Should the presence of this dread monster, called nihilism,
-ever be felt in America, the blame would rest entirely upon the
-shoulders of the sham aristocrats, just as the Czar and his nobles in
-Russia are responsible for its presence in that country. There must be
-a vent for the pent-up indignation of the people; this is, happily for
-us, found in the ballot-box. It is to this source of relief that we are
-indebted for the non-existence of socialism in America. It has not been
-the prudence, wisdom, or consideration of the sham aristocrats which
-prevents the growth of nihilism here.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XIX.
-
-PATRICIANS AND PLEBEIANS IN ROME.
-
-
-There is a striking historical parallelism between the Anglo-Saxons
-in modern history and the Romans a thousand years before. The Romans
-conquered the world as the Anglo-Saxons are conquering the world. The
-Romans were the first race to found and maintain an empire as wide as
-the bounds of western civilization. Their characteristic qualities
-were, like those of the Anglo-Saxons, their supreme sense of duty,
-their respect for law, their great natural aptitude for government,
-their earnest practicality, their somewhat deficient sense of the
-beautiful, and their high military skill and discipline.
-
-But before Rome could begin her march toward her later position as
-mistress of the world she had to rid herself of the domestic incubus of
-an internal oligarchy. The authentic history of Rome--for the earlier
-annals of her seven kings are little more than legends--opens with the
-struggle of the Plebeians--the mass of her people--to break down the
-hereditary domination of the privileged “caste,” the Patricians, who
-had a monopoly of political power, had appropriated the whole of the
-public land, and by unjust laws had burdened the Plebeians with taxes
-and debts, and reduced many of them to actual slavery.
-
-In the year 495 B. C., there one day rushed into the crowded forum an
-old man, ragged and emaciated, his back covered with bloody stripes. He
-loudly proclaimed his history, which was that of hundreds of others. He
-had done service in several wars; his farm had been ravaged and burned,
-and his cattle driven away; to pay his taxes he had been forced into
-debt; his Patrician creditor had demanded a usurious interest, and had
-finally compelled him to work as a slave.
-
-The occurrence created great excitement among the Plebeians, and
-would have provoked an outbreak had not messengers entered the city
-bearing the news that a Volucian army was marching to attack Rome.
-With their stern sense of patriotic duty, the disaffected citizens
-prepared to meet the foe, it being promised that their wrongs should be
-investigated after the war. They met and defeated the enemy, but the
-promise of the Patricians was not kept.
-
-In despair of obtaining justice, the Plebeians decided to secede from
-the Commonwealth and to found a city on the Sacred Hill, three miles
-from Rome. This brought the Patricians to terms. Rather than lose
-the working force of the community, they agreed to release all those
-enslaved for debt, and to authorize the appointment of magistrates,
-called Tribunes, who should be chosen from the Plebeians, and should
-have the right of forbidding any act of oppression.
-
-From that beginning the Plebeians advanced to full political and social
-enfranchisement, after a struggle that lasted for two centuries--a
-stern and bitter struggle, although it was waged “with a perseverance,
-forbearance, and moderation, of which there is scarcely a parallel
-in the history of the world.”[3] The next step was a law to compel
-the Patricians to pay rent for the public land they occupied. It was
-disregarded, and the Tribune Genucius, who attempted to enforce it, was
-murdered. Then by mutual agreement a body of commissioners (Decemvirs)
-was appointed to draw up a revised code of laws for all classes. Again
-the Plebeians had been deceived; the commissioners seized the executive
-power, and held it illegally and tyrannously until the Commons ended
-their usurpation by a second secession to the Sacred Hill.
-
-The agrarian question remained a burning one until the Tribunes
-Licinius and Sextius forced a settlement of it by stopping the whole
-machinery of government until their propositions were accepted. The
-procedure was constitutional, but for ten years (376 to 366 B. C.)
-Rome was in a state of anarchy, and the fact that actual civil war was
-avoided testifies strongly to Roman self-restraint.
-
-The legislative power was now the only one denied to the Plebeians.
-The Publican law was passed to give it to them, but the Patricians
-prevented its enforcement until by a third secession the Commons again
-carried their point, and at last secured final and complete equality
-between the classes. (286 B. C.)
-
-Rome, once the mistress of the world, retained her grandeur only so
-long as the principles of true democracy pulsated through her body
-politic and nerved her every action. When prosperity, corruption, and
-abuse blinded the rulers to the claims of the Plebeians, then came
-revolution, civil war, decline, and finally the fall of the proudest
-empire known in the history of man.
-
-So, the mightiest empire the world ever knew declined and fell before
-the power of the PEOPLE, who, outraged in their most sacred rights,
-revolted again and again, until, as may be said, the fabric, whose
-shadow reached to the uttermost ends of the earth, was torn asunder,
-and so went to fragments that not one stone was left upon another.
-
-FOOTNOTE:
-
-[3] Dr. Schmidtz’s History of Rome.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XX.
-
-GREECE--VENICE--THE RULE OF “CASTE.”
-
-
-Although ancient Greece was divided into many small countries, yet they
-were united by bonds of union, of community, of blood and language, of
-religious rites and festivals, manners and character. In these respects
-they were distinguished from all other people, whom they called
-barbarians.
-
-A thousand years before the Christian era the Greeks were divided into
-the nobles, who were powerful and wealthy; the freemen, some of whom
-owned estates; and the slaves.
-
-But the manners of the highest class were simple. The nobles were proud
-of their skill in the manual arts, and their wives and daughters ably
-discharged their household duties.
-
-Two hundred years later (B.C. 800) most of the states and cities of
-Greece became democratic. One uniform method characterized the change
-from monarchy to democracy. An oligarchy of nobles would overthrow the
-monarchy, and then some one noble would overthrow the oligarchy and
-establish the cause of the people.
-
-Sparta was the highest type of oligarchy; Athens of democracy.
-
-Ever since Aristotle distinguished them, there have been three
-recognized types of government--monarchy, oligarchy, and democracy--the
-rule of one man, the rule of a few men, and the rule of the people.
-
-That the last is the just and the true form of polity, the enlightened
-opinion of the world has long ago irrevocably decided. Of the other
-two, experience shows that monarchy is more tolerable. A Nero may
-have stained the pages of history by the diabolic cruelty to which
-autocratic power gave free scope; a Napoleon may have poured out half
-the life-blood of his country to further his selfish personal ambition;
-yet, on the whole, the evils of one man’s rule have been more endurable
-than those of the domination of a class or “caste.” In latter days
-the sovereign has come to be looked upon less as a personal ruler
-than as an abstraction--an embodiment of theory expressed in the old
-maxim that “the king can do no wrong”--a conception far less offensive
-to the innate democracy of all manly peoples; or, he is regarded as
-a mere figure-head, as may be said to be the case is England, whose
-nominal monarch has far less practical influence upon the executive and
-legislative departments than has the President of the United States.
-
-An oligarchy is the worst of all governmental systems. It has never
-made a people truly great. Wherever such a government has existed its
-record has almost always been dark and its end bloody.
-
-Look, for example, at two of the most successful oligarchies of
-history--ancient Sparta and mediæval Venice. Sparta was, as Bulwer
-justly observes in his “Rise and Fall of Athens,” a “machine wound
-up by the tyranny of a fixed principle, which did not permit it even
-to dine as it pleased; its children were not its own--itself had no
-property in self. So it flourished and decayed, bequeathing to fame
-men only noted for hardy valor, fanatical patriotism, and profound but
-dishonorable craft--attracting, indeed, the wonder of the world, but
-advancing no claim to its gratitude and contributing no single addition
-to its intellectual stores.”
-
-Such was the state that was ruled by the privileged “caste” of the
-Spartans and its administrative committee, the Ephoræ--a state
-remembered only for its brief military supremacy over her Grecian
-neighbors. Contrast her with one of those neighbors--Athens, the most
-typical and the most democratic of ancient democracies.[4] “The people
-of Athens,” says Bulwer, “were not, as in Sparta, the tools of the
-state--they were the state! In Athens the true blessing of freedom
-was rightly placed in the opinions and the soul. This unshackled
-liberty had its convulsions and its excesses, but it produced masterly
-philosophy, sublime poetry, and accomplished art with the energy and
-splendor of unexampled intelligence. Looking round us, more than four
-and twenty centuries after, in the establishment of the American
-Constitution, we yet behold the imperishable blessings which we derive
-from the liberties of Athens. Her life became extinct, but her soul
-transfused itself, immortal and immortalizing, throughout the world.”
-
-Venice was another such oligarchy as Sparta--ruled by a small patrician
-“caste,” who chose an all-powerful Senate from their own number; and
-from the Senate was selected an Executive Council of Three--a name that
-has become proverbial for a body of secret and irresponsible tyrants.
-Venice’s strength was in commerce, in finance, as Sparta’s was in war.
-Her rich trade with the East and West made her seem
-
-
-     The pleasant place of all festivity,
-     The revel of the earth, the masque of Italy.[5]
-
-
-But her internal government was one long reign of terror. The Council
-of Three met at night, masked and robed in scarlet cloaks, to judge
-those against whom accusations had been thrust into the yawning “Lions’
-Mouths”--two slots in the wall into which any might thrust an anonymous
-denunciation of his enemy. And from the Council’s sentence there was no
-hope of appeal; its victims were hurried across the Bridge of Sighs to
-vanish forever from human sight in the awful torture chambers to which
-that melancholy passage led.
-
-The ending of most oligarchies has been a violent one, as was that of
-the Thirty Tyrants at Athens, or that of the Decemviri at Rome. At
-Venice the sway of a “caste” lasted for centuries, and was ended only
-by a foreign conqueror--so complete an ascendency had the privileged
-patricians gained over the fettered populace. The wonderful mercantile
-prosperity of the community stifled the sentiment of popular
-liberty--a notable warning to mercantile and materialistic America!
-
-No oligarchy, and nothing of oligarchic tendencies can be endured in
-this country. We must not and will not have a dominant “caste.”
-
-FOOTNOTES:
-
-[4] In the best age of Athens, life was marked by a dignified and
-elegant simplicity. Every free citizen was one of the rulers of the
-state, through his vote in the assembly and the law courts; and,
-consequently, there was little exclusiveness in social life. An
-Athenian might be poor, but if he had general ability, wit, or artistic
-skill, he was welcome in the best houses of Athens.--_Sanderson’s
-Epitome of History_, p. 169.
-
-[5] Childe Harold, Canto IV.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXI.
-
-EGYPT, 4235 B. C.
-
-
-Egypt, the cradle of civilization, had its Democrats, who struck
-resistless blows for equality, freedom, and fraternity for the race.
-So accustomed have we become, in thinking of Egypt, to be struck so
-forcibly by those evidences, the pyramids, of slave labor and the
-oppressed condition of the large portion of the ancient population
-of Egypt, that the existence of democrats in Egypt seems totally
-inconsistent with our preconceived idea of the ancient civilization
-of that country. Yet, we find, during the fourth dynasty--4235 B. C.,
-the pyramids were builded, and the great Sphinx at Gizeh. The wealth
-and splendor of Egypt were unapproached elsewhere; civilization, the
-arts and sciences, reached a height which, in some respects, the world
-has never known since that time. The civilization of to-day is unequal
-to the task of rearing such structures as the pyramids, over which
-more than fifty centuries have rolled without displacing a stone or
-crumbling a corner of the prodigious masses of granite, hewn from
-the distant quarries of Asswan, Mokattam and Tarah, and transported
-by means beyond the skill and comprehension of the science of the
-nineteenth century.
-
-But with all its splendor, wealth, magnificence and culture, the
-kings and rulers of the Fourth Dynasty became corrupt, oppressive and
-tyrannical. The Common People, as they were called, revolted, and a
-revolution of fire and blood extinguished the dynasty, 3951 B. C.
-
-Heedless of the immutable law that only in union is there strength,
-Egypt not only became corrupt and tyrannical, but divided into two
-kingdoms, who warred furiously against each other. Then it was that the
-nomadic hordes of Arabia and Syria saw their opportunity, and, swarming
-over the borders (2114 B. C.) and overflowing the valley of the Nile
-with a human flood a thousand-fold more destructive than the turbid
-inundation of that great river, they crushed the struggling legions
-like worms in the dust, and became the masters of the country.
-
-They were the Hyksos, or Shepherd Kings, who stamped their rugged
-individuality on that wonderful land. They ruled for four centuries,
-forming the fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth dynasties. Their last
-king was Apepi, who reigned sixty-one years, and is believed by many
-to have been the Pharaoh (“Pharaoh” was the general name for kings) in
-whose reign Joseph came into Egypt and was made governor over all the
-land.
-
-The Shepherd Kings gradually succumbed to the civilization, culture,
-and manners of the Egyptians, and vanished from history by absorption
-among those people.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXII.
-
-CHRISTIANITY.
-
-
-Aside from the fact of its divine origin and inspired teachers, the
-doctrine of Christianity, the advent of the Messiah, was so opportune
-that, even had he not been the true Saviour, but taught as he did and
-as his disciples did, Christianity, by reason of the condition of the
-civilized world, would have made rapid and permanent progress among
-the “Common People.” Rome was at that time mistress of the world. Her
-empire extended over the whole of Western, and a large portion of
-Eastern civilization. Her conquering legions had carried their eagles
-to the utmost confines of the then civilized portion of the Western
-world.
-
-The cultured Greek and the barbarous Briton, the learned Egyptian and
-the warlike Teuton, alike felt the Roman yoke. Palestine was a province
-of the great Roman Empire. Roman officials, Roman representatives,
-and Roman soldiers ruled the people of Palestine with a rod of iron.
-It had once been said that “to be a Roman citizen was to be a king.”
-While the Roman Republic had ceased to exist, and the Cæsars ruled in
-place of the old republican form of government, creating, as a result
-of a monarchy, a nobility, class distinction, and “caste,” still the
-traditions and the feelings of the Roman citizen remained with him. He
-was a king in comparison with the conquered people of the provinces
-which had been added to the Roman Empire.
-
-The Romans were essentially warriors; cruel and oppressive,
-merciless and masterful, at every period of the existence of the
-Roman government, whether monarchical or republican. But under the
-Cæsars there had sprung up a privileged class, the nobility, who
-had accumulated vast wealth, surrounded themselves with an army of
-retainers and servants, through whom they imposed upon the “Common
-People” every kind of oppression imaginable.
-
-This was not so much the case where the nobility came in contact with
-only Roman citizens, but in every conquered province or country the
-arrogance and cruelty of the representatives of the nobility of Rome
-made absolutely wretched and hopeless the lives of the conquered people.
-
-The Jewish people had become almost accustomed, as a race, to the yoke
-of a conqueror. So often had they been oppressed, and so long, they had
-learned that the ark of their hope and comfort lay, not in temporal
-power, but in that hope of everlasting happiness which the Word of God,
-delivered to Moses, insured them hereafter. This had resulted in the
-creation among the Jewish people of a priesthood and a religious order
-almost as powerful as the priesthood of ancient Egypt, which exerted,
-with regard to spiritual and social affairs, though not in conflict
-with the power of Rome, almost the same tyrannical power as Rome did by
-the might of her legions in temporal affairs.
-
-Between the grindstones of military despotism and priestly despotism
-the poor Jew was ground until his very soul cried out in anguish. The
-true religion, given to his forefathers, through that great teacher,
-Moses, by God Almighty, had ceased to afford him comfort. “Caste”
-had crept into the temple, as well as into the Roman government,
-destroying, as it ever will, peace and happiness at home, security and
-prosperity abroad. Therefore, when a voice was heard “crying in the
-wilderness, Come, ye who are heavy-laden,” the ears of the Jew, the
-Gentile, the barbarian, all the world over, were ready to listen and
-follow the sweet music of hope created in the breasts of the oppressed,
-which Christ brought.
-
-The persecution of our Saviour and his sufferings arose and were
-occasioned by the priestly “caste,” and executed, in that scene on
-the cross, by the military “caste”--the Roman soldiers. “Caste,” and
-the crime of it, is responsible for the crucifixion of our Saviour,
-the Son of God. The “Common People,” in multitudes, followed Jesus,
-and listened in rapt attention to the loving words of peace and hope
-he brought them. It was the high priests of the temple who accused
-him; it was the Roman governor who had him crucified, by reason of the
-accusations of the priestly “caste.”
-
-No fair-minded man, examining into the beautiful story furnished by
-the existence of the Son of God on earth, can fail to recognize that
-the loving, peaceful, kindly mission of our Saviour was made wretched,
-resulting in his suffering and death, by reason of the _crime of
-“caste.”_
-
-Aristocrats and aristocracy have occasioned, from the beginning of the
-world, nearly all of the sins, wretchedness, and misery of the children
-of God; and when He sent His Son to save us, they crucified Him. In the
-coming of Christ, the “Common People” of Palestine saw a gleam of hope,
-a star to guide them to that haven of rest where neither priesthood
-nor Romans ruled; that province where all should be bright, where all
-should enter into perfect bliss. This sensation among the “Common
-People,” starting like the ripples created by casting a stone into
-still waters, extended and widened until it permeated every province of
-Rome, making converts of the “Common People.”
-
-The conquered provinces had felt the severity of the iron heel of
-Rome upon their necks. The Roman nobles had driven so deeply into
-the hearts of the conquered the idea that “to be a Roman was to be a
-king,” and that the subjugated people, though morally and mentally
-often the superiors of the Romans, were, by the power of the Roman
-legions, the inferiors of the followers of the eagles of the Cæsars.
-The utter uselessness and impotency of any outbreak upon the part of
-the subjugated people, where resort to arms would be sought, was so
-apparent, the futility of contending with the might of Rome was so
-great, that the civilized world at that time was hopelessly suffering.
-To contend with the trained and masterful soldiers of the Cæsars
-would be productive of but one result--destruction, suffering, and
-humiliation.
-
-To the world, so bereft of all hope for relief from their sufferings,
-from the oppressive Roman “caste,” His words and His teachings came
-like the sweet, refreshing breath of heaven, bringing a salve to the
-wounded spirits of the hopelessly oppressed masses. Christ, the Son of
-God, was of the people. The earthly parents selected by the All-Wise
-Almighty for the Son that He should send to save His people, were of
-the lowly. Christ himself learned the trade of His father, and was
-a carpenter; His every utterance, His life, the selection of His
-disciples, was, like the Truth, democratic. In fact, Christ would
-to-day have been pronounced a socialist. In the nineteenth chapter of
-St. Matthew, twenty-first verse, we read: “Jesus answered, If thou
-wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, and give to the poor.”
-In St. Mark, tenth chapter, twenty-first verse: “And Jesus, beholding
-him, loved him, and said unto him, One thing thou lackest: go thy way,
-sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor.” In St. Luke, twelfth
-chapter, thirty-third verse, we find Jesus saying: “Sell that ye have,
-and give alms.”
-
-Imagine a minister of to-day, a teacher of the doctrines of this same
-Jesus, rising in some good Episcopal church with the would-be noble
-Astors seated in front of him, and proclaiming to them: “One thing thou
-lackest: go thy way, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor.”
-Think of a Baptist minister, before permitting John D. Rockefeller
-and William Rockefeller to partake of the Holy Sacrament, commanding:
-“Sell that ye have, and give alms.” Imagine the outrage, indignation,
-of these many-millioned moneyed lords, if the son of a poor carpenter
-should suggest to them, as Jesus did of old: “If thou wilt be perfect,
-go and sell that thou hast, and give to the poor.” That meek and lowly
-Jesus who came as a panacea for all sorrow, selecting fishermen to
-abide with Him and be His associates, sitting at the table and breaking
-bread with these fishermen, making of them “fishers of men,” teaching
-to the world the equality of man by His actions and His life; He who
-was in the beginning the God, the Saviour, could sit at the table and
-live in close communion and association with fishermen. Will you, Mr.
-Rockefeller, will you, Mr. Astor, good Christians that you are? Are you
-following the doctrines of Him in whose praise you raise your voices,
-Sunday after Sunday, in a hundred-thousand-dollar church, before an
-aristocratic, well-bred, genteel, ten-thousand-dollar-a-year clergyman?
-
-Would you, fair dames of fashion, assist at the coming into the world
-of a child in a stable, whose cradle was a manger, whose curtain was
-the straw thereof? You ladies of America, whose crests adorn your
-carriages, affect to view with adoring eyes a hundred-thousand-dollar
-painting of the Madonna and her child, yet gaze with contempt, and
-avoid with averted glances, contact with the pure but poor wives and
-mothers of our land.
-
-St. Paul, who, of all the early teachers of Christianity, was probably
-the “most respectable,” as soon as the angel of God appeared to him,
-became converted to the doctrines of Him who was Truth personified,
-and threw “caste” to the winds. In the seventeenth chapter of the
-Acts, St. Paul, upon Mars Hill, at Athens, proclaimed the equality of
-man; in the twenty-sixth verse, he says: “And hath made of one blood
-all the nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth.”
-As God has made us all of one blood, how contrary to the teaching of
-Him whom you say you follow, to endeavor to establish a theory that
-birth makes a difference and inequality, that there is any peculiarity
-about one drop of human blood that makes it better than another. The
-teachings of the divine philanthropist, the Saviour of mankind, took
-deep and permanent root in the minds of men, because the very essence
-of it was that no matter whether the believer in those teachings be
-a poor, oppressed Jew, or an outcast Gentile, or a Roman Cæsar, he
-stood only before his God as an equal of any other of God’s children.
-It was the leveling, the equalizing of rank and power that gave the
-impetus, at first, to those truths which are the pillars of the faith
-of the Christian nations of earth. “Come, ye who are heavy-laden,” is
-the doctrine that appealed to the “Common People.” As lasting and as
-abiding as the faith that we have in the Christian religion, so long
-and enduring will be the sentiment of the human soul believing in the
-equality of man. It has been so from the beginning, and will be to
-the end, and surprise and astonishment at each fresh evidence of its
-outburst is unnecessary. The plebeians of Rome, before the coming of
-the Lord, asserted the same right, and would have sought the Sacred
-Hill to establish a city of their own had not the patricians made
-concessions. It is the same spirit that cost Charles I. his head, Louis
-XVI. his head, the British Government this vast empire, and the same
-spirit that, November 8, 1892, cost the Republican party its hold upon
-power; because, in the minds of the people, that party was thoroughly
-impregnated with the much-hated principle of the inequality of man.
-
-The rich and powerful were the last to be converted to Christianity.
-They trembled and said, as the Roman Governor did, “Almost thou
-persuadest me to be a Christian,” but not quite, because the very
-fundamental principles of the Christian religion are Love, Charity,
-and Equality. Their conversion would mean the surrendering of their
-cherished claim of “caste.” Many a conversion among the mighty, when at
-last effected, was the result of policy upon the part of the converted,
-who had commenced to feel the power of the “Common People” who had
-listened and become imbued with the divine teachings of the doctrine of
-Christianity.
-
-Had it been necessary, as now, to pay salaries of from one to
-ten thousand dollars to those teachers who, in the early age of
-Christianity, promulgated the doctrines of their God, how few
-conversions would have been made at all. These wayfarers, obeying the
-divine injunction of our Saviour, to “go and teach all the people of
-earth,” took no heed of the morrow. They did not teach in temples which
-required thousands of dollars to build; they did not find it necessary
-to be surrounded with luxury; they needed no vacations and excursions
-to recuperate their exhausted natures. Had it been necessary for
-those “fishers of men” to have carriages, temples, and salaries, the
-Christian religion would have made exceedingly slow progress. There
-were no Astors, Vanderbilts, Rockefellers, in the congregations that
-surrounded the early teachers of the doctrine of the meek and lowly
-Jesus.
-
-We hear on every side (when this idea is advanced), proclaimed by
-the gentlemen of the clerical profession, that “the conditions have
-changed.” If such be the case, then history is terribly misguiding. We
-are told of the luxuries that surrounded the rich of the Roman empire.
-We read, in the Scripture, of Dives, and the rich men of that day. We
-know--unless history is entirely in error--that Astors, Vanderbilts,
-Rockefellers, existed then. But the early teachers of Christianity
-loved their Lord and followed his footsteps, in that he came to give
-hope, comfort, and rest to those who were heavy-laden.
-
-The meetings held by the early followers of Christ were not “club
-meetings,” at which expensive music entertained the audience.
-The audience was not addressed by high-priced elocutionists, nor
-entertained by the mental gymnastics of some word-painting acrobat.
-
-Humbly and meekly, hopefully, trustingly, the people sought the
-presence of that Teacher whose earnestness and faith was evidenced in
-His life and manner of living. His words were blest, all untutored
-as he was, with the eloquence of that truth with which his soul was
-filled. He did not say to the people, “Give alms,” and at the same
-time live in a brown-stone front. He did not say, “Take no heed of the
-morrow,” and keep a bank account. He did not preach to his cold and
-hungry brother that the Christian religion would give him comfort, and
-keep the warm overcoat on his back while doing so.
-
-In their very lives the early teachers of Christianity made the truth
-of their own convictions apparent. Is it any wonder that in this, the
-nineteenth century, doubt arises in the minds of the people? They doubt
-the doctrine because they doubt the sincerity of the teacher. It is so
-utterly inconsistent in a man to preach, “If thou wilt be perfect, go
-and sell that thou hast, and give to the poor,” while his hearers know
-that within a few blocks of where this teacher lives in comfort and
-luxury, some poor family is starving.
-
-Let us find men to teach us, who, when they find a poor, shivering
-wretch, but a brother, on the streets, will take off their warm coats
-and throw them round his shoulders. Let us find our leaders in the path
-made plain by the divine Master, taking off their shoes to clothe the
-benumbed feet of the outcast tramp. Then, and when that day arrives,
-there’ll be no such thing as “caste” and class distinction in the
-house of God. Then will the house of God be sought by the multitudes,
-as of old they sought the mount whereon the Lord did preach. When the
-privilege of entering the house of God and occupying a seat therein
-is not sold to the highest bidder, to furnish the ten-thousand-dollar
-salary for the teacher of the doctrine of that lowly Master, who had
-nowhere to lay His head, then will the multitudes gather to do the
-bidding of the teacher. When there are no high places in the temple to
-be sold to the representatives of “caste” and sham aristocracy, then
-will the house of God be a home and refuge for the people. When the
-charities of Christ’s church on earth are not controlled by snubbing,
-scornful, shoddy aristocrats, when the wife of the poor man shall feel
-welcome to give her mite, along with the contributions of the rich,
-without enduring their scornful glances, and subjecting herself to the
-insult of their assumed social superiority, then will the people become
-charitable. The church, the Sunday-school, the church society, the
-charitable committees, have all become impregnated with this crime of
-“caste,” which crucified the Saviour.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXIII.
-
-NOT A DEMOCRATIC PARTY VICTORY.--DEMOCRACY IS NOT THE NAME OF A PARTY,
-BUT OF A PRINCIPLE.
-
-
-The endeavor has been made in the preceding chapters to furnish
-examples of the uprisings of the people from the time of ancient Egypt
-to the present day.
-
-The endeavor has been made to place before the thinking men of the
-wealthier class parallels, in ancient history, of great political
-upheavals in the past history of our own country, as well as in the
-history of foreign countries and nations--exhibitions similar to the
-powerful protest made by the people on November 8, 1892.
-
-The object to be attained by such an arrangement of facts as will
-impress the wealthier classes, is that a change in their methods and
-manners may be brought about. No one can pretend to contradict that
-the people with incomes less than $5,000 a year could, if they saw
-fit, cause such legislation as would relieve them from the burden of
-the expenses of the government. It is almost incredible that a journal
-as preëminent in the Democratic campaign as was the New York _Sun_,
-should publish an editorial, as late as the 10th day of December, as
-follows:--
-
-
-NOT DEMOCRATIC.
-
-     “Various propositions for an income tax come from Democratic
-     free-traders, who are ready for any scheme for raising revenue
-     that doesn’t depend upon a protective tariff. Then there are the
-     Populists, Nationalists, and divers miscellaneous cranks who
-     object to wealth on general principles. Other men’s wealth, of
-     course. To these powerful thinkers an income tax is a penalty
-     to be inflicted upon the plutocrats, a discouragement to the
-     acquisition of money. There is much flabby talk about plutocracy,
-     and a good deal of the talk in favor of an income tax is of that
-     nature.
-
-     “With the opinions of the Populists we are not concerned, except
-     as students and observers of the political curiosities of the
-     time. It is proper, on the other hand, to remind Democrats that an
-     income tax is undemocratic. Undemocratic in principles, because
-     it is an interference with individual business and a premium upon
-     perjury. Undemocratic in precedent, because the imposition of such
-     a tax was unanimously and strenuously opposed by the Democratic
-     party, and because the extension of the life of that tax from 1870
-     to 1872 was likewise opposed, with substantial unanimity, by the
-     Democratic party.
-
-     “The only excuse for the income tax was that it was a war measure.
-     What excuse can be given for reimposing it? Is there a war against
-     money or against common-sense?”
-
-
-Democratic free-traders, so obnoxious to the New York _Sun_, by the
-suggestion of an income tax, are merely seeking for means whereby the
-expenses of the Government may be defrayed. They know that something
-is the matter with the Democratic masses, who have shown their
-dissatisfaction with the existing state of things. These Democratic
-free-traders (and they fairly represent the doctrine proclaimed as a
-principle of the Democratic party, and adopted as a platform in the
-Chicago Convention) know that if they are to be consistent they must
-abolish, to a great extent, the duties upon imported articles. They
-also know that if they abolish duties, there will not be sufficient
-money paid into the treasury of the United States to defray the current
-expenses of the Government. They have realized the powerful current of
-public opinion, which demands the equalization of taxes between those
-who enjoy the benefits of living under the government of the Federal
-Union. The tariff duties do not fall with the same proportionate weight
-upon the rich and the poor. The rich derive greater benefit from the
-security offered their property than the poor, as the amount of their
-property is greater than that of the poor; yet a Vanderbilt consumes
-no more sugar, and therefore pays no more duty, than the Homestead
-striker.
-
-The Democratic free-trader, “with his flabby talk of an income tax,” is
-merely seeking for a means to furnish, upon something like an equitable
-basis, the money necessary to run the Government.
-
-The “Populist, Nationalist, and divers miscellaneous cranks” (referred
-to in the editorial quoted) call to mind the Abolitionists of 1856, who
-were spoken of with so much contempt, and yet who, four years after, as
-the Republican party, with Abraham Lincoln as their candidate, swept
-the country. If “flabby talk” means a demand made by the people upon
-the wealthier class to render unto the Government in proportion to
-benefits conferred by the Government, then let “flabbyism” continue to
-characterize the talk of our legislators, because it would be, with all
-of its “flabbiness,” a welcome doctrine to the “Common People.”
-
-The editorial under discussion goes on to recite the fact that the
-opinions of “the Populist are not worthy of concern, except to those
-students and observers of the political curiosities of the times.”
-Again is called to mind the studies and observations made concerning
-“curiosities” that existed in the political firmament in 1856, and
-resulted in the AURORA BOREALIS in 1860.
-
-This editorial, which is worthy of great attention, emanating from the
-source that it does, reminds the Democrats (meaning the Democratic
-party) that an income tax is “undemocratic--undemocratic in principle,”
-because the Democratic party strenuously opposed the life of that tax
-from 1870 to 1872. There is _not_ a shadow of doubt that an income tax
-is _not_ in accordance with the principles of that party which bears
-the name of the _Democratic party_; but that _it is in accordance_
-with _democracy_ and the _feelings_ that fill the breasts of the
-masses who voted last November for Grover Cleveland, and no one better
-understands the fact that the victory of last November was not won by
-the Democratic party, as a party, than the one man most benefited and
-elevated thereby; that is, the President-elect, Grover Cleveland.
-
-The howl that one thing or another is “not according to the principles
-of the Democratic party,” ought to have but little effect upon him;
-and, judging from the editorial of November 21st, which appeared in
-that other journalistic pillar of the Democratic party, the New York
-_World_, Grover Cleveland appreciates the exact position of affairs,
-and how and why he was elected.
-
-
-THE FRUITS OF VICTORY.
-
-     “Mr. Cleveland’s speeches since the election are even better than
-     those which he made in the campaign. There is an advantage in
-     perfect freedom.
-
-     “No truer or more philosophical statement of the causes that
-     underlay the recent political revolution has been made than
-     was contained in Mr. Cleveland’s brief speech at the Manhattan
-     Club. ‘The American people,’ he said, ‘have become politically
-     more thoughtful and more watchful than they were ten years
-     ago. They are considering now vastly more than they were then
-     political principles and party policies, in distinction from party
-     manipulation and the distribution of rewards for partisan services
-     and activities.’
-
-     “During the campaign, it was a common remark that so quiet a
-     Presidential canvass had not been seen in many years before.
-     But the result showed that the people had been thinking, and
-     that they knew what they wanted. What they want, and what they
-     have demanded, they must be given, if the Democratic party is to
-     remain in power. And what the people ask and expect, Mr. Cleveland
-     clearly indicated in this earnest and elevated passage in his
-     speech:--
-
-     “‘In the present mood of the people, neither the Democratic party
-     nor any other party can gain and keep the support of the majority
-     of our voters by merely promising or distributing personal
-     spoils and favors from partisan supremacy. They are thinking of
-     principles and policies, and they will be satisfied with nothing
-     short of the utmost good faith in the redemption of the pledges
-     to serve them in their collective capacity by the inauguration of
-     wise policies and giving to them honest government.
-
-     “‘I would not have this otherwise, for I am willing that the
-     Democratic party shall see that its only hope of successfully
-     meeting the situation is by being absolutely and patriotically
-     true to itself and its profession. This is a sure guarantee of
-     success, and I know of no other.’
-
-     “Truer words were never spoken. The fruits of Democratic victory
-     must be sought in lower and more just taxes, in lessened
-     expenditures, in a better public service, in the reform of abuses
-     and the remedy of evils from which the people are suffering, and,
-     in general, in good and honest government. This is indeed the
-     only vindication of the success that has been achieved, the only
-     guarantee of other triumphs to come.”
-
-
-Grover Cleveland, better probably than any other man in the Union,
-appreciates the fact that his elevation to the Presidential chair was
-not secured because there are more members of what is known as the
-Democratic party in the Union than members of what is known as the
-Republican party. It must be apparent that many who formerly voted with
-the Republican party decided, for some good and sufficient reason,
-that they would vote for the nominee of the Democratic party, in the
-last Presidential election, and that they did so vote on the 8th day
-of November is evidenced by the fact of Grover Cleveland’s large
-majorities, and the increased vote for the ticket bearing his name,
-even in States whose electoral votes will be cast in the Electoral
-College for the nominee of the Republican party.
-
-It is impossible to ascribe this change to increased emigration and the
-fact that recently naturalized citizens voted the Democratic ticket. In
-the first place, there is no such unanimity of love for the Democratic
-party, as a _party_, in the breasts of the emigrants who have been
-recently naturalized, as to account for their voting unanimously the
-Democratic ticket. Again, the number of foreigners who have been made,
-by naturalization, citizens of the United States within the last four
-years is not sufficient to account for this tremendous revolution;
-and, further, the greatest gains made by the Democratic nominee were
-not made in those sections wherein the greatest flood of emigration
-has poured. Therefore, it seems conclusive that the nominee of the
-Democratic party received the support of Americans who had formerly
-voted with the Republican party.
-
-Now, upon what ground can this general conversion rest? It was not done
-by the flaring of trumpets, by oratory, or reasoning upon the issues as
-set forth in the platforms of the two parties. It is hard to imagine
-many voters being convinced of the advantages that would arise under a
-system of State banks. It would seem that that would convince few, if
-any, that the Democratic party was more desirable than the Republican
-party, to have in charge of the finances of the nation. That, as an
-abstract principle, “Free Trade,” or “tariff for revenue only,”
-converted this large number of former Republican voters, is a statement
-not justified by the vote cast in different States, nor is it possible
-to find one man, in each hundred who voted the Democratic ticket, who
-can intelligently discuss the subject of Protection and Free Trade and
-give satisfactory reasons for preferring Free Trade. The subject is a
-perplexing one, even to those who have devoted much time and study to
-political economy.
-
-To show a lack of unanimity among the high priests of Democracy on
-the subject of Protection and Free Trade, one has only to refer to
-the record of the late and eminent Samuel J. Randall, who was a most
-pronounced Protectionist, yet a sterling member of the party known
-as the Democratic party. On the other hand, we have the Hon. John G.
-Carlisle, Senator from the State of Kentucky, who represents ultra
-Free Tradeism. Even the same difference exists between those two great
-journals, in which are supposed to be mirrored Democratic doctrines
-and principles: the New York _Sun_, whose editorial is here quoted,
-which is an absolute Protection organ, and the New York _World_, whose
-editorial is also quoted, the last-named paper being an absolute Free
-Trade organ.
-
-It would seem perfectly apparent to even the most benighted mind
-that, with such divergence of opinion among the old-line Democrats,
-a doctrine not believed in unanimously by them, could make but few
-converts from the ranks of the party pledged to Protection.
-
-Free Trade and State banks were the two leading cries in the campaign
-of the Democrats, joined to which was occasionally heard the cry of
-fear of a Force Bill.
-
-The worthy New York _Sun_ would, doubtless, attribute largely the
-victory to its efforts in calling the attention of the public to the
-Force Bill and the danger of its passage if the Republicans should gain
-the control of the Federal Government. As a matter of fact, however,
-the people of the Union had seen the Republicans in power, controlling
-both branches of the National legislature, and also the executive
-department of the Government; yet, the people have seen the Lodge Bill,
-known as the Force Bill, pass the Republican House of Representatives,
-and die a doleful death in the Republican Senate, killed by the votes
-of Republican Senators. Therefore, that part of the Democratic policy
-which indicated a strenuous objection to the passage of a Force Bill,
-if put in power, could not possibly have a great deal of effect in the
-missionary work done by the Democratic managers. Those Republicans who
-voted for the nominee of the Democratic party, at the last election,
-could not have been influenced to do so by the arguments advanced with
-regard to the Force Bill.
-
-They had seen Senators of their own, the Republican party, kill a
-Force Bill in the Senate of the United States, and they had no reason
-to believe but that a recurrence of murder would take place should
-another Force Bill pass the House of Representatives and be sent to a
-Republican Senate. These three leading features of the Democratic party
-appear most prominently in the campaign. Can any fair man say that any
-one or all of them influenced those Republicans who voted for Grover
-Cleveland to change from the Republican party and become members of the
-Democratic party? Is there anything in any one of them or all of them
-jointly to make a man forsake old associates, old ideas and faiths, and
-to associate himself, by reason of conviction, with things that are new?
-
-It could not be a matter of reason. It was a matter of sentiment. And
-(again repeating) no one seems to understand that to be the case better
-than the President-elect. It was the sentiment of detestation upon the
-part of the masses--the “Common People”--for that assumption of class
-distinction, the attempted introduction of “caste” in our country
-by those who are allied to, or who had forced themselves upon, the
-Republican party.
-
-The cold and clammy arms of “caste,” in which the Republican party was
-encircled, doomed it to defeat. All of the great virility with which it
-was endowed when, as Abraham Lincoln’s Republican party, it represented
-the “Common People,” was crushed out of it by this venomous python,
-so that when it faced, in 1892, the arrayed resentment of the “Common
-People,” it was but a shapeless, disfigured form, in which all the
-beauty, purity, and strength with which it was endowed at the time of
-its creation had ceased to exist. Had the Republican party retained
-the vigor that marked its young manhood before it became suffocated by
-this mass of putrid matter, called aristocracy, there would have been
-another story to tell of the election November 8, 1892.
-
-Had the argument been well defined, as it was in the last election,
-with parties of equal merit in the eyes of the people, possessing
-equally the virtues and spirit of the American people--had we arrayed
-upon one side the Democratic party, with its oriflamme of “Free Trade,
-State Banks, and No Force Bill,” and upon the other side marshaled the
-Republican hosts under a leader like Lincoln, a man of the people, upon
-whose standard should be written, “Protection for American Industries,
-Sound Money Guaranteed by the Faith of the Nation, and Fair Election,”
-can any one who is fair doubt as to what the issue would have been?
-
-It was not, Novembers, 1892, a battle between the Republican party
-and the Democratic party, and when journals like the New York _Sun_
-would attempt to yoke the people’s will by party principles and party
-traditions, they are merely preparing a harness of cobwebs, which
-public opinion will tear asunder, and ring the death-knell of the
-Democratic party in so doing.
-
-The New York _World_, November 10th, publishes a remarkable editorial,
-in which it recites, among other things, what this victory does _not_
-mean. The editorial is given, because, if it be correct--and the New
-York _World_ is certainly good authority--then it surely does not mean
-a victory for the Democratic party, while it does mean a victory for
-the “Common People,” the democratic masses, and such cries in future
-as that of the New York _Sun_ against an income tax, because it is
-contrary to the Democratic party, will be meaningless, inasmuch as the
-Democratic party has not won this victory, and Grover Cleveland was not
-elected President by the Democratic party.
-
-Quoting from the New York _World_, whose editorial of November 10th
-is printed herewith, these sentences occur: “This victory does not
-mean Free Trade.” Then, does it mean “Tariff for revenue only”? which
-is an expression in the Democratic platform, adopted in Chicago, and,
-therefore, if this be a Democratic victory, it must mean what the
-Democratic party pledged themselves to in their National Convention at
-Chicago. “It does not mean,” says the New York _World_, “the unsettling
-of industry nor the derangement of commerce.” Well, but how can we have
-tariff for revenue only without unsettling industry and the derangement
-of commerce? And, if it be a Democratic victory (by Democratic victory
-is meant a victory of the Democratic party), we must have such laws
-made and executed as will create a schedule of tariff for revenue only.
-
-Quoting further from this editorial: “It does not mean disturbance of
-what is sound in finance.” Then how can that portion of the Democratic
-platform, adopted at Chicago, be made consistent with the legislation
-in the future regarding the finances of the country? If the tax of
-ten per cent. upon State banks be withdrawn, and thus State banks be
-enabled to issue their notes, how will it be possible to prevent “a
-disturbance” of whatever is sound in finance?
-
-Now, if this be a victory of the Democratic party, such a repeal of the
-ten per cent. penalty tax upon State banks must be enacted--that is, if
-the Democratic party intends to keep faith with its constituents.
-
-
-FOR THE GOOD OF ALL.
-
-     “If there are honest Republicans who really believe what their
-     party journals and speakers have told them--who fear that
-     Democratic success in the nation threatens danger or disturbance
-     to business--to them we say: Your fears are idle.
-
-     “The majority of the people of the United States, represented by
-     the great Democratic majority, do not mean injury to themselves.
-     This country is their country. Its business interests are their
-     interests. Its prosperity is their prosperity. Its honor and
-     welfare are their concern.
-
-     “This victory does not mean Free Trade. It does not mean the
-     unsettling of industry nor the derangement of commerce. It does
-     not mean disturbance of whatever is sound in finance.
-
-     “The President-elect is the very embodiment of conscientious
-     caution. He is preëminently conservative. His administration
-     will mean economy, reform, retrenchment in every branch of the
-     Government.
-
-     “The victory does mean putting a stop to the riot of extravagance,
-     profligacy, and corruption. It means the end of the reign of
-     Plutocracy. It means relief from the monstrous robbery of the
-     masses by unjust and unnecessary taxation. It means a veto
-     upon the looting of the Treasury and the hideous waste of
-     hundreds--nay, thousands--of millions of dollars in the course of
-     a generation by unmerited pensions. It does mean lower and juster
-     taxes and larger freedom of trade. It does mean good money, and
-     good money only.
-
-     “Our party has triumphed under the happy union of a great issue
-     and a great man. The Republic is stronger for this Democratic
-     victory. The Republicans themselves will be more prosperous, and
-     in the end happier because of it. Government of the people is
-     safe in the hands of a great majority of the people.”
-
-
-In the concluding paragraph of the above editorial of the _World_, we
-read (and those of us who live in New York State, with considerable
-astonishment): “Our party has triumphed under the happy union of a
-great issue and a great man.” To start with, the issue seems to have
-been, judging from all of the preceding, Tariff on one side, Free Trade
-on the other; National banks on one side, State banks on the other; and
-Force Bill as a kind of “Flyer.”
-
-With regard to these “great issues,” there was a lack of unanimity
-among even the great newspapers of the Union, at the head of which,
-justly and properly, we put the Free Trade New York _World_ and
-the Protection New York _Sun_. With regard to the “great man” (and
-there is no attempt to disparage in any manner the President-elect
-of this nation), it seems somewhat peculiar to use the term “great”
-to designate that citizen of the Union who has been selected as
-chief magistrate of the nation, in view of the fact that he had been
-dubbed the “Stuffed Prophet” by that great organ of Democracy, the
-New York _Sun_, and was so heralded through the Union for more than
-a year before his nomination. And when four years ago, he sought
-re-election, the New York _World_ killed this “great man” by faint
-praise. His popularity and greatness did not seem to be recognized
-by the seventy-two members of the Democratic National Committee
-who represented the State of New York, in the National Democratic
-Convention at Chicago, as these representatives protested against the
-nomination of their “great” fellow-citizen, declaring that he could
-not be elected if nominated; and they represented the politics of the
-Democratic party; and they told the truth as far as the Democratic
-party was concerned.
-
-By reason of his greatness or his popularity, he could not have been
-elected. But when he came before the people, as representing the great
-mass of the “Common People,” then he became great, but only great in so
-far as he represented the greatness of the people.
-
-The politicians of New York State pronounced the verdict of all that
-which is controlled by politicians in the State of New York, when
-they declared it as their opinion that Grover Cleveland could not
-carry the State of New York. They were simply saying what they, the
-politicians, in their little political way, could do. But when Grover
-Cleveland became the representative of the “Common People,” then the
-“Common People” made him great--far greater than could the politician
-have done--and he has sailed into office on the favorable wind of the
-opinion of the “Common People.” His greatness is only the reflected
-greatness of those whom he represents. Inherently, greatness in Grover
-Cleveland may exist, but certainly no evidence of it has yet been
-given. He is great to-day because of the great support that has been
-given him by the will and pleasure of the “Common People.” He is no
-more great of himself and in himself than would be the rifle in the
-hands of an expert marksman. The masses, the “Common People,” represent
-the marksman. Grover Cleveland is merely the weapon which they will
-use to bring down the animal which has been devouring their substance,
-destroying their homes and happiness. The weapon, even though it be
-the rifle of Davy Crockett, would become impotent in the hands of the
-weak and inexperienced. The people are powerful, and they will render
-great the weapon which they wield. The people are skillful. For many
-centuries, as the preceding chapters recount, in the history of all
-nations, the people have become trained and skillful in the use of
-their power.
-
-The President-elect has it within his reach to achieve greatness as
-the willing and trusty weapon of the masses, the “Common People,” by
-whom he was elected. And wherever the “Common People,” the masses, have
-found a weapon untrustworthy, they have cast it aside as readily and
-quickly, and secured another, as the ordinary hunter of the wild animal
-would do.
-
-The “Common People” have been engaged in a chase after this wild
-animal, this destructive beast, called “caste,” sham aristocracy, and
-over-accumulation of wealth. They imagine that they have secured a good
-weapon in the man of their choice, November last. And, should it become
-evident that they have been mistaken, his greatness will cease to be as
-soon as the great power by which he is supported falls away from him.
-
-It is not well to call a man great until he is dead. Had Benedict
-Arnold died after the Battle of Saratoga, he would have gone down in
-history as one of the great heroes of the Revolution.
-
-Grover Cleveland was elected, contrary to the expectations expressed
-(and expressed honestly) by the seventy-two most influential Democratic
-politicians of the State of New York. He carried the State represented
-by these sagacious politicians by more than 40,000 majority. And it was
-all done, independently of the politicians, by the will of the “Common
-People”--not by the Democratic party. For upon what issue, possibly,
-could converts have been made by the politicians?
-
-From the standpoint of politicians, and from past experience, that
-eminent Democratic orator, the Hon. Bourke Cockran, was perfectly
-correct when he stated in Chicago, in his famous speech before the
-National Democratic Convention, that Grover Cleveland was the most
-popular man in the country on every day in the year, except election
-day. This was said, honestly and sincerely, by a leading light of the
-political world of the Democratic party. Mr. Cockran could not foretell
-that the great Democratic masses, the “Common People,” would utilize
-any one who might happen to be chosen as the weapon of destruction
-which the “Common People” would use in the chase after the object of
-their resentment, that brute, represented by “Chappie” on Broadway, the
-Astors, Vanderbilts, Rockefellers, and Goulds--the sham aristocracy.
-
-Mr. Cockran has, since the election, doubtless realized that, as a
-politician of the State of New York, he is justly eminent for his
-sagacity and wisdom, as well as his eloquence; but, as a judge of what
-the PEOPLE will do, he is as unreliable in his judgment as the veriest
-babe in swaddling clothes.
-
-He was talking in Chicago, as was the honorable Governor of the State
-of New York, and others, for the Democratic party, which COULD NOT and
-DID NOT elect Grover Cleveland. When, therefore, after the election
-of Grover Cleveland, that Democratic party, as represented by the
-New York _Sun_, assumes to dictate to the party of the people, who,
-independently of the Democratic party as a political organization, but
-acting only as “Common People,” have elected a chief magistrate and
-representatives to represent them, the “Common People,” it is simply
-bidding for the extinction of the power of that political party known
-as the Democratic party, with whom, on this occasion, the “Common
-People” have acted, for purposes of their own, and to achieve ends
-which they consider desirable.
-
-Should it be assumed by those elected November 8, 1892, to represent
-the people in the government of the nation, that they were elected
-because they were Democrats--or, rather, members of the Democratic
-political party--then it would become their duty, as honest men,
-pledged to support the views entertained and expressed by the makers
-of the platform of the Democratic National Convention at Chicago, to
-repeal all existing tariff laws, until the amount received from duties
-would only be sufficient to defray the expenses of the Government. In
-other words, having a tariff for revenue only, and not for protection;
-but, inasmuch as the expenses of the Government are as great or greater
-to-day than its income, it would mean that the “Common People,” who
-voted for the nominee of the Democratic party, have simply swapped
-horses in crossing a stream, without benefiting themselves in any
-particular. The Government must have money to defray its expenses, and
-if, practically, the present tariff is only furnishing a sufficient
-revenue to defray the expenses of the Government, where is it possible
-to reform it, so as to lighten the burden of taxation now imposed
-upon the “Common People”? This is all upon the assumption that the
-Democratic party claim that it was that peculiar plank in their
-platform, “Tariff for Revenue Only,” that gave them the victory last
-November. Then the tariff would remain as it is, as we need every
-dollar of the income of the nation to defray its expenses.
-
-Should the Democratic party assume that it was that peculiar part of
-their platform which demanded a repeal of the ten per cent. penalty
-tax for the State banks, then, by the repeal (to which they are
-pledged) of the said penalty tax of ten per cent., State banks would
-spring into existence, issuing their own notes, as was the practice
-before the National Banking Act was enacted. What great good to the
-“Common People” could grow out of this change in the currency of the
-nation (that would apparently be the only thing, if the Democratic
-party is convinced that its nominees were elected because of the
-virtues contained in their platform), that can possibly be carried
-into execution by the incoming Government? The suggestion of an
-increase in the internal revenue tax levied upon alcohol would not be
-productive of an increase in the revenue derived from this source, as
-past experience, both in this country and in Europe, has demonstrated
-that increased taxes upon any article decrease the consumption of said
-article, and, therefore, decrease the revenue.
-
-The perplexing question, therefore, that will confront those who
-believe that the DEMOCRATIC PARTY was elected to power, is: How can we
-adhere to the platform of the Democratic party, and at the same time
-benefit, in the slightest degree, the people of the nation? For even
-the most egotistical Democrat will understand, and does understand,
-that the people of the nation, having placed in the hands of those men
-whom they have chosen, the entire control of the affairs of the nation;
-that they, the “Common People” of the nation, will not be satisfied
-with merely holding things as they are. That would be merely a shifting
-of scenes without changing the play on the stage of public affairs.
-Something must be done, in addition to the mere putting out of one set
-of office-holders of the Republican party and putting in another set of
-office-holders of the Democratic party. The “Common People” of America,
-the masses, are not office-seekers. They desire something more than
-the mere changing of the political faith of their Postmasters, United
-States Marshals, and other Federal office-holders.
-
-If the Democratic party, now in power, fails to do anything except
-shift the scene and change office-holders, then the Democratic party
-will be relegated to that dismal slough of despondency, at the next
-election, in which the Republican party is now submerged. The people
-will elect, by some political name, a party who will perform something
-for the people’s benefit.
-
-It is almost impossible to reduce the tariff without running the
-government into debt. It is impossible to increase the internal revenue
-tax to supply the deficiency. Then, if the Democratic party believes
-in lower duties and decreased tariff, what other course is open for
-it? What other course is fair to the poor “Common People” of America
-than to pass an income tax to supply the needs of the nation? It is
-perfectly useless to talk about abolishing the pensions to any amount
-sufficient to create any perceptible impression upon the decrease in
-the income of the nation, should the tariff be materially reduced. It
-is utterly worthless to argue the subject. The time is wasted. Pension
-frauds--if any exist--should be at once abolished. But any attempt to
-repeal any existing legislation with regard to the pensions of the old
-soldiers of the Union would simply be met by such a howl of indignation
-as to make a step of that nature impracticable. Whatever sums have
-been given, and whatever obligations have been incurred, by the Federal
-Government in the last four years (except frauds which may possibly
-have been perpetrated), must continue to exist until time shall have
-relieved the Federal Government from its obligations to the old
-veterans of the Civil War.
-
-We must have money for internal improvements, for our navy, and for
-our pensions. We cannot procure the money if we materially reduce
-the tariff, except in one way, and that is by an income tax, which
-necessarily must be a graded one. The people of America will not stand
-a general income tax, wherein one man with an income of a million
-dollars per annum can pay two per cent., and the man whose income is
-only two thousand dollars per annum shall pay also the same percentage
-upon his small income. That would be obviously unfair to the poor
-man, to whom two per cent. from his small income would represent an
-inconvenience to him greater than fifty per cent. would to the man with
-an income of a million.
-
-If the Democratic party assume to have won this victory, then let
-them proceed, upon the platform adopted at Chicago, which will result
-practically in nothing being accomplished. If Grover Cleveland has
-been elected solely for his “greatness,” and by reason of his immense
-personal popularity, then let him gather the Reform Club with one arm
-and Tammany Hall with the other. This trinity of greatness, purity, and
-brightness will be sufficient for his administration, but nothing will
-be done.
-
-If, as the facts are, or seem to be--and the vote indicates the
-correctness of the position--Grover Cleveland and the Democratic
-party have been put into power by the “Common People” because they
-represented to the minds of the “Common People” the opposition to
-“caste,” sham aristocracy, and great accumulation of wealth, and not
-by the mugwumps and the kid-gloved gentlemen of the Reformed Club or
-the Tammany Heelers, then, if Grover Cleveland and the Democratic party
-recognize their election to be the result of the votes, not alone of
-the faithful of the Democratic faith, but of the “Common People,” let
-something be done that may enable the “Common People” to realize their
-hopes and expectations--then, at the end of Grover Cleveland’s four
-years of administration, he having performed the wishes of the “Common
-People,” let us pronounce him GREAT.
-
-If the Democratic party, with the President at its head, will now
-utterly throw to the wind old traditions and principles of the
-Democratic party, and give no heed to the howling of the Democratic
-press, but comply with the mandates of the people, that they should be
-relieved from this incubus which is crushing them--over-accumulation
-of wealth, centralization of capital, and sham aristocracy; the only
-possible way, without resorting to measures obnoxious to the American
-mind--confiscation and like enactments--is by a graded income tax,
-which will throw the burden of the Government where it belongs,--_i.
-e._, upon the shoulders of those who have become fat and lusty by
-feeding upon the blood of the nation. And, in proportion as the burden
-of taxation is laid upon those ample shoulders, it may be lifted from
-the crushed and suffering poor of the body politic.
-
-The mere utterance and repetition of the word “reform” is meaningless.
-_Saying_ the word does not make any reformation. When Grover Cleveland
-was elected eight years ago, he was elected upon the “Reform” cry.
-The people were then suffering from this “class” infliction, and they
-gave vent to their feelings by the election of Cleveland. It had been
-so often repeated that there was great corruption in the Republican
-party, that the people expected a wonderful exposure of corruption and
-a great reformation in the affairs of the nation. Nothing was done. No
-corruption was exposed. The ledgers of the nation seemed to have been
-accurately kept. No crime was unearthed, and nothing was accomplished.
-The very plausible excuse was offered that the Republican party still
-controlled the Senate of the United States, and made abortive any
-attempt at reformation, or the accomplishment of any relief for the
-“Common People.”
-
-Now, upon this occasion, Grover Cleveland, after a vacation of four
-years, has been called once again by the “Common People” to command the
-Ship of State. Both mates and the whole crew have been placed under his
-command. They believe of him what the New York _World_, November 13th,
-here gives us:--
-
-
-THE “STUFFED PROPHET.”
-
-     “The ‘Stuffed Prophet’--that is the nickname bestowed upon Mr.
-     Cleveland by the newspaper organ of plutocracy, which has for
-     years professed Democracy for the purpose of betraying it.
-
-     “The name was bestowed in derision. It was the favorite invention
-     of a malice which mistakes insolence for wit. It was intended for
-     ridicule, but, rightly viewed, it is a title to be worn as an
-     honor.
-
-     “It is an honor to Mr. Cleveland that he has never had or merited
-     the approval of the New York _Sun_. It is a credit to him that
-     that journal is chief among those to whom General Bragg referred
-     when he said, ‘We love him for the enemies he has made.’
-
-     “And there is fitness in the nickname, too.
-
-     “Mr. Cleveland was a true prophet when he set the face of
-     Democracy towards reform, foreseeing that the country would
-     in due time demand it. He had the gift of the seer, when at
-     the Washington Centennial banquet, he avowed his unfaltering
-     confidence in the wisdom of the people who had so recently
-     overthrown his cause, and his assurance that they would soon come
-     to a juster view, and vote down the policy of monopoly and class
-     privilege and oppressive taxation. They have done it this year.
-
-     “And this prophet is stuffed.
-
-     “He is stuffed with the virtue which accepts public office only as
-     a public trust;
-
-     “Stuffed with the honor which refuses to ‘palter in a double
-     sense’ with words, or even to keep silence when--as at the time
-     of the silver craze--frank utterance seems to promise only
-     destruction for his own and his party’s ambitions;
-
-     “Stuffed with sturdy common-sense which ‘sees clear and thinks
-     straight,’ and so commends itself to the ‘plain people’ who love
-     the right and seek justice;
-
-     “Stuffed with a foresight unsurpassed by that of any statesman of
-     our time;
-
-     “Stuffed with a purity of patriotism which views place and power
-     merely as opportunities to render service to the country;
-
-     “Stuffed with unprecedented majorities, the eager tributes of the
-     people in testimony of their approval;
-
-     “Stuffed with the confidence of his countrymen, who have called
-     him again into their service in order that wrongs may be righted,
-     oppressions overthrown, errant tendencies checked, and that
-     government of the people, by the people, and for the people may
-     not perish from the land;
-
-     “Stuffed with the Democracy that means all this, for truly--
-
-     “The next President _is_ a Democrat.”
-
-
-If, as we hope, “Grover Cleveland is stuffed with the virtue which
-accepts public office only as a public trust,” then he will accept his
-office as President of the United States as a trust from the “Common
-People” of our country, and not from the political party who nominated
-him,--_i. e._, the Democratic party; he will accept the trust confided
-in him by the Democracy in its broadest sense--the “Common People” of
-the land.
-
-If he be “stuffed with honor,” in accepting that trust, he will do so
-with full cognizance of the fact that in honor bound he is to acquit
-himself in his high office to which he has been called by the “Common
-People” of America, as will best satisfy them, and remove those crying
-evils which call aloud from the hearthstone of every Common Man in
-America. The most objectionable of all the evils, and the one most
-prominently considered by the voter last November, was the existence of
-an attempted class distinction in our country.
-
-If he is “stuffed,” as God grant he is, “with sturdy common-sense,
-which sees clearly and thinks straight, and so commends itself to
-the plain people who love the right and seek justice,” his sturdy
-common-sense will teach him that he has been elected by the “plain
-people,” and he will “think straight,” that the “plain people” want
-such legislation and the execution of such legislation as may relieve
-them--not in pocketbook, but in feeling--from the assumption of a
-superiority upon the part of the wealthy worshipers at the throne of
-“caste,” and to that end a graded income tax will be productive of more
-good and be more efficacious in the accomplishment of an object so near
-to the “plain people who love right and seek justice,” that it made the
-plain “Common People” forget old affiliations last November--old ties
-and associations--and vote for the President-elect and the political
-party by which he was nominated.
-
-If he be “stuffed with a purity of patriotism which views place and
-power merely as opportunities to render service to the country,” then
-when his term of office shall have expired, having rendered that
-service to the country, and the “Common People” of the country, to do
-which he was elected President by the “plain people,” he will have
-endeared himself so to the patriotic “plain people” of the land, having
-faithfully kept the trust reposed in him by the people, that his name
-shall go down in the records of the nation associated with the names
-of Washington, Jefferson, Jackson, and Lincoln.
-
-Grover Cleveland is certainly “stuffed” with the confidence of his
-countrymen, who have called him again into their service, in order
-that wrongs may be righted, oppression overthrown, arrant tendencies
-checked, and that “the government of the people, by the people, and
-for the people, may not perish from the land.” Let us hope that
-this confidence is well placed, and that now, when he may call to
-his assistance both branches of the national legislature, he will
-right those wrongs, and overthrow the oppression of which the people
-complain; and the chiefest of these is the accumulation of vast sums of
-money in the hands of families and persons, which creates a danger to
-“the government of the people, by the people, and for the people.”
-
-The people do believe that he is “stuffed with true democracy, in
-its broadest sense,” else they never would have elected him. And how
-can that true democracy be exhibited better than by suggesting such
-legislation as will cast the burden of taxation upon that class who
-can so easily bear it--that class which have rendered themselves so
-entirely obnoxious to the “Common People” of America, those “plain
-people, who love the right and seek justice,” and who, loving the
-right, have sought justice by calling him to the position of Executive
-of the nation? How can Grover Cleveland better right the wrongs of the
-“Common People” than by urging, as chief of the party in power, the
-passage of a graded income tax, which would certainly meet with the
-approval of the “Common People,” by whom he was elected, that thereby
-funds might be furnished for defraying the expenses of the nation, and
-thus relieving the burden cast upon the “Common People,” at the same
-time preventing a continuation of this much-to-be-feared accumulation
-of wealth in the hands of a few in our country.
-
-A double object would be thus accomplished: First, the primary
-consideration for which they voted, the abolition of “caste,” sham
-aristocracy, would be brought about by preventing vast incomes being
-enjoyed by individuals or families, and the consequent idleness,
-luxury, selfishness, sensuality, and snobbishness attendant upon the
-enjoyment of vast incomes, where the recipient remains in idleness.
-Second, it would afford a cure and relief for the present excessive
-system of taxation which falls so heavily upon the general mass of the
-people. Thus, at one time, and by one measure (perfectly consistent
-with the will of the people by whom he was elected), Grover Cleveland
-could right most of the wrongs, and give relief to the “Common People,”
-the “plain people” (so called by the New York _World_), by whom he has
-been chosen as chief.
-
-There is no need to mince matters upon this subject. It is plainly
-and obviously the duty of Grover Cleveland to give some outward and
-visible sign of the inward and spiritual grace which is in him. There
-is no time to waste in this matter. Grover Cleveland understands too
-well that he was not elected by the Democratic party; that he will have
-the support of the party of the people, call it by what name you will.
-The Populists, representing, as they do, some of the grievances of the
-“plain” “Common People,” will act with Grover Cleveland’s party, the
-party of the “Common People.”
-
-The New York _World_ furnishes an admirable article upon the subject,
-“Why Are They Natural Allies?” speaking of the Populists. Because
-they are the party of the plain “Common People,” who, along with
-the Democratic party, will control the legislation of the nation,
-Grover Cleveland represents this army of “Allies,” as surely as did
-Wellington, at the Battle of Waterloo, and the “Common People” will
-expect him to defeat, “horse, foot, and dragon,” the enemy--the sham
-aristocracy, the representatives of “caste,” and the monopoly of money,
-who have, like Napoleon, carried devastation and destruction into our
-country; just as Napoleon did into every country of Europe. Grover
-Cleveland will have the assistance of these “Natural Allies,” the
-Populists, which is indicated in the timely article below, from the New
-York _World_, of December 15, 1892:--
-
-
-     “The Populists in the next Senate will be the natural allies of
-     the Democrats on the most important matters that will come before
-     Congress.
-
-     “The Democrats and the Populists fused in several of the Western
-     States. They will together control several of the legislatures.
-     The third party has no affiliation with the Republicans. It is
-     composed in the main of voters who have become disgusted with
-     Republican rule.
-
-     “The Republicans cannot rely upon retaining their grip on the
-     Senate by the votes of the men who have overthrown them at the
-     West.”
-
-
-If Grover Cleveland and the party which nominated him will but once
-recognize, _and at once_, that they did not triumph by reason of
-the conversion of old Republicans to the doctrines enunciated in
-the Democratic platform, at Chicago, but will now promptly come to
-the conclusion, which is so obvious, that they were elected by the
-“Common People,” for the plain purpose of righting those wrongs which
-the people have endured in silence, then it will be impossible for
-Republican newspapers to claim that they are “at sea without a chart.”
-They are “at sea without a chart” at present, because the Democratic
-party, under the whip and spur of Democratic newspapers, driving
-them to cling on to Democratic principles, and to hold to Democratic
-doctrine, will prevent Grover Cleveland and the Democratic party from
-taking any action which would furnish relief to the people. The New
-York _Sun_, under the able and magnificent management of Hon. Charles
-A. Dana, cries for Protection and against the Income Tax; while that
-most potential newspaper, the New York _World_, also Democratic, under
-the control of the Hon. Joseph Pulitzer, inveighs against Protection
-and in favor of an Income Tax. Torn by the dissensions in its own
-ranks, the Democratic party, if it attempts to cling on to the old
-ideas, will simply do nothing; _and that is what the people fear_.
-
-Now is the occasion for Grover Cleveland to prove himself to be a
-“great” man. Now is the time for those representatives, elected by
-the will of the people, to demonstrate to the people that they are
-willing servants, and that “public office is a public trust”; that, as
-trustees of the will of the people, they will comply with the request
-of the people. And the request has gone forth to give relief to the
-people from this tumor which has grown upon the body politic--“caste,”
-snobbery, and sham aristocracy, and the attendant evil which was the
-cause of the tumor--excessive taxation and class legislation. Throw
-old doctrines and principles of the Democratic party to the winds.
-Cleveland, the next House of Representatives, and the Senate of the
-United States were not elected and selected upon old principles,
-which were part of the constitution of the Democratic party. They
-were elected upon a broad democracy, and if they will adopt the will
-of the people, their wants and needs, and apply such remedies as the
-people may demand, then will it be impossible for Republican writers,
-who wield a trenchant pen like that of the Hon. John A. Cockerill, to
-truthfully say: “The incoming party is at sea without a chart.”
-
-The New York _World_, of December 11th, says of Grover Cleveland’s
-speech, that its generalities are eminently sound and patriotic, and
-that he asserts that the people can be trusted and that they know what
-they want, which is here given:--
-
-
-     “Those who looked for any definite statement of his policy from
-     the President-elect in his speech at the Reform Club banquet last
-     night will be disappointed. Mr. Cleveland evidently thinks, and
-     probably correctly, that the time for this has not yet come.
-
-     “But Mr. Cleveland’s generalities are eminently sound and
-     patriotic. Especially excellent is his sturdy assertion of the
-     good Democratic doctrine that the people can be trusted, that
-     they know what they want, and are entitled to have their will
-     respected. Contrasted with the current Republican talk that the
-     voters have been befooled for three years and are bent on turning
-     the progress of their country backward, Mr. Cleveland’s robust
-     patriotism and faith are eminently refreshing.
-
-     “The spirit in which he contemplates the responsibility soon to
-     be placed upon him and his party is equally admirable. There
-     is neither shrinking nor boastfulness, but a calm courage
-     characteristic of the man and befitting the occasion. It is
-     to be hoped that Mr. Cleveland’s admonition to and defence of
-     economy, as something about which ‘there is nothing shabby or
-     discreditable,’ will not be lost upon the present Congress.”
-
-
-This fills us with hope, we “Common People,” who regard the _World_ as
-a leading light in the Democratic firmament of journalism. It is like a
-bow of promise set in the heavens of the future, and especially when,
-upon the succeeding day, the _World_, which voices the sentiments of
-the Democratic party, publishes the following:--
-
-
-     “A monopoly organ declares that an income tax is ‘undemocratic.’
-     It says that ‘the only excuse for the income tax was that it was a
-     war measure,’ and asks: ‘What excuse can be given for reimposing
-     it?’
-
-     “The excuse of necessity. The government is confronted with the
-     condition of an empty treasury and a demand for tariff reduction
-     twice made by the people. Either one of these things may make new
-     taxes necessary. Combined, they are almost certain to do so.
-
-     “With an annual expenditure of over $220,000,000 due to the war
-     (for pensions and interest upon the public debt) a choice in war
-     taxes would fall on a graded income tax upon every principle of
-     economy and justice.
-
-     “It is surely Democratic to tax luxuries rather than necessaries,
-     superfluities rather than essentials. As one of the speakers at
-     the Reform Club said: ‘Any tax on what men have is better than a
-     tax on what men need.’ It cannot be undemocratic to tax those who
-     are best able to pay, to apportion public burdens in a manner to
-     cause the least hardship to the greatest number.
-
-     “A graded income tax is the coming tax if the expenditures of the
-     government are to continue anywhere near the present mark.”
-
-
-It is with hope and trustfulness that we regard the future.
-
-Here is a spectacle presented before us by two of the Democratic
-newspapers of New York City--the stronghold of Democracy in the Union
-is New York City--one arrayed on the side of Protection and against a
-graded income tax, the other, of equal prominence and position, arrayed
-on the side of Free Trade and a graded income tax. Now, let the members
-of the Democratic party view this picture presented to the “Common
-People” of America, and ask themselves: For what did the people vote
-November 8, 1892? Did they vote with the New York _Sun_ when they voted
-for Grover Cleveland, or did they vote with the New York _World_ when
-they cast their ballots for the President-elect? Common-sense, common
-reason, would indicate to the most superficial that they voted neither
-with the New York _Sun_ nor the New York _World_, nor the Democratic
-party.
-
-This is not a victory of the Democratic party! And it cannot be said
-too forcefully that this victory _does not belong_ to the Democratic
-party! It is a VICTORY OF THE PEOPLE, who demanded a suppression and
-an extinguishing of the wrongs that had been inflicted upon them. They
-voted out West with the Populist party on the same basis as they voted
-with the Democratic party in the East and South. It was anything--call
-it by what name you please--so that that thing, when elected, should be
-a party of the people.
-
-Don’t insist upon a revivification of the doctrines of the Democratic
-party. The people have spoken for themselves, and their voices must
-be heard through the representatives selected by them in the halls of
-Congress. During the next four years, Grover Cleveland must execute
-the WILL OF THE PEOPLE. He has been elected by no party. The Populists
-will be his “natural allies,” because they represent the People, as
-he does. He need not remain “at sea without a chart” one day or hour,
-only follow the will of the people! They have placed their heels of
-disapprobation upon “caste” and sham aristocracy and the attempt to
-engraft it upon American society. They have placed the nail erect and
-have given Grover Cleveland the hammer. Now let him drive it home!
-And we will stud the coffin of dead “caste” so full of nails that the
-shaking skeleton, borrowed from Europe, will never have a resurrection
-in our country. There is only one effectual way to accomplish the end
-desired--the eternal entombment of this multi-lived creature--and
-that is by the infliction of such an income tax as will prevent the
-possibility of the existence of a thing like “Chappie” on Broadway,
-and make America an undesirable field for the coroneted sportsmen of
-Europe to hunt in for matrimonial game, and prevent the accumulation of
-fortunes that would arouse a feeling of cupidity in the weazen chests
-of the puppified lords and degenerate descendants of Europe’s nobility,
-whose greatest pride is in the “Bar Sinister” in their armorial
-bearings.
-
-Why is delay in the execution of the will of the people necessary?
-Grover Cleveland is thoroughly convinced that he was elected, not by
-the Democratic party, but by the people at large. The first step in
-the right direction would be this--as soon as Grover Cleveland assumes
-the office of President of the United States--(that is, President
-of the nation, by the will of the “Common People”), to then and at
-once take such steps as would quickly afford the relief the “Common
-People” expect of him and his administration. Will the cry of the
-Republican newspapers, that “the Democratic party will do nothing,”
-prove correct? It is only for four years that this man of the people,
-Grover Cleveland, can occupy the position to which he has been called
-by the “plain” people of America. After his induction into office, the
-“Common People” will expect that not one single day will be wasted
-in the execution of their wishes. “Twice in the election of Congress
-the people have decreed a reform in taxation and other changes in the
-policy of the government.” And the people will not permit any further
-delay in the matter. The people, in the most pronounced manner, have
-exhibited their determination to bring about certain changes and a
-certain kind of reformation. Every hour that it is delayed is pregnant
-with danger to the Democratic party.
-
-The closing sentence taken from the New York _World_, of December
-10th, seems full of meat--“The way to reform is to reform.” All the
-platitudes and promises ever uttered would not be a reformation. The
-people, by an overwhelming majority, have decreed that there shall be
-a reformation in taxation, and with regard to the social life of the
-American people, which has been made unhappy by the introduction of
-foreign mannerisms. The way to begin is to _begin_, and the sooner the
-better.
-
-The calling of an extra session of Congress is but a minor detail
-where the will of sixty-five million people has been expressed in
-the positive manner that it was on November 8th, 1892. The great
-Democratic dailies of the Union, like Kilkenny cats, are fighting over
-little matters, seemingly losing sight entirely of the truth of the
-case, _i. e._, that this is not a Democratic victory, but a victory
-of the people. And the sooner the wrongs of which the people complain
-are righted, so much sooner will end the sorrow, sufferings and the
-oppression of the people. Whether there should be an extra session or
-not, it is hardly worth while for two great dailies like the New York
-_World_ and New York _Herald_ to quarrel over. The people have said: It
-is well that certain things be done. “Then, if it be well that it be
-done, it is well that it be done quickly.”
-
-In concluding this chapter, it is desirable to have it distinctly
-understood that this volume was not written or intended as a Democratic
-aftermath campaign argument. If it be incomprehensible with the mass
-of the people who may read this book, that it was written from a broad
-democratic standpoint, and not from a Democratic party standpoint, that
-it is to be regretted. It has not been the aim of the author to fall
-prostrate at the feet of the Hon. Grover Cleveland, the President-elect
-of the nation, further than to believe and trust in his promises and
-integrity, and his manliness of character, and to await the result
-of his actions, with regard to the will of the people, pronounced
-the 8th day of November, 1892, in their selection of him as their
-representative. Should the Hon. Grover Cleveland, President-elect of
-the Union, by the will of the “Common, ‘plain’ People” of America,
-prove himself to be all that the people believe, should he fulfill
-the trust reposed in him, as did Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson,
-and Abraham Lincoln, then with earnestness and sincerity would the
-author lend his voice to the anthem that would go up in his praise from
-the mouths of the “Common People,” saying: “Well done, thou good and
-faithful servant; great hast been thy trust, and in such manner hast
-thou executed the trust that thy name shall be handed down, in the
-records of history, to be read by future generations of Americans as
-THE GREAT GROVER CLEVELAND.”
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXIV.
-
-NOT A DEFEAT OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN’S REPUBLICAN PARTY.
-
-
-The “Grand Old Party,” which sprang from American intelligence and the
-advancement of civilization, fully armed, like Minerva from the brain
-of Jupiter!
-
-That transcendent glory which will ever surround the name of the
-Republican party with a halo, was not forever submerged beneath the
-flood of indignant votes, November 8, 1892. That party which, by its
-deeds, shall ever live in the grateful recollection of the American
-heart, was not vanquished in the fight November last.
-
-The symmetry, beauty, and virtues so pre-eminent in the party of
-Abraham Lincoln in 1860, will ever present a spectacle for the
-admiration of the “plain” “Common People” of America. They loved the
-Republican party in 1860, and cast their votes for it because it
-represented them--the plain “Common People”; because the candidate of
-the Republican party, Abraham Lincoln, was one of them, the “Common
-People”; because in the right hand of the Republican party was carried
-the standard of _equality and emancipation_; because in their
-standard-bearer, Abraham Lincoln, the plain people recognized a typical
-man of the “Common People.” “Mudsillism” was synonymous to them with
-the term “Common People.” The industrial and laborial North was aroused
-to righteous indignation by the assumption of a social superiority on
-the part of the cavaliers, the believers in “caste,” in the South.
-The Republican party, led by that wonderful creation of the American
-soil and the air of freedom, Abraham Lincoln, won the battle of the
-equality of man in 1861-65. Following still the guiding star which had
-left its reflected glory upon the horizon even after it had descended
-into the tomb made by the assassin, the people of the Union elected the
-victorious general, Ulysses S. Grant, to the office of Chief Executive
-of the nation. Believing in and trusting the man who had been a friend
-to Abraham Lincoln, when he was surrounded by a multitude of dangers,
-they cheerfully re-elected the victorious General Grant to be the
-President of the people for a second term.
-
-Slowly, but none the less surely, had been going on, during General
-Grant’s administration, the disintegration of those principles that
-made the party of Abraham Lincoln _great_ in the eyes of the “Common
-People” of the Union. After twice enjoying the exalted position of
-Chief Magistrate of the nation, General Grant was called upon to
-surrender his office to a successor. So great had been the inroads
-of decay upon that sterling honesty of the Republican party--that
-Republican party which had been planted by the loving hands of Lincoln
-in the breasts of the American people--that President Hayes succeeded
-General Grant, as a Republican President, only by concessions made in
-the interests of peace by a great statesman, Samuel J. Tilden.
-
-The weakening influence of the barnacles growing upon that stalwart
-tree of Republicanism, and which had been washed there by the ocean
-tide of prosperity that had surged upon our nation, was felt in
-the campaign between Hayes and Tilden. And let all good Americans,
-Republicans as well as Democrats, uncover their heads in speaking of a
-man like Tilden, who was a man of the people, thought of the people,
-and of the horrors of civil war. Each succeeding administration tended
-but to weaken the hold of that good old Republican party, that Grand
-Old Party! (and it gives us pleasure to say it) upon the hearts of
-the American people, because the barnacles which had clung on to the
-life-giving roots of the stalwart oak of Republicanism and the Grand
-Old Party--those barnacles of sham aristocracy, believers in “caste”
-and class distinction, the wealthy--had managed to sap the strength of
-the vigorous young tree planted by Abraham Lincoln, until, deformed,
-it presented a spectacle obnoxious to the eyes of the “Common People”
-of America.
-
-The first decisive evidence of the dissatisfaction of the people was
-given in the election of Grover Cleveland in 1884.
-
-While Burchard, with that remarkable alliteration, “Rum, Romanism, and
-Rebellion,” is accredited with having caused the defeat of James G.
-Blaine, the impression made upon the “Common People” by the spectacle
-of that dinner of millionaires, called the “Belshazzar feast,” at which
-the nominee of the Republican party, James G. Blaine, occupied a seat,
-was much greater than the howling of “Rum, Romanism, and Rebellion,” by
-an obscure preacher.
-
-The Republican party had ceased to represent to the minds of the plain
-“Common People” what it had originally represented. There had grown
-upon that party the fruit of evil, in the shape of a moneyed class, who
-assumed to be better than the plain “Common People” of America. Hence,
-James G. Blaine, with all his personal popularity, magnetism, and
-magnificent record, was unable to secure, from the ranks of the “Common
-People,” the votes necessary to elect him President.
-
-The defeat of Grover Cleveland by President Harrison was brought about
-(and there can be no doubt of it) largely by the use of money, secured
-as contributions from the moneyed class to perpetuate the control of
-the Republican party in the Federal Government, thinking that by so
-doing the power and assumption of social superiority upon the part of
-believers in “caste,” who cared nothing about the principles of the
-original Abraham Lincoln Republican party, and who were as far beneath
-it in patriotism, honesty, and truth as the earth is beneath the
-heavens, would also be perpetuated.
-
-There is not a shadow of doubt, and even the most prejudiced slave of
-political “bossism” will be forced to admit, that President Harrison
-has filled his high office with dignity; that he is an honest,
-patriotic, representative American. He has kept faith with the American
-public, as far as was possible for him to do so, in the execution
-of the laws enacted by the legislative bodies of the nation. His
-renomination was but the natural consequence of his administration.
-
-The Republican party certainly entered the campaign of 1892 opposed
-by a divided Democratic press, a divided Democratic party, upon the
-supposed and alleged great issue of the campaign--that is, Protection
-and Free Trade.
-
-To illustrate that point, compare the New York _Sun_, believing in
-Protection, with the New York _World_, believing in Free Trade.
-
-The American people for intelligence will average as highly as the
-people of any other nation, but they are not all political economists.
-They had not, even during the four years and with all “the campaign of
-education,” become sufficiently instructed to form a decided opinion
-upon the information acquired by them with regard to the questions of
-political economy involved in the discussion of Protection and Free
-Trade.
-
-It is perfectly ridiculous to hear it asserted that the people of the
-United States voted against the Republican party in sufficient numbers
-to create a political revolution by reason of the fact that they had
-learned sufficient to become convinced, founding their conviction upon
-information and reason, that Free Trade was preferable to Protection.
-
-The average American voter would be as lost in an argument upon the
-subject of political economy as would a disputant regarding a legal
-proposition who had never heard of Blackstone or Kent, because the
-average American citizen has never read one line of Adam Smith, John
-Stewart Mill, or, in fact, any of the hand-books of political economy.
-
-The conclusion to be drawn from the assertion that the people of the
-United States had become convinced that it was beneficial to them to
-have Free Trade is groundless. The Republican party had certainly the
-advantage in the argument, because, under the existing state of our
-tariff laws, the country is and was prosperous, wages were higher, a
-greater sum of money was deposited in the savings banks by the laboring
-classes than ever before in the history of our country. Now, these good
-things, representing a prosperous condition, actually existed and do
-exist under the Protection policy of the Republican party. It is hard
-to believe that the mass of our fellow-citizens would be led away by
-the simple desire for an “experimental change.” It is hard to convince
-any man (when you select an individual) that he shall forsake a
-business or occupation which he knows furnishes him with a competency,
-to embark into some new and untried venture, forsaking that which he
-already knows furnishes him with a sufficiency, for that which is
-speculative.
-
-Now, this is exactly what the Republican party, as represented by the
-Republican newspapers, is trying to preach as the cause of the defeat
-of the Republican party last November. In other words, the press of the
-Republican party assumes that, collectively, the people of the Union
-are more utterly ignorant, stupid, and absurd than they would be when
-acting as individuals, which, of course, is ridiculous.
-
-It was not a question of the pocketbook with the masses. It was not a
-question whether they were doing better by reason of the Protective
-policy of the Republican party than they could hope to do under
-the Free Trade policy enunciated by the Democratic party. It was a
-clear-cut proposition: Shall we allow longer the accumulation of
-money in the hands of a few families, who are assuming before us and
-flaunting in our faces their claim to a social superiority, making a
-sham aristocracy, “caste,” in our country? It was not the pocketbook,
-for with regard to that proposition there can be no doubt that the
-American characteristic, “shrewdness in business,” would have inclined
-every voter to let well enough alone.
-
-The Republican party and the principles enunciated at Minneapolis with
-regard to Protection had certainly the best of the argument. From a
-business standpoint, what was and is, is well. What may be in the
-future, under the Free Trade theories of the Democratic party, from
-a business standpoint, is problematical. But the voter remembered
-the snubs, sneers, and insults inflicted upon his wife and family
-by would-be social superiors, whom he associated in his mind, in an
-unmistakable manner, with the Republican party.
-
-It was not a defeat upon the principles of the Republican party. It
-was a defeat of _class_, “caste,” and sham aristocracy. It was not a
-defeat because of the pocketbook.
-
-On November 5th, the _Mail and Express_, of New York City, published
-the following editorial, which is absolutely truthful:--
-
-
-BUSINESS AND POLITICS.
-
-     “Here it is the last week before the Presidential election, and so
-     sound are all the conditions that people seem to have little time
-     to talk politics. Never before in the history of the country has
-     business gone right on with so much more than usual activity for
-     the season. Money has been easy and the volume of exchanges, as
-     shown by the Clearing House returns, unprecedented for the season.
-     Anxiety over the result of next Tuesday’s election has neither
-     interfered with the ordinary trend of trade nor has it checked its
-     activity.
-
-     “The fact that wheat has this week sold at the lowest price ever
-     known at New York (73½ cents) must interest the farmer in the
-     cry of English cheap labor. If the Englishman comes to this
-     country because he can live better here, he increases the demand
-     for bread, and the farmer can certainly get a better return for
-     his produce when he sells it to a workingman at home instead of
-     sending it 3,000 miles across the ocean, paying freight room in a
-     foreign steamship to support a foreign workman.
-
-     “It is rather surprising that this cry should have been raised
-     just at this time. If the consumer and the producer are brought
-     closer together, is it not better for both? They save the cost of
-     the transfer from one to the other. If the English weaver can come
-     to this country and work, so that his product does not have to
-     cross the ocean, and then get his wheat, flour, and meal without
-     having to pay the additional cost, do not both profit? The country
-     is so large that we can well afford to increase its population
-     when we can reduce to a minimum the cost of the exchange of
-     necessary means of life.
-
-     “The market for iron is better all around, from the fact that
-     stocks are being taken up faster than ever at this season of the
-     year. This is due very largely to the even weather, which has been
-     so favorable to building projects, the number of working days in
-     October being probably more than in the same month for years, and
-     now, in the first week of November, work is going on just the same.
-
-     “This will be apparent to every one who has watched the progress
-     of work and seen new buildings reach the fifth or sixth story
-     when, if the season had been adverse, they might not have been
-     half as high at this time. The railroads have also contributed to
-     consumption, for they are forehanded in placing early orders for
-     the large increase in the equipment that they will have to have
-     for next year.
-
-     “The voluntary advance in wages by the Fall River manufacturers
-     is another suggestive indication. The South has had three years
-     of steadily increasing cotton crops. The country has not only
-     exported more than ever, but it has consumed more, and out of this
-     great crop the proportion spun and woven in the United States has
-     advanced even more rapidly. The figures will show that domestic
-     consumption has increased proportionately faster than the crops.
-
-     “There is no better proof of prosperity than the ability of the
-     people to buy clothes. Food they must have, but they can wear old
-     clothes. Now, the woolen factories are full of work, and yet,
-     thus late in the season, the orders are so large that the cotton
-     manufacturers make a second advance in wages within three months.
-     There is no idleness in the boot and shoe factories, and the
-     rubber mills are as fully occupied.
-
-     “The country never was more prosperous on the eve of election.”
-
-
-It is impossible for a truthful man, who is not talking for the
-benefit of “the galleries,” or as a political demagogue, to dispute
-the facts recited in the above article in the _Mail and Express_.
-That argument and the facts therein recited, ought to have had great
-weight; but did they? No! And the reason? The _Mail and Express_ is
-owned by Colonel Shepard--doubtless a most worthy gentleman--but,
-unfortunately for any effect that might be created by the utterances
-of Colonel Shepard; unfortunately for the influence looked for by
-articles published in the _Mail and Express_ upon this occasion, it
-is well and thoroughly understood that Colonel Shepard is a very
-wealthy man, a son-in-law of the Vanderbilts; that he represents the
-money power of the Vanderbilt family. The people of New York City
-(and Colonel Shepard and the _Mail and Express_ is but an example)
-said to Colonel Shepard, to the _Mail and Express_, in no hesitating
-manner, November 8th, We will not dispute the facts that you publish
-concerning our prosperity and the advantages that we enjoy under the
-Protective policy. You appeal forcibly to our pocketbooks. But it is
-now the turn of the people to say to Colonel Shepard, the _Mail and
-Express_, and all the representatives of capital--The truth of your
-argument, so far as our pocketbooks are concerned, to the contrary
-notwithstanding, you, Colonel Shepard, representing that _class_ of
-which your father-in-law was a prominent member, and to quote from his
-magnificent rhetoric--you, Colonel Shepard, _Mail and Express_, and
-representatives of “caste” and sham aristocracy, now in turn we say
-it, “You be damned!” as Vanderbilt a few years ago said “The public be
-damned.”
-
-We have been Republicans, we, the “Common People,” until the party for
-which we voted in 1860, and which, under the leadership of that great
-Commoner, Abraham Lincoln, forever silenced the claim of the Southerner
-to social superiority. We have been good Republicans until _you_ have
-fostered and aggravated the ulcerous sore of a sham aristocracy,
-defiling the healthy and vigorous body of the Republican party. You
-may have the best of the argument on Protection; it may benefit our
-pocketbooks, but we are not selling our birthright, the equality of
-man, for a mess of pottage!
-
-The _Mail and Express_, at great trouble, and, doubtless, expense,
-furnished plausible excuses for the defeat of the Republican party, and
-disliking to admit the _true cause_, for in admitting that true cause,
-it would be necessary to hold the father-in-law of the proprietor
-of the newspaper responsible for his share of this “Waterloo.” (In
-fact, W. H. Vanderbilt was to the Republican party what Grouchy was
-to Napoleon at Waterloo.) With great care did the _Mail and Express_,
-saving no expense, ascertain the opinions of the various newspapers
-in the State of New York, concerning the cause of the defeat of the
-Republican party.
-
-Its columns were filled with the opinions of editors throughout the
-Empire State. Many and various were the reasons given. The defeat
-was blamed upon the “stay-at-homes”; the defection of the farmers
-on account of the McKinley Bill; the Saxton Ballot Law; a simple
-desire for a “change”; lack of organization; and a few correspondents
-intimated that the “Common People,” tired of accumulations of wealth,
-voted the Democratic ticket in the hope of securing relief and equality
-thereby.
-
-Could not one editor have been found by the inquiring representatives
-of the _Mail and Express_ who possessed sagacity sufficient, coupled
-with enough frankness, to say, directly, that it was not against the
-policy of the Republican party, their platform, nor candidate, that
-the people voted November 8th, but that it was against that element
-in society which the proprietor of the _Mail and Express_ represents
-so ably as the son-in-law of W. H. Vanderbilt, the sham aristocracy,
-snobbery, and the believers in “caste”?
-
-It is not so much a matter of astonishment that the editors of
-Republican newspapers should have misjudged with regard to the cause of
-the social revolution as it is to find that eminently representative
-American, General Benjamin Harrison, the candidate of the Republican
-and the present President of the United States, giving expression to
-ideas so erroneous as those accredited to him in an interview published
-in the New York _World_, November 13, 1892.
-
-The American people will always regard with kindly feeling the present
-President of the United States, General Benjamin Harrison, as a citizen
-of the Union, who was elevated to the position of Chief Executive of
-the nation, and who has kept faith with those by whom he was elected.
-It is well for a President, upon leaving the White House, to feel
-that he carries with him into his reabsorption in the mass of the
-people, the respect and confidence of his fellow-citizens. President
-Harrison, personally, has the respect and admiration of every patriotic
-American citizen in this broad land of ours. He may feel justly that
-satisfaction which is the reward of services well rendered to the
-Republic. Had his party, or, rather, the party which nominated him,
-the Republican party, not been cursed with the crime of “caste,”
-doubtless he would have been re-elected, for he enjoys the confidence,
-irrespective of political affiliation, of each individual voter in the
-Federal Union.
-
-In the day of disaster to the party by which he had been nominated, in
-the bewilderment arising from the overwhelming defeat of the Republican
-party, President Harrison may reasonably be excused for his erroneous
-judgment as to the cause of the disaster to the Republican party.
-That he should seek for an excuse, standing upon the vantage ground
-of truth itself, in the idea that the people of the Union had become
-Free Traders, possibly may be justifiable. At the same time, President
-Harrison is so thoroughly American that we would have expected a
-nearer approach upon his part to the real cause of the defeat of the
-Republican party.
-
-That the Republican party had the best of the argument, so far as sound
-finance is concerned, there can be no question or doubt. There lingers
-yet, in the minds of many voters, recollections of the debased currency
-in use prior to the National Banking Act, passed by the Republican
-party. A bill issued now by a bank has the guarantee of the credit of
-the Federal Government behind it. Such would not be the case should
-the penalty tax of ten per cent. upon State banks be repealed. Every
-dollar of currency to-day in use in America is worth a hundred cents.
-And a lively picture to the contrary is presented by the experience
-of those older citizens who endured all the inconveniences of a
-State bank currency. The most ardent Democrat (meaning member of the
-Democratic party) would hardly have temerity sufficient to assert that
-the financial policy, as advocated by the Democratic platform, adopted
-at the Chicago National Convention, is superior to the sound money
-existing by reason of the legislation enacted under the Republican
-administration of the finances of the Federal Government.
-
-But the people said, November 8, 1892, it matters not whether the
-currency be debased or not. We, the plain “Common People,” will not
-be debased into social inferiority! It matters not whether there be
-thousands of counterfeits in the currency of the community. We would
-rather have counterfeited currency than counterfeited aristocracy! The
-dollar to-day, guaranteed by the faith of the Federal Government,
-may be worth a hundred cents, and we’ll make it worth only fifty
-cents, as guaranteed by each State in the Union, but the position,
-socially and otherwise, of each man and citizen of the Union must be
-worth a _hundred cents_. And we are weary at the attempt made by sham
-aristocrats to depreciate the value of that doctrine, which is dearer
-to the American than dollars and cents--the EQUALITY OF MAN.
-
-With regard to the Force Bill, the Republican party had the best of
-the argument. Their platform, as adopted in Minneapolis, only indorsed
-the idea of a fair, free, and honest election, all of which was
-but the reiteration of part of that Rock of Ages for the patriotic
-American--the Constitution of the United States. Can any man argue
-that, as a good citizen of the Union, it is proper for him to believe
-in anything other than a fair, honest election? If there be such, he
-is not to be found in the ranks of the plain, common, honest people,
-who absolutely abhor any fraud upon their franchise as citizens of the
-United States.
-
-So that, in point of fact, apparently the three great issues to be
-decided in the last campaign by the American people were: Protection
-_versus_ Tariff; National Banks _versus_ State Banks; Fair Elections
-_versus_ Frauds on the Franchise.
-
-Without a moment’s hesitation, the American people would have decided
-that the Republican party should continue in control of the affairs
-of the nation, especially when that Republican party had for its
-standard-bearer a man who, like Benjamin Harrison, possessed the
-confidence of the American people--a man in whom the American people
-recognized every patriotic principle inherent in the breasts of the
-common, plain people of America.
-
-But the Republican party of 1892 had become lost in the mist arising
-from the exhalations from the manure heap of sham aristocracy and
-“caste.” Figures looming out of the gloom of the present, hardly
-compare favorably with those giants who cultivated the soil in which
-was planted the Republican oak tree.
-
-Through the miasma arising from the rotting present of the Republican
-party, the picture of Thomas Platt appears. In the pellucid atmosphere
-of the Republican party of the past, we see the picture of Seward.
-
-Amidst the odoriferous present we find the likeness of the skillful,
-the Honorable Matthew S. Quay. Upon the clear sky of the past is
-mirrored the majestic Roscoe Conkling.
-
-Amidst the hurly-burly and charlatan parade of the present, we
-perceive that prince of clowns and jesters, Chauncey M. Depew, king
-of after-dinner speech-makers, the witty buffoon who represents the
-princely Vanderbilts, the man who was never heard of except when
-clothed, either in dress suit or imported English clothing. By the side
-of this figure of the present, look back and see the picture of that
-man of the Republican party who met Stephen A. Douglas on the stump in
-Illinois, whose jests were filled with the meat of common-sense, whose
-heart was an out-gushing spring of kindness towards his fellow-men,
-the “Common People.” Place the present picture, Chauncey M. Depew, in
-dress suit, supported by the Vanderbilts’ millions, beside the long,
-angular figure of that Illinoisian, Abraham Lincoln, supported by the
-people--but pause; this is sacrilege!
-
-Republicans, you know why your party was defeated. Be frank; be brave;
-be manly, and charge it upon the proper cause--“caste!” affectation!
-sham aristocracy! degeneracy!
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXV.
-
-THE POPULIST: THE “ALLIES.”--ELECTED BY THE PEOPLE; THEREFORE, WITH THE
-“COMMON PEOPLE.”
-
-
-It does not seem to afford any great amount of pleasure for the
-hide-bound members of the Democratic party, the thought that possibly
-the Democratic party may become but a fifth wheel to the coach, and
-they view with evident dislike the growing power of the Populist party.
-
-Quoting from the New York _Sun_, of December 11th, that able
-representative, in a journalistic way, of the Protection Democrats, we
-print the following statements:--
-
-
-WEAVER AND HIS MILLION VOTES.
-
-     “The Populists are naturally excited and encouraged by their
-     demonstration of numerical strength at the election of 1892. The
-     Populist view of the achievement, and the Populist interpretation
-     of its significance, are set forth in detail in the very
-     interesting summary of results printed in another part of this
-     paper. In brief, the claim is this:--
-
-     “One million votes in the South and West for the Weaver electors;
-
-     “Twenty-three electoral votes obtained by fusion or otherwise;
-
-     “Five Populist Senators and ten Populist Representatives in the
-     next Congress;
-
-     “Populist State Governments in Kansas, Colorado, and North Dakota,
-     and greatly increased Populist representation in the legislatures
-     of these and several other States;”
-
-
-Which evidently furnishes no great amount of satisfaction to that
-organ, which is essentially Democratic in a party sense.
-
-Weaver, and his 1,000,000 votes, present the startling possibility
-to the organ of the Democratic party, that perhaps the people, who
-are members of that broader democracy, may be breaking away from the
-traces of the party harness. It is a little harder to prognosticate
-concerning future political events and manage the people, when they
-escape from party traces. The million votes for Weaver represent that
-part of the people who have become thoroughly exasperated by the manner
-of that excrescence, “sham aristocracy,” on the Republican party, and
-who, at the same time, were still unwilling to become harnessed in the
-party-wagon controlled by the Democratic party. Thousands would have
-been glad to vote with the Populists had that party not been filled
-with all kinds of incongruities and “isms.” There was a curse on the
-houses of both the Democratic and the Republican parties, and the
-people, exclaiming with Mercutio, in Romeo and Juliet: “I am hurt;
-a plague o’ both your houses! I am sped,” voted for Weaver and the
-Populists; because the plain “Common People,” who were Republicans of
-the Abraham Lincoln school, had no confidence in the Democratic party
-as a party. They were plain “Common People,” who wanted a party in
-which they would feel at home. They did not find it in the Democratic
-party, and, being absolutely disgusted with the degeneracy and social
-shams of the Republican party, they flocked to the party of the
-Populists to the extent of 1,000,000 voters, as presenting a haven--no
-matter how insufficient--in the storm created by the wrath of the
-people, caused by the idiocy and assumption upon the part of believers
-in “caste” in our country.
-
-
-     “The prestige of gains and achievements, indicating that the
-     Populist party is destined to become one of the two great
-     political organizations of the country.
-
-     “This last item is the deduction of optimism from the foregoing.
-     The heavy popular vote for the Populist electors in some of
-     the Southern States serves principally to show that under the
-     conditions existing in 1892, the solid South would have been
-     broken and its solid electoral vote lost to the democracy had
-     not the Force Bill issue been put at the front. The twenty-three
-     electoral votes credited to Weaver in the West and Northwest
-     separate themselves, on analysis, into elements in which the
-     Omaha platform and the specially characteristic features of the
-     Alliance movement sustain a subordinate part. Colorado and Nevada
-     went for Weaver because they were for silver, not because they
-     were for Weaver. Kansas, Idaho, North Dakota, and the one vote in
-     Oregon were gained by the acquiescence of the Democratic managers
-     in a scheme of fusion obviously to the advantage of the Democratic
-     national ticket. Weaver’s proportion of the vote, either popular
-     or electoral, cannot be accepted as a trustworthy measure of the
-     growth of public sentiment in the West in favor of the general
-     programme drawn up at Omaha.
-
-     “The first solid and effective achievement in the list is the
-     direct gain of the Populists in their representation in the
-     Congress of the United States. This means something. They must
-     have Senators and Representatives if they are ever going to shape
-     the legislation of the country; and until they can legislate, or
-     muster sufficient strength at the Capitol to force legislation
-     agreeable to their ideas of public policy, they have accomplished
-     nothing. Now they turn up with five Senators, as they believe,
-     and with at least ten Representatives, as they have reason to be
-     certain. It is a respectable showing for a new party, even if we
-     do not count the silver Senators as Populists out and out. But,
-     as an indication of the probable strength of the Populists in the
-     Fifty-fourth Congress, or in the Fifty-fifth, as a reasonable
-     assurance of future progressive development, it is worthless.
-     We need only remind the Populists that their predecessor, the
-     so-called National party, representing the greenback craze, and,
-     in a measure, the dissatisfaction with political conditions that
-     marked the period after the counting in of Hayes, went into the
-     Forty-sixth House with fourteen Congressmen. The Greenbackers
-     and Readjusters went into the Forty-seventh House with eleven
-     Congressmen. In the Forty-eighth, their strength dropped to two.
-     The Greenback wave had swept off and away; the two old parties
-     confronted each other as before, and the phenomenon of a third
-     party in Congress, mustering more than a dozen lawgivers, had
-     disappeared as utterly as if it had never been.
-
-     “The same thing is true respecting the capture, with the aid of
-     fusion, of some of the Western States. Nobody has forgotten the
-     astonishingly sudden appearance and subsidence of the Greenback
-     wave in the old and conservative New England State of Maine. In
-     1878, the Greenbackers cast about fifty per cent. more votes than
-     the Democrats. In 1879, the Greenback vote was more than double
-     the Democratic, and the election was thrown into the Legislature,
-     which chose a Democratic Governor. In 1880, the Greenbackers
-     fused with the remaining fragments of the Democracy, and carried
-     the State and controlled its government. Where are the Maine
-     Greenbackers to-day?
-
-     “The two great political organizations in this country have always
-     been and must always be the party of centralization, paternalism,
-     and meddlesome interference with affairs not belonging to the
-     Federal Government, and the party resisting those destructive
-     tendencies on the lines of Jeffersonian Democracy and home rule.
-     The issue is permanent and the same, no matter what the parties
-     may call themselves. There is no chance for the Populists on the
-     ground now occupied by the victorious Democracy. If they can crowd
-     the Republican organization out of the special function which it
-     has filled with distinguished ability for a quarter of a century,
-     that is their business, not ours. The achievement would be much
-     like Jonah swallowing the whale.”
-
-
-The Abolition party, which absorbed the old Whig party and made the
-present Republican party, had not nearly so respectable a beginning as
-the Populist party. With all the predictions of failure recited above,
-the Populist party has a name--and there is much in a name--which has
-already endeared it to the hearts of the masses to the extent of a
-million votes.
-
-It was the suffering masses, the plain “Common People,” who, under the
-name of Populist, voted for Weaver. There can be no doubt about the
-affiliation between the Democratic party and the Populist party in the
-next Congress of the United States. Every Representative elected by the
-Populist, every Senator selected as the result of their votes cast for
-the State legislators, will recognize that the Populist party contains
-the same elements, to the plain “Common People,” as the Democratic
-party, and, therefore, faith will best be kept with the constituents
-by whom the Populist Representatives and Senators were elected, by
-acting with the Democratic party, so long as it continues to wage war
-upon “caste” and class distinctions and the accumulation of wealth in a
-dangerous degree in our country.
-
-The Populists have a mission in furnishing to the weary wayfarer
-a resting place. Many political wayfarers who formerly journeyed
-under the guidance of the Republican party, hesitate before seeking
-the protection of the Democratic party. To such the Populist party
-furnishes a haven of rest.
-
-Should the Democratic party and Grover Cleveland, as representative
-of the party by whom he was nominated, fail to secure to the “Common
-People” those rights of which they deem themselves deprived by the
-Republican party; and should there be a hesitancy or neglect in
-righting those wrongs of which the “Common People” complain, then the
-Populists, if some of the “isms” be weeded out of its fair garden,
-would furnish the Eden for the “Common People.” Should Grover Cleveland
-and the Democratic party neglect quickly and unhesitatingly to pass
-such laws, and execute the same, as will relieve the “Common People”
-of the burden that is cast upon them by ungraded taxation, then the
-“Common People,” by the might that abides with them, may select the
-Populist party, freed from some of its idiosyncrasies, as the party of
-the people.
-
-It is merely a question of whether the Democratic party and Grover
-Cleveland will perform the will of the people. If not, the people, by
-a reorganization of this, the Populist party, will secure a political
-organization which will perform the mandates of the “Common People.”
-The “Common People” will thrust aside both the old parties and utilize
-that party which by the magic of simply a popular name was enabled to
-gain a million votes taken from both of the old parties.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXVI.
-
-“FLABBYISM” AND THE INCOME TAX.
-
-
-Now, be it well understood that there is no attempt made, in
-commenting upon the article on the editorial page of the New York
-_Sun_, to disparage in any manner that worthy and eminent journal. It
-represents one part, or side, of that incongruous party, called the
-Democratic party, which presents phases as worthy of observance by the
-curiosity-seeker in the political field as the Populist party. On one
-side, Protection, endorsed by the New York _Sun_; Free Trade, endorsed
-by the New York _World_; a graded income tax, endorsed by the New York
-_World_, and even the suggestion of an income tax, dubbed by the New
-York _Sun_ as “flabby talk.”
-
-Noah Webster defines flabby to mean, “soft, yielding, loose, easily
-shaken.” Well, if the will of eleven million voters, as heard in the
-verdict rendered by the majority November 8, 1892, be “soft, yielding,
-easily shaken,” then the talk of an Income Tax _is flabby_, then the
-talk of a Graded Income Tax _is flabby_. The will of the majority of
-the said eleven million voters made possible the election of Grover
-Cleveland and the other nominees of the Democratic party. Possibly the
-will of the people, so expressed November 8th last, may be “flabby”;
-but there will be another and fearful story to tell unless the will
-of the people, as expressed, be executed by their servants selected
-November last.
-
-The New York _Sun_ does not astonish the people--the plain “Common
-People”--of America when it announces a predilection upon the part of
-the privileged wealthy classes to commit perjury. The “Common People”
-of America have become accustomed to associate in their minds the
-worshipers of “caste” with every kind of crime which is consistent
-with their assumed superiority. It is only necessary to quote an
-article which appeared in one of the leading journals, to give evidence
-that, even under the present system of a tax on personal property,
-the inclination of these sham aristocrats, the would-be nobility of
-America, is to commit perjury. So worthy is the article of attention
-that it is given in _extenso_, that the people may judge of the animal
-they are chasing, and that the weapon, Grover Cleveland, may duly
-appreciate what efficiency is necessary, upon his part, as the weapon
-in the hands of the huntsman to destroy this beast of “caste” and
-accumulated wealth in our land:--
-
-
-     “Ever since the Comptroller and Tax Commissioners of the city
-     declared war upon Lawyer H. Charles Ulman for issuing his famous
-     circular, offering legal services to those whom he believed to
-     be grossly wronged by a wilfully corrupt administration of the
-     personal tax laws, the enterprising counsellor has been hard
-     at work accumulating evidence in support of the very critical
-     attitude he has assumed.
-
-     “Mr. Ulman is a hard fighter and is determined to prove to the
-     entire satisfaction of the public that the serious allegations he
-     makes against our Tax Department officials are all true.
-
-     “Yesterday Mr. Ulman notified me that he had completed the
-     compilation of a few statistics which he desired to submit to the
-     HERALD for publication. I found him ready with his statistics and
-     loaded to the muzzle with hot shot for the Tax Commissioners in
-     general and Tax Commissioner Feitner in particular.
-
-     “‘Let us get right down to business,’ were the words with which
-     Mr. Ulman supplemented the regulation greeting. ‘I have recently,
-     as all New York is aware, challenged the methods of our Tax
-     Commissioners as to personal property taxation. I now reiterate
-     the challenge and desire to submit to public judgment a few
-     figures taken from the personal tax records recently opened for
-     inspection. These figures conclusively prove that our richest men
-     are assessed for ludicrously small personal properties, so small
-     and palpably unfair as to establish the conviction that falsehood
-     and fraud are at the bottom of the ridiculous valuations. Here is
-     the list:--
-
-
-                        Assessed for
-                        Personal Property
-                        to the
-                        Value of
-
-     Jay Gould          $500,000
-     George J. Gould      10,000
-     Russell Sage        100,000
-     Wm. Rockefeller      50,000
-     C. P. Huntington    150,000
-     Henry Hilton        100,000
-     E. S. Jaffray       100,000
-     Morris K. Jesup      75,000
-     Eugene Kelly        100,000
-     George Kemp         100,000
-     Luther Kountz        10,000
-     Augustus Kountz      15,000
-     Andrew Carnegie     150,000
-     Addison Cammack     100,000
-     William Astor       500,000
-     W. W. Astor       4,311,400
-     Henry Villard        25,000
-     Jessie Seligman      50,000
-     James Seligman       50,000
-     I. Wormser           10,000
-     S. Wormser           10,000
-     D. O. Mills          50,000
-     Henry Flagler        25,000
-     John H. Flagler      10,000
-     R. P. Flower        150,000
-     Ogden Goelet        150,000
-     Robert Goelet       150,000
-     F. W. Vanderbilt    100,000
-     G. W. Vanderbilt    100,000
-     W. K. Vanderbilt    200,000
-     C. Vanderbilt       200,000
-     T. A. Havemeyer     100,000
-     H. O. Havemeyer     120,000
-     Wm. F. Havemeyer     15,000
-
-
-     “‘Now,’continued Mr. Ulman, ‘whether every one of these
-     individuals appeared in person before the Commissioners, or
-     whether the amounts were placed by the Deputy Commissioners, I
-     cannot say.’
-
-     “The fact remains the same, that among all our very rich men
-     there is but one--W. W. Astor--who pays taxes on anything
-     like the amount of his actual personal property. Either the
-     deputies charged with making the examinations have committed
-     ‘larceny,’ or the wealthy citizens above mentioned have appeared
-     before the Commissioners, ‘swore off’ as a matter of form, and
-     been ‘whitewashed’ as a matter of course upon due exercise of
-     ‘influence.’
-
-     “‘Let me tell you something that will surprise the public. The
-     ladies of the city are its heaviest tax-payers. Every one of them
-     who has personal property has an assessment levied upon her to the
-     full amount of her possessions. In her case there are no votes
-     to be considered, no political influences to be placated, and,
-     as a result, no deductions are made, no scaling or estimating is
-     allowed, but every dollar possessed is taxed. I have, practically,
-     but just inaugurated this crusade against the corruption existing
-     in the Tax Office, and I believe that a careful examination of the
-     public records, backed by the logic of facts and figures, will
-     enable me to expose a degree of rottenness more startling even
-     than that of the old Tweed ring.’
-
-
-     THE BLAME.
-
-     “‘Who is to blame for the state of things in the Tax Office?’ I
-     asked.
-
-     “Mr. Ulman pondered this question for some minutes before he
-     replied, as though hesitating to convert his general charges
-     against the Tax Department into a direct personality. But once
-     having made up his mind, the counsellor sailed into the senior
-     member of the Tax Commission--Mr. Thomas L. Feitner--with
-     surprising vigor, handling him without gloves, and winding up with
-     the suggestion of an appeal to Mayor Grant for his dismissal.
-
-     “‘The fact of the matter is,’ said the counsellor, ‘Mr. Feitner
-     is the entire commission. The two gentlemen associated with him
-     are comparatively new to the department, and are pushed into the
-     background and kept there, by this all-wise Pooh Bah.
-
-     “‘The Chief Justice and his associates on the bench of the Court
-     of Appeals have had occasion to chide Feitner in their decisions,
-     but Feitner will tell you that the Court of Appeals does not
-     understand tax laws, and that its rulings are not good law.
-
-     “‘Special capital is his special prey just at this time. Under
-     the laws of New York it must be contributed in money and the
-     amount advertised. This renders Mr. Feitner’s raid upon it a
-     matter of very simple procedure, and he levies his assessments
-     upon it whether the status of the property in which the capital
-     is invested is in Spain, Africa, or New York. Nor does it matter
-     if the money is invested in imported goods in original packages,
-     although, by the constitution of the country, such goods are
-     removed from the jurisdiction of the State’s taxing powers.
-
-     “‘But this does not trouble Feitner. He puts his assessments upon
-     capital so invested, compelling the owner to submit to a taxation
-     of from ten to fifteen per cent. of his money or go into court by
-     certiorari and obtain a release at an expense of more than the
-     amount of illegal tax.
-
-     “‘If Mayor Grant desires an equitable and proper administration
-     of the Tax Office he will dismiss Mr. Feitner and appoint a man
-     to fill his place who, to say the least, has a knowledge of
-     commerce, the needs of business, and can understand the plainly
-     written law when he reads it.
-
-     “‘There is another point in this matter which furnishes food for
-     reflection--namely, the very small number of persons in this city
-     who are assessed for taxation--less than thirteen thousand out of
-     a taxable population of nearly one hundred thousand.’”
-
-
-After reading the above--and presumably it is correct--let us stand in
-holy astonishment that Jay Gould should suddenly have acquired over
-$65,000,000 of personal property, according to his will, since this
-schedule and assessment of personal property was filed, because this
-late lamented Gould was the possessor of personal property only, with
-the exception of his residence. Therefore it is obvious, since he swore
-to possessing only $500,000 of personal property, that he must have
-acquired, in some miraculous manner, more than $65,000,000 of personal
-property, which he bequeathed to his children, according to his will,
-recently filed in the Surrogate’s office in the city of New York.
-
-Mr. George Gould swears that he has only $10,000 in personal property.
-Now who believes it? Mr. Russell Sage has only $100,000 in personal
-property! and the Vanderbilts each have from $100,000 to $200,000 worth!
-
-Poor men! Let the commiseration of the masses go forth. These
-gentlemen, who are accredited with the possession of millions, and
-who, when they die, find themselves suddenly possessed of the millions
-with which they are accredited by the public, are poor men while they
-live, and have to pay taxes!
-
-Right you are, New York _Sun_; an income tax would lead to perjury!
-Of course, not upon the part of the gentlemen named--for “Brutus was
-an honorable man”--but we will agree with you, after reading this
-schedule, that an income tax would lead to perjury. But let us suggest
-that we, the people, have elected a man as chief executive of the
-nation, who represents us, the “Common People,” and will see to the
-execution of the laws of the nation--Grover Cleveland. To be an honest
-man and fulfill the expectations of the people, he will see that those
-who should pay the expenses of the Government by an income tax shall
-make honest returns concerning their possessions, and pay that sum of
-money to which the Government is entitled.
-
-If he do not so, he is faithless, and the people will hold him
-accountable. The power of the Government will be in his hands--both
-branches of the Legislature. And should the National Legislature,
-selected by the people, deem it wise to furnish revenue for the
-Government, and pass an income tax graded according to the incomes
-received, then it will devolve upon Grover Cleveland, as trustee of
-the nation, to see that the will of the Legislature is executed. He
-has the power to appoint such officers as may be necessary to properly
-execute the laws of the Federal Union, and we, the “Common People,”
-will expect a ratification of all the promises made by him to the
-people of the Union. The people of the nation, trusting and relying
-upon his honesty and integrity, selected him for the high office of
-Chief Magistrate of the GREATEST NATION ON EARTH. We have placed in
-his hands the power of the majority, and we shall expect the execution
-of such laws as the will of the majority may dictate; _the foremost of
-which will be an income tax_, whereby may be eradicated many of the
-evils of which the masses, the “plain people,” complain.
-
-Should perjury be committed--and it would not be astonishing, because
-the “plain people” of America are not apt to be astonished at anything
-vile that may be done by the sham aristocracy and worshipers of “caste”
-in our country--then let Grover Cleveland, as Executive of the nation,
-having the power of the people behind him, supported by the mighty
-voice of the broad democracy of our land, prosecute, by means of the
-officers of the Federal Government (paid by the people to punish crimes
-of the character indicated by the New York _Sun_, such as perjury),
-and, upon conviction, let the glorious sight be afforded to us plain
-“Common People,” of a millionaire working in a shoe shop at Sing-Sing;
-let us see the stripes of the criminal adorning the backs of some
-of these good, my lords, the barons, who swear to lies and perjure
-themselves about their incomes; grab a dozen of them; convict them
-of perjury; make them appear before the people as criminals, as the
-people believe they are. One batch of a dozen going to Sing-Sing and
-Auburn--one batch of a dozen would-be Patricians breaking rock for the
-good of the public, would be a sight that would delight the very souls
-of the “Common People.”
-
-The people make the laws! Now, you millionaires, obey the laws; and a
-transgression against those laws, though you be worth $100,000,000,
-will not be excused. The people believe that an income tax can be
-collected in spite of the perjury predicted by the New York _Sun_,
-because of the PUNISHMENT that the PEOPLE WILL INFLICT upon the
-perjurers.
-
-The people have had enough, a surfeit, of this cry of immunity from the
-consequences of crime because the criminal happens to possess wealth.
-We are weary, tired of it. And the people have made up their minds that
-the wealthy criminals shall be brought to the bar of justice along with
-the poorest, pilfering thief of a penny loaf. There shall not be in our
-land one law for the rich and another for the poor. If these wealthy
-criminals perjure themselves with regard to their incomes, they must
-be punished, and the people will expect the punishment and penalty to
-be inflicted by and through the administration of Grover Cleveland.
-
-To cry out, with the New York _Sun_, that “If you pass a law requiring
-the citizens of the American Union to swear to the truth and record
-their incomes, it is but offering an inducement to perjury, and,
-therefore, is undesirable,” is to admit that our Government is a
-failure, that a Republic is a failure, that the will of the majority
-shall not rule, that the American Constitution is a farce and a fraud,
-all of which the “Common People” will not believe to be the case.
-They demand the law! The enforcement of it rests with the Executive
-of the nation. The punishment rests upon the integrity and honor of
-the judiciary of the Federal courts. And there has been no evidence
-yet of a lack of honesty in the members of the Federal judiciary. The
-perjurers can and should be punished. If the Legislature of the nation,
-the Congress of the United States, will pass a graded income tax, as
-the people desire that they should do, the people believe that the
-law will be executed under the wise and honest administration of that
-Executive chosen by them November 8, 1892--Grover Cleveland. The people
-believe that, should any be accused of perjury and false return of
-their incomes, they will be prosecuted by the officers of the Federal
-courts, who will be honest, being appointed by Grover Cleveland, the
-representative of the people; that, when so charged, perjurers brought
-to trial will be prosecuted fairly and ably by the representatives of
-the executive department, selected by the people November last, and,
-when so tried, the people, by twelve of their number, the jury, will
-decide whether the accused be guilty or innocent, and, if guilty, the
-people believe that the wealth and position of the accused will not
-enter into the consideration of the Magistrate representing the Federal
-Government, but that he will sentence a guilty man, even though he be
-worth a million or a hundred million, in the same manner as he would
-the commonest counterfeiter or petty larceny thief in the land.
-
-Believing thus, the plain people of America see no good reason or
-argument in the cry that an income tax will be productive of perjury
-and that it is a sufficient reason to prevent its passage. And,
-therefore, a graded income tax becomes the most desirable measure
-possible to introduce for the advantage of the people who elected the
-incoming administration, November 8, 1892.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XXVII.
-
-CONCLUSION.
-
-
-It would be with feelings of regret that this volume is brought to
-an end if the object for which it was intended could reasonably be
-expected to be in any way nearer of attainment. Unfortunately for the
-successful solution of the social problem in the United States, such
-can hardly be hoped for by the publication of one book, or as the
-result of one election; it will require the efforts of many skillful
-writers, a vast number of volumes, and it is to be feared many and
-more serious exhibitions of the indignation felt by the “Plain People”
-than that of the election of November 8, 1892, to convince the sham
-aristocracy of our country, that the existence of “caste” or privileged
-classes will not be endured in Free America. It is to be dreaded by
-all who love the Union, that the blinded believers in snobbery and
-imitation of European manners will not be warned by the positive,
-pronounced disapprobation exhibited last election day of the plain
-“Common People” with the conduct, lives, morals, and manners of the
-worshipers of “caste;” that these sham aristocrats will neglect to
-heed the signal of danger which their insolence and affectations have
-created in our loved Republic, until upon the next occasion the plain
-“Common People” may have become so incensed as to no longer exercise
-the great and good common-sense of the American people in dealing
-with questions of internal interest--but will throw to the winds
-moderation, and crush out the pretensions of that asinine part of the
-human family who believe in the possible existence of anything like
-“caste” in our country. To some of these shoddy aristocrats who have
-become absolutely intoxicated by their dreams of social greatness,
-this book will be unworthy of their condescending attention; they will
-dismiss the subject as the vaporings of a madman, without investigating
-the possible and more than probable theory expressed herein, that the
-result of the last Presidential election was produced, not by the fact
-that the people of the nation had become Free Traders and gone over
-to the Democratic party, _en masse_, but by the natural resentment
-felt by the democratic “plain” people of the country at the absurd
-and offensive pretensions of the wealthy classes who had fastened
-themselves like leeches upon the Republican party, and who, by aping
-the manners and morals of the aristocracy of Europe, had rendered
-themselves hateful in the eyes of the worth and merit of our land, the
-“Common People” of America. By the existence of this leech upon the
-body of the Republican party, all the pure patriotic blood had (in the
-opinion of the people) been sucked out of that Grand Old Party, leaving
-only a withered skeleton around whose fleshless form was twined in
-festoons the venomous serpent of “caste,” imported, like the cholera,
-along with much else of evil that comes to this dear land of ours from
-Europe.
-
-A small part of owners of villas at Newport and castles in Scotland
-will see in this book the expression of opinions which they dub as
-dangerous, and declare should entitle the utterer to the treatment
-accorded the private soldier who did not sympathize with the tyrannical
-Frick in his treatment of the Homestead strikers. This part of our
-would-be nobility have always ready in their throats the cry of
-“Socialist”--“Anarchist.” With studious care has the author of this
-volume insisted upon the fact that the only practical and effectual
-method of ridding the land of the curse that would result from the
-existence of “caste” here, is by the ballot--by laws enacted to prevent
-the accumulation of menacingly large fortunes in the hands of a few
-citizens of the Union.
-
-To this part of the pretended “Lords and Barons,” who declare that
-truth is sometimes best left unexpressed, and that a man may become
-dangerous by giving utterance to the feelings that fill the breasts of
-other men, it would be well to consider which is the most efficacious
-method to be adopted in dealing with the bite of a mad dog, or a
-cancer. Is it by covering it with beautiful silken bandages, and thus
-concealing it from view, or is it by cauterization? Does concealment
-render the disease less dangerous or deep-seated? Recommending a cure,
-and not a curtain to cover the wound which festers all the more rapidly
-by the fact that it is heated by the covering, should be the line of
-treatment adopted by the good physician of the public body, as of
-the individual body. Every party slave may object to the idea of the
-victory of the “Common People,” November 8, 1892, being considered
-in any light save that of a party triumph. The fact remains just the
-same, however; party machination had little to do with results produced
-by the people at the last election. There are such positive and
-unmistakable indications of the demand of the people for the passage
-of a Graded Income Tax, that silence any longer upon the subject is
-puerile.
-
-When leading Democratic party newspapers, like the New York _World_,
-openly proclaim the necessity of such laws, it is useless to hesitate
-in meeting frankly the causes that led to the demand of the people for
-such legislation as a “Graded Income Tax.” Since part of this volume
-was put in type, an American citizen has died, leaving an estate of
-$70,000,000, which tremendous amount consisted almost entirely of
-personal property, upon which practically no taxes were paid. This
-almost countless mass of the wealth of the nation is held entirely by
-the descendants of Jay Gould. Not one dollar was bequeathed to one
-single object of charity. Not one poor man calls to mind the name of
-Jay Gould with gratitude. The common, plain people of America have no
-desire to rob the children of Jay Gould of that $70,000,000. “Enjoy
-that great fortune in peace and safety,” the people say to the Goulds;
-but the people also add this: “We have now an opportunity to judge of
-the supreme selfishness and absence of charity in the hearts of the
-millionaires. As an object lesson, Jay Gould’s will is valuable. In
-future give us a Graded Income Tax, and prevent the vast accumulation
-of wealth in the hands of the selfish and uncharitable.”
-
-
-
-
-+-------------------------------------------------+
-|Transcriber’s note:                              |
-|                                                 |
-|Obvious typographic errors have been corrected.  |
-|                                                 |
-+-------------------------------------------------+
-
-
-
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-<h1 class="pgx" title="">The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Crime of Caste in Our Country, by
-Benjamin Rush Davenport</h1>
-<p>This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States
-and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no
-restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it
-under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this
-eBook or online at <a
-href="https://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you are not
-located in the United States, you'll have to check the laws of the
-country where you are located before using this ebook.</p>
-<p>Title: The Crime of Caste in Our Country</p>
-<p>Author: Benjamin Rush Davenport</p>
-<p>Release Date: June 26, 2021  [eBook #65707]</p>
-<p>Language: English</p>
-<p>Character set encoding: UTF-8</p>
-<p>***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CRIME OF CASTE IN OUR COUNTRY***</p>
-<p>&nbsp;</p>
-<h4 class="pgx" title="">E-text prepared by Tim Lindell, Martin Pettit,<br />
-    and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team<br />
-    (https://www.pgdp.net)<br />
-    from page images generously made available by<br />
-    Internet Archive<br />
-    (https://archive.org)</h4>
-<p>&nbsp;</p>
-<table border="0" style="background-color: #ccccff;margin: 0 auto;" cellpadding="10">
-  <tr>
-    <td valign="top">
-      Note:
-    </td>
-    <td>
-      Images of the original pages are available through
-      Internet Archive. See
-      https://archive.org/details/crimeofcasteinou00dave
-    </td>
-  </tr>
-</table>
-<p>&nbsp;</p>
-<hr class="pgx" />
-<p>&nbsp;</p>
-<p>&nbsp;</p>
-<p>&nbsp;</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_ii" id="Page_ii">[Pg ii]</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="center"><a name="frontispiece.jpg" id="frontispiece.jpg"></a><img src="images/frontispiece.jpg" alt="ABRAHAM LINCOLN" /></div>
-
-<p class="bold">ABRAHAM LINCOLN<br />A Man of the People, who Loved and Served the People.</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<div class="center"><img src="images/title.jpg" alt="title page" /></div>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_iii" id="Page_iii">[Pg iii]</a></span></p>
-
-<h1><span class="smcap">The Crime of Caste</span></h1>
-
-<p class="bold">IN OUR COUNTRY</p>
-
-<hr class="smler" />
-
-<p class="bold">AMERICANS ENFORCE EQUALITY</p>
-
-<hr class="smler" />
-
-<p class="bold">No Sham Aristocracy of Wealth Permitted by the People</p>
-
-<hr class="smler" />
-
-<p class="bold2">Lesson of 1892 Taught Imitators of<br />English Aristocracy</p>
-
-<hr class="smler" />
-
-<p class="bold">HISTORY OF THE POWER OF PEOPLE RE-TOLD</p>
-
-<hr class="smler" />
-
-<p class="bold">Records for Three Thousand Years Searched<br />for Examples</p>
-
-<hr class="smler" />
-
-<p class="bold2">Bullets, 1861&mdash;Ballots, 1892</p>
-
-<hr class="smler" />
-
-<p class="bold">By BENJAMIN R. DAVENPORT</p>
-
-<hr class="smler" />
-
-<p class="bold">PHILADELPHIA:<br />KEYSTONE PUBLISHING CO.<br />1893</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_iv" id="Page_iv">[Pg iv]</a></span></p>
-
-<p class="center">Copyright by<br />JOSEPH W. MORTON, <span class="smcap">Jr.</span><br />1892</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_v" id="Page_v">[Pg v]</a></span></p>
-
-<p class="center"><span class="smcap">This Book is Dedicated to All American Citizens,<br /><br />who believe<br /><br />
-That Patriotism, Honesty, Virtue, and Merit</span><br />
-<br />ALONE CONSTITUTE INEQUALITY IN MANKIND;<br /><br />
-<span class="smaller">WHO OBJECT TO AND RESENT ARROGANCE AND PRESUMPTION<br />
-UPON THE PART OF</span><br /><br />THE POSSESSORS OF WEALTH<br /><br />
-<span class="smaller">AND TO THOSE TO WHOM</span><br /><br />
-<span class="smcap">&#8220;Caste&#8221; and Foreign Mannerisms are Obnoxious</span>.</p>
-
-<p class="center"><span class="s12">&nbsp;</span><span class="smcap">The Author.</span></p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_vi" id="Page_vi">[Pg vi]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2><i>DEFINITION OF &#8220;CASTE.&#8221;</i></h2>
-
-<hr class="smler" />
-
-<p><i>The word &#8220;Caste,&#8221; we derive from a Portuguese word, which means &#8220;a
-race;&#8221; the Portuguese being the early voyagers to the East Indies,
-where they found the distinction of classes of society established
-under the Brahminical regime of India. Thence it came to be applied as
-a term of distinction of society in other countries. There were four
-castes in India: 1, the Priests; 2, military; 3, merchants; 4, the
-servile classes.</i></p>
-
-<p><i>Members of the lowest caste were forbidden to marry those of the
-upper. Children of such unions were outcasts and irredeemably base;
-they could not accumulate property, nor change or improve their
-conditions. Along with many other senseless and inconvenient rules for
-the conduct of the different castes, were such as those forbidding
-members of different castes from using the same springs or running
-streams, sitting at the same table, eating with the same utensils, or
-preparing food in the same vessels. It was contamination for those
-of the first class to even mingle in the public highway with those
-who were of the lower castes. For convenience, and in the interest of
-the commercial prosperity of India, the British, after much exertion,
-have been able to eradicate many of these absurd distinctions, and the
-habits that resulted therefrom.</i></p>
-
-<p><i>The attempt to create class distinctions in Free America, upon the
-basis of wealth or assumed social superiority, is a crime, and as such
-will be punished by the Common People.</i></p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_vii" id="Page_vii">[Pg vii]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2>INDEX.</h2>
-
-<table summary="CONTENTS">
-  <tr>
-    <td></td>
-    <td><span class="smaller">PAGE.</span></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left"><span class="smcap">Introduction</span></td>
-    <td><a href="#Page_11">11</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2">&nbsp;</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2" class="center">CHAPTER I.</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Vox Populi, Vox Dei</td>
-    <td><a href="#Page_33">33</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2">&nbsp;</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2" class="center">CHAPTER II.</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">The Alleged General Discontent</td>
-    <td><a href="#Page_65">65</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2">&nbsp;</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2" class="center">CHAPTER III.</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">November 8, 1892</td>
-    <td><a href="#Page_79">79</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2">&nbsp;</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2" class="center">CHAPTER IV.</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Society as the People Found It November 8, 1892</td>
-    <td><a href="#Page_91">91</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2">&nbsp;</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2" class="center">CHAPTER V.</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Some Reasons for Wrath</td>
-    <td><a href="#Page_111">111</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2">&nbsp;</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2" class="center">CHAPTER VI.</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">The Aristocratic &#8220;Chappie&#8221; <i>vs.</i> Abraham Lincoln</td>
-    <td><a href="#Page_145">145</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2">&nbsp;</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2" class="center">CHAPTER VII.</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Hon. John Brisben Walker, on Homestead</td>
-    <td><a href="#Page_161">161</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2">&nbsp;</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2" class="center">CHAPTER VIII.</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Surrender at Homestead.&mdash;Organized Labor Defeated</td>
-    <td><a href="#Page_183">183</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2">&nbsp;</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2" class="center"><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_viii" id="Page_viii">[Pg viii]</a></span>CHAPTER IX.</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Possible Fruits of Victory</td>
-    <td><a href="#Page_204">204</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2">&nbsp;</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2" class="center">CHAPTER X.</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">The Cause of Bullets, &#8217;61; Ballots, &#8217;92.&mdash;Abraham<br />
-Lincoln, the People&#8217;s Choice in &#8217;60</td>
-    <td><a href="#Page_225">225</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2">&nbsp;</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2" class="center">CHAPTER XI.</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Andrew Jackson, 1828</td>
-    <td><a href="#Page_241">241</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2">&nbsp;</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2" class="center">CHAPTER XII.</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Thomas Jefferson, 1800</td>
-    <td><a href="#Page_249">249</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2">&nbsp;</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2" class="center">CHAPTER XIII.</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">The Revolution in 1776</td>
-    <td><a href="#Page_257">257</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2">&nbsp;</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2" class="center">CHAPTER XIV.</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">The French Revolution</td>
-    <td><a href="#Page_278">278</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2">&nbsp;</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2" class="center">CHAPTER XV.</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">England, 1645</td>
-    <td><a href="#Page_295">295</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2">&nbsp;</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2" class="center">CHAPTER XVI.</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">The German Empire, 1520-1525</td>
-    <td><a href="#Page_307">307</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2">&nbsp;</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2" class="center">CHAPTER XVII.</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Switzerland, 1424</td>
-    <td><a href="#Page_312">312</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2">&nbsp;</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2" class="center">CHAPTER XVIII.</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Russia</td>
-    <td><a href="#Page_315">315</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2">&nbsp;</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2" class="center"><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_ix" id="Page_ix">[Pg ix]</a></span>CHAPTER XIX.</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Patricians and Plebeians in Rome</td>
-    <td><a href="#Page_320">320</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2">&nbsp;</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2" class="center">CHAPTER XX.</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Greece.&mdash;Venice.&mdash;The Rule of &#8220;Caste&#8221;</td>
-    <td><a href="#Page_324">324</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2">&nbsp;</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2" class="center">CHAPTER XXI.</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Egypt, 4235 B. C.</td>
-    <td><a href="#Page_330">330</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2">&nbsp;</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2" class="center">CHAPTER XXII.</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Christianity</td>
-    <td><a href="#Page_333">333</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2">&nbsp;</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2" class="center">CHAPTER XXIII.</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Not a Democratic Party Victory.&mdash;Democracy is Not<br />
-the Name of a Party, but of a Principle</td>
-    <td><a href="#Page_346">346</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2">&nbsp;</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2" class="center">CHAPTER XXIV.</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Not a Defeat of Abraham Lincoln&#8217;s Republican Party</td>
-    <td><a href="#Page_390">390</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2">&nbsp;</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2" class="center">CHAPTER XXV.</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">The Populist: the &#8220;Allies.&#8221;&mdash;Elected by the People;<br />
-therefore, with the &#8220;Common People&#8221;</td>
-    <td><a href="#Page_409">409</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2">&nbsp;</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2" class="center">CHAPTER XXVI.</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">&#8220;Flabbyism&#8221; and the Income Tax</td>
-    <td><a href="#Page_417">417</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2">&nbsp;</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2" class="center">CHAPTER XXVII.</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left"><span class="smcap">Conclusion</span></td>
-    <td><a href="#Page_428">428</a></td>
-  </tr>
-</table>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_x" id="Page_x">[Pg x]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2>ILLUSTRATIONS.</h2>
-
-<table summary="ILLUSTRATIONS">
-  <tr>
-    <td></td>
-    <td><span class="smaller">PAGE.</span></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Abraham Lincoln</td>
-    <td><a href="#frontispiece.jpg">Frontispiece.</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Grover Cleveland</td>
-    <td><a href="#i032.jpg">32</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">James B. Weaver</td>
-    <td><a href="#i064.jpg">64</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">John D. Rockefeller</td>
-    <td><a href="#i105.jpg">105</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Ward MacAllister</td>
-    <td><a href="#i110.jpg">110</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">&#8220;The Public be D&mdash;d&#8221;</td>
-    <td><a href="#i115.jpg">115</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Mrs. Benjamin Harrison</td>
-    <td><a href="#i127.jpg">127</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Benjamin Harrison</td>
-    <td><a href="#i131.jpg">131</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">American Queen</td>
-    <td><a href="#i136.jpg">136</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">American Duchess</td>
-    <td><a href="#i137.jpg">137</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Jay Gould</td>
-    <td><a href="#i142.jpg">143</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Abe, &#8220;The Rail-Splitter&#8221;</td>
-    <td><a href="#i154.jpg">154</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">&#8220;Chappie&#8221; on Fifth Avenue</td>
-    <td><a href="#i155.jpg">155</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Andrew Carnegie</td>
-    <td><a href="#i160.jpg">160</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Henry C. Frick</td>
-    <td><a href="#i162.jpg">162</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">The Mistake at Homestead</td>
-    <td><a href="#i182.jpg">182</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">William H. Vanderbilt</td>
-    <td><a href="#i219.jpg">219</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">W. Seward Webb</td>
-    <td><a href="#i223.jpg">223</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Andrew Jackson</td>
-    <td><a href="#i240.jpg">240</a></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Thomas Jefferson</td>
-    <td><a href="#i248.jpg">248</a></td>
-  </tr>
-</table>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2>INTRODUCTION.</h2>
-
-<p>Had a Johnstown flood, a Charleston earthquake, a war with Chili, or a
-Homestead strike occurred on November 8, 1892, instead of an election,
-those Napoleons of journalism, James Gordon Bennett, of the New York
-<i>Herald</i>, Joseph Pulitzer, of the New York <i>World</i>, and Whitelaw
-Reid, of the <i>Tribune</i>, would have had a score of representatives on
-the scene at once, without thought of expense; would have had every
-detail in its most minute particular investigated, and reproduced
-every statement, embellished by the pencils of a host of artists,
-utterly regardless of expense, keeping, as these magnificent journals
-ever have, good faith with the public and their readers, making
-lasting monuments of their wonderful papers for coming generations of
-journalists to gaze upon.</p>
-
-<p>But a revolution occurred on November 8, 1892, a revolution of the
-American people, so overwhelming, so decisive, and so pronounced
-as to absolutely stupefy even the genius of the press. Instead of
-corps of reporters, artists, special correspondents, speeding over
-the land to ascertain the cause&mdash;not the result; the cause, the
-origin,&mdash;of this stupendous surprise, all the great<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span> journals of the
-country, having each nailed to its flag-staff some theory or text
-utterly inconsistent with the result, utterly disproportioned to the
-overwhelming revolution, that they have sought by vain endeavor to make
-an overwhelming result compatible with and agreeable to some one part
-or portion of the cause thereof.</p>
-
-<p>To loudly proclaim, as did the New York <i>Sun</i>, that an exhibition of
-the will of the people, so pronounced as that of November the 8th,
-was occasioned by the Force Bill, is as utterly unreasonable as to
-ascribe the magnificent volume within the banks of the Mississippi to
-some little trickling rivulet flowing from the plains of Nebraska.
-To say, with the <i>Tribune</i>, that the grand result pronounced in the
-mighty voice of the people was produced by the misunderstanding of
-the McKinley Bill, is as groundless as to ascribe the echoing thunder
-tones of heaven to the swelling throat of a canary bird. To herald
-over the land, &#8220;Pauper emigration did it,&#8221; with the New York <i>Herald</i>,
-is about as pregnant with truth as would be the assumption that the
-foundation and everlasting strength of Christianity has for its basis
-the misguided vaporings of a negro preacher in Richmond, who proclaims,
-&#8220;The sun do move.&#8221; To announce, as did the <i>World</i>, that &#8220;Tariff reform
-and WE, the Democrats, achieved this victory,&#8221; is entitled to as much
-respect as would be given<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span> the utterances of a drummer boy of the
-Federal Army at Gettysburg.</p>
-
-<p>It was not any one nor all of these causes that moved the people. Each
-newspaper, Democratic or Republican, has selected some nail upon which
-it hangs the laurel wreath of victory, inscribed with its own puny text
-for which it has fought its little battle, and each newspaper of the
-Republican press has covered, with the tattered garments of defeat, its
-little text wherein it had proclaimed that the Republican party would
-be victorious, and labeled its tattered garment of lack of judgment
-with some phrase like, &#8220;Disloyalty of Platt,&#8221; &#8220;Incapacity of Carter,&#8221;
-&#8220;Want of Organization,&#8221; &#8220;Lack of Popularity and Magnetism of our
-Candidate,&#8221; &#8220;The Voters didn&#8217;t come out.&#8221; Had the press no part of its
-own reputation at stake, they would have searched and delved into the
-bosoms of men; yes, neither space nor distance, time nor expense, would
-have been spared by the magnates of the newspaper world to ascertain
-the true cause. But in ascertaining that true cause, it would have been
-necessary, in announcing the same, to stultify themselves in what they
-had been predicting, proclaiming, foretelling, and advising, for months
-and years.</p>
-
-<p>The truth is in the air; was in the air before the election. &#8217;Twas
-breathed; it was thought; yea, better, it was <i>felt</i>, by the
-great throbbing,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span> aching heart of the men and women of the Union.
-From the hovel to the palace, the insidious, poisonous vapor of a
-supposed affected, sham aristocracy, with the noxious slime of a
-half-proclaimed doctrine of the inequality of man and woman, by reason
-of non-possession of wealth, had crept. The air of freedom was polluted
-by the emanations arising from the imported English decaying corpse
-of aristocracy. It was everywhere. In blindness and self-delusion,
-the press made its battle; in the very air of it, howling against
-Protection and for Protection, against Force Bill and for Force Bill,
-while the wretched, cankerous ulcer was eating into the pride of every
-free-born man and woman in the land. The very silence of the people,
-the general apathy, was evidence of but one of the symptoms of the
-insidious disease with which the body politic was being consumed.</p>
-
-<p>A scene that has been described in Washington just prior to the late
-Civil War best illustrates the condition of the people. The city of
-Washington was filled with silent, sullen, suspicious men. A sombre
-air pervaded the Capital. South Carolina had seceded; the Union was
-disintegrating. All that had been, was being forgotten. Old ties
-were breaking; old friendships becoming strange. Each man viewed his
-neighbor and his friend of yesterday, with a doubt in his mind as to
-whether they would fight side by side, or beat each other&#8217;s<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span> throats
-to-morrow. Men paced their rooms in the various hotels, anxious
-and careworn, sleepless and fearful. Yet, the surface was still, a
-dangerous state of general apathy obtained, if silence and murmuring,
-without action, can be called apathy.</p>
-
-<p>It was night, yet the streets were not deserted. Suddenly a window
-of the Ebbitt House was raised, a man stepped on to the balcony out
-of the window, and in clear, vigorous, and manly tones began to sing
-&#8220;The Star-Spangled Banner.&#8221; Windows were raised; the crowd collected
-around the Ebbitt House. It was the signal for the breaking of a dam.
-A flood of patriotism burst from the hearts of the hearers; it was the
-bugle note, calling upon Americans to save their country. Where there
-had been silence, were now outspoken vows of fidelity and loyalty
-to the Union. The battle was won that night; not at Gettysburg and
-Vicksburg<a name="FNanchor_1_1" id="FNanchor_1_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_1" >[1]</a>.</p>
-
-<p>Just so with the people of America in 1892; for years they have
-endured in silence, murmuring and thinking, heart to heart speaking by
-responsive heart throbs; not by word. The rich, who had accumulated
-their wealth by reason of monopolies which were the necessary
-consequence of the Civil War, men who had laid the foundation<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span> of
-their fortunes by speculating upon the necessities of the government
-while contending for the very existence of the Union, had, year by
-year, by a stealthy, yet ever-increasing presumption, begun to assume
-the possibility of a class distinction, presuming that the possession
-of wealth entitled them to privileges, and arrogating to themselves
-mannerisms of the titled classes of Europe, adopting crests, coats of
-arms, claiming descent from titled foreigners, an exclusiveness in
-their social relations, disregarding the laws of morality. The women of
-this would-be aristocratic class, flaunting their jewels and laces in
-the faces of their poorer sisters, with elevated noses, and garments
-drawn aside, feared to touch or gaze at the poor but honest mothers and
-wives of America.</p>
-
-<p>It was not much: it was rank presumption; it was nonsense, absurd.
-&#8220;There&#8217;s no such thing possible in America as class distinction; in
-fact, it does not exist, cannot exist; the &#8216;Four Hundred&#8217; of New York
-is a joke, a by-word, a stupendous folly.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>But, good people of the said &#8220;Four Hundred,&#8221; remember that while the
-American is neither a Socialist nor an Anarchist, when you presume to
-make a distinction, socially, between the poor man, his wife, children,
-and mother, you touch him in the most sensitive part of his being. You
-may<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span> have your villas at Newport, you may ape the English fashionable
-season in London by a similar one in New York; you may have your steam
-yachts; you may ride to hounds; your women may marry divorced dukes and
-puppified sons of lords; but, mark you, claim no privilege, attempt no
-distinction between yourselves and the poorest honest man and woman in
-the land. Equality is the jewel that every true American holds most
-dear. No free son of our Republic will sell this treasure for gold,
-whether it be offered directly as a bribe or shrewdly tendered under
-the guise of &#8220;protected&#8221; wages.</p>
-
-<p>It did not do for the Republican press of the country to demonstrate
-that Protection brought higher wages to the workingman. They might
-have proved that by voting the Republican ticket the workingman&#8217;s pay
-would have been a hundred dollars a day; they might have shown him
-that in point of pocket he would be eternally blest by supporting the
-party which he deemed identified with those who attempted to force
-&#8220;caste&#8221; upon our country. It is not a question of money; the equality
-of man is the American&#8217;s birthright. For it, our fathers sought these
-shores, contending with privation, enduring untold labor, dangers,
-and death. For it, our forefathers fought the most powerful nation on
-earth, when they were but a scattered handful of colonists, scattered
-from<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span> Massachusetts to Georgia. When the attempt was made&mdash;that it was
-attempted, there can be no doubt&mdash;to buy the American&#8217;s birthright by
-preaching to him &#8220;increased wages,&#8221; it failed.</p>
-
-<p>Take every speech of every Republican orator, every bit of Republican
-literature, every editorial in the Republican papers, all speak from
-but one text, viz.: &#8220;Workmen, farmers, in fact, all ye good people
-of America, you can make more money under Protection;&#8221; which plainly
-means, &#8220;Let Protection and the Republican party (which you designate in
-your hearts as The Rich Man&#8217;s party) continue in power, accumulating
-wealth, creating class distinctions, and you can have better wages.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>In other words, &#8220;Sell us the right to create a Republic like that of
-Venice, wherein the rich became the privileged class, and we will give
-you better pay.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>The Democratic press, orators, and literary bureau were no better.
-They no more understood the feeling of the people, for their continual
-cry was, &#8220;Free Trade, and you will be better off in pocket.&#8221; They
-excoriated trusts, monopolies; they talked of corruption and what would
-be done to benefit, IN POCKET, the poor man, if the Democratic party
-came in power; just as blind as their brothers of the Republican party,
-they appealed to the American pocketbook. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>While every Democratic orator knew that he felt the sting of the
-venomous and growing reptile, &#8220;caste,&#8221; in no place in the literature of
-the Democratic party, in no paper, can be found one single reference
-to the pride of the American in his citizenship, in his equality. It
-seemed as if each man thought that he alone endured a pang upon the
-subject of &#8220;caste&#8221; and social distinction; for, bear in mind, the man
-with one million will feel the slight and attempted distinction between
-his family and the family with ten millions, just as keenly as the
-cashier of a bank will feel the distinction that the president attempts
-to make between their social positions; the farmer with ten acres feels
-towards the farmer with a hundred acres, exactly the same as the farmer
-with a hundred does towards the farmer possessed of a thousand acres.</p>
-
-<p>This disease was not confined to the horny-handed sons of toil; the
-heart in the hovel was not the only one that ached. It was not confined
-to the follower of the plow; but its pestilential breath pervaded every
-home in the land, leaving everyone below the multi-millionaire unhappy.
-The clerk of the dry-goods store was hurt because the floor walker
-assumed a superiority; the floor walker, because the proprietor assumed
-it; the proprietor, because the importer from whom he purchased goods
-assumed a distinction; and so it<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span> continued, from the longshoreman up,
-until it reached our millionaire would-be princes, who ape and mimic
-English life and manners, leaving, as it arose, a sting of increasing
-bitterness; but each man felt too proud to give utterance to what he
-thought it shamed him even to recognize as a sensation.</p>
-
-<p>Hence the apathy on the surface, the sentiment confessed only to
-themselves and in the closet of the voting booth. Because the people
-had identified the Republican party with the class of men who were
-striving to create this class distinction, and because of the very
-charm of the word Democracy to their aching hearts, they voted the
-Democratic ticket&mdash;not Democrats alone in a political sense, but men
-who believe in democracy in the broad sense that St. Paul preached on
-Mars Hill at Athens, in the broad sense that Christ&#8217;s life demonstrated.</p>
-
-<p>It was useless, against this first overmastering, powerful emotion in
-the American breast, to call upon the old veterans of the Civil War, to
-whom the Republican party had given increased pensions. It was useless
-to cry even to the negro, to whom the Republican party had given
-freedom. He, too, had become imbued with the spirit of equality. The
-wealthy could not purchase the birthright of the veteran by appealing
-to his pocketbook, any more than they could that of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span> laborer.
-He had shed his blood in the cause of equality, resisting then the
-assumed superiority of blood and birth so often flaunted in his face by
-gentlemen from the South.</p>
-
-<p>In 1861, the &#8220;mudsills&#8221; of the North and West, the tillers of the
-soil, had shouldered their muskets at the call of that great man of
-the people, Abraham Lincoln, leaving home and loved ones to face
-unknown dangers and diseases in the cause of <span class="smaller">EQUALITY</span>. Down
-in their hearts then was a sentiment which is revived in 1892. That
-thing which had been the hardest to bear, for the laboring settler of
-the West and the workman of the North, was the existence of &#8220;caste&#8221;
-in the South, and the supposed superiority of the Southerners in the
-halls of Congress. Love of the Union was the outspoken, pronounced
-cause of their coming at Lincoln&#8217;s call; but there was something behind
-and beneath all of that, that had been growing for years; it was
-resentment, because of the South&#8217;s assumption of &#8220;caste&#8221; in our country.</p>
-
-<p>The question was settled, by these very veterans, from 1861 to &#8217;65 with
-bullets, and it was utterly unavailing to call upon them for ballots in
-1892 against the cause for which they fought in 1861.</p>
-
-<p>The very negro said to himself: &#8220;You gave us freedom, the Republican
-party, but the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span> Republican party of Abraham Lincoln was purely a
-Democratic party, in a broader sense.&#8221; To the negro&#8217;s mind, no three
-Presidents of the past will more thoroughly represent a picture
-pleasing to the eye of the enslaved or the lower classes, than
-Jefferson, Jackson, and Lincoln. All were Democrats&mdash;men who believed
-in the people and labored for the people, leading lives of pure
-simplicity, affecting no superiority of rank or position. It was
-useless to attempt to hold the negro vote.</p>
-
-<p>The very name of the &#8220;People&#8217;s Party,&#8221; so strongly did it indicate and
-describe this sentiment of the people; enabled that party, with all its
-incongruous doctrines, to carry the electoral votes of some States of
-the Union.</p>
-
-<p>How frivolous seemed the claim of the Democratic papers and
-politicians, that the popularity of Grover Cleveland, and the
-confidence that people had in his rectitude and honesty, caused this
-revolution. How it appears to be trifling with truth to ascribe the
-victory of the people, the true Democracy, to the &#8220;masterly manner in
-which Mr. Harrity managed the campaign.&#8221; Mr. Whitney&#8217;s diplomacy, Mr.
-Dickinson&#8217;s energy and ability, Mr. Sheehan&#8217;s shrewdness, sink into
-utter insignificance, and become as a grain of sand upon the seashore,
-where they have happened to be tossed by the mighty wave of the ocean
-of feeling, full of resentment, that filled the hearts of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span> people.
-Their little all was but the piping of a penny whistle in a gale of
-wind. W. H. Vanderbilt&#8217;s four words, &#8220;The public be damned,&#8221; uttered
-from the pedestal of $150,000,000, made a greater impression, and
-became more indelibly impressed upon the minds of the whole people,
-ranging in wealth from $10,000,000 to less than a cent, than all the
-management of Harrity, the diplomacy of Whitney, the skill of Sheehan,
-or the energy of Dickinson. The reported expression of Mr. Russell
-Harrison, when asked, while in London, what his position was in
-America, as son of the President,&mdash;&#8220;Oh, about what the Prince of Wales
-is here,&#8221;&mdash;was thought of and resented to greater purpose than was
-produced by all the speeches of the eloquent Cockran.</p>
-
-<p>The women of the land made more speeches, and effective speeches,
-to the voters of the land when they thought of the much-advertised
-American Duchess. They had felt most keenly&mdash;for woman&#8217;s life is social
-much more than man&#8217;s&mdash;the attempted social distinction; and, strange as
-it may appear to some of the skillful politicians that they had never
-recognized it, the women of America had become largely Democratic, and
-in them the Democratic party had its most powerful orators; for even
-the most brutal, neglectful, and unloving husband resents in a vigorous
-manner the least slight or insult offered to his wife. Upon every<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span>
-occasion, gathering, entertainment, charitable undertaking, some wife
-had been slighted. Because of the attempted creation of &#8220;caste,&#8221; she
-became a powerful factor, at once, in the campaign of the people. It
-mattered not whether her husband was a millionaire or not, no matter in
-what portion of society,&mdash;the clerk in a dry-goods store, the farmer,
-the banker, the millionaire,&mdash;the same result would follow. Some would
-attempt to arrogate to themselves a better position, and claim certain
-superiority over her. The banker&#8217;s wife feels as keenly the slight of
-the wife of a railroad president, as the wife of a longshoreman does
-any assumed difference in social position on the part of the wife of
-the retail grocer.</p>
-
-<p>This all-prevailing crime of &#8220;caste&#8221; does not, like most crimes are
-supposed to do, originate in the gutter, but it permeates the mass of
-the population, like the source of a great river, starting at the very
-top of the mountain, and dripping constantly downward.</p>
-
-<p>The example of the rich in imitating the immoralities of the privileged
-classes of Europe, presents a spectacle of presumed immunity from the
-consequences of their crimes which would be as detrimental to the
-continuation of the purity of American homes, as the increase of the
-feeling of &#8220;caste&#8221; would be to the happiness of the people. A most
-beautiful illustration of corruption in high<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span> places was presented
-in the disgusting and nauseating Drayton-Borrowe affair, wherein the
-daughter of an Astor, a multi-millionaire, one of the members of the
-supposed upper &#8220;caste,&#8221; is paraded before the public as imitating the
-vices and immoralities of the Court of Charles II. Yet these same
-Astors would claim, by reason of their assumed position, some exemption
-from the result of the crime, which would not be accorded to the wife
-of a farmer, clerk, or a bank cashier, to say nothing of the fact
-that, had this beautiful sample of America&#8217;s sham aristocracy been
-a laborer&#8217;s wife, she would, by the peculiar ethics adopted by the
-corrupt English aristocracy, have been a fit subject for the police
-court.</p>
-
-<p>Another of the disgusting apings of foreign vices, along with the
-foolish claim of &#8220;caste,&#8221; is exhibited in the delightful Deacon
-assassination in France. Another representative of American
-aristocracy, so-called, would play the part of a French Countess.
-Fortunately for the world, the man Deacon had left remaining a few
-drops of American blood in his veins, and rid the world of a brute,
-as any honest American laboring man would have done. The class which
-the shameless imitators pretend to represent in America assumed the
-privilege abroad (in Europe) to indulge in drunkenness, debauchery,
-gambling, and general immorality; leaving the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span> virtues, sobriety,
-honesty, and purity to the lower classes. In America, there being but
-one class, those who assume to imitate the manners of the immoral, to
-carouse and debauch, render themselves obnoxious to the mass of the
-people, and that political party which becomes identified in the minds
-of the people with any set, or &#8220;caste,&#8221; possessing such distorted
-principles, becomes correspondingly objectionable. There can be but
-one law of morals in America. Debauchery, drunkenness, and dishonesty,
-though sheltered by a palace, are as odoriferous to the senses of the
-people as the polluted air from a sewer.</p>
-
-<p>There are many able and learned men of America who think seriously and
-have thought intently for years upon this subject, but hesitated to
-utter sentiments that falsely and absurdly are called socialistic and
-anarchical. There is no desire upon the part of Americans to deprive
-any citizen of his property and his freedom to enjoy the same as he
-will, so long as he has due appreciation of and respect for the rights
-of others. No man in the Republic can possess any right, by reason of
-his wealth, greater than the poorest in the land. Each citizen of a
-republic, in consideration of the liberty that he enjoys, surrenders
-all claim to be anything except one of the people, and any assumed
-immunity from the consequences of his acts is objectionable, and will<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span>
-be visited upon his head. The roistering sons of millionaires, though
-clad in evening dress and drunk with champagne, are no less disgusting
-rowdies than the sons of the laborer, hilarious as the result of gin
-drunk in a groggery. Unfortunately for the Republican party, in looking
-over the row of America&#8217;s money princes (?), we find &#8220;Republican&#8221;
-written behind almost every name. The villa at Newport, the castle in
-Scotland, the Tally Ho coach, is generally owned by a Republican. In
-fact, our would-be aristocrats began to assume that it was almost a
-disgrace to be anything else than a Republican; one would lose &#8220;caste&#8221;
-thereby.</p>
-
-<p>The Republican party, of course, is not responsible for this. The
-Republican candidate, Benjamin Harrison, than whom there is no better
-example of a patriotic, earnest, honest American, Christian, father,
-husband, son, gentleman, and soldier, is worthy to be an example to the
-young men of our country. He was not responsible for the impression
-made by this excrescence that has grown like some hideous and poisonous
-fungus upon the stalwart oak planted by Abraham Lincoln. The decay
-has arisen from this polluting attachment. The McKinley Bill and
-Protection, while possessing many points of excellence it behooves the
-country to examine with care before erasing from the statute-books, are
-not responsible<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span> for the natural animosity of the people toward this
-child, deformed, misshapen, Sham Aristocracy, clinging to the skirts of
-the Republican party. The attack was upon this hideous tumor, and, by
-its amputation by the people, the life-blood of the Republican party
-has become exhausted; for the operation necessarily was made painful,
-deep-felt, and severe. The Democratic party derived all the benefit
-from the defeat of the Republican party, at the hands of the people,
-without having contributed thereto to any amazing extent.</p>
-
-<p>The result of the election of 1892 should be as the warning written on
-the wall was to Belshazzar. The rich must understand, and learn now in
-time, that they hold their lives, their liberty, and their property
-in this Republic only by the will of the people; that the people,
-Democratic always in the broad sense of democracy, are long-suffering;
-but retribution, as surely as night doth follow day, may come, if
-this warning be not heeded, in some more terrible shape than an
-overwhelming defeat, at the polls, of that party to which the rich
-attach themselves. It is not well to flaunt riches or claim privileges
-or &#8220;caste&#8221; before the face of a free people.</p>
-
-<p>It would be well for the rich to learn this lesson. It was taught by
-the people under the name of the Republican party when they elected
-Lincoln; under the name of the Democratic party<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span> when they elected
-Andrew Jackson; under the name of the Democratic party when they
-elected Thomas Jefferson. It was taught to rich and powerful England
-when she lost a continent in 1776; it was taught to Anglo-Saxon England
-when Charles I. lost his head; it was taught to France when the
-long-suffering peasantry and poor broke down the barriers of &#8220;caste,&#8221;
-and flooded her fair fields with the tide of blood.</p>
-
-<p>It has been taught in every nation&mdash;Rome, Greece, Egypt. The people
-will suffer long and much, but the resentment occasioned by &#8220;caste&#8221; and
-social distinction far outweighs any advantages that money can buy them.</p>
-
-<p>November 8, 1892, showed that the workmen couldn&#8217;t be bought, the
-farmer couldn&#8217;t be bought, the veteran couldn&#8217;t be bought, the negro
-couldn&#8217;t be bought, by all the fair promises held out by the party
-of Protection, because this cup of nectar was poisoned by the deadly
-essence of &#8220;caste,&#8221; which means extinction of all that the people
-hold dear. Should the Democratic party create, cause, or have arise
-under its administration, and become attached to that party, any set,
-or &#8220;caste,&#8221; claiming any superiority over their fellow-citizens, the
-Democratic party would be killed, though the eternal sun might never
-shine again upon America should that party be defeated. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>The purpose and object for which this book is written is not for the
-instruction of the people as to how they <i>are</i> to do, but it is, if
-possible, to put notes to the music that has been singing in the hearts
-of the Common People,&mdash;for we are all Common People. That song which
-echoes our own sentiments, even though we cannot sing the song, is
-always the sweetest. The man who tells the story we have thought and
-felt, is the greatest writer to us. Dickens is dear to the hearts of
-us all because he echoes and puts in words the sentiments of our own
-souls. If this book tell, in words, that which has been throbbing in
-the breasts of the people, it but articulates that which they have
-spoken silently for themselves. The author is one of the people, but he
-has felt what he believes others have felt. The book is not intended
-to aid or to harm either the Democratic or the Republican party. The
-writer is a supporter of <span class="smaller">ANY</span> party, call it what you will,
-that represents the <span class="smaller">BEST INTERESTS</span>, <span class="smaller">THE HONOR</span>,
-<span class="smaller">DIGNITY</span>, <span class="smaller">VIRTUE</span>, of <span class="smcap">Americans</span> and American
-homes.</p>
-
-<div class="center"><div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
-<div>&#8220;Is there, for honest poverty</div>
-<div class="i1">That hangs his head, and a&#8217; that;</div>
-<div>The coward-slave, we pass him by.</div>
-<div class="i1">We dare be poor, for a&#8217; that;</div>
-<div>For a&#8217; that, and a&#8217; that,</div>
-<div class="i1">Our toil&#8217;s obscure, and a&#8217; that,</div>
-<div>The rank is but the guinea&#8217;s stamp;</div>
-<div class="i1">The man&#8217;s the gowd for a&#8217; that.</div>
-</div><div class="stanza">
-<div><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span>&#8220;What though on homely fare we dine,</div>
-<div class="i1">A prince can make a belted knight,</div>
-<div>A marquis, duke, and a&#8217; that;</div>
-<div class="i1">But an honest man&#8217;s aboon his might</div>
-<div>Guid faith he manna fa&#8217; that,</div>
-<div class="i1">For a&#8217; that, and a&#8217; that,</div>
-<div>The pith o&#8217; sense and pride o&#8217; worth</div>
-<div class="i1">Are higher ranks than a&#8217; that.</div>
-</div><div class="stanza">
-<div>&#8220;Then let us pray that come it may,</div>
-<div class="i1">As come it will for a&#8217; that,</div>
-<div>That sense and worth, o&#8217;er a&#8217; the earth,</div>
-<div class="i1">May hear the gree, and a&#8217; that,</div>
-<div>That man to man, the world o&#8217;er,</div>
-<div class="i1">Shall brothers be for a&#8217; that.&#8221;</div>
-</div></div></div>
-
-<h3>FOOTNOTE:</h3>
-
-<p><a name="Footnote_1_1" id="Footnote_1_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_1">[1]</a> This story has frequently been related, verbally, but the
-Author has never seen it in print. Its authenticity, however, is fully established.</p>
-
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="center"><a name="i032.jpg" id="i032.jpg"></a><img src="images/i032.jpg" alt="GROVER CLEVELAND" /></div>
-
-<p class="bold">GROVER CLEVELAND.</p>
-
-<p class="bold">Selected by the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; November 8, 1892,<br />to Represent the
-Interests of the Masses<br />against the Classes.</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2><span>CHAPTER I.</span> <span class="smaller">VOX POPULI, VOX DEI.</span></h2>
-
-<p>The voice of the people, is indeed, the voice of God, and in grand and
-tremendous tones has that voice resounded through the land. The 8th of
-November, 1892, will long be remembered in the history of our country
-as one which stands in the annals of time as a monument to the might
-of the people, upon which might be carved in letters of everlasting
-durability, &#8220;Do not tread on me.&#8221; The tidal wave, so often referred to
-by the newspapers, has come with unexpected momentum, washing aside the
-puny politicians as thistledown on the mighty stream of the Mississippi.</p>
-
-<p>That mirror of public opinion, so generally correct, so apt to be
-accurate, is absolutely stupefied by the tremendous character of the
-uprising of the people. Even those who fondly hoped for victory,
-among the Democratic journalists, stand in reverential awe before the
-stupendous results so noiselessly and irresistibly effected by the
-masses. They vainly seek, like one bereft of sight, for the delusive
-cause of this great outpouring of Democratic sentiment. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>That most preëminent and respectable organ of mugwump principles,
-the New York <i>Times</i>, of November 9, 1892, sounds the praises of
-Cleveland and his popularity as the cause; which is pardonable, as the
-<i>Times</i> has consistently closed its eyes before the blinding light of
-Cleveland&#8217;s preëminence and brilliancy, and refused to see anything
-else or any other issue in the campaign, arguing that by the magic of
-the one word, &#8220;Cleveland,&#8221; victory could be attained. Its leader on
-the result of the people&#8217;s resentment to the crime of &#8220;caste&#8221; in our
-country, is a sounding eulogy upon Cleveland, with here and there a
-glimmer of light breaking upon the vision.</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;Meanwhile the victory of Mr. Cleveland is the most signal since
-the re-election of Lincoln in the last year of the war for the
-Union.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>It is noticeable in this paragraph that Cleveland&#8217;s preëminence so
-overshadowed, in the mind of the <i>Times</i>, Lincoln, that the prefix
-of &#8220;Mr.&#8221; is used before Cleveland&#8217;s name, while just plain &#8220;Lincoln&#8221;
-is good enough for the man who preserved the Union. One would hardly
-expect, therefore, that the <i>Times</i> would do more than shout the
-praises of Cleveland, and give no credit to the sense of the people for
-their victory. Quoting from their article:&mdash;</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;The nomination of Mr. Cleveland was dictated by the general
-sentiment of the party,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span> inspired wholly by confidence in his
-integrity, purity, firmness, and sound sense. It was unaided by
-any organization, promoted by no machine, advocated by no literary
-bureau, appealed to no base passion. * * * * * * His election is
-due to the recognition by hundreds of thousands of sound-hearted
-American citizens, who had not before acted with the Democratic
-party, that under his guidance, with its avowed policy, that
-party was a fit depository of the powers of the Government. It
-is, moreover, preëminently a victory of courage and fidelity to
-principle. The Chicago Convention, in taking Mr. Cleveland as its
-candidate, planted itself firmly on the ground of principle.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>It is perfectly plain to be seen that, from a source where the wreath
-of victory dangles, inscribed with but one word, and that &#8220;Cleveland,&#8221;
-one could hardly expect to find information as to the cause that
-brought about this revolution in the minds of the people. Not that
-there is any objection to the praises of Cleveland, because all that
-they say of him is believed by thousands throughout the country, and
-the same thing is believed to be true of thousands of other men whom
-the Democratic party might have nominated. Horace Greeley, could he
-have been taken from his tomb and reanimated, would just as surely
-have been elected upon the Democratic ticket, had the people believed,
-as they did, that that ticket represented that &#8220;caste,&#8221; moneyed
-aristocracy, to which they were bitterly in their heart of hearts
-opposed. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>The New York <i>World</i>, controlled by one of the brightest, keenest, and
-shrewdest of men in the journalistic field, in an excellent editorial
-of November 10, 1892, proceeds to tell what the victory means. And one
-sentence particularly would be significant, if followed by a little
-definition of &#8220;plutocracy.&#8221; Were this word significant enough to cover
-the objectionable features of the peculiar kind of &#8220;caste&#8221; which had
-become identified with the Republican party, it would be sufficient,
-but such is not the understanding of the word.</p>
-
-<p>New York <i>World</i>, November 10th: &#8220;The President elect is the very
-embodiment of conscientious caution. He is preëminently conservative.
-His administration will mean economy, reform, retrenchment in every
-branch of the Government. The victory does mean putting a stop to riot,
-extravagance, profligacy, and corruption.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>Few, very few, men who voted the Democratic ticket believe that there
-had been corruption, profligacy, under the Republican administration.
-The people were not directly affected by the aforesaid charges. The
-victory did not mean that.</p>
-
-<p>The people are no longer political drones; they are thinking men, moved
-by sentiments and forces which have not as yet been explained by the
-most laborious newspaper articles written in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span> the heat of the campaign,
-actuated in many cases by partisan interests, party journalists,
-aristocratic tendencies, and political affiliations. Each would see
-only his side of the party shield, and that was sure to be golden.</p>
-
-<p>Mr. Cleveland, in his speech at the Manhattan Club, New York,
-commenting on this fact, states: &#8220;The American people have become
-political, and more thoughtful, and more watchful than they were ten
-years ago. They are considering now, vastly more than they were then,
-political principles and party policies, in distinction from party
-manipulation and distribution of rewards for political services and
-activities.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>The reason for this is obvious. The country has been flooded of late
-years with newspapers, brought down to a nominal price; the people
-have read them thoughtfully; have written to them for explanations
-of difficulties and doubts arising in their minds, and have profited
-by these explanations. They have seen paraded in the newspapers the
-exhibitions of the pride of &#8220;caste&#8221;; they have seen chronicled the
-doings of the American Duchess with her divorced duke; they have
-learned to hate that which the Republican party would have preached
-to them as the source of all their happiness and prosperity. The
-Republican party, viewing it only as a means whereby fortunes were
-accumulated, espoused the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span> principles which created a desire in the
-minds of divorced dukes, puppified lords, and degenerate descendants of
-English nobility, from cupidity, to marry America&#8217;s fair daughters. The
-cheapness of the newspapers placed within the reach of the poorest the
-information upon which he based his faith. The penny paper is the great
-leveler of the land.</p>
-
-<p>The New York <i>Herald</i>, of November 13th, commenting on the recent
-election, takes a biblical text as its theme: &#8220;Then were the people of
-Israel divided into two parts. Half of the people followed Tibni and
-half followed Omri; but the people that followed Omri prevailed against
-the people that followed Tibni: so Tibni died and Omri reigned,&#8221; and
-says:&mdash;</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;In those days, questions in dispute were settled by pitched
-battles. In these modern times, the arbitrament of war has become
-wellnigh obsolete, and national policies are decided by ballots
-instead of bayonets. We doubt if the history of the world records
-a spectacle as inspiring or instructive as that presented by the
-American people on Tuesday last, when by an orderly revolution
-they sent one class of political ideas to the rear, and another
-class to the front. The party leaders on both sides may have gone
-into the conflict for personal emolument, or some advantage for
-their followers, which is scarcely concealed under the words,
-&#8216;Patronage and Purposes,&#8217; but the body of the people were the
-rank<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span> and file&mdash;the merchant, mechanic, artisan, and farmer; they
-cast their votes for the greatest good to the greatest number,
-because the prosperity of the whole means the prosperity of each.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>In other words, 65,000,000 people have made themselves acquainted with
-the principles which underlie their government; have learned, through
-innumerable newspapers, which fall on hill and prairie as thick as
-snowflakes in December, the value and effect of the differing national
-policies, and on election day, expressed an intelligent and honest
-opinion.</p>
-
-<p>In his work on &#8220;The American Commonwealth,&#8221; James Bryce put the matter
-in terse and brilliant language, as follows:&mdash;</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;The parties are not the ultimate force in the conduct of affairs.
-Public opinion&mdash;that is, the mind and conduct of the whole
-nation&mdash;is the opinion of the persons who are included in the
-parties, for the parties taken together are the nation, and the
-parties, each claiming to be its true exponent, seek to use it for
-their purposes. Yet, it stands above the parties, being cooler
-and larger-minded than they are. It awes party leaders, and holds
-in check party organization. No one openly ventures to resist it.
-It is the product of a greater number of minds than in any other
-country, and it is more indisputably sovereign. It is the central
-point in the whole American policy.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>The people have spoken. Democracy is triumphant. Democratic principles
-have prevailed.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span> They are rooted in the hearts of the common people.
-The voice of God has spoken. To you, Mr. Cleveland, is entrusted a
-great task. You took the enemy in flank, you invaded his own territory;
-you put him upon the defensive, and the defence was unsuccessful, while
-his offensive operations against the Democratic stronghold crippled
-and embarrassed. You have the love of the American people. Nourish
-it; cherish it as the apple of your eye, and your name will go down
-into history, linked with the name of Jackson, Jefferson, and Abraham
-Lincoln.</p>
-
-<p>Mr. Thomas Dolan, a well-known manufacturer, of Philadelphia, told
-some plain truths in an impromptu speech at the Clover Club banquet in
-that city, shortly after the election. Some parts of it have become
-public. Mr. Dolan was asked, jokingly, why &#8220;it snowed the next day.&#8221;
-His answer had the pungent, incisive, trenchant quality characteristic
-of the man. &#8220;You ask me,&#8221; he said, &#8220;why it snowed the next day. If
-you want an answer, I will give it to you; but I must give it in
-plain terms, for I can speak in no other way. It &#8216;snowed the next
-day&#8217; because there was the most stupendous lying in this campaign of
-any that I have ever known. It has been said here this evening, that
-this was a campaign without personality and without mud-flinging. That
-may have been so in the treatment of candidates, but<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span> in reference
-to others, it was a campaign of shameless lying, vituperation, and
-calumny. The manufacturers of the country, some of those here to-night,
-were held up as thieves and robbers who are stealing what belongs
-to labor. The very men who are giving labor its employment, and are
-seeking to assure it good wages, were assailed and denounced as its
-worst enemies. The Democratic press was full of abuse of those who
-have done their best to build up the prosperity of the country. There
-never was more unscrupulous lying than there has been in the dishonest
-and demagogic attempt to array class against class, and it is because
-of this persistent lying, imposed upon the people for the time being,
-that &#8216;it snowed the next day.&#8217;&#8221; This is, of course, an explanation by a
-<i>representative</i> Republican, of Republican defeat.</p>
-
-<p>The New York <i>World</i>, of November 20th, gives a better explanation,
-though not a true one:&mdash;</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>Republican politicians are searching in all manner of
-out-of-the-way corners for the causes of their party&#8217;s defeat.
-They are carefully overlooking the actual cause which lies open to
-less prejudiced view. The Republican party was defeated because
-its politicians have strayed away from honest and patriotic
-courses. They have worshiped strange gods; they have allied
-themselves and their party with the plutocratic interests of the
-country; they have betrayed the people<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span> to the monopolists; they
-have sought to substitute money for manhood as the controlling
-power; they have tried to buy elections; they have squandered
-the substance of the country, in order that there might be no
-reduction in oppressive taxes, which indirectly, but enormously,
-benefit a favored class. The party is punished for its sins. It
-has forfeited popular confidence by its misconduct. It has ceased
-to deserve power, and the people have taken power from it.</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>Murat Halstead, a deep thinker, wielding a forceful pen, writing about
-the recent mistakes of the Republican party, says:&mdash;</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;There was too much &#8216;Tariff Reform&#8217; and too little attention
-to practical politics in the conduct of the recent Republican
-campaign. The mistakes of the Republican party were many. They
-attempted too much tariff reform and too much ballot reform and
-too much civil service reform, and strangely mingled too little
-and too great attention to practical politics. The high character
-of the Harrison administration was not of the &#8216;fetching&#8217; sort.
-There were strong and distinguished Republicans sharply opposed to
-another Harrison administration, in California, Nevada, Colorado,
-Kansas, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York,
-Maine, and several of the Southern States. In some States, there
-was grief because he did too much for Senators and too little for
-Representatives, and in others, the Senators suffered because the
-Representatives were especially recognized; and there were scores
-of personal irritations that were nothing in themselves, but in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span>
-the aggregate, became an element of mischief that was magnified
-into disaster. The ranks seemed solid toward the close of the
-campaign, but there were weaknesses, here and there, known to
-those whose information was from the interior. There were three
-things that seemed to give assurances of Republican success:
-First, the country was prosperous, and the economic value of
-protection seemed to be demonstrated, and nowhere more clearly
-than in the Homestead strike. Second, it was the testimony of home
-statistics and foreign news that the McKinley tariff was helping
-our workingmen, and had a powerful tendency to the transfer of
-industries to our shores, while the reciprocity treaties were
-aiding our manufacturers and food producers alike to new markets.
-Two of the grandest steamships on the Atlantic, one the swiftest
-ever built, were to hoist the stars and stripes and be transferred
-from the British navy to our own, and this was understood to be
-the dawn of an era of restoration of our lost strength on the
-seas. Third, President Harrison was revealed to the nation in
-his administration as a man of the highest order of ability, of
-industry that never wavered, and will that was unflinching and
-executive, while he was the readiest, most varied, and striking
-public speaker of his time. We have had no President with more
-influence with his own administration than he wielded. The
-Republicans have so long been accustomed to holding at least a
-veto on the Democratic party, that they could not be aroused to
-the full appreciation of the danger of giving that party the whole
-power of Government. The masses of men declined, in this<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span> fast
-age and rapidly-developing country, to be warned by the events
-of more than thirty years ago. The first surprise was public
-apathy. There were few displays. It was not a great summer and
-autumn for brass bands and torches. It was not a great year for
-newspapers. Those that largely increased their circulation did it
-outside of presidential excitements and political attractions. The
-second surprise was the immense registration. Then it was seen
-that comparative public quietude did not mean lack of interest.
-Everybody knew something was going to happen. Republicans were
-cheered, and said: &#8216;This means the quiet vote. The secret ballot
-is with us. Times are good. There&#8217;ll be a big vote, on the quiet,
-to let well enough alone. Harrison is a great President, and it
-is the will of the people that he shall continue his good works.&#8217;
-The Democrats said: &#8216;The secret ballot is with us this time.
-The workingman is dissatisfied. He gets more wages than he does
-abroad, but he holds that he is robbed of his share of the riches
-of the land, and the quiet vote is with us. The workshops are
-for a change.&#8217; There was much in what they said. The workingmen
-gave the Democrats New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Indiana,
-Illinois, and the election; but was there ever such a combination
-of antagonisms gathered into an opposition force, to carry the
-Government by storm, as that which the Democracy was enabled
-to make? Contrast the Democratic platforms of Connecticut and
-Kentucky. They are more flagrantly opposed to each other than the
-Minneapolis and Chicago papers. Connecticut is rankly Protection,
-and Kentucky<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span> rabidly Free Trade. Both are for freedom. The
-Democrats joined with the Populists in several States to give
-Weaver votes, and in other States terrorized, threatened,
-assaulted, and cheated his opponents.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Take the money matters; we find the Democracy are red dog, wild
-cat, rag baby, silver pig, or gold bug, according to the local
-demands. They are all for Cleveland, however. The very ferocity
-of the personal factions of the Democratic party in New York
-was converted into steam power to drive the Cleveland machine.
-There was emulation in his service, between his old friends and
-enemies; and the enemies of other days exceeded the friends in
-the competitive struggle. The Democrats who hoped he would be
-defeated, and there were many thousands of them, were the most
-particular of men to vote for him because they felt their future
-in the party depended upon their &#8216;record.&#8217; What they wanted was to
-be beaten in the &#8216;give-a-way game,&#8217; and they trusted to the last
-to be able to say: &#8216;There, you see how it is; we told you he was
-impossible. We&#8217;ve done all we could, and it is just as we said.&#8217;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;When the shriekers of calamity are able to harness the prosperity
-of the country and turn it against the Government; when the
-beneficiaries of a great policy turn against it and vote it down;
-when those who lick the cream of good times, hunger and thirst
-for experimental changes; when opposing interests and factions,
-principles and purposes, personalities and all the potencies
-of all the fads, can be united for a common purpose, there are
-surprises for citizens who have<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span> held in a commonplace way, but
-the unreasonable and inconsistent, the unwarrantable and the
-illogical, must also be the impracticable.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;It has been remarked of St. Petersburg, that in case of the
-occurrence of, first, a great flood in the Neva; second,
-extraordinary high tide; third, a long, strong blow from the gulf,
-the city must be overwhelmed. The years, the decades, and the
-centuries come and go without the disaster. It was long understood
-in the Ohio valley that there would be a flood beating all in
-history, and competing with Indian tradition, if there happened,
-in the order set down, these events: (1) during a wintry night,
-a sudden general rain, followed quickly by a freeze, covering
-Western New York and Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Kentucky, West
-North Carolina, Tennessee, Ohio, and Indiana with a sheet of
-ice; (2) if, upon this vast glassy surface, there should fall a
-series of heavy snows; (3) if, upon the snow, there should come
-rain, beginning near the Mississippi, which should be full and
-filling all the streams, locking them from the mouths against
-speedy discharge; (4) and if there followed rain-storms for a
-week, so distributed as to boom all the rivers in order from west
-to east; (5) culminating with three tremendous downpours over all
-the mountain regions, sweeping from the glazed earth the whole
-accumulation of snows, and so timed as to tumble all the floods
-at once into the Ohio, whose channel has been obstructed by the
-piers of many bridges, and a habit of encroaching upon it, then
-the river would make a demonstration memorable and marvelous.
-All this took place, just as we have<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span> set it down, five winters
-ago, and the high-water-mark at Cincinnati is seventy feet above
-low-water-mark. Up to this, the boast of the old folks in the
-valley was, that they had seen &#8216;the flood of &#8217;32,&#8217; and there could
-never be anything like it. The world did not now-a-days afford
-such spectacles as they had beheld in &#8217;32! A few dingy old houses
-had incredible high-water &#8217;32 marks upon it. If the river looked
-angry, and rushed through a few low streets, the veterans would
-say: &#8216;You should have seen the flood of &#8217;32. &#8217;Twas the biggest
-thing we ever had, or ever will have. But they do say the Indians
-said, they once hitched canoes to walnut trees away above the &#8217;32
-mark; but them Indians was such liars.&#8217; The flood of 1885 beat
-that of 1832 two feet, and the flood of 1887 was nearly seven feet
-above the old high-water-mark. Averaging the chances, it will not
-happen again for one hundred years. The river Rhine has a way of
-rising at the same time with the Ohio, and was higher in 1885
-than it had been in two hundred years. There was favoring the
-Democratic party this year, such a combination of circumstances as
-that which made an Ohio flood seem a prodigy. The high-water-mark
-is astounding. The country is still here. There is something to
-eat, and even to drink. Such a Democratic disaster will not be due
-again for a generation.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>John Russell Young, the brilliant journalist, writing in the
-Philadelphia <i>Evening Star</i>, quoted by the New York <i>Press</i>, of
-November 19th, has his explanation for the defeat ready: &#8220;Communities<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span>
-are like men, like women, like children, like dogs. Why do they do it?
-Why does a man buy wildcat stocks? Why does a woman rave over a bonnet,
-or marry a student of divinity? Why? Because we are more or less fools,
-even as the good Lord made us fools, and if we were not fools, it would
-be a teasing, tiresome world. Why does a boy go to bed as cross as
-the roaring forties after his Christmas dinner? He has had too much
-mince pie. The country has had too much mince pie. It kicks. It kicked
-after Quincy Adams, the best of all Presidents. It kicked after Van
-Buren, who was as downy as an Angora cat. It kicked after Arthur, whose
-administration was sunshine. It kicks after Harrison, the radiant,
-prosperous Government. Too much mince pie! Cleveland comes in because
-of his medicinal properties. We must take to our herbs now and then.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>The practical politicians of the Republican party feel it incumbent
-upon them to give their version of the great defeat. James S.
-Clarkson, who, for many years, has been a guiding spirit among
-Republican leaders, of the late verdict says: &#8220;It is an order from the
-American people for a change in the industrial economic policy of the
-Government.&#8221; He charges that the Republican party has lost strength
-and votes among the rich and among the people of independent<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span> means,
-who now want cheap labor; also among the workingmen, who have come to
-believe that free trade will cheapen the expense of living, while the
-Trades-Unions will still keep up their wages. He says: &#8220;The result is
-not a personal defeat of President Harrison, nor really a defeat of
-the party. It was a Protection defeat, a repudiation of high tariff, a
-Republican reverse in a field where it put aside all the nobler issues,
-and staked everything on economic and mercenary issues.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>The surprising overturn of affairs in the distinctly Republican State
-of Illinois is accounted for by Senator Cullom by distinctive issues
-other than the McKinley and Force Bills: &#8220;Our losses in this State are
-mainly due to the school question, but in the nation at large they
-are due, in my judgment, to the passage of the McKinley law, and the
-impression in the minds of the masses in regard to it. When it was
-passed, the people expected us to revise the tariff, and revise it in
-the direction of reducing duties, and, while we did make reductions,
-they were dissatisfied because so many increases were made. When
-the bill came to the Senate from the House, we cut many of these in
-pieces, but, when it went back to the House and got into the Conference
-Committee, enough of them were restored to put us on the defensive
-and at a great disadvantage. Yes, I<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span> think our defeat can fairly be
-attributed to the McKinley Bill,&#8221; and Senator Cullom represents the
-State of Abraham Lincoln. The prairies that gave breath to the typical
-champion of the people, produced this statesman, who, representing
-the State of a man who stands first in the minds of the people as
-their representative, sees only the indications of the mercenary
-spirit of the people. How Abraham Lincoln would have gauged correctly,
-instinctively, the heart-throbs of the people whom he assumed to
-represent in the councils of the nation!</p>
-
-<p>Senator Cullom, in his opinion, mirrors only the reflection, cast upon
-the surface of his mind, by the aristocratic and multi-millionaired
-Senate of the Union, in which he occupies a seat. He sees only the
-cold, hard dollars and cents at issue.</p>
-
-<p>He does not appreciate, as Abraham Lincoln would have done, the
-feeling of the people whom he pretends to represent. In every prairie
-home of Illinois there was an insulted wife or mother by the assumed
-distinctions made by the would-be aristocrats of the Republican party.
-Stevenson&#8217;s speeches awakened no echo in their hearts, except that it
-gave an opportunity for the exhibition of the old, old story, written
-by the swords of the Anglo-Saxon people, &#8220;Caste is a crime.&#8221; That the
-State of all States, Illinois, which gave to the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span> Federal Union Abraham
-Lincoln, should be presented in the sedate Senate of the Union, by a
-man whose views are so narrowed by the horizon of his own thoughts as
-to express a sentiment like the foregoing; namely, that the people
-were governed in their selection of their representative, the Chief
-Magistrate, by the power of the pocketbook; to be so unresponsive to
-the throbbing hearts of his constituency, is most disappointing.</p>
-
-<p>Editors can be at times epigrammatic, and this election has brought
-forth some keen and trenchant opinions on the causes of defeat.
-Here are a few of them. All of them seek, as a child playing
-blind-man&#8217;s-buff, in darkness, for that which, had the bandage which
-blinds them been removed from their eyes, would have been made plain,
-and which was occasioned by their own presumption in assuming to
-measure the depths and power of the people&#8217;s feelings and impulses:&mdash;</p>
-
-<p>Clark Howell, in the Atlanta <i>Constitution</i>, says: &#8220;Now, after
-thirty-one years, since Buchanan&#8217;s Democratic administration, another
-political revolution has taken place, and, as a result, the election
-of 1852, which destroyed the Whig party, is repeated in the Waterloo
-defeat of the Republican party, and the question is, will this defeat
-finish the career of that party? The probability is that it will.&#8221; </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>The Atlanta <i>Constitution</i>, of November 17th, in a brisk editorial,
-states that &#8220;Colonel J. B. McCullagh, the esteemed editor of the St.
-Louis <i>Globe-Democrat</i>, is not very happy. Naturally, he has his
-regrets and his hours of gloom, but he is not so miserable that he is
-unable to appreciate a mystery that crosses and recrosses his path in
-broad daylight. He cannot, for instance, understand the post-mortem
-talk of his party leaders. &#8216;Curiously enough,&#8217; he says, &#8216;they are now
-claiming that Harrison was defeated by the very things which they then
-said must insure his success.&#8217; Of course, these statements have a
-humorous twang, but it seems to us that a Republican as prominent as
-Colonel McCullagh would be willing to drop a veil over these gibbering
-evidences of human frailty. After all is said, there is but one trouble
-with the Republicans. They have but one regret. Editor Grubb, of
-Darien, outlined the situation very aptly when he said that the only
-thing that the Republicans desired, was the opportunity to steal a
-State. They are perfectly willing to see Harrison defeated; they are
-perfectly willing to retire from the control of the government; the
-only bitterness they feel is the realization of the fact that they
-failed to steal a State. They stole three Southern States in 1876.
-They stole two Northern States in 1890, and they stole a Western State
-last year, but they have failed to steal a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span> single one in 1892. It
-is no wonder they are going about talking wildly and rolling their
-eyes. These are the symptoms of paresis, and, under the circumstances,
-Senator McCullagh ought to forgive them. The grief and disappointment
-of the Republican leaders are natural; a general election, and not a
-State stolen! Surely, their hands have lost their cunning. They made a
-tremendous effort to keep up their record. They tried to steal Delaware
-and West Virginia and Connecticut, but everywhere the Democrats met
-them and exposed their plans. The result was, that they failed to steal
-even one State. Under the circumstances, we think editor McCullagh
-should treat his brethren gently; he should not make satellite
-allusions to their troubles. Let them gibber.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>Thank God, with our Australian Ballot system, each free-born
-American citizen carries with him into the voter&#8217;s booth, if he
-be at all sensitive, and clothed with an enlightened conscience,
-the same awful sense of responsibility with which the enlightened
-and tender-conscienced Catholic enters the sacred realm of the
-confessional-box. Tremendous issues are at stake. He feels their force,
-and arises to the occasion, as he ever has done when the exercise of
-worth, virtue, or virility has been required upon his part, and of the
-great mass of the common people, Daniel Webster,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span> Henry Clay, Abraham
-Lincoln, furnish fair samples of the people&#8217;s worth, virtue, and
-virility.</p>
-
-<p>The Buffalo <i>Commercial</i>, than which there is no paper in the State of
-New York in possession of more perspicacity and political common-sense,
-in speaking of Senator Allison, a Republican leader of the Senate,
-states that just before leaving for Europe he intimated that the
-McKinley Bill was too strong a specific for the Republican party. &#8220;You
-remember,&#8221; he said, &#8220;that epitaph on the tombstone of the young man who
-died before his time: &#8216;I was well; medicine made me ill, and here I
-lie.&#8217;&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>The Illinois <i>State Journal</i> remarks: &#8220;Until the post-mortem is held,
-it is, perhaps, just as well not to be certain what it was that hit
-the G. O. P. last Tuesday. It may have been the McKinley Bill, or the
-Homestead matter, or the Lutheran business, or the naturalized vote,
-or several other things, and then it may have been a complication of
-all these diseases.&#8221; Thou wise physician, who would lose sight of the
-most important evidence of the disease, the discontent of the people,
-the artificial class distinction created by the sham aristocracy of
-America, the diagnosis of the disease, called discontent, as made by
-the press generally, is as faulty and erroneous as would be the opinion
-of the quack who would call measles, smallpox. Every symptom of the
-displeasure of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span> the people at the prevalence of the crime of &#8220;caste&#8221; in
-our country was evident; yet, apparently, the most learned failed to
-discern it.</p>
-
-<p>The Toledo <i>Bee</i> says: &#8220;The Republican party is dead. The step backward
-has been taken, and it was a step back that led the party over the
-precipice of power into the depths of oblivion. The Democratic party
-has relegated the boodlers, the spoilsmen, and the factional leaders to
-the rear. What is there left for us to live for?&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>Says the Louisville <i>Courier-Journal</i>: &#8220;The people will have none of
-its high tariffs, and none of its Force Bills; but without its high
-tariffs and its Force Bills, it is only an organized hunt for official
-plunder. The people will not support it in its old course, and will not
-believe its brittle promises of reform.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;&#8216;High tariff did it,&#8217; said Mr. Harrison; but in taking satisfaction
-for his defeat out of the Napoleonic McKinley, the President is less
-than just to the magnetic Blaine; for, if high tariff caused the
-explosion, despite the &#8216;reciprocity attachment,&#8217; what might it not
-have done without that little Pan-American vent-hole?&#8221; This from the
-Philadelphia <i>Record</i>.</p>
-
-<p>The President, had he combined the magnetism of Blaine, the Napoleonic
-ability of McKinley,&mdash;yea, had he, in fact, borne the magical name of
-Lincoln,&mdash;could not possibly have been re-elected,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span> for the people were
-opposed to the ideas of &#8220;caste,&#8221; fostered with such care by the members
-of the Republican party, in whom, in some mystical manner, have become
-concentrated the wealth and objectionable characteristics which tended
-to make the Southern cavalier so unpopular in 1860. The people, in
-their wrath, would have risen against any party so besmeared with the
-slime of that noxious crime.</p>
-
-<p>The Atlanta <i>Constitution</i>, of November 17th, claims that &#8220;the leaders
-of the two great parties have had a good deal to say during the past
-few months about &#8216;the campaign of education.&#8217; In the main, this
-phrase very correctly describes the work of both parties. Republican
-speakers and journalists work night and day to convince the people
-of the benefits of high Protection. On the other hand, the Democrats
-are equally active in exposing the true inwardness of McKinleyism and
-class legislation. This educational literature covered the country,
-and the average voter got a clearer insight of the questions at issue
-than he ever had before. One effort of this campaign of education was
-to eliminate personalities; principles and measures were discussed,
-and the candidates escaped the usual mudslinging. Another result is
-seen in the sweeping and decisive nature of the vote. The revolution
-was so complete that the defeated side realized the utter absurdity<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span>
-of indulging in any bitter complaints, with the great mass of American
-people arrayed against them. Our victory was so crushing, that it
-absolutely restored something like good feeling; and we find Whitelaw
-Reid and Chauncey Depew saying pleasant things to Mr. Cleveland at a
-banquet, and speaking of their defeat in a humorous fashion. This would
-not have been the case, had the election been close and only a bare
-majority of electoral votes for the successful ticket. Altogether, the
-country has good reason to be satisfied with its campaign of education.
-It has purified our politics, wiped out sectional lines, and made our
-people more thoroughly American than ever.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>And for the erasure of sectionalism, God be thanked! but that a man of
-Mr. Clark Howell&#8217;s preëminent ability should have wandered around so
-near to the object of his search, the cause of the Republican party&#8217;s
-defeat, and not found it, is astonishing. In his own home, the State of
-Georgia, the Empire State of the South, and as editor of the leading
-paper in the State, that he should be so oblivious to the fact that
-the election, by the votes of the people, was a protest upon the part
-of the people against the assumption by the rich, that such a thing as
-&#8220;caste&#8221; could be possible in America.</p>
-
-<p>Georgia, of all the Southern States, is preëminently industrial.
-Oglethorpe, when he first<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span> settled on the banks of the Savannah river,
-was himself surrounded by the poor debtors of England. The Salzburgers,
-who sought the shores of the uninhabited, uncivilized, new colony, were
-poor, uncultured people. Georgia never possessed, as a colony or as a
-State, the aristocratic tendencies of its neighbor, South Carolina. The
-foremost men have ever been essentially of the people; her settlers
-largely of the Democratic masses; the names preëminent in her history
-are the names of industrial New England. So Democratic is and was the
-State of Georgia, that her most eminent son, Alexander H. Stevens,
-had to be weaned away reluctantly from the doctrine of which Abraham
-Lincoln was the personification. Since the war, the State of Georgia
-more readily adapted herself to the new condition created by the result
-of the struggle. It was never a State of tremendous landed proprietors.
-The influx of emigration from the crowded Northern States found readier
-assimilation in the State of Georgia than in any other Southern
-State. In that State, the negro sooner realized his responsibilities
-as a citizen of the South, sooner became convinced that his best and
-wisest course was to merge himself into the large class of toilers and
-laborers in the commonwealth. That a man with the opportunity, ability,
-and brilliancy of Clark Howell, should become so utterly befogged by
-the mists<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span> arising from the marsh of old party cries and principles,
-should fail to recognize that the tremendous majority accorded the
-Democratic candidate, was but an exhibition of that spirit which has
-pervaded the State of Georgia from its embryonic existence on the
-Savannah river; that Mr. Howell should have forgotten the lesson taught
-by the forefathers of the Georgians of to-day, that Democracy was one
-of the essential elements to the happiness of the citizens, settlement,
-colony, commonwealth, and State, is passing strange. The very negro,
-upon becoming a Georgian and a citizen, became a Democrat, almost as
-a matter resulting from the atmosphere he breathed. Georgia&#8217;s vast
-majority for the Democratic nominee was not rolled up except by the
-aid of the negro, who, in his heart of hearts, is a Democrat, and the
-appeals of the Republican party to his gratitude, claiming that they
-were the emancipators of his race, were as futile as was the waving of
-the bloody shirt in the face of the veterans of the North. The negroes
-of the State of Georgia joined with their fellow-laborers of the
-Anglo-Saxon race, to give added weight to the opposition of the masses
-against &#8220;caste&#8221; in our country.</p>
-
-<p>The <i>Mail and Express</i>, in an editorial of November 9th, says:
-&#8220;If Benjamin Harrison is defeated, the people of this country, by
-their<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span> ballots yesterday, decided again to try the experiment of the
-Democratic administration. It is most extraordinary and unusual for
-the American people to seek a change in administration at a time of
-unwonted prosperity; to render a verdict in favor of a change, while
-the working masses are everywhere busily employed, while farmers are
-reaping their richest harvests, factories running day and night, and
-building extensions and our foreign trade growing with rapid strides,
-all under the beneficent influences of Republican policy, wisely and
-faithfully administered by a President whose conduct of affairs has
-been conspicuously conservative, successful, acceptable, and clean.
-If Grover Cleveland has been elected, a change in administration has
-been ordered. What shall we get in return? We shall see! The triumph
-of Democracy would mean a radical change in our economical policy. It
-would mean the selection for Vice-President of a man whose political
-record has stamped him as unsafe, untrustworthy, and conspicuously
-unfit for the high office to which he has been called. An ardent
-advocate of the unlimited issue of greenbacks and fraudulent silver;
-a bitter opponent of National Banks, and the advocate of State Banks
-issue; outspoken in his demand for the imposition of the abandoned
-and inquisitorial income tax, Mr. Stevenson would, after the 4th of
-March, occupy a place<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span> separated from the Executive head of this
-Government by the frail tenure of a single life. In the Senate, the
-highest legislative body in the land, over which Mr. Stevenson, as
-Vice-President, would preside, a Senate which may possibly have a
-Democratic majority, his influence in favor of economic and financial
-heresies would be potential. Let the people bear in mind the peace,
-the happiness, and the prosperity they now enjoy. When anxiety and
-unrest come, as they speedily would, with the renewed agitation in
-the next Congress, of an attack upon our protective tariff; when the
-spindles of our mills are silent, the forges black with ashes, our
-looms yellow with rust, and unemployed men clamor here as they are
-clamoring to-day in the streets of London and Lancashire against the
-reduction of wages, let them listen to the plausible excuses and
-fine-spun prevarications of the Free Trade tariff reformers, who will
-be responsible. And if, as Vice-President, he should do the evil he can
-do by aiding the meddlers with our financial and taxation systems, the
-honest money men of New York and New England, of Illinois and Indiana,
-who voted for him because he was associated with their idolized free
-trade candidate, would have only themselves to thank for the prospect
-of disaster and panic they might face. They would then pay the penalty
-of their reckless inconsideration. Protection<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span> for American homes, for
-American workingmen and American farmers, an honest dollar for honest
-men, and a policy of free trade extension by the beneficent influences
-of reciprocity, may all suffer assaults in the four years to come,
-but we can trust the sober, second judgment of the American people,
-in the light of another but recent experience with the free trade and
-fraudulent silver Democracy, to do again in 1896 what it did with that
-party at the close of the first Cleveland experiment, and turn the
-incompetents out.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>It <i>is</i> most extraordinary and unusual for the American people to seek
-a change in the administration at a time of unwonted prosperity, but
-the inward agitation of soul at the thought of great wrongs committed
-by a pretended beneficent party led to the revolution of &#8217;92, in very
-much the same manner as inward agitation on another subject brought
-about that which placed Abraham Lincoln in the Presidential Chair. The
-American workman is above the American dollar!</p>
-
-<p>The New York <i>World</i>, in an editorial of November 16th, says: &#8220;The
-<i>Iron Trade Review</i> is putting the manufacturers up to a dodge in order
-to make the people sorry that they voted for Mr. Cleveland. Its advice
-is that the manufacturers reduce the wages of their workingmen &#8216;to
-fortify themselves in advance in view of the increasing probabilities
-of destructive foreign competition.&#8217;<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span> Is this an indication of
-the kindly feeling entertained by the Protectionists for their
-workingmen? They have professed that their tax policy was maintained
-for the purpose of increasing wages. They have been charged with
-misrepresentation; and they are now advised by one of their organs to
-prove that the charge is true, by making the wage-earners suffer in
-order that revenue reform may become unpopular. Nothing could better
-show the dishonesty of the Protection claim that the tariff exists for
-the workingman. If that claim were true, the manufacturers would resist
-every tendency toward downward wages, instead of pushing them down in
-order to gain an advantage for themselves in a political controversy.
-The wages of labor are regulated by the supply and demand of the labor
-market, and the people who would cut down wages, not because they must,
-but because they want to revenge themselves for a Democratic victory by
-making the workingman suffer, are the people who have been insisting
-that the McKinley law repealed the law of supply and demand, and that
-they are the true and unselfish benefactors of the workingmen. Happily,
-the next President is a Democrat.&#8221; </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="center"><a name="i064.jpg" id="i064.jpg"></a><img src="images/i064.jpg" alt="JAMES B. WEAVER" /></div>
-
-<p class="bold">General JAMES B. WEAVER.</p>
-
-<p class="bold">Presidential Candidate of the People&#8217;s Party, 1892.</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2><span>CHAPTER II.</span> <span class="smaller">THE ALLEGED GENERAL DISCONTENT.</span></h2>
-
-<p>The workmen of our country, it is true, want better times, cheaper
-clothing, the doing away with trusts, and many other desirable changes;
-but far more than this, they feel the need of the absolute crushing
-out of the last vestige of &#8220;caste.&#8221; They at last realize that &#8220;caste&#8221;
-is a crime; and the common people have, at heart, no sympathy with
-criminals, and especially criminals of that class. The common people
-stay at home, work hard, and very seldom have need to &#8220;go to Canada,&#8221;
-or take a flying trip to Southern Europe. Their sins are mainly
-those of passion. At their best, they are kindly disposed to their
-fellows; but they are <i>human</i>. They feel a snub from their employer
-or employer&#8217;s son as keenly as their honest, hard-working wives and
-daughters feel the haughty stare and condescending patronage of Madame
-Cr&#339;sus and her bejewelled daughters. Here we offer our readers some
-explanations, given by the common, average American citizen, for the
-defeat of the Republican party at the polls on November 5th. The
-article is taken from the pages of the New York <i>Tribune</i>, November
-21,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span> 1892, the official organ of the Republican Vice-Presidential
-candidate, and therefore entitled to more than ordinary consideration.
-The article is headed &#8220;The General Discontent.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>It consists of talks with the people about the recent election in
-New York State and Vermont. It is, largely, the observations of a
-correspondent who has walked through the State, asking farmers and
-workingmen why they voted for Cleveland. Let it not be forgotten that
-Whitelaw Reid is the editor of this paper.</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;The politician who attempts to explain defeat is &#8216;crying over
-spilt milk.&#8217; The newspaper which tells &#8216;how it was done&#8217; is
-&#8216;whining.&#8217; The writer of a political obituary has hardly an
-enviable task. A defeated party is supposed to accept with
-philosophical resignation the rejection of pet policies, and with
-the calmness of the fatalist, tell itself that it &#8216;was to have
-been.&#8217; The reasons given for the result of the recent election
-are as numerous as there are differences in the minds of the two
-parties. Some say that the desire for free trade is the cause of
-the Republican overthrow. Others, that the thing that did it is
-the McKinley bill; others again, that the people want the &#8216;repeal
-of the Bank Tax law&#8217;; but to him that looks beneath the surface,
-there is ample evidence that the defeat of the Republican party is
-not mainly due to the &#8216;unpopularity&#8217; of its candidates, nor to the
-love which the people are said to bear for Grover Cleveland; not
-to the McKinley bill, nor to any &#8216;desire on the part of the people
-for free trade;&#8217; not because free silver is or is not wanted.
-Not through the &#8216;superb generalship&#8217; of the Democratic National
-Committee was a victory gained, nor was the battle lost through
-the &#8216;lamentable incompetency&#8217; of the Republican leaders. The chief
-cause of Republican defeat and Democratic victory is the modern
-tendency toward socialism.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;This statement by no means implies that the socialistic<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span>
-propaganda has taken a firm hold upon the citizen of the United
-States, or that its tenets have but to be sowed in American soil
-to bear an abundant harvest. The people have not subscribed to
-the mild doctrines of Henry George, nor to the more radical and
-incendiary plans of John Burns, nor do they place confidence
-in the ability or stability of the leaders of the &#8216;New Order
-of Things.&#8217; They have not the slightest desire to overturn
-existing government; the ravings of the Anarchists they repudiate
-altogether.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;But since 1873, on Black Friday, political and social conditions
-in the United States have been those of unquiet and discontent
-among certain thousands. The Greenback party then had its origin.
-It is within the last decade, however, that social discontent has
-manifested itself more markedly in the formation of political
-parties, all of which, according to the leaders of them, were
-destined to glorious futures, when the Democratic and Republican
-parties should be wiped out of existence.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;This unsettled state of affairs showed itself in the formation of
-the Greenback party, the Labor party, the Socialistic party, the
-Farmers&#8217; Alliance, and, finally in the People&#8217;s party.</p>
-
-<p class="center">THE RISE OF THE PEOPLE&#8217;S PARTY.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The true reason for the formation of the Alliance, or People&#8217;s
-party, in the North, West, and South, is not difficult to find.
-When the tide of immigration and settlement turned toward the
-great wheat and corn fields of Iowa, Nebraska, North and South
-Dakota, every natural condition was favorable to the growing of
-abundant crops, which brought the farmer a golden return for his
-labor. But beginning with 1884 the crops in many sections of the
-Northwest were failures. This unfavorable condition lasted until
-1890, when a great demand for cereals from Europe, and enormous
-crops harvested in America, turned the flood of prosperity back
-again to the farmer, who had for six years suffered because of
-poor crops. During these years of hard times the farmer had
-encumbered himself with numerous and necessary debts, so that
-the profits of the prosperous years of 1890 and 1891, as well as
-those of this year, have gone in payment of accrued<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span> interest
-and the liquidation, in part, of a vast mortgage indebtedness.
-After having been obliged to stint himself for several years,
-it is but natural that when a chance presented itself he should
-desire to surfeit upon the plenty, rather than be obliged because
-of his indebtedness to pay out the first money which had come to
-him from several years of toil to those whom he owed. It is but
-natural, too, under such conditions, that he should have embraced
-a project which, as he understood it, was to lift the burden from
-his shoulders and put it upon the back of the Government, to make
-money &#8216;easy,&#8217; and to render indebtedness not a hardship, but
-rather something which might be wiped out as easily as it could be
-incurred.</p>
-
-<p class="center">THE DISCONTENT IN THE EAST.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The result in Wisconsin shows clearly that the wounds received
-in the battle over the Bennet law had not yet healed, and the
-agitation over the repeal of the Edwards law is the cause of
-Republican disaster in Illinois; but no such issues as perverted
-the minds of Republicans in the Northwest, and in Wisconsin and
-Illinois, were matters of controversy in the old line Republican
-States of Ohio and New Hampshire.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The political veteran who has battled in these States for many
-campaigns is puzzled where to seek the cause of such overwhelming
-disaster. To cry &#8216;boodle&#8217; is to bring ridicule upon the party, but
-to give the McKinley bill as the only or main cause is to show
-only a superficial knowledge of the existing condition of affairs.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;To find out why the people voted as they did, one must ask
-them. It is they that have piled up these great majorities, and,
-seemingly, have repudiated Republican doctrines, and put the seal
-of disapproval upon what the Republican party believes has given
-this country unexampled prosperity. Let any man who believes
-that the &#8216;popularity&#8217; of Grover Cleveland, the demand for free
-trade, or any policy which is shown in the Democratic platform,
-other than that which embodies the general statement that the
-Democrats will give the country better times, is the cause of
-Republican defeat, ask the people why they voted as they did, and
-he will find that it is this tendency, unconscious and entirely
-undeveloped,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span> toward socialism which has given the Democrats
-victory. It is not permanent nor lasting, so far as it exists in
-seeming antagonism to Republican policies. In 1896 a cyclone of
-disapproving votes is just as likely to sweep over the Democratic
-camp as it has this year devastated the Republican stronghold.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;But it is one thing to make a statement, and another to prove
-it. In order to ascertain what it was that brought defeat to the
-Republican party, I took a trip through the States of New York and
-Vermont, and in five days interviewed several hundred laboring
-people and men who are in business in a small way in various
-mercantile pursuits, and who voice the opinion and sentiments of
-thousands in similar walks of life. Talk with many was profitless.
-They had nothing against President Harrison, nothing in particular
-that they knew of against Protection. They did not vote the
-Democratic ticket because they were impressed with the greatness
-of Mr. Cleveland, or with the soundness of his views, or with the
-policy of the party as presented in the Chicago platform. They
-said they wanted better times and more money. They wanted cheaper
-clothing, cheaper fuel, cheaper everything; but they wanted to
-sell what they had to sell, whether it be labor or goods, at the
-highest possible price. They did not, because they could not, deny
-that the country as a whole had grown vastly prosperous under
-Republican administrations.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;They were not sure that the McKinley bill or previous tariffs had
-had anything to do with the hard times which they declared exist.
-The laborer could not say but what the cost of store articles had
-decreased largely in the last quarter of a century. In fact, many
-of them could remember when articles of common consumption and
-use cost much more than they do to-day; while the products of the
-farmer and the stocks of the shopkeeper, so the farmer and the
-tradesman were obliged to affirm, were sold not many years ago at
-a lower price and with less profit than to-day.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The farmers acknowledge that perhaps the elements may have had
-something to do with poor crops, that the opening of the vast
-farming territory of the Northwest, and the inexorable enforcement
-of the law of supply and demand, may have had something of a
-disastrous effect upon the farmers of the East. But these were not
-looking for reasons. They did<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span> not want reasons. They did not wish
-to consider causes. They did not think that they and their affairs
-have anything to do with causes, effects, policies, or platforms.
-All they know is that times are bad&mdash;with them. All they want
-is better times. &#8216;Figures don&#8217;t prove anything,&#8217; they say. &#8216;We
-are hard up, and have been for years; we do not know what causes
-hard times, nor do we care, if the future only brings prosperity.
-The Republicans are in power, and have been since 1862, with the
-exception of four years; therefore, if they have not given and
-cannot give us better times, who can but the Democrats? We are
-going to try them.&#8217;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;This is what a part of that vote which gave the Democratic
-majority in New York thought. They would have voted just as
-readily for Populist, Prohibition, or Socialist candidates
-had they thought that any of these parties had the power to
-better their condition. But this element was not large enough
-alone to give Mr. Cleveland a majority in New York State. It
-was the smaller tradesman, the farmer, and the laborer. These
-are the ones, and such the element whose vote gave success to
-the Democratic party, and in voting thus they had no intention
-of rejecting any particular Republican, or of approving any
-particular Democratic policy.</p>
-
-<p class="center">AN EXAMPLE OF POPULAR REASONING.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;A tailor who lives in a little town not far from Albany, and
-whose entire stock in trade does not amount in value to the
-cost of one bolt of goods owned by his more fashionable brother
-who does business in Broadway, voted on November 8th his first
-Democratic ticket. I asked him why he did so, after having voted
-for four Republican candidates, and having all his life approved
-the Republican policy of Protection. He said: &#8216;I voted for Mr.
-Cleveland, not for anything Mr. Cleveland or the Democratic party
-have done, but rather for what he and his party have said they
-would do. Nor did I vote against Mr. Harrison because I do not
-like him, nor against the Republican party because it has always
-stood for Protection, but more with a view of making an experiment
-than anything else. I do not believe that times are good with a
-majority of people; I know they are not with me. This does not
-seem to be the day for the man who is in <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span>business in a small way.
-I don&#8217;t know anything about the condition of affairs in free-trade
-England, but I know that here we have Standard Oil trusts, a sugar
-trust, a rubber trust, and a trust in almost every line, and if a
-small dealer attempts to compete with a large dealer, the weaker
-man is crushed. The great clothing company, with its millions of
-capital, undersells me, and I am compelled to meet its prices or
-go out of business and get into something else.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;&#8216;All the business of the country seems to be getting into
-the hands of a few people and a few big corporations. I don&#8217;t
-like such a state of affairs. I don&#8217;t want to be crushed out
-of existence for attempting to compete with the millionaire
-clothing dealer. In order to live and conduct my business I must
-make a profit on my goods. I do not say that the tariff or that
-any Republican legislation is responsible for this condition of
-affairs. It may be that no legislation can eradicate the evil, but
-legislation certainly can prohibit trusts.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;&#8216;What I do know is that I, and such men as I am, cannot do
-business in competition with these combinations of capital. What
-I want is a living. In this I am not unreasonable; the world owes
-me a living, but I am willing to work and work hard to get it. All
-that I want is a fair chance. Maybe I made a mistake when I voted
-the Democratic ticket. Perhaps Protection is just what we have
-needed and yet need. Perhaps Free-Trade will make things better. I
-don&#8217;t know how this is, but when I voted I was willing to run my
-chances in order to find out. I am a Republican still, and if the
-Democrats cannot make things better I shall try to take life as it
-comes and do the best I can.&#8217;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;This is, in a measure, the reasoning of most of the smaller
-tradesmen. They want better times; they want centralization
-of capital done away with; they want trusts prohibited, and
-combinations of all kinds destroyed. They want more money, money
-more easily obtained, with a less rate of interest.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The intelligent laborer is giving much thought to the condition
-of himself and his fellows. He is as yet not enough of a student
-to dive into theories, to analyze policies; nor is he able, at
-the present, to plan for himself any legislation which shall
-better his condition. A group of laborers, some of whom worked
-on the railroad and some in the quarries, in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span> Washington County,
-acknowledged to me that they voted on the 8th of November, for
-the first time, the Democratic ticket. I was not able, after
-exhaustive questioning, to get from any one of them a reason
-why he had voted as he had done. The answer one gave me is the
-answer all gave: He wanted less hours of work, better pay,
-cheaper necessities. A boss of one of the gangs of quarrymen,
-a man who in his time had been a day laborer himself, a person
-of good, hard common sense, an out-and-out Republican, told me
-that, although the men under him had always before voted the
-Republican ticket, so far as he knew, yet at this election they
-had voted for Cleveland, more because they were dissatisfied with
-their condition, to a certain extent, and the Republicans were in
-power, and because the Democrats had repeatedly made the general
-statement that their policies would bring good times, when the
-laborer should work few hours for large pay, the necessities of
-life be much cheaper than they are to-day, and the luxuries of the
-rich taxed to support the general government.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;&#8216;I tried to reason with them,&#8217; said the boss; &#8216;but you might
-as well have tried to reason with a drove of mules, they are so
-stubborn. I told them they might better leave well enough alone;
-that the country had never been so prosperous as it was to-day;
-that wages were good, and that the cost of store articles had been
-steadily decreasing for years, and had never been so low as they
-were to-day. But no, they did not believe that; they did not want
-to believe it; they said they were overworked; that they were not
-getting good pay&mdash;although their wages have never been larger&mdash;and
-they want, well, I don&#8217;t believe any one of them can tell what he
-does want. They said the Republican party was in power and times
-were not good, and if the Democrats were able to make good times,
-why, they wanted them in power and would vote the Democratic
-ticket.&#8217;</p>
-
-<p class="center">OBSERVATIONS OF ONE WHO VOTED THE REPUBLICAN TICKET.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;A shoemaker in the town of Granville, Washington County, a good
-deal of a philosopher in his way, with plenty of good horse-sense
-showing in his rugged face, a man whose language was refined,
-and whose conversation showed him to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span> be a reader as well as
-a reasoner, gave me the best exposition of the causes of the
-Republican defeat that I have yet heard anyone make. &#8216;I am a
-Republican,&#8217; said he; &#8216;I always have been and I always shall be. I
-hoped the party would win, but yet when I talked with the people
-around this place, and in other towns which I sometimes visit,
-those people who do a great deal of thinking, and who vote as
-their reason, wrong or right, tells them to vote, I was mightily
-afraid the fight would go against us. I do not think very much
-of Anarchistic ideas, or of the theories of the Socialist, nor
-of the golden promises made by Weaver and the People&#8217;s party. No
-human being can ever make a paradise out of this world, and at no
-one time will everyone in it be satisfied and happy. This nation
-of ours has grown so rapidly, and there are so many foreigners
-here who have become citizens, and we print so many cheap and
-silly books, that I am not surprised that the Republican party was
-defeated. If a party of angels had made up the Government, the
-result would have been just the same. The same causes that led to
-Republican defeat in 1892 will overthrow the Democratic Government
-in 1896. Ever since the Greenback party was started, and ever
-since the Socialistic and the hundred other &#8217;istic&#8217; agitators have
-been telling the people how they are abused, how they are robbed,
-that the rich are growing richer and the poor poorer, everything
-has been in such an unsettled condition that I do not wonder at
-the result of the election. It could not have been otherwise.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;&#8216;I believe the Administration has been everything it should be;
-that General Harrison has been a splendid President; that his
-policy has been for the good of the people; but I don&#8217;t believe
-that the best man that ever lived, if he had been a Republican
-and in power, could have been elected to the Presidency of the
-United States this year. Up in all this section of the country,
-and throughout the State, for that matter, the man who had always
-before voted the Republican ticket in an independent way cast a
-Democratic ballot, more because he wanted to make an experiment
-than anything else. It is funny how unreasonable people are. They
-don&#8217;t sit down and calmly figure for themselves, but they jump
-at conclusions, and because with some of us times are hard, they
-don&#8217;t stop to think who or what is responsible.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span> I was talking
-with just such a man only the other day. He was hard up, so he
-claimed, but I know he has been doing business here ever since I
-can remember, and has always lived and looked and acted just about
-the same as he does now. He keeps a store. As near as I could get
-at it, he wanted to sell everything he had to sell at a good deal
-better price than it is fetching now, but he wanted everybody else
-to sell to him what stuff he wanted to buy a good deal cheaper
-than what he is paying for it now. He would not listen to me when
-I told him that that is what everybody else wants to do; to buy
-everything cheap and sell everything dear; but I told him that if
-people did not buy until they could get things at their own price,
-or sell until they could sell things at their own figure, it would
-take but a mighty little while for everybody to starve to death.
-He said he was going to vote the Democratic ticket just to see
-what would happen in the next four years.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;&#8216;Many of the quarrymen bring their boots here to be mended. They
-tell me they want more money and fewer work hours. They have not
-much of an idea how they are going to get them, other than that
-the Democrats have told them that if Cleveland was elected they
-would get what they wanted and everybody would be happy.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;&#8216;Therefore, they voted the Democratic ticket. But, I believe,&#8217;
-continued the shoemaker, &#8216;that after all this election will turn
-out mighty well for the Republican party. In the end, the new
-way of voting is going to help us. Before this the boss or the
-politician could take his men or his gang and vote them as he
-wished. Now this is, to a certain extent, changed. The half-way
-independent man who before was led to the polls and voted, goes
-to the polls and votes for himself. Before this he was part of
-the machine, gave election matters but little thought, and was
-enthusiastic only because others were so. Now, he must either vote
-blindly or he must think for himself, and in the end he is going
-to think it out and is going to do the right thing. He will then
-see that the Republican policy has been and is for his benefit;
-that it has contributed more than any other one thing to make this
-country great and prosperous, and the people happy and contented.&#8217;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;One of the head workmen in a Troy factory possesses<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span> similar
-ideas. He is a man of more than ordinary intelligence, and says
-that many of his acquaintances voted the Democratic ticket more
-because they were uneasy and wanted something, they did not know
-what, than because they had any particular liking for Cleveland
-and the Democracy, or dislike for Harrison and the Republican
-party. This opinion is held by many of the skilled workmen of
-the factories in both Albany and Troy, and in the smaller towns
-between New York and Plattsburg.</p>
-
-<p class="center">A FARMER&#8217;S REASONS FOR HIS VOTE.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;It was a more difficult matter to get any Republican farmer to
-acknowledge that he voted the Democratic ticket. One was finally
-found who admitted that he had.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;&#8216;What were your reasons?&#8217; I asked.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;&#8216;Well, I don&#8217;t know as I can exactly tell you,&#8217; he answered; &#8216;we
-have not had a very easy time of it, we farmers, for the last
-eight or ten years.&#8217;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;&#8216;But don&#8217;t you think,&#8217; said I, &#8216;that the opening of the farming
-lands in the West has a great deal to do with the decrease of farm
-values in the East?&#8217;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;&#8216;Well, perhaps so,&#8217; he replied. &#8216;It is hard for a man who is not
-a political economist and who doesn&#8217;t make a business of keeping
-track of such things to give any reason for the hard times, or to
-choose between the reasons given by Democrats and Republicans.
-So far as I know, the Republican party has always kept its
-promises made to the farmers. Since the McKinley tariff we have
-been getting better prices for our potatoes and other produce in
-Northern New York, for before, we had not been able to compete
-with Canada. Yet, we don&#8217;t make much of a living, even at this.
-You say that statistics prove that this country, as a Nation, is
-vastly more prosperous than any other, and that we are a good deal
-richer than we were ten years ago; yet I am not any better off,
-and most of the farmers around here are not any better off, and
-I made up my mind that if, as the Democrats promise, a change of
-Administration would make good times, why, I wanted a change; if
-Free Trade will make things better, I want Free Trade; if State
-banks will give us money, and more of it, I want State banks put
-on equal terms with<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span> National banks. If these changes are brought
-about, it may make things a good deal worse than they are now. At
-any rate, I am willing to try it. If I find that the Democrats
-have deceived me, in 1896 I shall vote the Republican ticket
-again.&#8217;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;These interviews show the state of mind among people who are
-enough in number to turn overwhelmingly a majority for either the
-Republican or the Democratic party. In them is ample evidence
-that the people whose votes defeated the Republican party are
-not dissatisfied with Republican administration of affairs. They
-do not charge that the McKinley bill, or that the financial
-or any other Republican policy is responsible for hard times,
-nor is there any testimony which can be taken as evidence that
-the &#8216;unbounded popularity&#8217; of Grover Cleveland or the (by the
-Democrats so called) broad financial and economic policy of that
-party, has brought about this sweeping victory. A talk with the
-independent voter shows, first, that there exists among the
-smaller tradesmen, among those whose votes turn the tide toward
-victory or toward defeat, dissatisfaction because, as they claim,
-they are unable to compete with combinations of capital; they want
-decentralization of capital, and trusts prohibited by law and the
-law enforced.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;A condition of affairs exists, the dissatisfied tradesman claims,
-in which he cannot earn a living. The Republican party was in
-power, and had been, with the exception of four years, for a
-quarter of a century, and while it possibly may not be responsible
-for trusts and for the centralization of wealth and capital, yet
-the tradesmen says, &#8216;I cast my vote for Cleveland and Democracy to
-make an experiment, the result of which I am willing to take the
-consequences of.&#8217;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The workingman was influenced to vote for Democracy more because
-he had been repeatedly told that all rich men and manufacturers
-are Republicans than for anything else. Capital, of late years,
-has been denounced so severely, and strikes, the cause of many
-of which are hard to determine, have of late been so frequent
-(fortunately for the Democratic party, because by these strikes
-Democratic speakers were able falsely to claim that they were
-caused by the attempt of the rich Republicans to crush the
-workingman, and because by the shortness of the campaign the
-Republicans were unable <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span>effectively to disprove these Democratic
-statements) that the Republican party, although its policy of
-protection was approved by the labor union leaders, has been in a
-measure handicapped.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The independent farmer voted the Democratic ticket because the
-prices of farm products are not up to the figure he thinks they
-should be, and because the Democrats have told him that their
-financial and economic policies, if carried out, will enhance the
-value of his farm products, give him the markets of the world, and
-greatly decrease the cost of the necessities of life, although he
-cannot disprove that this state of affairs does not exist to-day,
-almost wholly because of a protective tariff.</p>
-
-<p class="center">GREAT NUMBERS OF NEW CITIZENS.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;But there is another element, and one which always has and
-always will contribute to Democratic success. Naturalization was
-unusually large this year; the citizen of foreign birth is a power
-in the land and the Democratic party was felicitously named. There
-is something in the word &#8216;Democracy&#8217; which appeals strongly to
-the citizen of foreign birth. In this country &#8216;Democracy,&#8217; as
-applied to the Democratic party, signifies to them that have left
-their homes in Europe, a party of the people in contradistinction
-to plutocracy and to aristocracy, the party of wealth and the
-party of people of noble birth. That this has weight with a
-certain foreign element is conclusively shown in the statement
-made by several foreign laborers in Washington County. Their
-knowledge of things American is not sufficient for them to grasp
-the import of the policies advocated by either party, and hence
-it is that they vote for the party whose name means the most to
-them. From a talk with many of them I am convinced that it is a
-natural antagonism toward the party in power, a love for the word
-&#8216;Democracy&#8217; that caused not a few newly made citizens to vote for
-Mr. Cleveland. One of them told me that the Republican party was
-made up of bankers, of great manufacturers, of men who had formed
-combinations for the purpose of advancing the cost of necessities
-of life&mdash;the party, in fact, to which every one who has money
-belongs. In other words, that to be a Republican is<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span> to be a
-capitalist, and to be a Democrat is to be a man of the people:
-that by voting the Democratic ticket the power could be taken from
-the capitalist and put into the hands of the people, and that the
-people ruling the people would mean legislation which would give
-the greatest good to the greatest number.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;A talk with the people shows further that the Republican party
-is still very much in existence; that its defeat in this election
-does not mean a rebuke for anything that it has ever done, nor
-for any policy which it advocates, but it means that unless
-the Democratic party makes good the promise which it has given
-to bring about better times, it will meet with a defeat more
-overwhelming than that which overturned and shattered Republican
-hopes in 1892, and that the Democrats will not only lose the
-States which have gone from the Republican ranks this year, but
-that West Virginia, South Carolina, Alabama, and Louisiana will
-turn from their allegiance to Democracy, cast their vote either
-for a third party, for fusion, or for the Republicans, and for
-future years make what is now known as the Solid South nothing but
-a mournful Democratic memory.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>Through the whole of these interviews, when attention is directed to
-the subject, it becomes perfectly apparent that the thread of the story
-is the people&#8217;s objection to the prevalence of social distinction among
-them. It is half expressed in nearly every one of these interviews,
-while they hesitate to put it in words; possibly because they highly
-appreciate that as the motive that so powerfully moved them on November
-the 8th. And then again, because of their hesitancy in expressing their
-recognition, even, of the attempt on the part of those possessed of
-greater wealth, to assume social superiority of those less fortunate.</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2><span>CHAPTER III.</span> <span class="smaller">NOVEMBER 8, 1892.</span></h2>
-
-<p>November the 8th, 1892, will be noted, by the historian of the future,
-as a date constituting a milestone to mark the road and journey of
-struggling humanity. What July the 14th is to the French, July the 4th
-is, and November the 8th will be, to the American people.</p>
-
-<p>The surface of the waters of public opinion presented a peaceful
-appearance at the dawning of that autumn day, but beneath the tranquil
-surface there raged subterranean and powerful forces, moving the deep
-waters of public sentiment. The much-discussed &#8220;general apathy&#8221; was the
-silent, sullen wrath, dangerous in individuals as it is in the masses.
-The silent fighter is tireless and terrible. The people had ceased to
-be moved by oratorical effort, brass bands, and torchlight processions.
-They had become surfeited with argument upon the subject of Protection.
-The changes had been rung upon the effect of the passage of a Force
-Bill, until the people had become as accustomed to the beating of the
-flanges of the newspapers upon the rails of this somewhat attenuated
-subject, as a slumbering passenger on a railway train. In fact, the
-cessation of the clangor would have attracted<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span> more attention than the
-continuation of the monotonous drumming.</p>
-
-<p>The leading journal in the Force Bill camp had been that preëminently
-vigorous newspaper, the New York <i>Sun</i>. Under the guidance of the
-genius of the Hon. Charles A. Dana, the New York <i>Sun</i> had seized the
-most attractive, because the most novel, instrument of noise presented
-in this campaign of education. It had blown such vigorous blasts, that
-a large portion of newspaperdom, who regarded the opinions expressed
-by Mr. Dana as apt to be eminently reasonable, had joined in the
-chorus of the Force Bill farce, and created discordance and noise
-enough to have nauseated the masses with weariness of the subject. The
-pot-house politician, as well as his more exalted brother of the Fifth
-Avenue palatial political headquarters, was abashed and confused, by
-the fact that his efforts to arouse enthusiasm among the masses were
-utterly fruitless. They neither agreed with him nor disagreed with him.
-There was no room for argument. It was like the professional pugilist
-descanting on the beauties of the bruiser&#8217;s art to a Whittier, Holmes,
-or Longfellow; the subjects, upon which the politicians of all degrees
-and kinds had exhausted themselves, were not interesting.</p>
-
-<p>The issue before the people was sentimental. The detestation of the
-prevalence and growth of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span> a pretended and sham aristocracy, became the
-important and all-absorbing theme within their hearts. They heard the
-talk; they read the dissertations of learned editors, and while it was
-all, doubtless, the product of powerful brains, it was not the most
-important matter in the struggle to be decided that November morning,
-between the masses and an assumption of &#8220;caste&#8221; in free America.
-Mr. Thomas Dolan, at the Clover Club, in Philadelphia, in referring
-to the result of the election, had at least the candor to admit the
-cause of the Republican party&#8217;s defeat. Had he, and gentlemen of his
-doubtless aristocratic tendencies, realized the impression that their
-course of conduct was making upon the minds of the mass of the Common
-People prior to that eventful day, November the 8th, and had they
-taken warning by the signs of the times, had they believed less in the
-Burchard theory of Blaine&#8217;s defeat in &#8217;84, and more in the efficacy of
-the impression, prejudicing the minds of the people against Mr. Blaine
-and his party by that banquet,&mdash;which has been dubbed in political
-parlance, &#8220;the Belshazzar feast,&#8221;&mdash;they might have been forewarned. But
-those who have been, for the last thirty years, attempting to create
-an artificial order to govern society, &#8220;caste,&#8221; have become so puffed
-up by wealth, and blinded by the ever-narrowing view they are able
-to obtain from their assumed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span> exalted position, that they have lost
-sight of every other consideration; becoming absorbed in their own one
-overmastering emotion&mdash;love of money. Before this god of Mammon they
-had performed such obsequious service, that they imagined the only
-appeal necessary to make to the people, was the one so much paraded
-by the Republican press, <i>i. e.</i>, the advantage of Protection to the
-pocket of the poor man. Upon this day, November 8th, which was to
-decide, in no doubtful manner, the destiny of the nation with regard
-to its social life, in the silence, communing only with their outraged
-sense of the rights of man and the equality of all mankind, the voters
-sought the confessional-like closets in the booths, established by
-the introduction of the Australian system of voting. There was no
-hurrah, no noise, no violence, but a tremendous outpouring of men,
-filling every voting precinct in the land, creating a larger percentage
-of voters who exercise their right of franchise than on any former
-election ever held in America.</p>
-
-<p>As the hours of the day passed, some of the keen observers and astute
-party leaders began to realize that the existence of a general &#8220;feeling
-of apathy&#8221; had been more apparent than real; else what was the meaning
-of this outpouring of voters, who, silently and with determined, fixed
-certainty of purpose, sought to exercise their<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span> right as citizens?
-Even in those sections of the large cities where the wealthy reside,
-and in the back country, where it is difficult for the voter, often,
-to find the time, opportunity, and the means of getting to the polls
-on election day, it was the same story. The nation had been aroused in
-some magical and mysterious manner, which was beyond the expectation
-and prognostication of the politicians and party leaders. The people
-had taken the matter out of their hands. They had simply taken the ship
-of State into their own keeping, and the professional politician had to
-cling to the life-line in the wake thereof.</p>
-
-<p>Wonderment seized these gentlemen of supposed miraculous political
-perspicacity. They asked one another, by their silent and inquiring
-glances: &#8220;What does this mean? Is our occupation, like Othello&#8217;s, gone?&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>The people, regardless of their mistaken mouthing, like some massive
-Percheron horse, had taken the bit; and, regardless of all attempts
-at guidance, were exerting the strength which, when aroused, they
-possess, contrary to the expectations of the learned gentlemen of the
-political profession. When the sun went down, November 8, 1892, none
-were less able to predict the result of this tremendous uprising of the
-people than those who by their diplomacy had arrived at that position,
-so enviable in the minds of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span> petty politicians, Chairmen of various
-Campaign Committees. Chairman Carter might have exclaimed, with the
-drowning people at Johnstown, as he sank beneath the flood of indignant
-&#8220;Common People,&#8221; &#8220;Whence comes this water?&#8221; Chairman Harrity might well
-have been drunk and delirious, as the result of his own good fortune,
-for as surprising to him as to Chairman Carter was the existence of
-this slumbering volcano of indignation which had brought about the
-overwhelming success of the candidate who represented, in the minds of
-the people, the opposition to the growing aristocracy which had become
-engrafted upon the Republican party. Chairman Harrity might well have
-been dazed by the remarkable results of his own endeavors, had he not
-realized that his efforts had been incidental to, and not the cause of,
-the success of Cleveland.</p>
-
-<p>It is not presumed to criticise the conduct of the campaign as managed
-by the campaign committees of both sides. Their duties, without
-doubt, were performed in a most masterly manner. The organizations
-with which both committees worked with tireless energy to achieve
-success for their respective sides, cannot fail to impress even a
-very tyro in politics. It was, however, like two learned physicians,
-disputing over the disease of a patient, and both being in error; each
-applying established remedies that experience had taught<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span> him were
-efficacious in the disease he had imagined it to be; both equally in
-error because they had mistaken the complaint of the patient. To the
-average politician of the present day, Tariff Reform and Protection
-constitute the sum of all evils and diseases of the body politic.
-Like Dr. Sangrado&#8217;s instruction to Gil Blas, they have only two
-remedies: phlebotomy and plenty of hot water. And the astonishment
-expressed by them at the possible existence of some other disease
-and some other remedy, was productive of as much consternation as
-that in the breast of Gil Blas, at the result of the treatment of his
-patients at Valladolid. As the returns from the different States began
-to arrive at the headquarters of the different committees; as the
-result of the opinion of the people upon this momentous occasion (so
-fraught with disappointment to the aristocratic believers in &#8220;caste&#8221;)
-became apparent, surprise and astonishment were depicted upon every
-countenance; while, mingled with unalloyed delight in the breasts of
-the Democrats, and with mortification in the hearts of the Republicans,
-the same surprise and astonishment existed. That Illinois, a State that
-had sent over 200,000 men to fight under the Federal flag, and in which
-such large sums of pension money had been annually distributed to the
-disabled veterans for many years, should have been so unmindful and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span>
-heedless of the display of the time-honored and ensanguined garment,
-the &#8220;Bloody Shirt,&#8221; and the howling of the Republican press about
-Cleveland&#8217;s vetoes of pension bills, was simply outrageous to the minds
-of the stupefied Republican leaders.</p>
-
-<p>Could it be possible that their so often victorious shout of
-sectionalism, and constant address to the pocketbook of the veteran,
-had been relegated to the shadowy shelf of &#8220;innocuous desuetude&#8221;?</p>
-
-<p>They looked aghast at the result of the counting of votes in Indiana.
-That much-talked-of, recently-discovered Gas belt, in which had
-sprung up innumerable manufactories, whose workshops were filled with
-&#8220;Common People,&#8221; had failed to find an all-obscuring attraction in
-the glittering gold that the magnates of wealth had held out to them
-as an inducement to perpetuate the power of the rich and to increase
-those privileges and class distinctions that they fondly hoped would
-be accorded to them by the American people. Verily, like DeFarge, in
-Dickens&#8217; &#8220;Tale of Two Cities,&#8221; the workman of the manufacturers in
-Indiana had presumed to hurl the magical Louis piece back into the
-carriages of the wealthy, rejecting with indignation the attempt to
-bribe their honor, and their sense of the equality of man.</p>
-
-<p>The negro of Alabama, Georgia, and Virginia, upon whom these
-bondholders thought they had a mortgage, by their claimed procurement
-of his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span> emancipation, had, even in spite of his color, previous
-condition, and gratitude, joined with his fellow-citizens, the &#8220;Common
-People,&#8221; taking as the representative of those who had most benefited
-him and his race, the immortal Abraham Lincoln, a man of the &#8220;Common
-People&#8221;; and, by the negro&#8217;s vote, was added strength to the blow,
-struck by the white Democracy of the Union, at this arrogant assumption
-of that thing which the negro, along with the white man, had learned to
-hate and resent&mdash;the assumption of &#8220;caste&#8221; upon the part of any set of
-citizens in the United States of America.</p>
-
-<p>The wool-grower of Ohio, the home of the popular McKinley, added sorrow
-to the cup held to the lips of the would-be aristocrats. He no longer
-felt bound to bow his head before the advantages held out by the party
-of wealth. He preferred to take a little less for his wool, and a
-little more respect for himself, his wife, and children in the social
-world, where every landmark of equality was being washed away by the
-tide of aristocratic tendencies. The bewildered Republican leaders
-gazed with terror upon the transmogrified weapons with which they had
-waged war. The sword of steel, when held by the hand clad in a golden
-gauntlet, had become a weapon of straw. They murmured to one another:
-&#8220;If these weapons have failed us, in what shall we seek safety?&#8221; </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>Consternation was in the council of the great of that party who, for
-more than a quarter of a century, had controlled the legislation of
-the Republic, and by whom was created, in the minds of the people,
-the errors of social distinction and &#8220;caste&#8221; that have crept into the
-country. The Republicans, assembled at their headquarters, became more
-bewildered at each new piece of evidence of the disapprobation and
-rejection of those doctrines, the understanding of which they deemed
-such conclusive argument to the minds of the people. The oncoming storm
-had no centre. It was blowing in all directions of the Union. Illinois,
-Indiana, Ohio, even manufacturing Pennsylvania, were sending a
-horrible howling of destructive wind, which would sweep away all their
-carefully-prepared barriers. At the Democratic headquarters, no less
-was the degree of wonder stamped, though with joyous imprint, upon the
-faces of the party leaders. Could it be possible that Illinois had cast
-the majority of its vote for the leaders of the Democratic party, those
-standard-bearers against whom so much had been said to prejudice the
-mind of that great Soldier State, the home of Lincoln, the birthplace
-of the Republican party and of the Grand Army of the Republic?</p>
-
-<p>It was hard for the most hopeful to realize. Had the vaunted undoing
-of the Democratic party in the State of Indiana, the increase of
-the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span> manufactures, and the personal popularity of a President, one
-of Indiana&#8217;s chosen sons, been proved false and groundless? Had the
-negroes in Virginia, North Carolina, and Georgia joined the Democratic
-&#8220;Common People,&#8221; in spite of the promised covenant of their salvation,
-The Force Bill, and added to the majorities in those Southern States?
-Connecticut&mdash;much-protected Connecticut; could it be possible that she
-would increase the few hundred majority accorded to the Democratic
-candidate four years ago?</p>
-
-<p>All seemed so utterly out of keeping with the fondest hopes and
-expectations of the sagacious chieftains of Democracy, that incredulity
-was stamped upon every countenance. It seemed to be utterly beyond the
-comprehension of the wisest of the political world of both parties,
-that, possibly, they had been treating an unknown and unappreciated
-disease, the nature whereof they had failed to recognize. The result
-was not compatible with any established theory of either party. The
-people had evinced such utter disregard for all the old arguments and
-well-tried remedies, that it dumbfounded the physicians who pretend to
-minister to the wants of the nation. From such unsuspected quarters,
-and in such ridiculous proportions, had come the disapproval of the
-people, that all were at sea; some wrapping themselves in their own
-glory, proclaiming, like Cock<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span> Robin, &#8220;I did it, with my little bow and
-arrow;&#8221; others, seeking to shield themselves behind the transparent,
-fragile shield of another&#8217;s fault: &#8220;He did it, his unpopularity;&#8221;
-&#8220;Protection did it; it was his policy;&#8221; each trying to escape the
-general stampede, occasioned by the long-suppressed indignation of
-the people who objected, not so much to the economic doctrines of the
-Republican party (not that they had become converted to the tenets
-of the Democratic faith), but to that crime of &#8220;caste&#8221; which, with
-its many ramifications in the whole mass of society, was causing them
-unhappiness.</p>
-
-<p>It is not well for the Democratic party to lay the flattering unction
-to its soul, that the mass of the people had become converted to the
-principles enunciated by that party in Chicago, at the Convention where
-Mr. Cleveland was nominated. It would be as delusive and disappointing
-to them, in some future election, as it has proved to the Republican
-party upon the occasion of their late discomfiture. On the other hand,
-the Republican party should be well convinced, by its downfall, that
-the people will not endure the wrapping up, in silken garments, of the
-progeny of the deformed and diseased state of European society, palming
-the enshrouded babe off as an offspring of that land that lit the torch
-of freedom for the world.</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2><span>CHAPTER IV.</span> <span class="smaller">SOCIETY AS THE PEOPLE FOUND IT, NOVEMBER 8, 1892.</span></h2>
-
-<p>Society, as the people found it, on last election day, was certainly
-not as attractive as that autocratic gentleman, the distinguished Ward
-McAllister found it, and has helped to make it, as related by him in a
-book which has been published with much flourish of trumpets, entitled
-&#8220;Society as <i>I</i> Have Found It.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>While the volume itself hardly rises to the dignity of a dime novel,
-it still, doubtless, is a true statement and record of the doings and
-pretensions of the very class of people who, by their presumption, have
-aroused the silent and sullen indignation of America. The book referred
-to, and its writer, Ward McAllister, of course, received a large share
-of criticism and ridicule. The absurdities of the book impressed the
-critics of the newspapers all over the land. It was made a butt for
-the squibs, sarcasm, and ridicule of some man on every newspaper
-throughout the country. Passages were selected from the book wherein
-Mr. McAllister poses himself in the position of a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span> first-class cook,
-and where he recounts how he has been playing the millinery maid for
-some lady of fashion. Of course, it struck every one as ridiculous that
-any manly man who claimed to be an American should be impressed by the
-criticism made upon the &#8220;cut of the tails of his dress-coat,&#8221; or to
-pay any attention to the advice of &#8220;a well-dressed Englishman, well up
-in all matters pertaining to society,&#8221; as to the peculiar fashion to
-be adopted concerning a man&#8217;s hat; how he should wear his watch-chain,
-etc. All such things were so extremely amusing and so utterly farcical
-to the brainworkers attached to the newspapers, that they held up the
-book and McAllister as objects to create merriment. That was the only
-possible view that could be taken by them of anything so absurdly funny
-as a man&#8217;s highest ambition, his idea of dignity, his aim in life being
-so small as that evidenced in McAllister&#8217;s autobiography.</p>
-
-<p>There was another side to that question. A creature like McAllister
-is not a spontaneous or instantaneous creation of our great Republic.
-There must have existed a congenial atmosphere in his &#8220;smart set&#8221; to
-produce an exotic of such rare and unattractive perfume. Had it not
-been perfectly apparent that Ward McAllister was not the only person
-who imitated and aped foreign manners, and desired to create a social
-distinction<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span> in America, the book would have been a roaring farce.
-Had the people at large supposed that he was the single individual in
-America who approved of and earnestly desired to create a collection
-of idiots who should claim that &#8220;caste&#8221; could exist in our country,
-then the people would have regarded him much in the manner they would a
-buffoon on the stage of a theatre, or some idiot who, from a desire to
-attract attention, paints his face sky-blue. But the very advertising
-that this blooming flower of sham aristocracy received at the hands
-of the newspapers&mdash;which was done by the newspaper men in a spirit of
-levity, possessing, as they do, sufficient brains to find McAllister
-and his subject utterly absurd, in conjunction with many other
-well-advertised and extravagantly absurd assumptions on the part of the
-wealthy, made a much deeper impression upon the minds of the &#8220;Common
-People&#8221; than it was supposed that it would or could do. McAllister&#8217;s
-&#8220;smart set&#8221; in this country&mdash;and his &#8220;smart set&#8221; is not confined to
-New York City, but exists in some form or manner in every city, town,
-village, and county in the Union&mdash;this McAllister-like &#8220;smart set&#8221; in
-each little community, as well as in the large cities, has managed by
-its arrogance and assumed superiority to arouse a spirit of resentment
-among the &#8220;Common People&#8221; of the <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span>Abraham Lincoln and Andrew Jackson
-stamp, because the masses have seen an attempt to establish something
-which would create an inequality between the citizens of the Republic.</p>
-
-<p>It was a monstrous joke that the Knights of the Pencil saw in
-McAllister and his &#8220;Society as I Have Found It,&#8221; and, like the
-keen-witted men that they are, they proceeded to hurl the javelins of
-their wit and sarcasm at this balloon of idiocy and impudence; but in
-piercing the balloon, the nauseating odor arising from its explosion
-pervaded the nostrils of the &#8220;Common People&#8221; with more than ordinary
-unsavoriness.</p>
-
-<p>In every little village and town, and even through the farming
-sections, there is some would-be Ward McAllister and &#8220;smart set;&#8221;
-some little circle who from some imagined cause or reason, in their
-own conceit are a little better than the typical old settlers of our
-country, who brought the Republic into existence. They try to impress,
-and sometimes most insultingly, this supposed superiority upon the
-minds of the &#8220;Common People.&#8221; In one little village it will be, for
-example, the owner of some protected little factory, which, in the
-wisdom of the legislators, has been protected to encourage and increase
-the industries of our country. In the solicitude of the legislators for
-the welfare of the people (acting honestly<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span> and in the best interests
-of the country), they have created the possibility for this man, this
-small manufacturer in the little village referred to, to accumulate
-a few thousand dollars more than his fellow citizens of the little
-village. The money has not been earned either by his sagacity, business
-ability, superior education, nor his intrinsic merit as a commercial
-genius. It is the result of accidents and the necessity that the
-legislators honestly felt existed, to create manufactories in our own
-country, to furnish the articles consumed by the people, rather than to
-buy the same from England and other foreign countries, sending our gold
-abroad out of the country in payment therefor.</p>
-
-<p>The honesty of purpose and the wisdom of the action of the legislative
-part of the Government, it is not the province of this book to
-question. It is to record the result of the action upon the social
-relations of the different members of that little community, or
-village, in which the small factory was established, and the attendant
-unhappiness arising from the accumulation of a disproportioned amount
-of money in the hands of one of the citizens of the community. The
-manufacturer, becoming prosperous, began to assume an air of social
-superiority. He was enabled to take a trip every now and again to
-some near-by city. He<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span> there saw his model McAllister. He returned to
-his village with un-American affectations, aping the manner of his
-model&mdash;the McAllister of his near-by city. He began to draw around
-him (in much the same manner as McAllister describes the creation of
-the &#8220;Patriarchs&#8221; of New York) those whom he deemed suitable for that
-superior social position which he, modelling the machinery after the
-manner of the city McAllister, deemed so desirable.</p>
-
-<p>Before proceeding to describe the birth of this superior social
-class, and the method of its organization, for which information we
-are indebted to this Prince of Cooks and Coats&mdash;McAllister&mdash;it is
-desirable to regard in a political way this local would-be aristocrat,
-the manufacturer. He imagines that Protection, the tariff, by which he
-has been enabled to amass the wealth, as the foundation upon which he
-bases his claim to a more exalted position, socially, than his fellow
-citizens, is entirely due to the doctrines of the Republican party.
-He loses sight of the fact that the Republican party did not owe its
-origin to Protection. The Abraham Lincoln Republican party did not owe
-its victory and popularity in the hearts of the people to Protection.
-There were other causes which operated powerfully in producing the
-result of the election in 1860; but the manufacturer of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span> that little
-village, before mentioned, absorbed by the one idea that Protection
-has been the one cause of his success, and that it was due to the
-Republican party, becomes oblivious to the fact that the necessities of
-the Government, during a war to preserve the Federal Union, became so
-great that revenue had to be derived from some source, and that many of
-the duties imposed upon foreign importations by the Republican party
-had for their cause the stern necessity of the soldiers in the field,
-fighting to preserve the Union; that the war was not a battle for
-Protection. It had for its origin other and very different causes.</p>
-
-<p>The war, which had been the outgrowth of the election of the candidate
-of the Republican party, created expenses which the Republican
-administration had to meet, and as a means to that end it became
-necessary to increase the existing duty and to place new duties upon
-imported manufactured articles. And by so doing they carried to a
-successful termination the great struggle for the preservation of
-the Union, to which the Republican party had pledged itself; which,
-together with the inclination and desire of some of the prominent
-members of the Republican party to increase the manufacturing
-industries of the country, has brought about that Protection and tariff
-by which he, the village manufacturer, has profited. He<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span> never stops
-to consider whether the tariff was a means to the end so profoundly
-desired, the preservation of the Union, a means of furnishing sinews
-of war by which the stars were retained upon our flag. He regards the
-tariff and Protection only in its personal aspect. The Republican
-party, to him, means his benefactor, to whom he owes an eternal debt of
-gratitude for enabling him to acquire that which, without Protection
-and tariff, he never could have obtained in the open field of the
-commercial battle wherein the world at large may contend. The position
-held by great thinkers of the Abraham Lincoln period is utterly
-unappreciated by him. That this tariff and Protection, which has been
-such a boon to him, was not created for his especial benefit, never
-suggests itself to his mind; that men of the Lincoln day and stamp
-should have had in view only the preservation of the Union and creating
-a fund to pay the expenses of those engaged to accomplish that end,
-does not occur to the village manufacturer.</p>
-
-<p>In fact, many of the Republican politicians have made too much of
-the Protection doctrine and not enough of the cause that created it.
-This village, protected, small manufacturer, communing with himself,
-concludes that without Protection he could never have amassed that
-wealth which he is endeavoring to make elevate him above the social<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span>
-status of his fellow citizens. He acknowledges, possibly, to himself,
-that without Protection he might still be struggling for existence upon
-an equal plane with the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; above whose heads he hopes
-to elevate himself socially. He regards only the Republican party of
-to-day, utterly oblivious to the fact that he and men of the McAllister
-and the &#8220;smart set&#8221; type have no just appreciation and no great
-admiration for the father of the Republican party, Abraham Lincoln, and
-his doctrines, which are the doctrines and sentiments of the &#8220;Common
-People.&#8221; He merely knows that Protection helped <i>him</i>, and he cares
-nothing for what it was that brought about Protection and compelled the
-Republican party to advocate a high tariff during the Civil War.</p>
-
-<p>Hence, this village manufacturer, this would-be social leader, the
-imitator of the city Ward McAllister, is a most ardent Republican. The
-little set of satellites which he gathers round him, glad to imitate
-the examples and opinions of one who has attained success and who is
-a recognized leader of this social movement to create &#8220;Caste&#8221; in our
-communities, become also ardent Republicans. In other words, it becomes
-almost a mark of respectability (so called) in the little community
-wherein resides the small protected manufacturer, to be a Republican. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>The very word &#8220;Democrat&#8221; smacks so much of the &#8220;Common People.&#8221; A man
-of intelligence, education, or wealth, who is a Democrat, becomes a
-social anomaly in that little community. A few prominent men through
-the land, who have become associated with the Democratic party, are
-spoken of merely as the result of inherited opinions through a long
-line of ancestry, similar to an inherited religion, or a motto on a
-coat-of-arms. A man who believes in Democracy, in its broad sense,
-is regarded in these little communities, when he is possessed of
-education, intelligence, and money, as a kind of firebrand. His every
-action is viewed with suspicion. So firmly has it become fixed in
-the minds of this little set of satellites, who surround the local
-manufacturing magnate, that &#8220;Republicanism&#8221; and &#8220;respectability&#8221; are
-synonymous, that they find it utterly incompatible with reason and
-refinement for a man to be respectable, according to their definition
-of the term, and not at the same time be a Republican.</p>
-
-<p>The &#8220;Common People&#8221; in these little communities, many of whom have been
-Republicans with Abraham Lincoln, many of whom were veteran soldiers of
-the Union, became more incensed by the impression created by this local
-&#8220;smart<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span> set,&#8221; than convinced by argument, during the campaign of 1892.</p>
-
-<p>Before proceeding to more fully dissect the sentiment created by this
-kind of nonsense, and by its almost invariable association with the
-Republican party throughout the land, we will return to the admirable,
-unabashed Ward McAllister, and quote something from his text-book of
-snobbery, as to the methods adopted in the creation of the &#8220;smart set&#8221;
-in New York, which has furnished a model for similar creations through
-the length and breadth of the land.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;As a child,&#8221; writes this scion of a race of nobles(?), &#8220;I had often
-listened with great interest to my father&#8217;s account of his visit to
-London, with Dominick Lynch, the greatest swell and beau that New
-York had ever known. He would describe his going with this friend to
-Almack&#8217;s, finding themselves in a brilliant assemblage of people,
-knowing no one and no one deigning to notice them; Lynch, turning to my
-father, exclaimed: &#8216;Well, my friend, geese, indeed, were we, to thrust
-ourselves in here, where we are evidently not wanted.&#8217; He had hardly
-finished the sentence when the Duke of Wellington (to whom they had
-brought letters, and who had sent them tickets to Almack&#8217;s) entered,
-looked around, and seeing them, at once approached them, took each<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span>
-by the arm and walked them twice up and down the room; then, pleading
-an engagement, said &#8216;Good-night&#8217; and left. Their countenances fell as
-he rapidly left the room, but the door had barely closed on him when
-all crowded around them, and in a few minutes they were presented to
-everyone of note, and had a charming evening. He described to us how
-Almack&#8217;s originated&mdash;all by the banding together of powerful women of
-influence for the purpose of getting up these balls, and in this way
-making them the greatest social events of London society.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Remembering all this, I resolved, in 1872, to establish in New York an
-American Almack&#8217;s, taking men instead of women, being careful to select
-only the leading representative men of the city, who had the right to
-create and lead society. I knew all would depend upon our making a
-proper selection. I made up an Executive Committee of three gentlemen,
-who daily met at my house, and we went to work in earnest to make a
-list of those we should ask to join in the undertaking. One of this
-committee, a very bright, clever man, hit upon the name of &#8216;Patriarchs&#8217;
-for the Association, which was at once adopted, and then, after some
-discussion, we limited the number of Patriarchs to twenty-five, and
-that each Patriarch, for his subscription, should have the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span> right of
-inviting to each ball four ladies and five gentlemen, including himself
-and family; that all distinguished strangers, up to fifty, should be
-asked; and then established the rules governing the giving of these
-balls&mdash;all of which, with some slight modifications, have been carried
-out to the letter to this day. The following gentlemen were then asked
-to become &#8216;Patriarchs,&#8217; and at once joined the little band:</p>
-
-<table summary="Patriarchs">
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">John Jacob Astor,</td>
-    <td class="left">Royal Phelps,</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">William Astor,</td>
-    <td class="left">Edwin A. Post,</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">De Lancey Kane,</td>
-    <td class="left">A. Gracie King,</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Ward McAllister,</td>
-    <td class="left">Lewis M. Rutherford,</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">George Henry Warren,</td>
-    <td class="left">Robert G. Remsen,</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Eugene A. Livingston,</td>
-    <td class="left">Wm. C. Schermerhorn,</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">William Butler Duncan,&nbsp; &nbsp; </td>
-    <td class="left">Francis R. Rives,</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">E. Templeton Snelling,</td>
-    <td class="left">Maturin Livingston,</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Lewis Colford Jones,</td>
-    <td class="left">Alex. Van Rensselaer,</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">John W. Hamersley,</td>
-    <td class="left">Walter Langdon,</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Benjamin S. Welles,</td>
-    <td class="left">F. G. D&#8217;Hauteville,</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Frederick Sheldon,</td>
-    <td class="left">C. C. Goodhue,</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td colspan="2" class="center">William R. Travers.&#8221;</td>
-  </tr>
-</table>
-
-<p>These proud patriots, constituting a tribunal upon whose decision a
-man&#8217;s claim to social equality with any other citizen in New York must
-rest, could find much in the conduct of their descendants to question
-with regard to their title to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span> social superiority. The ventilation
-given to the Drayton-Borrowe-Millbank affair reflected no great credit
-upon the great name Astor&mdash;the first on the list of the &#8220;Patriarchs.&#8221;
-The asinine utterances of a descendant of another of the &#8220;Patriarchs,&#8221;
-which is here given, gives little evidence of inherited wisdom or
-common sense.</p>
-
-<p>In the curious case recently tried in New York relative to the right of
-a women&#8217;s association to erect a statue to a lady who, though counted
-among the metropolitan &#8220;Four Hundred,&#8221; was possessed of much public
-spirit and philanthropic energy, one of the witnesses&mdash;a member of
-the same family&mdash;testified that her grandfather &#8220;never invited such
-people as Horace Greeley&#8221; to his house. A correspondent of the New York
-<i>World</i> enquires:</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;Is it possible that we have an aristocratic society in this
-republican country of ours to which the great founder of the
-<i>Tribune</i> could not be admitted? Horace Greeley was born in New
-Hampshire, the native State of Gen. John Stark, Levi Woodbury,
-Daniel Webster, and a long line of soldiers, statesmen, and men
-famous in literature. If it is a title to aristocracy to belong
-to a family who were original settlers of the country, the
-Hamiltons are comparatively a new people, the great founder of
-the family being an emigrant from the West Indian island of Nevis
-about the year 1770. The Schuylers derive their distinction from
-Major-General Philip Schuyler, who was a distinguished officer of
-the Revolution, but whose services could not compare with those of
-that sterling old hero of Bennington&mdash;John Stark. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Why, Mr. Editor, there are thousands of good Democratic citizens
-who can trace back their descent to the Pilgrim Fathers, more than
-a hundred years before Alexander Hamilton landed from the West
-Indies. Is it not a relic of feudal times and barbarism to claim
-distinction above our fellows and superiority of birth on account
-of the deeds of an ancestor a hundred or more years ago?</p>
-
-<div class="center"><div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
-<div>&#8220;&#8216;Honor and fame from no condition rise.</div>
-<div>Act well your part; there all the honor lies.&#8217;&#8221;</div>
-</div></div></div></blockquote>
-
-<div class="center"><a name="i105.jpg" id="i105.jpg"></a><img src="images/i105.jpg" alt="JOHN D. ROCKEFELLER" /></div>
-
-<p class="bold">JOHN D. ROCKEFELLER,</p>
-
-<p class="bold"><span class="smcap">A Magnate of the Standard Oil Company</span>.</p>
-
-<p>Shades of the great dead of journalism, the Bennetts, Raymonds, and
-others who have left<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span> the stamp of their genius upon newspaperdom in
-America, look down and pity the inane idiot who gives utterance to
-sentiments concerning Horace Greeley like those of the descendant of
-one of the &#8220;Patriarchs!&#8221; And men who occupy positions in the world of
-journalism, like Halstead, Cockerill, Clark Howell, how like you such
-utterances?</p>
-
-<p>Really, had Horace Greeley been alive and known of such an utterly
-meaningless assertion, doubtless the old genius would have smiled;
-but here is the query: Would it not have made a Democrat of every
-female member of his family, who regarded him as the epitome of worth,
-virtue, and merit? That a man like Horace Greeley, who had arrived at a
-position so pre-eminent as to disregard the snarls of puppies, should
-be amused at such a statement, would not be astonishing; but it would
-be none the less disagreeable for the women of his family. A woman&#8217;s
-life is essentially social.</p>
-
-<p>This illustration, and it would be impossible to find a better, of
-this nauseating attempt to establish &#8220;caste&#8221; in our country, will
-demonstrate the assertion that attempted class distinction has not
-been confined to the laboring man, the workman, or the poor man, but
-has been attempted, and made obnoxious, in every degree of wealth,
-learning, and position. The little country or village<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span> manufacturing
-magnate, whose Republicanism is not the Republicanism of <i>principles</i>
-nor the Republicanism advocated by Abraham Lincoln, has adopted
-the scheme set forth by Ward McAllister as a successful one, to be
-imitated in his little community, in establishing his own little &#8220;smart
-set&#8221;&mdash;his own local &#8220;Patriarchs.&#8221; Proceeding upon that basis, he and
-his little band of innovators have attempted an improvement upon the
-social system of each little community, which has become associated
-in the minds of the &#8220;Common People&#8221; of these little communities with
-Republicanism; and, therefore, the Republican party, in November last,
-was forced to bear the opprobrium that attached itself, in the minds of
-the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; to the &#8220;smart set&#8221; in their little communities.</p>
-
-<p>Never was a greater mistake made than in supposing that the influence
-of this attempted social distinction shall only influence the laborers
-and working classes of a community. In proportion as a man, by increase
-of wealth and reputation, acquires in the work-a-day world a higher
-position with regard to the influence that he wields in the business
-or professional world, just so much more bitterly does he resent
-the arrogance of the few, who, like the Patriarchs, would establish
-a tribunal to try their fellow citizens concerning their social<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span>
-positions, at which those outside of the charmed circle have no
-opportunity to appear and offer proofs and evidence of their worth and
-merit. The banker who finds that his wife has been neglected when the
-invitations to the Patriarchs&#8217; ball are distributed, feels as keenly
-and resentfully the insult as does the longshoreman upon finding that
-his wife has not been invited to the butchers&#8217; ball.</p>
-
-<p>Be honest with yourselves, and you will find, down in your hearts, a
-very ocean of bitterness occasioned by some slight or insult inflicted
-upon your family; and these are the things to which men do not give
-words, but which are silently felt, and to change which men silently
-voted.</p>
-
-<p>American men bestow upon the women of their families a degree of
-devotion and admiration greater than that given by foreigners generally
-to their families. The Americans have exalted the women of our
-land, irrespective of wealth or condition, to a position of so much
-pre-eminence in our social affairs, that in that department of our
-lives our women are permitted to have absolute sway and control.</p>
-
-<p>A man who dawdles around society, permitting it to absorb his time and
-attention, loses in a certain degree the respect of the large mass of
-American men. He is considered rather effeminate. Our social lives are
-controlled by the woman.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span> Our opinions are moulded by her; hence, we
-feel that, on subjects of a social nature, her judgment, opinions, and
-thoughts are entitled to the greatest respect&mdash;in fact, controlling
-largely our own. Hence the mighty influence of the women who had become
-resentfully Democratic because of social snubs. One woman had not been
-invited to the Patriarch&#8217;s ball; another to the railroad magnate&#8217;s
-ball; another to the Standard Oil Company king&#8217;s entertainment; and,
-so on, it runs all down through the different stages created by this
-attempted crime of &#8220;caste,&#8221; leaving behind it a sting in the hearts of
-each home as it passes, until it reaches the laborer and strikes him
-and his with telling force and effect. The Fricks, Carnegies, Goulds,
-Vanderbilts, Astors, become names as hateful to him as Tarquin&#8217;s ever
-was to the Roman &#8220;Common People.&#8221; </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="center"><a name="i110.jpg" id="i110.jpg"></a><img src="images/i110.jpg" alt="JOHN D. ROCKEFELLER" /></div>
-
-<p class="bold">WARD MacALLISTER.</p>
-
-<p class="bold">Self-Appointed Leader of the &#8220;Four Hundred&#8221;<br />of New York.<br />
-&#8220;A Prince of Cooks and Coats.&#8221;</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2><span>CHAPTER V.</span> <span class="smaller">SOME REASONS FOR WRATH.</span></h2>
-
-<p>Had the spurious article, &#8220;American aristocracy,&#8221; confined its
-vaporings and exhibitions to secluded spots, it would have been
-tolerated by the American people, exactly like many other &#8220;isms,&#8221;
-shams, frauds, and delusions. Had the worshipers at the shrine of
-&#8220;caste,&#8221; and supposed social superiority, reserved their devotions to
-some secluded chapel, they might have worshiped in peace at the feet
-of the tinseled god whom they adore&mdash;&#8220;caste.&#8221; The American people
-tolerate almost any kind of &#8220;ism&#8221; for a time, provided the &#8220;ism&#8221; be
-not paraded before them, and flaunted in their faces in an insulting
-manner; but a determined people are the citizens of this nation, and
-when once aroused to a sense of outrage, they throw to the winds all
-consideration of law, danger, and consequence. The people of Chicago
-heard the howling of the anarchists with patience and amusement,
-Sunday after Sunday, along the lake front, but when the anarchists at
-Haymarket hurled one bomb among the citizens of the Republic, the day
-of anarchism was ended in Chicago. Innocent or guilty, the leaders of
-the movement must be punished. And they were! </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>Had the sham aristocrats of America been contented to reserve their
-exhibition of arrogance and presumption to those dervishes who
-worshiped at their own shrine&mdash;&#8220;caste&#8221;&mdash;and not to the general public,
-it is possible that their absurd &#8220;ism&#8221; might have been tolerated
-in a good-natured way for some time longer. It had certainly the
-advantage of anarchism, inasmuch as, when reserved to a few dervishes,
-it was excessively amusing. But, unfortunately for the champions of
-&#8220;caste,&#8221; their followers, possessing neither a great amount of brains
-nor courage (and in these particulars, even the anarchists have an
-advantage over the sham aristocrats), have absolutely delighted in
-trifling with and imposing upon the good-nature of the public. In
-little, mean, spiteful ways, they have exhibited a smallness of soul,
-and an attempt, in a cowardly manner, to impose upon those who, poor
-in pocket, or dependent in some way, were unable to resent it. Take
-the evidence of the clerks, employés, servants, of the sham imitators
-of English aristocracy, and, almost without an exception, you will
-find their bosoms filled with resentment and hatred for that class;
-born, not with any desire to possess the property of their employers,
-nor from any socialistic tendency, but entirely the result of mean,
-spiteful, scornful snubbing. They have been wounded in pride, for, God
-knows! they are entitled, as free American<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span> citizens, to the possession
-of self-respect and pride.</p>
-
-<p>Do you ask, Madame, why it is so hard for you to secure and retain
-servants? The reason is given above.</p>
-
-<p>An explanation of the cause for the dearth of good domestic servants
-was sought by a great New York daily newspaper. It opened its columns
-and asked for communications explaining why a young woman preferred to
-work in a shop ten or twelve hours a day, and receive therefor three
-dollars a week, rather than accept a position as a domestic servant, in
-your house, Madame, where she would have greater comfort in the way of
-food and lodging, and receive more dollars.</p>
-
-<p>Read the answers received by the <i>Recorder</i>, of New York. In almost
-every instance, the writer of the communication would say that it
-was not a matter of food, lodging, and dollars, but a matter of
-self-respect. They were snubbed and sat upon when engaged in serving
-the rich.</p>
-
-<p>Go to any fashionable restaurant, or saloon, where the would-be swells
-swill champagne. Ask the attendants their opinion of those who, with a
-supercilious air, throw them a dollar to fee them for their services.
-You will hear expressed, in reply to your question, opinions like this:
-&#8220;I feel like knocking their heads off. I am ready to work.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span> I don&#8217;t
-want their money for nothing; but I am a <i>man</i>, and as good as they
-are.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>The workman was content, nor did it interest him if the rich should
-drive their Tally-hos. He had no desire to divide the money of the
-purse-proud devotee of &#8220;caste&#8221;; but when, weary from his day of labor,
-trudging along the road to his humble home, with tooting horn and
-flourish of whip the Tally-ho sweeps by him, and he has to scurry out
-of the road, he long remembers the derisive smile of the insolent,
-purse-proud occupants of the coach, and he objects&mdash;not to the
-coach&mdash;but to the manner and the smile of the occupants.</p>
-
-<p>The heart of the shop-girl or the seamstress is not filled with envy
-because the fine lady (?) of fashion possesses garments of silk and
-laces; but the insolence and supercilious manner, when the fine lady
-(?) brought in contact with her, fills her soul with a sense of injured
-dignity. She knows she&#8217;s quite as good as a lady of fashion. Possibly
-her father is not a protected, petty manufacturer; and she goes to
-her home, resenting the assumed superiority in the manner of the fine
-lady, and preaches to father, brother, and lover equality and broad
-democracy. The fine ladies (?) of fashion have ever been most potential
-causes for victories by the people. No orator so eloquent as the wife,
-daughter, sister, or sweetheart; and her wrongs were resented November
-8th. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="center"><a name="i115.jpg" id="i115.jpg"></a><img src="images/i115.jpg" alt="THE PUBLIC BE Damned" /></div>
-
-<p class="bold">&#8220;THE PUBLIC BE D&mdash;&mdash;D!&#8221; </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>The New York <i>World</i>, of November 20th, 1892, publishes an article in
-connection with New York society, that, having received a place in that
-great Democratic journal, because of its undoubted truth, is worthy of
-a place in this volume. In speaking of the death of Mrs. Belmont, the
-<i>World</i> makes use of the occasion to express some remarkably forcible
-facts with regard to New York society. It says:&mdash;</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;In the social history of New York it will be a lasting
-distinction to Mrs. Belmont that she was a conspicuous figure in
-good society before good society had been vulgarized. I have no
-quarrel with the society of to-day, which has merely followed the
-law of its evolution. I merely insist that the New York society
-of thirty years ago had all the good features of to-day, and was
-conspicuously free from certain faults which are now conspicuously
-prominent. The society which accepted the leadership of Mrs.
-Belmont had birth, and breeding, and culture, ample means and
-true refinement, and it had also that last test of a genuine
-aristocracy, that it held its rank by unquestioned title. It had
-so little fear of the security of its position that it freely
-admitted strangers of equal social rank.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;<i>It was possible for a rich merchant to permit a clerk to visit
-at his house</i>, and even scholars and educated people were not
-considered detrimental. While it had the respect of ingenuous
-youth for the older aristocracies of Europe, it did not abase
-itself in comparison with them, and was incapable<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span> of servility
-before them or before anything human. <i>It was singularly free from
-scandals.</i>&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>Then, thirty years ago,&mdash;that is, at the time of Abraham Lincoln&#8217;s
-great popularity, succeeding by two years the great uprising of the
-Common People, the &#8220;mudsills,&#8221; of the North and West,&mdash;a wealthy
-merchant of the North would receive his clerk, as a social equal, in
-his house. Then times have changed, and manners with them, within
-the last thirty years! The rich merchant of to-day has forgotten
-the force of the argument which resulted in the election of Abraham
-Lincoln,&mdash;&#8220;Americans enforce Equality.&#8221; Two years was not enough,
-thirty years ago, to enable the rich merchant to forget that the first
-man of the nation, the President of the Union, had been a laborer,
-rail-splitter, clerk in a grocery store, and was, while chief of the
-nation, still a man of the &#8220;Common People.&#8221; No, two years was not
-enough to bring about forgetfulness of these facts; but <i>thirty-two</i>
-years was.</p>
-
-<p>Hence, the overturning of the aristocratic party (or that party to
-which the aristocrats belong) cost what it might in dollars to the
-&#8220;Common People.&#8221; It is not a new economic doctrine that they demand; it
-is a new social system. While the assumed aristocracy of thirty years
-ago may have had respect for the older aristocracies of Europe, it most
-certainly did not abase<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span> itself, and was not as servile to them, as is
-the sham aristocracy of to-day.</p>
-
-<p>Quoting from the Koran of that high priest of the &#8220;smart set,&#8221;
-McAllister, who utters the sentiments of the most exalted in the holy
-of holies in swelldom:&mdash;</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;It is well to be in with the nobs who are born to their position,
-but the support of the swells is more advantageous&mdash;for society is
-sustained and carried on by the swells, the nobs looking quietly
-on and accepting the position, feeling that they are there by
-divine right; but they do not make fashionable society, nor carry
-it on.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>The &#8220;nobs,&#8221; then, of this temple of &#8220;caste,&#8221; feel that they occupy the
-high places by &#8220;divine right.&#8221; The phrase, &#8220;divine right,&#8221; sounds queer
-to Anglo-Saxon ears, to us, the descendants of a race who elevated
-Charles Stuart to the scaffold as a result of a &#8220;divine right.&#8221; It
-sounds strangely in the ears of a nation that furnished the example
-of Liberty and Equality to the world, and which, when followed by the
-Frenchmen, caused Louis XVI. to kiss the guillotine by reason of his
-&#8220;divine right.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>The meaningless, senseless sentences in &#8220;Society as I Have Found It,&#8221;
-would be entitled to not the slightest attention, were it not for the
-fact that they give words to the sentiments of the &#8220;smart set,&#8221; who
-have allied themselves&mdash;or rather stuck themselves on, as a piece
-of mud on<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span> a marble column&mdash;to the Republican party, and, hence, in
-the minds of equality-loving Americans, the Republican party became
-besmirched by that mud.</p>
-
-<p>Quoting further from the New York <i>World</i>, and believing that the
-writer of the article knew whereof he wrote, the following is
-inserted:&mdash;</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;I am writing about a period now thirty years gone by, and,
-consequently, beyond the personal knowledge of the great majority
-of my readers. But New York society of to-day is known to all
-readers of Sunday papers. They know it as an institution in which
-the prevalence of gigantic fortunes has made its atmosphere
-uncongenial for all who are not conspicuously rich. And while
-the valid claims of birth and breeding and culture have thus
-been crowded out at one gate of the social arena, the influences
-which have forced an entry at the other end in company with the
-mere millions, have all been vulgarizing influences. Society is
-no longer certain that it is the genuine article. If it were,
-it would not swagger so much, nor give so much thought to the
-effect it produces on the outer world. It is insolent, but not
-courageous; ostentatious, but not brilliant; it splurges, but does
-not shine; no glimmer of intelligence relieves the dullness of its
-boredom. It abases itself before the peerage of Great Britain, and
-the taint of corrupt living is unpleasantly frequent on its gilded
-exterior. Measured by the tests of a true aristocracy, it is below
-the standard of thirty years ago.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>The readers of the papers, who are the people, know that society is
-an institution, as organized to-day, created by gigantic fortunes,
-which have been accumulated within the last thirty years, and, in
-many instances, by men of low and vulgar instincts, of mean origin,
-poor ability, who have become rich as the result of accident, and the
-result of the necessities of the nation while engaged in the war for
-the preservation of the Union. These very men, who had not the courage
-nor patriotism of the commonest soldier who shouldered his musket at
-Abraham Lincoln&#8217;s call, and vindicated on the field of battle the right
-of the people, in a republic, to equality, and to the control of the
-government by the majority, who are beneficiaries of Protection and
-the exigencies of the nation, would assume a superiority over that
-common soldier whose courage and patriotism led him to risk his life in
-preserving the Union&mdash;for the fighting soldiers of &#8220;&#8217;61&#8221; were of the
-&#8220;Common People.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>Society is not only no longer uncertain that it is a genuine article,
-but it <i>knows</i> it is a sham and a fraud, and seeks to make up by
-impertinence, insolence, and arrogance what it lacks of the genuine
-article. It <i>does</i> swagger; it does produce an effect upon the outer
-world, and that effect was evident by the overwhelming vote of the
-people, who said to it and to its successors in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span> office, November 8th,
-last: &#8220;Thus far and no farther thou shalt go.&#8221; It abases itself in such
-a disgusting manner before that peerage of Great Britain, as to cause
-feelings of indignation and contempt to arise in the bosoms of the
-descendants of those old Continental soldiers, who, more than a hundred
-years ago, said to Great Britain and her aristocracy: &#8220;We have had
-enough of you. This shall be a land of freedom, equality, and liberty;
-though it should cost the last drop of blood in our veins.&#8221; And how
-effectively they demonstrated their determination to produce such a
-result, many a lord and lordling now mouldering in his grave, who
-sought these shores to impose the yoke of &#8220;caste&#8221; upon the colonies,
-could attest.</p>
-
-<p>The tuft-hunting, and absolute courting of English titled adventurers,
-by the inheritors of the wealth taken from the people, has filled with
-disgust the breast of every manly and womanly citizen of this country.
-The people are not Socialists. Mrs. Hammersley is entitled to all
-that she inherited. Her right to it would be protected and defended
-by every good citizen of the Union, and there are few, very few, who
-are not good citizens, among the people. She may marry whomsoever she
-will. It was her privilege to select (or be selected by) the Duke of
-Marlborough, descendant of&mdash;not the over-honest, but<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span> original&mdash;soldier
-of fortune. She had a perfect right to prefer the position as wife
-of a divorced duke. She could take the money amassed in America and
-refurnish Blenheim, for the benefit (after the death of her divorced
-duke) of his first wife, who was still living, and will now be enabled
-to enjoy the fruits produced by the waters of American dollars poured
-upon the somewhat decayed and degenerate house of Churchill.</p>
-
-<p>Mrs. Hammersley has the right to utilize the fortune of her deceased
-American husband under the wise provisions of his will (clever American
-he must have been!) as she chooses; but when she and her acquired (by
-purchase or otherwise) title is flaunted in the faces of American men
-and women, as something which entitles her to a more eminent position
-than she possessed as an American woman, the &#8220;Common People&#8221; object.
-Every time that the lady was spoken of, or written of, as &#8220;the American
-Duchess,&#8221; as &#8220;Our Duchess,&#8221; it aroused resentment. We have no American
-Duchess.</p>
-
-<p>As an American wife, Mrs. Hammersley was a queen; as a duchess, by the
-exertion of great pressure and influence, she gained the privilege of
-kissing the hand of another, <i>called</i> Queen, because of the accident of
-birth.</p>
-
-<p>Doubtless, Mrs. Hammersley was not responsible for being dubbed &#8220;the
-American Duchess&#8221;<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span> by the newspapers; but men of the Ward McAllister
-stamp, and the &#8220;smart set,&#8221; indicated so plainly the kind of desire
-that seems to pervade the members of the sham aristocracy, to acquire
-by some method, and at any price, a title, that it was pardonable
-that the newspaper men assigned the peculiarly objectionable title of
-&#8220;the American Duchess&#8221; to one of America&#8217;s daughters. The columns of
-our papers, day by day mirroring, as they do, the prevalence of this
-servile abasement of the dignity of the American woman in the &#8220;smart
-set&#8221; seeking alliances with a degenerate and unworthy offspring of a
-decayed and odoriferous aristocracy existing in Europe, have brought
-the subject to the attention of the people all over the land.</p>
-
-<p>What a relief it is to manly Americans to turn from a picture like that
-presented by the coroneted &#8220;Duchess,&#8221; whose title and coronet have been
-purchased by the wealth of a common American citizen, an account of
-which is here printed, taken from the New York <i>World</i> of November the
-13th:&mdash;</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;A fine old illustration of the Duke&#8217;s financial ability was
-shown in the way he obtained a <i>dot</i> of $500,000 with his wife.
-He made the Duchess borrow this sum in England and, to secure it,
-insure her life to that amount. She then returned with him to this
-country and here confessed judgment to her London creditors for
-the amount<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span> mentioned. They took the matter into the court, which
-directed that the trustees set aside annually from the Duchess&#8217;
-income $50,000 a year to pay the interest on the debt she had
-incurred in England and the principal. This money the Duchess gave
-to her husband. She also bought and gave him a house in London.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>And then to gaze with admiring glances upon that model of the American
-wife and mother, the late Mrs. Benjamin Harrison. To read of her, in
-the columns of a paper like the New York <i>Herald</i>, politically opposed
-to the party represented by President Harrison, that this good woman,
-Mrs. Harrison, representing that which is most queenly to the minds of
-the &#8220;Common People&#8221; of America, &#8220;was a model wife and mother;&#8221; that
-&#8220;during her husband&#8217;s early struggles she helped him in many ways, and
-her wise counsel was often a great service to him.&#8221; &#8220;She reared and
-educated her children thoroughly and sensibly, and made their home
-always attractive to them. * * * * She was also a skillful housekeeper,
-and few women were more adept in the art of domestic economy. * * *
-To do good works was her delight, and she was for many years one of
-the managers of the Indianapolis Orphan Asylum. * * * * At no time a
-woman of fashion. * * * In all the honors that came to her husband, she
-remained just the same consistent, helpful woman that she was the first
-day<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span> they were married. * * * * The domestic life at the White House
-has been something that all the world might be better for knowing of.
-Mrs. Harrison was the queen and centre of it all.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>Of this good wife and mother, endeared to the hearts of the &#8220;Common
-People,&#8221; by the possession of those same qualities and virtues that
-make the helpmates of the poor and lowly so dear to them, was said,
-in the editorial columns of the New York <i>Herald</i>, October 25th, the
-following:&mdash;</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;In this hour of his affliction, the sympathy of the entire nation
-will go out to President Harrison and his household.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The people of the country had only to learn of her worth to
-recognize and appreciate in Mrs. Harrison the virtues and graces
-of a noble womanhood. As mistress of the White House, she won the
-affection of all, as she endeared herself to her home circle by
-her qualities as wife and mother.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Her brave and serene spirit through long suffering, and the
-President&#8217;s tender devotion, have touched the heart of the
-country. Her death will be mourned as the loss of a good, lovable
-woman.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="center"><a name="i127.jpg" id="i127.jpg"></a><img src="images/i127.jpg" alt="MRS. BENJAMIN HARRISON" /></div>
-
-<p class="bold">MRS. BENJAMIN HARRISON.</p>
-
-<p>The sorrow occasioned by her death inspired even poets to place a
-wreath woven by their art, upon her tomb. It is well for the country
-that the President&#8217;s wife should have been one<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span> furnishing such a
-noble example to the women of America, that of her could be written
-what James Whitcomb Riley wrote of Mrs. Harrison:&mdash;</p>
-
-<div class="center"><div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
-<div>Now utter calm and rest,</div>
-<div>Hands folded o&#8217;er the breast,</div>
-<div>In peace the placidest,</div>
-<div class="i1">All trials past,</div>
-<div>All fever soothed; all pain</div>
-<div>Annulled in heart and brain,</div>
-<div>Never to vex again,</div>
-<div class="i1">She sleeps at last.</div>
-</div><div class="stanza">
-<div>She sleeps, but, oh, most dear</div>
-<div>And best beloved of her,</div>
-<div>Ye sleep not, nay, nor stir,</div>
-<div class="i1">Save but to bow</div>
-<div>The closer each to each,</div>
-<div>With sobs and broken speech</div>
-<div>That all in vain beseech</div>
-<div class="i1">Her answer now.</div>
-</div><div class="stanza">
-<div>And lo, we weep with you,</div>
-<div>Our grief the wide world through,</div>
-<div>Yet, with the faith she knew,</div>
-<div class="i1">We see her still,</div>
-<div>Even as here she stood,</div>
-<div>All that was pure and good</div>
-<div>And sweet in womanhood,</div>
-<div class="i1">God&#8217;s will her will.</div>
-</div></div></div>
-
-<p>The sympathy of the whole nation went out to President Harrison when he
-sustained the loss of that example of virtue and womanly excellence in
-the death of his wife. It was so deep and strong, that had the &#8220;Common
-People&#8221; not seen the party he represented through a glass clouded<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span> by
-the smoke and soot of sham aristocracy, he would have been re-elected.</p>
-
-<p>By that bedside, the people saw the chief of their nation with bowed
-head, shedding tears for that lost love who had shared with him his
-joys and sorrows, his hopes and disappointments, ambitions, and his
-failures. No tenderer sympathy or kindlier feeling ever filled and
-moved the hearts of the American people than that felt for that good
-husband, good patriot, good citizen, Benjamin Harrison. He was bereft
-of a helpmate who by his side had fought the battle of life, the early
-struggles in Indianapolis when he was a young lawyer, hewing his way
-through the forest of difficulties, which, like the forests of Africa
-that surrounded Stanley, in American life present themselves before
-the struggling, ambitious men of our land. And when, at last, bursting
-through the maze and underbrush of obstacles, like Stanley, he came
-upon the open plain of success, her voice had been first to join his
-in a prayer of thanksgiving. The bowed head of the aged chieftain of
-the nation, upon whom the heavy hand of sorrow had been laid, was an
-object to occasion even the most partisan political opponent to pause
-and shed one sympathetic tear. How full must his mind have been of the
-recollection of the hours anxiously spent by this loving American wife
-and mother, while he was exposed to hourly danger in defence of the
-American Union. How each sad hour must have been recalled to him, and
-how slight had been the recompense, accorded in the harvest of time to
-the faithful heart that had beat in rhythmic accord with his.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="center"><a name="i131.jpg" id="i131.jpg"></a><img src="images/i131.jpg" alt="BENJAMIN HARRISON" /></div>
-
-<p class="bold">BENJAMIN HARRISON.</p>
-
-<p class="bold">President of the United States, 1889-93.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>The sympathy of the nation was deep, broad, and strong; and had
-Benjamin Harrison represented anything else but what the people knew
-was the aristocratic party, on the flood-tide of that sympathy he would
-have been carried into office by an overwhelming majority. Let those
-who would excuse their own errors and the errors of their <i>class</i>, let
-the would-be astute politician and the abashed assumed barons ascribe
-the defeat of the Republican party to the lack of personal magnetism
-of their candidate, but the great heart of the people will feel that
-that charge was as false as the claim of the &#8220;Four Hundred&#8221; to social
-superiority.</p>
-
-<p>Benjamin Harrison will long be remembered as an exemplary President,
-if patriotism and the performance of those pledges made to the people
-who elected him, entitle a President to remembrance. Great as we all
-recognize the personal magnetism of that magnificent statesman, James
-G. Blaine, to be, it could not have exerted the influence over the
-minds of the masses that the death of Mrs. Harrison in the White House
-did. Death robbed the President of the position of the First<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span> Man in
-the Nation. He became at once the husband, the father, and the man;
-and had the issue been alone to be decided by personal magnetism,
-sympathy of the people, the outburst of approval and approbation would
-have been in favor of Benjamin Harrison. But he and the party whom he
-represents, justly or unjustly, had become accursed with the crime of
-&#8220;caste&#8221; in our country. He was defeated by those who, to a man, bowed
-their heads in sorrow with him, and shed tears of sympathy at his great
-loss as a fellow-man and citizen, but could not give him their votes as
-representing what to them became the party of sham, affected, foreign
-aristocracy.</p>
-
-<p>Another picture that rises simultaneously before the eyes of the masses
-as representing those queens in America, to whom more ready homage
-is paid than was ever accorded to a coronet or crown, is our Frances
-Cleveland. Ours, because the &#8220;Common People&#8221; claim her, as only an
-ordinary, sweet, lovely, modest American woman.</p>
-
-<p>That picture made more votes for Grover Cleveland than any political
-chicanery could have accomplished. With her baby in her arms, she
-represents American womanhood, motherhood, and simplicity; that which
-is best, purest, and dearest to the hearts of all of us, the &#8220;Common
-People.&#8221; No higher place is it possible for woman to attain than that
-she occupies with her babe on her bosom. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="center"><a name="i136.jpg" id="i136.jpg"></a><img src="images/i136.jpg" alt="THE AMERICAN QUEEN" /></div>
-
-<p class="bold">THE AMERICAN QUEEN.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="center"><a name="i137.jpg" id="i137.jpg"></a><img src="images/i137.jpg" alt="THE AMERICAN DUCHESS" /></div>
-
-<p class="bold">THE AMERICAN DUCHESS.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>She had gone into the White House a young, guileless, average, common
-American girl; she had represented, in the high position accorded to
-her by the hearts of the people, the first lady of the land, with a
-simplicity and dignity pleasing to every American woman from Maine
-to Texas. She had welcomed the friends of her girlhood, before, as
-wife of the President, she became the most prominent female figure
-in the land, with the same cordiality that as Miss Frances Folsom
-she had exhibited towards them. The unassuming air with which she
-occupied her high position as sharer of the honors of the Chieftain
-of a free people, endeared her to the hearts of the mass of us,
-&#8220;Common People.&#8221; The farmer&#8217;s wife in Illinois, the mechanic&#8217;s wife
-at Homestead, Pa., the banker&#8217;s wife at Philadelphia, the railroad
-president&#8217;s wife in New York, felt a ray of sunshine warming that
-spot in woman&#8217;s heart, which is the Holy of Holies with them, young
-wifehood; and when Time, the great scene-shifter, had rearranged the
-setting of the stage, and presented to us the picture of the young
-mother, she became as interesting an object as the President himself.
-She had given to America another American. She had set an example for
-the women of our land which it would be well, my lady in your palace
-on Fifth avenue, to follow. Do not leave the future generations,
-who will rule the destinies of this nation, to be the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span> offspring of
-foreigners; forego your balls, receptions, entertainments, and your
-trips to Europe; endure the inconvenience and annoyance of the nursery.
-Let us have some American children born. The prattle of the baby&#8217;s
-tongue will be sweeter music to your ear than the lisping flattery of
-some foreign duke. You may have the honor of being a mother of some
-future Jefferson, Jackson, Webster, Clay, Calhoun, Lincoln, Garfield,
-Cleveland.</p>
-
-<p>God bless you, Frances Cleveland, for the example you have set!
-Thoughts of you and sweet memories of the past, as dear even to the
-poorest woman as to the Queen of Great Britain and Empress of India,
-make Democrats of the hard-worked, poor old wife and mother in the
-little farmhouse of Illinois and Indiana. There is no scene in Grover
-Cleveland&#8217;s career to-day so embalmed in the hearts of the people as
-that wherein he is described as refusing to talk politics with one of
-the political satellites that ever hover round planets of the political
-firmament, putting them aside that he might watch the tottering
-footsteps of baby Ruth. It was just like any other man of the people,
-and the people recognized, as they did in the life and acts of Abraham
-Lincoln, that Grover Cleveland is one of us.</p>
-
-<p>When some member of the &#8220;smart set,&#8221; who allies herself with the
-effete nobility of Europe,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span> gives to the world a sample of what a man
-should be, as did the humble American wife, Nancy Lincoln, then the
-&#8220;Common People&#8221; will forget their wrath at the absurd assumption of
-the worshipers of the British peerage. Women like Martha Washington,
-Nancy Lincoln, Carrie Harrison, and Frances Cleveland, will ever be
-contrasted with those samples of the &#8220;smart set&#8221; who seek the society
-of the snobs and swells of foreign nations. The wrath of the people
-will ever be aroused at the arrogant assumption of snobbery and sham
-aristocracy upon the part of the successful searchers after titles.</p>
-
-<p>The saying, by the &#8220;smart set,&#8221; that the &#8220;Common People&#8221; have nothing
-to do with them or their actions, or with how they dispose of their
-wealth, is quite true; but the unwise exhibition of an attempt to
-create class distinctions, can arouse such gusts of anger that that
-wealth, which is held only by paying such taxes as the &#8220;Common People&#8221;
-may decree (being, as they are, the majority), that much-prized wealth
-may be swept away, as a handful of dust, before the storm of the
-people&#8217;s anger.</p>
-
-<p>The correspondent of the New York <i>World</i> hastens to vindicate the
-just censure written, from any suspicion of prejudice concerning New
-York&#8217;s &#8220;Four Hundred&#8221;; but, in the attempt to vindicate, gives evidence
-enough of the thought of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span> people with regard to the morals of any
-&#8220;smart set&#8221; possessed of unlimited millions, totally idle, selfish, and
-luxurious:&mdash;</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;To vindicate my censures from any suspicion of prejudice, let me
-hasten to add that the tone of New York&#8217;s &#8216;Four Hundred&#8217; is better
-than that of any corresponding set in the world. Comparisons are
-not satisfactory, because the society of Paris is the society of
-all France, and the society of London is the society of the whole
-British Empire. Compared with these, the social aristocracy of
-New York is merely a little clique. It is only just to say that
-it has not yet reached the coarseness of that fast set in London,
-which it aspires to imitate, and, if it lacks the refinement
-which centuries of courtly teaching have given to even the most
-unruly elements of French aristocracy, it also falls short of that
-cynicism which ignores all moral influences. Perhaps the present
-lowered tone of society may be only a passing malady. Perhaps
-things may get better before they get worse. Who knows? We can
-only say that unlimited millions, total idleness, and selfish
-luxury, are conditions not usually conducive to the elevation of
-morals.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>What the people meant by the exhibition of their wrath last November,
-in the vote that they cast against what they deemed the party of the
-&#8220;smart set,&#8221; was the creation only of pictures in future, so sweetly
-pure as that with which the <i>World</i> correspondent winds up the
-article:&mdash; </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="center"><a name="i142.jpg" id="i142.jpg"></a><img src="images/i142.jpg" alt="JAY GOULD." /></div>
-
-<p class="bold">JAY GOULD.</p>
-
-<p class="bold"><span class="smcap">Died December, 1892, worth $70,000,000.</span></p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;What a different social vista is presented to us when we turn
-to look back on the long and peaceful life of <i>Emerson&#8217;s widow</i>,
-who died last week at the ripe age of <i>ninety</i>. Although she made
-no claim on the world&#8217;s regard, we catch pleasant glimpses of
-her personality along the path of the great philosopher&#8217;s life,
-like the sunshine showing through the leaves of the Concord elms.
-Beside the simple dignity of a life like hers, how unsatisfactory
-appears the career of an over-dressed, over-fed, over-rich woman
-of fashion, worn out in the scramble and struggle to keep up with
-the procession.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>The people desire, and have so expressed themselves, by the mighty
-voice of the majority, a return to the simple, natural condition of
-social life in America, wherein &#8220;caste&#8221; has no place, from which social
-distinctions disappear; the simple, homely, every-day, virtuous life of
-the mothers, wives, and daughters of those who made the Republic. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>The &#8220;Common People&#8221; have recorded their protest against snobbery, sham
-aristocracy, &#8220;smart sets,&#8221; Ward McAllister, and multi-millionaires, who
-assume to be better, either by &#8220;divine right&#8221; or otherwise, than the
-ordinary American citizen. They have taught, by the lesson preached
-in the tremendous majorities for that party whom they deemed least
-tainted with this repugnant crime, that wealth, arrogance, assumption,
-and snobbery may have obtained an undue amount of influence,
-disproportioned to its merit, but that, thank God, on election day,
-every citizen of the Republic enjoys an equal right to the franchise,
-and that, by the voice of the majority, he will create such laws as to
-eradicate the insidious disease of &#8220;caste&#8221; from the wholesome body of the nation.</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2><span>CHAPTER VI.</span> <span class="smaller">THE ARISTOCRATIC &#8220;CHAPPIE&#8221; <i>vs.</i> ABRAHAM LINCOLN.</span></h2>
-
-<p>As that satellite of McAllister, that scion of the line of
-&#8220;Patriarchs,&#8221; parades Fifth Avenue, creating by his presence an
-aristocratic atmosphere for the poor, Common People to enjoy, what a
-picture he presents! How admirable and worthy of emulation!</p>
-
-<p>How the mind naturally recalls specimens of the <i>genus</i> Chappie when
-the subject of the young male aristocrat recurs to us! This descendant
-of a half-dozen fur traders, ferrymen, or land speculators, has become
-elongated and attenuated by the non-exercise of the muscles of his
-feet and legs in the long tramps that his forefathers used to take to
-barter for the peltries of the untutored Indian, exchanging rum and bad
-muskets therefor.</p>
-
-<p>We will begin with Chappie&#8217;s lower extremities, because of the greater
-importance of that part of his anatomy. The pimple which surmounts
-his structure is hardly worthy to be called a head, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span> is the least
-important part of his makeup. Around the thin shanks of his lower limbs
-are imported striped trousers, in imitation of his English model; these
-are turned up when it rains in London. His narrow, chicken-like bosom
-is covered by a hand&#8217;s breadth of imported material. (There&#8217;s no heart
-in his bosom, nor other organs worthy of naming within his whole body;
-hence, a little cloth will cover his trunk.) From sloping shoulders
-that would have done credit to a belle of the First Empire of France,
-hangs, in badly wrinkled folds, the latest thing &#8220;from Poole&#8217;s, of
-London, y&#8217; know!&#8221; Rising from the apex formed by the slopes of his
-shoulders is a thing through which he breathes, and which he calls a
-neck; around which, to fence it from the cold blasts of heaven, he has
-had built a structure which he calls a collar, modelled absolutely
-after that of &#8220;our late lamented Prince Clarence.&#8221; Above that thing
-he calls a neck is nothing; for that which in a human being would
-represent a face, in this creature is but a simpering mask of idiocy,
-arrogance, sensuality, intemperance, and licentiousness.</p>
-
-<p>That thing he calls a face, with assured presumption and insulting
-attitude, he thrusts before the gaze and upon the attention of the
-daughters of the poor but honest workmen, whose children, not having
-a fur trader for a grandfather, have<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span> to labor. This <i>thing</i>&mdash;this
-&#8220;Chappie&#8221;&mdash;would assume the same privileges as one of the new nobility,
-the creation of men like McAllister and the &#8220;Patriarchs,&#8221; as those
-assumed by the curled and perfumed darlings of the court which
-surrounded the licentious Louis XV. That which from fear he would not
-dare to do or say among the &#8220;smart set,&#8221; he feels at liberty to do or
-say when thrown among the children of the poor and defenceless on a
-public street. It is nothing to him to insult the poor shop girl; he
-would say, &#8220;That is one of the evidences that I am of the upper class.
-It should be an honor to be spoken to by me.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>It was ever one of the idiosyncrasies of the upper classes, wherever
-people have allowed them to exist, to insult innocence and outrage
-honor. History teems with it, and &#8220;Chappie,&#8221; by tradition, thinks
-that necessarily he must act it, to be of the &#8220;Prince&#8217;s set.&#8221;
-&#8220;Chappie&#8221; thinks that the scandal of Cavendish Square was but a little
-episode&mdash;nothing, in fact, because the children of the poor were the
-only ones contaminated; for the brutes who led to these orgies in
-Cavendish Square had already become decayed and rotten morally.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Chappie&#8221; in his exalted position sees in every unprotected woman (and
-he&#8217;ll make sure she&#8217;s<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</a></span> unprotected) a victim upon whom to exercise
-his wiles, and if, God help her! through weakness, love of dress,
-finery, or pleasure, she allows herself to be led to lean upon his
-honor, she&#8217;ll fall! For &#8220;Chappie&#8217;s&#8221; honor exists only as aristocracy in
-America, that being a sham and a fraud, as is Chappie&#8217;s honor.</p>
-
-<p>This outgrowth of accumulated wealth, this polluting toad in the pure
-water of public life, never has and never will, nor can he, give one
-atom of return to the Republic for the honor of living in it. He whose
-life is spent in idleness, debauchery, and sensuality regards his
-valet, coachman, cook, clerk, tailor, hatter, merchant, banker, as his
-social inferior. And he is always attached, like a barnacle, to the
-good Republican Ship built by Abraham Lincoln.</p>
-
-<p>Is it a wonder that the people said, in November last: &#8220;We&#8217;ll burn the
-ship rather than endure such barnacles?&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>This thing, so amusingly written of by that most excellent comic paper,
-<i>Life</i>, so ridiculed by <i>Puck</i> and <i>Judge</i>, held up for derision by the
-whole newspaper fraternity, is responsible for the loss of thousands of
-votes to the Republican party. Indignant wives, sisters, and daughters
-have returned with flaming cheeks to humble yet honest homes, and told
-the story of the insults offered<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[Pg 149]</a></span> them on the streets of this and other
-good cities in the Union by &#8220;Chappie&#8221; and those creatures of his kind;
-and in their telling of the story have made more votes, more Common
-People&#8217;s votes, than have been made by all the newspapers ever printed
-in the interests of the Democratic party. Each tear that was shed upon
-the bosom of the poor man by an honest working daughter became a nail
-in the coffin of the Republican party. Justly or unjustly, such is the
-case. The Grand Old Party had descended, in the People&#8217;s opinion, to
-the level of enduring representation of it by such as &#8220;Chappie.&#8221; &#8220;How
-have the mighty fallen!&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Chappie,&#8221; with his vacant semblance of a head, with his trousers
-carefully rolled up, with his insidious smile, insinuating manner,
-his suggestive gestures, and ogling glances, has proven himself a
-valuable assistant to Mr. Harrity, Chairman of the Democratic National
-Committee. Steadily he has increased the waters of wrath in the
-reservoir of the poor man&#8217;s heart, until, bursting all barriers, it
-swept away &#8220;Chappie,&#8221; his &#8220;smart set,&#8221; and all, November 8, 1892.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Chappie,&#8221; after his late and dainty breakfast and stroll down Fifth
-Avenue (every city has its Fifth Avenue or something like it), enabling
-the daughters of the poor to gaze upon his charming proportions;
-delighting their fancy with the <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[Pg 150]</a></span>possibility in the shape of finery
-that might be theirs would he only condescend to beckon to them; with
-a few chosen spirits similar to himself&mdash;all of the &#8220;smart set,&#8221;
-y&#8217; know!&mdash;seeks that most discriminating and select of saloons,
-Delmonico&#8217;s. (And every city has its Delmonico.) There, after tickling
-his palate and tempting his satiated appetite with delicacies so rare
-and difficult of procurement that the cost of each one of such dainties
-would feed some poor man&#8217;s family for a fortnight; forgetting that
-early grandfather, the fur trader, who considered pork a feast, leans
-back in his chair and lisps in affected imitation of the English,
-&#8220;Where shall we g-o, deah boys?&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>Now let us draw the veil over where &#8220;Chappie&#8221; spends his evenings.
-&#8220;Chappie&#8217;s&#8221; pleasures and &#8220;Chappie&#8217;s&#8221; unnatural amusements would cause
-a blush of shame to redden the face of the humblest horny-handed son
-of toil. &#8220;Chappie&#8217;s&#8221; exhausted nature has ceased to realize sensations
-natural to <i>men</i> and sons of God. &#8220;Chappie&#8221; is much poorer than his
-progenitor, the old fur trader; for the old fur trader was rich in
-all the natural inclinations and appetites created by a natural
-and vigorous manhood. The old fur trader had no coat-of-arms; but,
-&#8220;Chappie,&#8221; that old fur trader would blush at the decadence of his own
-descendant! When the historian, &#8220;Chappie,&#8221;<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</a></span> shall make up the records
-of this great nation, that old fur trader, though he swindled the
-Indians and debauched them with rum, had that which you, &#8220;Chappie,&#8221;
-lack&mdash;manliness, courage, and character, even though the character was
-of a peculiar kind.</p>
-
-<p>You have no character, &#8220;Chappie.&#8221; The Common People have found you a
-tumor, an excrescence upon the body politic. They have taken their
-knife to amputate, from wholesome Americanism, a foreign infliction. Be
-careful, &#8220;Chappie,&#8221; that the amputation does not include the severance
-of that semblance of a head that you carry on your sloping shoulders.
-Be warned in time; you and yours have wealth, luxury, influence, and
-obedience upon the part of those you dominate. You have all that wealth
-will buy&mdash;villas at Newport, yachts, palaces. You revel in banquets,
-balls, and glittering assemblages. The poor man&#8217;s home is illuminated
-alone by the light shed by honor. He who would steal or deprive him
-of that one light, takes all from him that makes his life worth the
-living. The poor man&#8217;s honor is the honor of his wife and children.
-Your immoralities have increased, like appetite, by what they fed upon.
-It is not after you, the deluge, but it is around you, the deluge. It
-is in the air, because it is in the hearts of the Common People. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>It is no exaggeration to say that the assumed license which young men
-of the &#8220;Chappie&#8221; class exhibit in their lives, morals, and manners, has
-done much to disgust the large mass of the people. The oft-repeated
-expression, that &#8220;virtue and honesty in England is confined to the
-great middle classes,&#8221; is reiterated by those of the &#8220;Chappie&#8221; class in
-America as an excuse for their own misdemeanors. The flagrantly sinful
-lives, filled with debauchery, which they lead, is an evidence, to
-their poor intellects, of their being members of the sham aristocracy
-with which America is cursed. The society of the kind composed of
-&#8220;Chappies&#8221; is so objectionable to the decency and intelligence of the
-Common People that its exclusiveness would be almost a virtue.</p>
-
-<p>The Common People of respectability would never seek &#8220;Chappie&#8217;s&#8221;
-society, and their hearts are filled with resentment at his
-supercilious manner and ignoble intentions when seeking the society of
-the Common People.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="center"><a name="i154.jpg" id="i154.jpg"></a><img src="images/i154.jpg" alt="ABE, THE RAIL-SPLITTER" /></div>
-
-<p class="bold">ABE, THE RAIL-SPLITTER.&mdash;The &#8220;Common People&#8221; Made Him
-President.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="center"><a name="i155.jpg" id="i155.jpg"></a><img src="images/i155.jpg" alt="Chappie on Fifth Avenue" /></div>
-
-<p class="bold">&#8220;Chappie&#8221; on Fifth Avenue.&mdash;The Worthless Product of
-&#8220;Caste&#8221; and Sham Aristocracy.</p>
-
-<p>To some it will appear ridiculous to have devoted so much space in this
-volume to such a nonentity. If we could confine the &#8220;nonentity,&#8221; like
-an ape, in the Zoological Garden in Central Park, it is true so much
-space would be wasted as he occupies in this volume. But, the fact is,
-he is allowed to run at large, and in his peregrinations<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</a></span> around
-the country he creates a feeling of disgust among the Common People for
-that political party to which he proudly asserts he belongs; claiming
-it to be the &#8220;only respectable party.&#8221; Were he not, as a &#8220;sandwich
-man,&#8221; a walking advertisement of the worst element that has become
-attached, like an octopus, to the Republican party, &#8220;Chappie&#8221; would be
-unworthy of the attentions he has here received.</p>
-
-<p>But, in seeking for the true cause of the decisive and overwhelming
-overthrow of Lincoln&#8217;s &#8220;Grand Old Party,&#8221; it is necessary to mix even
-this worthless ingredient into the porridge of defeat with which the
-leaders of the Republican party have been fed.</p>
-
-<p>It is a relief to turn from the despicable object of &#8220;Chappie,&#8221; and
-regard and compare in our minds with him the men who have &#8220;left
-footprints on the sands of time&#8221; in the history of our nation.</p>
-
-<p>What a contrast is presented when we shift &#8220;Chappie&#8221; from the scene of
-our mental vision and bring forth the loved &#8220;Harry&#8221; Clay, the miller&#8217;s
-boy. That barefoot boy, on a bony, ill-bred horse, with shaggy mane
-and tail; holding a bag of corn in front of him, on his journey to the
-mill for his widowed mother, is a more inspiring picture, decidedly,
-than &#8220;Chappie&#8221; on his well-bred English cob whose coat is soft as fur
-from<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</a></span> constant currying, whose tail is cropped off <i>a la</i> the fashion
-for riding-horses in London. As &#8220;Chappie&#8221; sits on his little imported
-English saddle, and daintily holds an imported English riding whip,
-prepared for a ride, to give the &#8220;Common People&#8221; an exhibition of the
-beauty, gallantry and horsemanship of the scion of sham aristocracy;
-with all his glory, backed with all of his millions, &#8220;Chappie&#8221; does
-not warm the hearts of the &#8220;Common People&#8221; like the picture of that
-miller&#8217;s boy, Henry Clay, the great Commoner of Kentucky.</p>
-
-<p>Daniel Webster, struggling as district school teacher in New England,
-clothed in ill-fitting garments, would somehow furnish a better model
-for the sculptor or painter who would make a statue or picture or a
-head of him who was, indeed, a mighty man.</p>
-
-<p>The music of the voice of grand old Daniel Webster, even though he did
-not drawl in delightful imitation of the English, would give greater
-delight to the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; plebeian as they are and unrefined,
-than &#8220;Chappie&#8217;s&#8221; lispings.</p>
-
-<p>There remains another figure, called to mind by the Common People
-when they view &#8220;Chappie,&#8221; by reason of the vast difference between
-the figure of &#8220;Chappie&#8221; and the &#8220;rail-splitter&#8221; of Illinois. The
-long, uncouth, gangling, ungainly<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</a></span> figure of a boy sprawled on his
-back, lying on the floor of a humble log-cabin, seeking knowledge
-in a well-thumbed book, by the light of a flickering fire, presents
-something that speaks more eloquently to the hearts of the Common
-People than &#8220;Chappie&#8217;s&#8221; gorgeous appearance and apparel; for they
-know that the name of the lad before that fire was <span class="smcap">Abraham
-Lincoln</span>, and that from that uncouth figure, and by the aid of that
-difficultly-acquired knowledge, resulted the production of that man
-who, as representative of the Common People as their President, stood
-as the Rock of Gibraltar when the fierce waves of fratricidal war swept
-over our land; immovable, firm and unchangeable as that rock itself
-in the determination that the Union should be preserved, and that the
-Stars and Stripes should float over every inch of ground of the United
-States of America. While others lost hope and many were downcast,
-groping for support in the hour of gloom and peril to the national
-existence of our country, that man, who was the outcome of the ungainly
-figure by the fire, led the people of the nation as the pillar of fire
-of old led the hosts of Israel.</p>
-
-<p>While men like Jefferson, Jackson, Clay, Webster and Lincoln present
-types which, to the minds of the Common People of America, are best
-and greatest, the picture of &#8220;Chappie,&#8221; in all of his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</a></span> splendid
-apparel, peculiar pronunciation, abnormal immoralities, will sink
-into insignificance beneath the flood of the people&#8217;s contempt and
-disapproval; just as the party to which &#8220;Chappie&#8221; had allied himself
-were swept away and submerged, November 8, 1892.</p>
-
-<div class="center"><a name="i160.jpg" id="i160.jpg"></a><img src="images/i160.jpg" alt="ANDREW CARNEGIE" /></div>
-
-<p class="bold">ANDREW CARNEGIE.</p>
-
-<p class="bold">A &#8220;Self-Made&#8221; Man. A Multi-Millionaire.<br />Made $20,000,000 in America;
-<br />Lives in Scotland.</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2><span>CHAPTER VII.</span> <span class="smaller">HON. JOHN BRISBEN WALKER, ON HOMESTEAD.</span></h2>
-
-<p>It is the good fortune of only a few to be possessed of the remarkable
-genius and imbued with the spirit of prophecy to predict coming events
-with the certainty and accuracy of the Hon. J. Brisben Walker, who,
-in an article published in the <i>Cosmopolitan</i> for September, 1892,
-foretold, with wonderful force, the rock upon which the Republican bark
-was drifting. It was not until the manuscript of this volume was almost
-completed that attention was called to Mr. Walker&#8217;s article. To the
-credit of journalists, and writers generally, be it said that no class
-or profession are as willing to recognize the ability of their brothers
-as are the members of that profession whose aim it is to foretell the
-future, to weigh the evidence of public opinion, prognosticate as to
-the result thereof, and record the events that transpire, either in
-accordance with their prophecies or contrary thereto. To Mr. Walker be
-accorded the honor of justly appreciating the suppressed indignation
-of the people, and of sounding the warning note to the wealthy, prior
-to November 8, 1892. To the writer of this volume little credit is due
-for merely recording that which,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</a></span> since the result of the election is
-known, is perfectly apparent. Had Mr. Walker looked into the future
-and been blessed with prophetic vision, he could not have told, more
-clearly than he has, the forces that were operating in September, and
-which produced the results so surprising to many in November.</p>
-
-<div class="center"><a name="i162.jpg" id="i162.jpg"></a><img src="images/i162.jpg" alt="HENRY C. FRICK" /></div>
-
-<p class="bold">HENRY C. FRICK,</p>
-
-<p class="bold"><span class="smcap">Manager Carnegie Works, Homestead, Pa.</span></p>
-
-<p>While Mr. Walker has taken Homestead for his text, the application of
-his article to the condition of the people of the Union generally is
-so apparent that each man for himself may shift the scene and make
-it applicable to his own little community. In every village, town,
-city, or county in the Union, is some one man, or some set of men,
-who arrogate to themselves a certain superiority resulting from the
-accumulation of wealth in their hands; this accumulation, having arisen
-from the inequality in the distribution of the increased wealth of
-the nation, being in many cases purely<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</a></span> accidental, and in others the
-result of the phenomenal development of the resources of this country,
-coupled with the wonderful spirit of invention shown in the land in
-the last thirty years. Mr. Walker takes Carnegie and Frick as types of
-the class to which the people object so strenuously. The building of a
-church, or the founding of a library, is but a small price to pay, in
-the opinion of the American people, for the right to assume privileges
-detrimental to the growth and continuance of that doctrine so dear to
-the hearts of the masses&mdash;the equality of man. Mr. Walker entitles his
-article, &#8220;The Homestead Object Lesson,&#8221; and begins by saying:&mdash;</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;An affair like that at Homestead educates the public mind
-rapidly; more rapidly in a month than ten years of books and
-pamphlets. In the face of death, men stop to think. What led to
-this? What does it mean? What is the remedy? And when the daily
-journal gives in one column the picture of Cluny Castle, or the
-magnificent pile from which the Lyttons have gone out to admit
-partner Phipps from the Homestead mills, and in another sketches
-showing the dead and dying upon the banks of the Monongahela, the
-contrast is so sharp that one draws a quick breath of discomfort,
-and even the most conservative, whose manhood is stronger than his
-love of dollars, admits that something is wrong.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>If a man in the walk of life of Mr. Walker shall &#8220;draw a quick breath
-of discomfort&#8221; at the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span> scene he pictures, because his &#8220;manhood is
-stronger than his love of dollars,&#8221; how utterly obvious it ought to
-have appeared, and should now appear, to those possessed of wealth,
-that an appeal for the support of that class who, as American citizens,
-not only possess an abundance of manhood, but, in addition thereto, are
-sufferers by the wrongs or conditions written of by Mr. Walker, was and
-is useless.</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;Lovers of the Republic may well tremble at this exhibition, so
-closely resembling the evil days when rich Romans surrounded
-themselves by hired bands of fighting bullies. True, our
-modern rich man does not parade the streets, surrounded by his
-gladiators. He sits in a secret office, removed from danger,
-and, in communication with the telegraph wires, orders his army
-concentrated from many States by rapid transit, and moves it
-unexpectedly upon his private foes. There is lacking that personal
-courage which gave a half-way excuse to the Roman who, sword
-in hand, shared the dangers of the fight. But the risk to the
-Republic is all the greater from these modern methods. For, if a
-man may hire 300 poor devils ready to shoot down their brothers in
-misery, there is no reason why he may not hire 10,000.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>There are not a few of us who will recall the natural indignation
-aroused in our bosoms while witnessing that noble impersonator of
-<i>Virginius</i>, John B. McCullough; the idea of the degradation to
-which we were drifting, by the possibility of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</a></span> existence of an
-aristocracy, whose hired bullies and parasitical clients acted as
-panders to the worst passions of man. If it be possible to adopt the
-old Roman method of hiring bullies and assassins, and maintaining paid
-private armies, how very possible to come to a condition similar to
-that so powerfully portrayed in <i>Virginius</i>! Lovers of the Republic,
-of honor, and virtue, may well tremble, at the bare possibility,
-vaguely imagined, but evidently more vivid to the minds of the masses,
-than was contemplated by those autocratic gentlemen who ordered their
-mercenaries to Homestead.</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;There is another side to this matter. Raised up under the system
-which declares that any man has a right to control, without limit,
-the earth&#8217;s surface and its productions, or the labor of his
-fellow-men, Mr. Frick, doubtless, feels that he is performing a
-sacred duty in protecting his property at Homestead, by any means
-that the law permits. Thousands of good men held the same thought
-regarding their slaves, before and during the war. It really
-seemed to them a divine right of property, and all classes of the
-community to-day&mdash;learned ministers and professors, intelligent
-merchants, and high-minded men of all professions&mdash;hold that our
-system of distribution is not only legal, but fair, and authorized
-by the teachings of the Gospel.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>In the most lucid manner, Mr. Walker continues to give the causes of
-the existence of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</a></span> conditions conducive to the results which have been
-produced by the accumulation of wealth, and, in consequence, assumption
-of a superior social position by the possessors thereof:&mdash;</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;Less than half a century ago the people of the United States were
-comparatively poor and the wealth of the country distributed with
-a near approach to equality, less than a dozen individuals having
-fortunes approaching the million mark. The laws had been made
-for the existing conditions of labor, and were, as a whole, of a
-satisfactory character. No one had yet dreamed of the marvelous
-inventions and discoveries of natural wealth which were to upset
-all the conditions of production, and make the succeeding fifty
-years a wealth-giving period, unprecedented in the history of the
-world. Anthracite and bituminous coals, petroleum, the cotton gin,
-the reaper, steam and electricity, with their thousand marvels,
-were suddenly emptied upon a community whose laws had been made
-for conditions the very opposite of those now existing.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;It is not to be wondered at that the American mind should seize
-upon the possibilities which old laws gave to individuals for
-grabbing these newfound treasures. They would have been more than
-human if they could have resisted the temptation, and besides,
-it must be recollected that the Christianity practised was of a
-perfunctory character, formal and nominal rather than real, and
-civilization just beyond the period of wild beast skin wearing.
-In fifty years the creation of wealth has become prodigious; the
-distribution of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</a></span> wealth has become frightful in its inequalities.
-The laws, which were beneficent for an agricultural and pastoral
-people, worked degradation and infamy in a manufacturing
-community. They permitted the few to grab the greater part of
-this new wealth. With great fortunes are coming upon the scene
-an unparalleled luxury upon the one hand, and a poverty upon the
-other, scarcely surpassed in the days when production did not
-equal one-tenth the present output. In the strife for wealth
-the law-making power was found to be a useful auxiliary. Judges
-were bought, senatorships were sold in the interests of railways
-and the great corporations; and within the last ten years we
-find wealth&mdash;not contented with the advantages which the laws,
-confessedly in its favor, give it&mdash;hiring private armies to give
-force to edicts allotting to the laborer a lesser share of the
-product.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>Experience and observation force the conviction upon our minds, that
-Mr. Walker is correct in his assumption that even the ministers believe
-that the distribution of wealth among the masses is not only legal, but
-fair, and authorized by the teachings of the Gospel. A little strange,
-however, is it for the teachers of the doctrine of Christianity to
-maintain principles so utterly at variance with those expressed by
-their divine Master: &#8220;If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou
-hast, and give to the poor.&#8221;</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;There is only one class to dispute this proposition. They are the
-toilers, whose labor is the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</a></span> immediate cause of the production of
-our wealth. We may say that there must be intelligence to direct,
-and that to the intelligence which takes advantage should come
-the gains. But Mr. Carnegie and Mr. Frick are proofs that in
-the ranks of labor itself there is intelligence to direct. Many
-Carnegies and many Fricks would spring up to-morrow if opportunity
-permitted. If one would study the justice of a system of political
-economy, let him surrender his vested rights of property and take
-his place among those whom the system crushes, whose labor it
-devours, and whose reward for labor is a bare, joyless existence.
-We who have the money can reason speciously regarding the justice
-of our laws, the excellence of our system of government. The
-laboring man can only groan in spirit. He has not hitherto had
-the power of his vote, notwithstanding our boasted representative
-government, because his brothers, in the agony which poverty
-brings, in their effort to relieve the hand-to-mouth miseries of
-their existence, have sold at each election this birthright for
-the merest taste of pottage.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>Fortunately, under the Australian system of voting, it was
-impracticable to buy Esau&#8217;s birthright with a delusive mess of pottage
-held out by the protected, wealth-accumulating, sham aristocrats.</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;Everyone knows that this has been true, that the labor vote has
-never been a unit, that its purchasability has been one of the
-well-understood factors in ward politics, that there has been<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</a></span>
-no combination, no united effort, no intelligent direction, no
-willingness to submit to leadership, and that there is to-day no
-probability of the vote of these people being cast at an early
-election for the objects in which they are so deeply concerned.
-The issues that are before the public in either of the great
-political parties for whose candidates the votes will be cast,
-are very largely those which concern the people of means and
-influence. Platforms are dictated with reference to Wall street,
-and the great corporations and the rich men who supply the sinews
-of political war.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>Fortunately, Mr. Walker&#8217;s prophecy has proved incorrect. There was a
-time in the very near future when the objects so sacred to them would
-outweigh any possible advantage that might accrue to their pocketbooks
-by voting with those who would impose the yoke of a class distinction
-upon our country. It was nearer the day of retribution than even Mr.
-Walker, farseeing as he has demonstrated himself to be, supposed.
-The 8th of November was to witness the vindication upon the part of
-the workman of his inherent right to exercise his prerogative as an
-American citizen, uninfluenced by mercenary motives. Almost without
-an error has Mr. Walker gauged the public feeling. It is pardonable,
-in one who is so much nearer right than the majority, to make one
-single error. None of us appreciated how full were the hearts of the
-workingmen, the poor, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</a></span> those oppressed by wealth and stung by an
-attempted exhibition of the privileges accorded to &#8220;caste.&#8221;</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;Nevertheless, there is a ground-current steadily moving
-across the continent. Workmen, who were wholly ignorant thirty
-years ago, are partly educated to-day. Within fifteen years,
-a highly-intelligent class has sprung up among the workmen
-themselves, and there are a few really able men who have been
-making efforts for their advancement. That man Powderly, for
-instance, is a statesman of a high order. He has capacity for
-organization, he has singleness of purpose, he has determination,
-and he has courage. And he is only one of a number. They have been
-educating their followers, and teaching them to unite upon certain
-simple propositions. It is like the fencing-master, who puts in
-the hands of his pupil the single-stick, before he confides to
-him the glittering rapier. There is talent enough among them to
-organize a movement more formidable than that of Spartacus. Thank
-God, they are men who love the Republic, and who hope for the
-elevation of their people through the evolution of the law.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>Mr. Walker could have gone on and called the attention of the wealthy
-to the fact that, while these men loved the Republic, they did not love
-the foreign spirit that pervaded the would-be upper classes. It is well
-that a man of Mr. Walker&#8217;s position should feel it incumbent upon him
-to compliment, or, more properly speaking, to duly<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</a></span> appreciate, a man
-like Powderly. Mr. Powderly, were he not a statesman and a patriot,
-is possessed of dangerous powers; were it not for the great amount of
-virtue, honesty, and common-sense that resides in the bosoms of the
-masses, some dangerous, daring, and magnetic leader might spring into
-prominence and cause the overturning which Mr. Walker so ably depicts
-later in his article. Mr. Powderly, and men of his kind, have ever
-acted as the governing-power on this tremendous engine, called Labor,
-in this country. They have exhibited a degree of conservatism and
-consideration for the rights of the wealthy, as well as the rights of
-the laborer, which entitles them to the respect of all sound-minded
-Americans.</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;Two things must always be borne in mind: First, that the laboring
-men have the majority, if they choose to exercise it, not only of
-votes, but of physical strength. Intelligence and cunning were,
-once upon a time, factors upon which the few rich could count to
-keep in subjection the many poor. The time is rapidly approaching
-when these will no longer avail. There is a prevailing thought
-that this must be a Republic, indeed, where all men shall be equal
-before the law; where the law will carefully guard the industrious
-man against the greedy man; where cunning will not place labor at
-the greatest of disadvantages; where labor will become honorable,
-and idleness contemptible; where effort will be expected from
-every citizen in the direction of his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</a></span> best talent, and where
-the needs of the unfortunate, through disease or inheritance,
-will be respected; in a word, the model government in which a
-near approach to the ideal Republic will be attained, an example
-set which the countries of Europe may well imitate. We have the
-opportunities here, with our rich territory, our great natural
-resources, and our population yet uncrowded, to do this. If we
-fail, the idea of a Republic may well be abandoned for the next
-2,000 years.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>Forcefully is it called to the minds of the fortunate possessors of
-wealth, by Mr. Walker, that the poor are in possession of a superior
-physical force. It would be well for those who enjoy the protection
-accorded to them and their property by this vast population, made up
-largely of the laboring classes, to consider what a small percentage
-the &#8220;wealthy&#8221; represent in the mass of 65,000,000 people. Their
-pronounced minority becomes apparent whenever they oppose the will of
-that great majority, the &#8220;Common People.&#8221; Should it ever be necessary
-to arbitrate any question of difference by physical force, how
-absolutely unequal are the contending elements! Men like Mr. Powderly
-have ever sought to cast oil upon the turbulent waters occasioned
-by too much arrogance upon the part of the wealthy. It is not only
-equality before the law which the poor man prizes, but that equality<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span>
-which is rather of a sentimental than a legal nature. He recognizes no
-inequality as existing between the woman whom he honors as his wife
-and the woman whom men like Messrs. Carnegie and Frick may clothe in
-seal-skins and laces, and bedeck with jewels. It is not only before the
-law that the poor man desires to be equal. The sentimental portion of
-his nature is moved to create a difference, socially, resting only upon
-those natural inherent qualities, worth, merit, and virtue, and not
-that which has its foundation in the possession of wealth alone.</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;That was a curious interview between the commandant of the
-militia, the gentleman born and bred&mdash;with an inheritance of
-belief regarding the rights to accumulate property, even if
-in so doing one crowded one&#8217;s fellow-mortal to the wall&mdash;and
-the iron-workers who constituted the Homestead committee.
-Gold-spectacled, practised in the art of snubbing and sure of the
-physical strength at his back, the officer was more than a match
-for the laborer, who in his turn was awed by his inherited respect
-for wealth and power. Chilled and overawed, the representatives of
-labor went down the hill from this unequal interview. The general
-in charge had neither the grace nor the will to recognize a labor
-association which embraced a membership large enough, if properly
-organized, to sweep out of existence the entire army of the United
-States. They must have reflected, as they went down the hill,
-these representatives of labor, that if a militia organization<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</a></span>
-carried such weight, permitted such freezing dignity upon the
-part of a citizen towards other citizens, it might possibly be
-well for their interests to have a few thousand of their own men
-enrolled in this same militia. There is nothing to prevent a body
-of American citizens from organizing themselves as a militia
-organization with proper arms and equipments. There are enough
-workmen in Pittsburg and vicinity to give a hundred regiments of
-the full complement of ten companies of seventy men each, with as
-many more left over for onlookers at parades. Six months of hard
-drill such as the enthusiasm of these men would permit would leave
-them equal to the best of the Philadelphia troops. Does anyone
-believe for an instant that if there had been a hundred such
-regiments among the workingmen of Pittsburg, General Snowden would
-have declared that he could not recognize the existence of such a
-body of men as the Amalgamated Association?&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>We will assume, with Mr. Walker, that the commandant of the troops
-sent to Pittsburg by the Governor of Pennsylvania, was a &#8220;gentleman
-bred.&#8221; About a man being <i>born</i> a gentleman, we may hold opinions at
-variance with Mr. Walker. Horses may exhibit the fact that they are
-thoroughbred, when intelligence in the shape of a jockey is perched
-upon their backs; but born gentlemen in America have never, as a rule,
-by their scintillating genius and danger-defying patriotism, carved out
-names upon the eternal monuments of the nation to rival the names of
-Clay,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</a></span> Webster, and Lincoln. We hope that the man put in command of the
-Pennsylvania militia was a &#8220;gentleman bred,&#8221; but the exhibition that he
-made of himself, while clothed with that brief authority, would not be
-conducive to the formation of such an opinion.</p>
-
-<p>In his meeting with the citizens of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania,
-who were contributing towards the payment of the taxes from which the
-expenses incurred by the State were to be defrayed, he did not conduct
-himself in a manner such as to make a shining example for those who
-shall command, in the future, the citizen-soldiery of the Republic. He
-seemed utterly oblivious to the fact that he came, not as a conquering
-hero, but as a private citizen, invested with a brief and circumscribed
-authority exercised for the greatest good to the greatest number in
-the prevention of lawlessness and violence and the peaceful solution
-of a local difficulty with which the Sheriff of the county appeared
-to be unable to contend. The arrogance assumed by this &#8220;gentleman
-bred&#8221; was not calculated to create any great amount of good feeling
-in the breasts of his fellow-citizens, to pacify whom he was sent
-by the Governor of his State. There would have been but slight loss
-of dignity upon his part to have allayed their anxiety by a little
-exercise of that &#8220;good breeding,&#8221; patience, and consideration for the
-feelings of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[Pg 176]</a></span> others, which are supposed to be characteristics of the
-gentleman the world over. General Ulysses S. Grant, commander of the
-armies of the nation, as victor in a contest of four years&#8217; duration,
-has set a magnificent example in the treatment of his vanquished but
-great opponent, Lee, by his courteous, kindly, and magnanimous behavior
-toward Lee and his vanquished legions whom Grant had so long faced and
-at last vanquished.</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;I choose to ask this question as a <i>reductio ad absurdum</i>, in
-the hope that it will cause my own class, who have power and
-authority, to stop and reflect that perhaps it will be best to
-concede something in the way of law, to regulate this one-sided
-distribution of wealth, lest it should be regulated through
-bloodshed, or, what is more horrible still, should throw into
-power, through sheer brute force, elements which will bring our
-Republic to anarchy. If there could have been pointed out to the
-nobles of Louis XVI. the things which were liable to follow their
-arrogance, the children of these French rich would have cause for
-congratulation to-day.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>Mr. Walker says that he chooses to ask this of men of his class. He
-hardly means that. Men of his class, like himself, would have brains
-enough not to require the question. Mr. Walker doubtless refers, in
-speaking of men of his own class, to the wealthy, and to them it is
-well addressed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</a></span> and worthy of their careful attention. France had its
-14th of July, which should have taught Louis XVI. and his nobles the
-lesson which it is hoped has been learned thoroughly by the rich of
-this country, as taught in the result of the election of November 8,
-1892. These are but the premonitory symptoms of a terrible scourge that
-might sweep over our country. The poor may be robbed with impunity;
-the &#8220;Common People&#8221; will good-naturedly submit to a lot of snubbing;
-but it would be well for men accustomed to exhibit their impudence and
-assumption, to forego the snubbing process when brought in contact
-with the people, as General Snowden was, while commanding the military
-power of the State, as he did at Homestead. General Snowden might well
-be taken as a type of the &#8220;smart set&#8221; of Philadelphia, imitating the
-manners of the McAllister &#8220;smart set&#8221; of New York.</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;The fact is, we have two separate worlds in this country. The
-man who lives in what is known as the world of society has no
-conception of what the world of labor is thinking. Their worlds
-are almost as distinct and as completely cut off from each other
-as if one had its capital at Kamtchatka, and the other at Terra
-del Fuego. The poor do injustice to the kindly-hearted people
-whose minds have been warped by the teachings of inheritance
-and by their environment of wealth; and the rich do not dream
-of the thoughts which<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[Pg 178]</a></span> fill the minds of the poor. It is a
-dangerous ignorance. These two factors are like the nitre and
-charcoal of gunpowder. Any stray spark may produce disastrous
-results. The laborer believes now that the law is gradually being
-altered to suit what he considers the equities of his position.
-Let him become fairly convinced that the government is for the
-few, that the military is but a means of carrying out schemes
-of aggrandizement by the rich, and that votes are bought or
-majorities counted out in the same interest, and the crucial hour
-of the Republic will at once have arrived.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Can science do nothing towards the solution of these
-difficulties? Statistics show us that if we were all to labor,
-no one would want for anything, neither the necessities of life,
-nor reasonable pleasures, nor enjoyments. Again, is there any
-intelligent rich man, who would not wish his sons to labor? Who
-does not believe that labor, in moderation, brings happiness, if
-only that it gives a keener zest for recreation? Who does not
-believe that idleness brings mental and physical injury? Who,
-then, would wish for his children existence in a community where
-idleness is to be their lot? Is there any thinking man who can
-feel reasonably comfortable, when only a few blocks distant,
-thousands are eking out a dark existence by labor that extends, in
-many cases, over double the allotted number of hours, who have few
-pleasures, and fewer still of what we call the comforts of life?&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>It is not simply that those not possessed of wealth may live within
-a few blocks of those who<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[Pg 179]</a></span> are possessed of wealth; it is not that
-their lives may be eked out in darkness; it is the crushing shame to
-them that their miserable existence is made still more hard to bear
-by the flaunted superiority, socially, of the possessors of wealth,
-who live a few blocks away. Poverty, when accompanied by none of the
-other and more objectionable features, is not so hard to bear. The
-poor man believes in the dignity of labor. He does not feel degraded
-by the fact that he may toil with his hands. He only feels a sense of
-shame, and his bosom only swells with wrath, when the disdainful dames
-of the wealthy class presume to snub or insult his wife, the sharer of
-his toil and privations. She is to him the light and life of even his
-miserable hovel, only a few blocks away from the wealthy; hence, the
-keener pang that he experiences when the one bright spot in his life,
-sacred to him, is invaded by snobbery and pretended class distinction.</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;Yet wise laws could regulate much of this in the brief period of
-one generation. Lighten the burdens of taxation upon the poor,
-by letting those whose wealth is protected by the State chiefly
-furnish the means of subsistence for the State, at the same
-time offering a discouragement to the amassing of great wealth.
-The well-known expedient of income-tax would be a step in this
-direction. Take out of the control of private individuals the
-power to amass great fortunes, at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[Pg 180]</a></span> the expense of the public,
-through the management of functions like railway, express, and
-telegraph, which are purely of a public character. Establish a
-system of currency, self-regulated, by means of postal savings
-banks; tax highly the unimproved properties which are held for
-purposes of speculation. Finally, let it be a recognized principle
-that when men employ many laborers, their business ceases to be
-purely a private affair, but concerns the State, and that disputes
-between proprietor and workmen must be submitted, not to the
-brute-force of so many Pinkerton mercenaries, but to arbitration.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>The espousal, by Mr. Walker, of a doctrine which, to most of the
-wealthy, is rank heresy,&mdash;an income tax,&mdash;is a step in the right
-direction. A graduated tax, to be regulated by the amount of income
-received and enjoyed by the taxpayer, would furnish a speedy,
-practicable, and just means, not only of preventing these vast
-accumulations in the hands of individuals, by accretions resulting from
-that part of their income which they are unable to spend, but it would
-also furnish a means whereby the Federal Government might be supported
-without the imposition of even the existing internal revenue tax, and
-only such protective tariff tax as would prove absolutely necessary to
-sustain our manufactures. It was a great step in the right direction,
-for the owner of such a prosperous magazine as the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[Pg 181]</a></span> <i>Cosmopolitan</i>, the
-possessor of much of the world&#8217;s goods, to propose such an expedient
-for the relief of the people; especially when coupled with the
-suggestion that corporations, like those of the railroads, telegraph,
-<i>et al.</i>, should not be controlled and managed for the profit of
-individuals. We should have fewer strikes, and much less labor trouble,
-if the Government controlled the great corporations who employ large
-numbers of laboring men.</p>
-
-<p>This article is given prominence and so liberally quoted from&mdash;not
-alone from the intrinsic merit of the article and discernment of the
-writer in predicting the overthrow of plutocracy, and warning the rich
-against their insolence to those less-favored brothers, as far as
-worldly wealth is concerned,&mdash;but also, because of the position of the
-writer of the article; a man of brains, enterprise, energy, and wealth.</p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="center"><a name="i182.jpg" id="i182.jpg"></a><img src="images/i182.jpg" alt="THE MISTAKE AT HOMESTEAD" /></div>
-
-<p class="bold">THE MISTAKE AT HOMESTEAD, PA.&mdash;JULY, 1892.</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[Pg 183]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2><span>CHAPTER VIII.</span> <span class="smaller">SURRENDER AT HOMESTEAD.&mdash;ORGANIZED LABOR DEFEATED.</span></h2>
-
-<p>It is fitting to follow the chapter composed so largely of what Mr.
-Walker has written concerning the condition of affairs at Homestead,
-with an account of the surrender. Carnegie, the owner of castles
-and coaches in Scotland, the many times millionaire, and Frick, his
-representative, living in luxury and attempted social superiority, have
-vanquished the forces of organized labor. They have won the battle.</p>
-
-<p>Some victories are more disastrous than defeats, and this victory, at
-Homestead, of capital, wealth, sham aristocracy, against the people,
-will teach the people to seek other methods by which their wrongs
-may be righted. It will show them, coming as it does just after the
-exhibition of the great power of the people, November 8, 1892, that
-their plan of action must be changed; that the effective missile to
-be used against the autocratic aristocrat is not the bullet, but the
-missive called the &#8220;ballot.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>The plan of campaign of the poor &#8220;Common People&#8221; must be changed.
-Their defeat at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[Pg 184]</a></span> Homestead will be the precursor of a long line of
-victories yet to be recorded. Organizations of <i>voters</i> will spring
-into existence, instead of Knights of Labor. The nation will give birth
-(as it ever has, when necessity has demanded) to men of organizing
-abilities. The Carnegies and Fricks will find the ballot of organized
-voters more effective in preventing encroachment on the rights of the
-people than the bullets of the strikers at Homestead hurled at the
-hirelings of Pinkerton. As Mr. Walker so ably says, in a conflict of
-physical force, the people&mdash;that is, the poor&mdash;are superior; when,
-according to law, they deposit their ballots, they will enforce the
-election of the chosen of the majority in spite of all the private
-armies of the Carnegies and Fricks. And, should that occasion arise,
-the militia and General Snowden will be found acting <i>with</i> the people
-in defending the rights of the people. There will be no insolence
-and arrogance then upon the part of the commander of the militia;
-for, after an election wherein the people have legally chosen their
-representatives and legislators, not one militiaman would obey the
-orders of the &#8220;well-bred&#8221; gentleman of Philadelphia, if such orders
-were contrary to the will of the majority as expressed at a legal
-election.</p>
-
-<p>The representatives of the first grade of &#8220;caste&#8221; have won at
-Homestead! In their <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[Pg 185]</a></span>&#8220;well-bred&#8221; bosoms, exultation may be the feeling
-of the hour. Enjoy the brief respite in the fullness of selfishness;
-but the hour is at hand when, according to the laws as enacted by
-legally-elected representatives, the people of the Union shall fill
-your &#8220;well-bred&#8221; bosoms with a sorrow and disappointment occasioned
-by your arrogance, selfishness, and disregard of their claim for
-respectful treatment upon your part of their representatives of
-organized labor. When their representatives, as <i>organized voters</i>,
-issue their mandates, no supercilious commander of militia, blessed
-with a little brief authority, will dare resist them.</p>
-
-<p>Organized labor is defeated at Homestead. Organized labor, organized
-in heart and spirit, if not by an expressed Association, won a great
-battle November last. The victory of the sham aristocracy at Homestead
-was but a skirmish. The victory at the polls in November was a
-Waterloo and Gettysburg rolled into one. The commander-in-chief of the
-victorious army is Grover Cleveland. In his hands the people place the
-power of their support&mdash;the great majority. He represents the choice
-of the &#8220;Common People&#8221;&mdash;not because he&#8217;s a Democrat&mdash;not because the
-people have become Democratic, in the narrow sense of the word, but
-because Cleveland represents to their minds the opposition to sham
-aristocracy, &#8220;caste.&#8221; </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[Pg 186]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>Grover Cleveland is an exponent of that sentiment that made Abraham
-Lincoln President in &#8217;61; Jackson, President in &#8217;28; Jefferson,
-President in 1800. Call the party by whom he was nominated any name
-that best suits the fancy of the speaker. It&#8217;s the same grand old,
-broad party of the people; triumphant now as it ever will be, God
-grant, in this Republic! We want no Republic in America like that of
-Venice. The people have entrusted Grover Cleveland with the executive
-power of the nation. At his hands they will expect the righting of
-those wrongs which these petty tyrants, sham aristocrats, believers in
-social distinction and &#8220;caste,&#8221; have inflicted upon the people. They
-have chosen representatives in Congress who control both branches of
-the legislature, through whom the people shall express their will and
-pleasure; and the people will expect of Grover Cleveland, as they did
-of Abraham Lincoln, Jackson, and Jefferson, the execution of their
-wishes. The people have never been disappointed by the actions of their
-former chieftains in this matter. When made chief magistrate of the
-nation, every former leader of the people has executed the will of the
-masses, according to the laws as enacted. No former chief magistrate
-has ever presumed to use his power of veto contrary to the will of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[Pg 187]</a></span>
-people as expressed by a majority of their representatives.</p>
-
-<p>The eyes of the nation are upon Grover Cleveland. In return for the
-defeat in their skirmish at Homestead, the people will expect to
-reap the fruits of their victory in the great battle of ballots last
-November. Long have they suffered, and now that the golden opportunity
-has arrived, the people are not to be thwarted. With kindly but
-scrutinizing gaze, the people regard their new leader, Grover Cleveland.</p>
-
-<p>The New York <i>Sun</i>, of November 20th, in an account of the defeat of
-the Amalgamated Association, prints the following:&mdash;</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;A prominent member of the Association was seen at his house
-this afternoon. His grate was piled high with burning pamphlets.
-Pointing to them, he said:</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;&#8216;I have no more use for them. They contain the laws and rules of
-the Amalgamated Association, and I have taken this means to be rid
-of them. I hardly think the Amalgamated lodges will be continued
-here, as nothing can be derived from membership in it. A potent
-fact in losing the strike was that too many of our men returned to
-work, and this helped the company to get its mills into working
-order. It was not the company, but our own men, that lost the
-strike.&#8217;&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>This prominent member of the Association, who was engaged in burning
-the laws and rules of the Amalgamated Association, was inadvertently<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[Pg 188]</a></span>
-acting in accordance with the unexpressed thought that the people had
-found a surer means of righting their wrongs than that furnished by
-associated labor. They had learned that their power, when opposed to
-the rich and aristocratic, was better utilized in the exercise of the
-ballot than when expressed through associated labor and associations
-of crafts and certain kinds of labor. If the Carnegies and Fricks were
-wise, they would view with fear and trembling the disruption of this
-thing called organized labor, which has been a toy by which the people
-have been amused and entertained and diverted from the use of their
-most effective weapon, the ballot.</p>
-
-<p>Organized labor and association have proved a pretty tin toy sword,
-which was attractive to gaze at upon a holiday parade, but utterly
-valueless in actual warfare. Its absolute inefficiency was never more
-clearly demonstrated, because it had never been so thoroughly tested in
-any previous contest of labor, as at Homestead.</p>
-
-<p>Here is given concisely&mdash;as that most excellent journal, the New York
-<i>Sun</i>, always presents all matters of public interest&mdash;an account
-of the cost of the strike to the laborers, to the capitalist, and
-to the State of Pennsylvania. Even the most careless reader and the
-most superficial inquirer after truth will read in this statement the
-evidence of the brave and valiant battle made by<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[Pg 189]</a></span> labor, which was
-defeated because the very sword it fought with was not of the kind of
-metal for actual warfare. The Ballot! the Ballot! the Ballot! is the
-weapon of the future:&mdash;</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;It is almost impossible to give figures at this time on the
-cost of the strike, but conservative estimates place it at about
-$10,000,000. Of this, about $2,500,000 were in wages to the men.
-The firm&#8217;s loss is thought to be two or three times that. The
-direct cost of the troops was nearly half a million. The indirect
-loss has been very large indeed.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;This contest was brought on by a demand for a reduction of wages
-of about 33-1/3 per cent. on certain classes of work in the open
-hearth departments, Nos. 1 and 2 mills, and in the 119-inch and
-32-inch plate mills. This reduction directly affected only about
-325 out of the 3,800 men in the works, but the others took up the
-matter as a common cause through sympathy, and agreed to stand by
-the men interested in case of a strike.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The scale expired under which they were working on June 30th.
-The company wanted the Amalgamated Association, which controlled
-the workmen in the mills, to sign the scale at the reduction. The
-scale was to be renewed on January 1st, instead of July 1st. The
-Association refused, and the men threatened to strike should the
-request for the existing scale not be granted before July.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;On June 30th, the company locked out all men before they had the
-opportunity to strike.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[Pg 190]</a></span> The wages question was soon lost sight of,
-and the contest for the recognition of organized labor followed.
-On the dawn of July 6th, the famous battle took place between the
-workmen on the mill property and the Pinkerton force attempting to
-land and take possession of the mill.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Then followed the trying times at Homestead, the reign of the
-Advisory Board, the scenes of lawlessness, the calling out of
-the troops, their long and trying stay, the shooting of Mr.
-Frick by Berkman, the departure of the troops, the arrest of the
-Homesteaders, the beginning of their trials, and now the ending of
-the strike.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;According to Superintendent Wood, of the Homestead works, not
-more than 800 or 900 of the total number of old employés will be
-able to secure employment. Before the break of last Thursday,
-there were left in Homestead about 2,800 of the original 3,800 men
-who were locked out. Of these 2,800 men, 2,200 were mechanics and
-laborers and 600 Amalgamated Association men.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>If Carnegie, Frick, son-in-law W. Seward Webb, of the New York Central
-Road, and men of that class can find any comfort in this evidence that
-the &#8220;Common People&#8221; have at last realized the utter lack of merit
-in their weapons, called &#8220;Organizations and Associations of Labor,&#8221;
-then most heartily are they to be congratulated. Let them enjoy for a
-brief period their dreams of autocratic power; for there will be a sad
-awakening as the result of the realization upon the part<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[Pg 191]</a></span> of the people
-that the ballot-box is the place for effective battle, and not the
-lodge rooms of Associations and Organizations.</p>
-
-<p>Grover Cleveland is the Grand Master of the great Organization of the
-Associated People, who legally will now enforce the demands of the
-&#8220;Common People.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>The defeated laborer, mechanic, and workman of Homestead has a prospect
-before him, so full of hope and promise, presenting a picture so
-pleasing to his oppressed soul, that the scene of his disastrous defeat
-becomes obliterated. Let him turn from those days of suffering, so
-vividly portrayed by the <i>Herald</i> of November 25th:&mdash;</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;There were dozens of tables in Homestead to-day where the
-Thanksgiving Day bird was absent, and on many of these tables
-hunger was the only sauce in sight.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;To-day while plenty ruled in American homes, starvation and cold
-were closing their grip on the families of the Homestead strikers.
-While the horn of plenty unrolled its golden store into the hands
-of the nation, there were children in Homestead crying for bread,
-with weeping mothers and despairing fathers.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;While well-clothed citizens were going to highly respectable
-churches to return thanks, there were people in Homestead
-shivering over scant fires, wondering where the next meal would
-come from. There were men with shoes so full of holes and clothes
-so ragged as to barely cover them. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[Pg 192]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The present sufferings of these men, women, and children were
-made all the keener by their forebodings of the future; of a
-winter without work, to be passed at the gates of starvation; with
-no work to be had at the Carnegie mills or any other mills on
-account of the terrible blacklist.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>The question will arise in the mind of the poor man, when recalling
-<span class="smaller">HIS</span> Thanksgiving dinner, With what did Andrew Carnegie and H.
-C. Frick feed their families that day? With what kind of conscience did
-they bow the knee and raise their voices in their costly churches and
-address the throne of the lowly Jesus, who left in the records of His
-life, utterances like these:&mdash;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, and give to the
-poor.&#8221; &#8220;Sell that ye have, and give alms.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>The answer which will force itself upon the minds of the &#8220;Common
-People&#8221; will not be such as to lessen or moderate the demands which
-they will make for the fruits of their victory in November.</p>
-
-<p>They have endured much; they have starved at Homestead; they have been
-cold and hungry; they have been led astray by false gods; but the Land
-of Canaan is now spread before them. The ballot-box has become their
-guiding star and hope. The bitter experience endured that Thanksgiving
-Day will prove a benefit to them in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[Pg 193]</a></span> removing from them the danger of
-relying upon the tin sword in future. Every line of this article in the
-<i>Herald</i> is full of danger to the insolent power of the rich, arrogant,
-sham aristocrats. It is brimming over with a lesson that the blindest
-is bound to read by the light of the recently-achieved victory of the
-people:&mdash;</p>
-
-<p class="center">CANNOT LEAVE HOMESTEAD.</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;Dozens there are who cannot leave Homestead or its vicinity. They
-are under heavy bonds to appear in the Allegheny County courts on
-charges of murder, treason, and riot. To stay means starvation,
-because here they will find little or no work. To go means to be
-sent to jail, because bondsmen are fearful and do not relish the
-idea of forfeiting thousands of dollars.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Most of the storekeepers in Homestead have ceased to give the
-locked-out men credit. If they did, it would mean bankruptcy.
-All of them are already creditors for hundreds and in some cases
-thousands of dollars, with poor prospects of getting any of it
-back for months, possibly years.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The last strike benefits that will be paid by the Amalgamated
-Association have been received by the idle men. Right here be it
-said that these benefits were by no means as reported during the
-strike. Not one-half of the men got $4 a week, and the majority
-received about $2 a week.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The Homestead steel-workers and their families are in need of
-almost everything that goes<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[Pg 194]</a></span> to make life comfortable. All need
-clothing more or less. One man I met to-day was trying to prevent
-the biting wind from sweeping a well-ventilated straw hat from his
-head.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Then there is fuel. There is hardly a street or roadway in
-Homestead on which there did not stand a house or several of
-them in which the cold stoves made the temperature more frigid
-by contrast. Those families that did burn coal or wood did so
-through the kindness of the neighbors or the good-will of the fuel
-merchant.</p>
-
-<p class="center">PLAYING THANKSGIVING.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;In walking through Homestead to-day I passed a vacant lot on
-Fourth avenue, in which a fire was burning. The fuel consisted of
-logs dragged from the river. Surrounding the fire were ill-clad
-boys and girls. They were keeping warm and roasting potatoes. One
-of the boys told me that &#8216;Maw hadn&#8217;t much for dinner at home, and
-we are playing Thanksgiving.&#8217;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;This was their feast; they were children of the strikers, who
-lived in a clump of shanties near by.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>Playing Thanksgiving! God of justice! look down upon such a picture.
-Playing at praying! Absolutely making a game and jest of thanking Thee!
-So cynical has become the hearts of even these children, caused by the
-oppression and injustice of the oppressor, that they would make a game,
-a jest, of giving thanks to the Giver of all good things! because the
-good things were on the tables of Carnegie, Frick, Webb, and others,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[Pg 195]</a></span>
-while they, somebody&#8217;s children&mdash;poor, &#8220;Common People&#8217;s&#8221; children,
-perhaps&mdash;were cold, ragged, and hungry; making a feast of half-burned
-potatoes, veritably, in a spirit of irony. So hard and desolate has
-become the destiny of the poor of our land that the children cease to
-be natural, loving, gentle, and sincere, and have become ironical,
-sarcastic, holding so lightly the respect due to the God of all men,
-that they make a jest of the day consecrated to rendering thanks to the
-Giver of all good things of life!</p>
-
-<p>A picture like this, for which the sham aristocrats are absolutely
-responsible, does more to arouse a feelings of socialism and anarchism
-in the breasts of even the best citizens, than all the ravings of
-crazed nihilistic leaders. Stop such scenes now! Socialism and
-anarchism have no foothold in America. Don&#8217;t allow these dangerous
-&#8220;isms&#8221; to form an entering wedge. Such scenes as those poor children,
-playing Thanksgiving, are the greatest allies of the socialists and
-anarchists.</p>
-
-<p>The gentleman (?) known as Ollie Teall should receive, at the hands
-of the disciples of anarchy and socialism, a medal for his valuable
-services in attempting to present a picture to the delectation of the
-assembled &#8220;Four Hundred,&#8221; of the children of the poor feeding (as
-animals, poor creatures!) in Madison Square Garden, last<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[Pg 196]</a></span> Christmas.
-This man, Teall, may have no qualities to recommend him other than
-this, that he is a superlative example of those who would create a
-state of anarchy in this country.</p>
-
-<p>It was his proposition, so it appears from the newspapers, to make
-a kind of horse-show at Madison Square Garden, wherein the children
-of the poor should perform the part of the horses, the animals. It
-was proposed to sell boxes to the rich, that they might sit around
-and behold the exhibition of the animals! To the originators of this
-novel exhibition is due the thanks and praises of the anarchists, who
-have sought a haven here, for they played into the hands held by the
-anarchists with wonderful precision.</p>
-
-<p>We must all respect the courage and manliness of one man who, justly
-conceiving his duty as a teacher of the doctrine of his Master, arose
-and protested. Yes, and he was worth more than a brigade of soldiers in
-quieting the wrath of the people, the Rev. Dr. Rainsford, of St. George
-Episcopal church, in Brooklyn, and let his name be remembered for his
-courage in denouncing the most damnable exhibition of the tendency of
-the &#8220;Four Hundred&#8221; of New York. The name of the Rev. Dr. Rainsford, of
-the St. George Episcopal Church, will ever be remembered by the poor as
-that of a man, a Christian, an American, and a gentleman. Vigorous was
-his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[Pg 197]</a></span> denunciation of the spectacular exhibition of the feeding of the
-poor like so many cattle.</p>
-
-<p>Yes, fair &#8220;Four Hundred,&#8221; as the nobles of France told the peasants to
-&#8220;eat grass&#8221; and were amused at their attempts of the performance, so
-you would feed a lot of poor children in Madison Square Garden, and
-take stalls and boxes to look on at the peculiar performances of the
-hungry eating! You know that each child is but the coming American man
-or woman. You would make a Roman holiday to exhibit the necessities
-of the People, who are your rulers. Delightful entertainment for the
-exclusive &#8220;Four Hundred,&#8221;&mdash;to sit around with their many millions and
-gaze at the ravenous appetites exhibited by the children of the poor.
-It was a holiday like the holidays in Rome, when the nobles assembled
-to see the persecuted Christians torn and mangled by every form of
-beast that, by research, could be brought to the Roman arena. Dr.
-Rainsford, thou art &#8220;a man for a&#8217; that.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>Do you wonder, millionaires, why the people whose children you would
-exhibit to create a carnival for you, did not vote with you November
-8, 1892? Of the purchasers of the boxes at Madison Square Garden for
-this unique performance, ninety per cent. were Republicans. Shades
-of Abraham Lincoln, look down and see the strong oak of thy creation
-benumbed by this<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[Pg 198]</a></span> parasite entwined around it! Imagine the creator, the
-originator, the father of the Republican party, this high priest in
-the hearts of the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; Abraham Lincoln, at such a scene.
-He would have been down with the children. In his loving arms he would
-have held the children of the poor. And these &#8220;Four Hundred,&#8221; a little
-better than the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; would look on at the feeding of the
-&#8220;common folks,&#8221; and, from their assumed exalted position, view the
-performance gotten up by their money, and would have had a sensation
-of almost hunger aroused where abundance had produced satiety. The
-proposition to hold such an exhibition as the feeding of the poor
-children in Madison Square Garden was in itself an insult to every
-American citizen. Imagine, fair lady, as you loll in your carriage
-drawn by your high-priced bays on Fifth avenue, how pleasant it would
-be to have your little curled and perfumed darling, left at home under
-the watchful eye of some imported French <i>bonne</i>, exhibited as a freak
-in a dime museum. Think of the tears that should be shed on a mother&#8217;s
-bosom, being paraded before the public as an object of amusement. A
-child&#8217;s sorrows and its joys are as sacred as the law of God delivered
-to Moses on Sinai, for a child has more of God in it; and you would
-make of the children of the poor, and their wants,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[Pg 199]</a></span> and needs, and
-appetites, a spectacle that you may pay so much money and see?</p>
-
-<p>The lisped prayer of the child of the poor ascends to the throne of God
-as surely, though it proceed from a hovel or the gutter, as that from
-the downy couch of the ease of luxury in the palace on Fifth avenue. Do
-not the poor love their children with the same earnestness and fervor
-as the rich? Have you to learn this lesson anew? Need you wonder, you
-people who seem astonished at the result of election, why the mighty
-voice of the people should be raised against you? You who wonder why
-the party of you, &#8220;the respectable,&#8221; should have been so overwhelmingly
-defeated, recall to mind the contemplated carnival you would have
-held in Madison Square Garden, feeding like pigs, the children of the
-poor, and thank God that the volcano upon which in seeming security
-you rested found a vent without tossing you heavenward. There would
-have been rivers of blood instead of lava; the ballot of 1892 was your
-salvation.</p>
-
-<p>Slumbering wrath was in the breasts of the people. One Robespierre or
-Danton would have set aflame this feeling, and the &#8220;Common People&#8221;
-only need a leader, an organizer who will teach them under form of law
-that their mighty voice is paramount, and the sham aristocracy will be
-crushed and annihilated, as was a better aristocracy<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[Pg 200]</a></span> in France in the
-latter part of the eighteenth century. Don&#8217;t let history repeat itself.</p>
-
-<p>Can such pictures as depicted in these few lines of the <i>Herald</i> about
-those poor children&#8217;s Thanksgiving dinner, the feast proposed by the
-&#8220;Four Hundred&#8221; at Madison Square Garden, be accurate and represent
-scenes in free America, the richest, freest, best country on earth?
-or are these some occurrences seen in poor, starving, Czar-ridden
-Russia? A bow of promise was in the sky that Thanksgiving Day,
-however. The people had spoken a few days before. They had selected
-their representatives to make laws relieving them of the presence of
-such scenes as above described. They had selected an Executive of
-unquestioned honesty, who will execute such laws as will emanate from
-the representatives of the people.</p>
-
-<p>The people had given no sign, but in silence had been thinking of
-scenes like that proposed at Madison Square Garden. They had voted
-November the 8th in silence.</p>
-
-<p>Silence is often more dangerous than utterance. The deadly cobra gives
-no signal before he strikes. &#8220;General apathy&#8221; and the silence of the
-people was deadly earnest, and you know whether it was forceful or not.
-And if the party that the people have put in power will not do the will
-of the people, then the people will put some other party in power which
-<i>will</i> execute the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[Pg 201]</a></span> desire of the masses. It is a quicksand that the
-rich tread upon. So accustomed have the rich become to the patience,
-long-enduring suffering of the poor, that they deem it impossible that
-any condition could exist other than the present. Only remember that
-Charles Stuart, Louis XVI., Tarquin, all thought it was impossible
-that aught could interfere with the set order of things; but righteous
-indignation, the wrath of the people, like a whirlwind may obliterate
-the little edifices of dust built upon the past.</p>
-
-<p>The rest of the story, so vividly portrayed by the <i>Herald</i>, is worthy
-of consideration and attention:&mdash;</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;I visited the house of J. W. Grimes, a striker, on the hillside,
-above the mill. He had a pair of rubbers on his feet. The rubbers
-were worn away and had been sewed together with twine. &#8216;You see,
-my shoes are so bad,&#8217; said the mill-man, apologetically, &#8216;that I
-have to wear these rubbers. Jim Sweeney threw them away, but I
-found them and sewed them up,&#8217; and he exhibited a shoe that would
-almost have fallen from his foot, but for the rubber which held it.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Grimes was doing the family washing when I met him. His arms were
-covered with soapsuds. He told me his wife was very sick. He had
-been injured in the mill before the strike and had been able to
-save but little. Since the strike he has been able to get only a
-few days&#8217; work, and his wife took in washing and did scrubbing to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[Pg 202]</a></span>
-keep the family in bread. Now she is near death&#8217;s door, a mere
-apparition, while her husband has no work and there is little in
-the house.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;I went to the house of Bridget Coyle, who, during her testimony
-in the Critchlow case the other day, said she would not tell a lie
-for all the money Carnegie is worth. Two of her boys worked in the
-mill; one has secured work in another city, but is making barely
-enough to keep himself. Another son is at Homestead, and idle.
-&#8216;We have enough in the house to keep us another week,&#8217; said Mrs.
-Coyle, &#8216;but after that the Lord knows what we&#8217;ll do. I just got a
-little coal on trust, and do wish I had a pair of shoes.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;&#8216;We own this little house; my son paid the last on it just before
-the strike.&#8217; She had rented, out a couple of rooms to Joshua
-Bradshaw, a mill-man, with his wife and four children. &#8216;They owe
-me six months&#8217; rent, but Lord, I know they can&#8217;t pay it, so I
-don&#8217;t ask them. They are poor people, and the missus is badly
-sick.&#8217;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Patrick Sweeney, another ex-striker, who can&#8217;t get work in the
-mill, and who lives on Sixteenth street, has been hunting for a
-pair of shoes for several days. Those he has were shoes once, now
-they are tatters. Sweeney, like dozens of the other men, has paid
-no rent for several months, and lives in daily dread that his
-family will be evicted. Being blacklisted, he cannot find work in
-Homestead or elsewhere.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;William Davis, of Fourteenth street, told me there wasn&#8217;t a
-pound of coal in his house, and a little less in the house of his
-mother, who lives alongside of him.&#8221; </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[Pg 203]</a></span></p>
-
-<p class="center">AN APPEAL FOR AID.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The instances mentioned are only an index to the suffering.
-Through personal pride most of the misery in Homestead is hidden
-as yet. When winter sets in, dozens of cases will come to light.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;On Saturday a meeting will be held to issue a call for aid. It
-has been called by Elmer Bales and John Wilson.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Mr. Bales said to-day: &#8216;There is positive suffering in Homestead
-from lack of food, fuel, and clothing. The sufferers will not
-speak of their distress to you or any other outsider, but we who
-live here know of it only too well. In a week or two it will be
-much worse.&#8217;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Hugh O&#8217;Donnell did not eat any turkey in the Allegheny county
-jail. There was no observance of Thanksgiving in his case. He was
-compelled to put up with the regular prison fare, which is not
-fattening to those who have tried it.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>Capital has vanquished labor at Homestead; but the skirmish left
-scars which will long remain unforgotten. Labor suffered, and learned
-that the power of the people resided in their presence at the polls
-on election day, when Carnegie, Frick, Webb, and others of the sham
-aristocrats and believers in &#8220;caste,&#8221; became of no more importance than
-each poor laborer, workman, mechanic, clerk, shopkeeper, or farmer, to
-whom on other days they assumed an air of superiority. The learning
-of the lesson was worth all the suffering that it cost the &#8220;Common
-People,&#8221; as represented by the workmen and strikers at Homestead, Pa.</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[Pg 204]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2><span>CHAPTER IX.</span> <span class="smaller">POSSIBLE FRUITS OF VICTORY.</span></h2>
-
-<p>We have considered, and we hope with charitable eyes, the scenes
-resulting from the victory in that skirmish at Homestead, between
-Carnegie, Frick, and the Common People; we have thought of the
-result of the picket fire at Buffalo between organized labor and the
-combination of capital represented by the New York Central Railroad;
-both of which engagements, while only out-post encounters of the
-on-marching army of the Common People, were decisive victories for the
-capitalists, the sham aristocrats, believers in &#8220;caste.&#8221; In the name
-of law and order (so dear to the American heart) they had appealed to
-the power of the State to protect, with militia, their property, and
-that militia, ever loyal and truly American, had responded to the call
-of the Executives (both Democrats) of the two most powerful States in
-the Union. That militia, largely composed of poor men, and men of the
-people, absolutely abhorring anything like the disregard of established
-laws, had responded to the call of the Governor of each<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[Pg 205]</a></span> respective
-State, New York and Pennsylvania. Law and order were re-established by
-the people of which the militia is but part. Two Democratic Governors,
-like patriotic citizens that they are, had bowed their heads before
-enacted laws&mdash;no matter what their personal feeling may have been upon
-the subject&mdash;and granted protection to the property of the capitalists,
-who, as citizens of each State, were entitled thereto, no matter by
-what means the capitalists and sham aristocrats may have acquired
-that property. The result of the action of these two Governors, and
-the acquiescence by the people and the support of the militia, is
-incontestible evidence that Socialism and Anarchism have no home in
-America.</p>
-
-<p>The people accepted the result, as did the people of Homestead
-starvation and distress, because its presence at every hearth became
-a matter of trifling consequence; each hearth of the poor &#8220;Common
-People&#8221; of America is illuminated and warmed by the patriotic fires
-lighted thereon by our forefathers in 1776. The law must be obeyed!
-As long as that law exists, unrepealed, unmodified, or unamended, it
-must be obeyed! And the might of the people, the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; the
-Abraham Lincoln party, the Andrew Jackson party, the Thomas Jefferson
-party, and the Grover Cleveland party, all guarantee the <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[Pg 206]</a></span>enforcement
-of every law upon our statute-books. And the chiefest of these is the
-Constitution of the United States of America, wherein is guaranteed
-the franchise of every citizen; wherein is declared that the &#8220;majority
-shall rule in America.&#8221; The poor, the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; have suffered
-defeat in their strikes and attempted resistance to the claim of social
-difference existing in our country. They have borne the arrogance,
-insults, and wrongs inflicted by a sham aristocracy. All attempts at
-correction of the evil have proved abortive.</p>
-
-<p>On November 8, 1892, the &#8220;Common People&#8221; resorted to that most
-efficacious of remedies in this great Republic, the ballot-box; and
-their victory was as great and pronounced as their suffering had been
-severe in the past. As the fruit of their victory, as in 1860, they
-will place in the Presidential chair at Washington a <span class="smaller">MAN OF THE
-PEOPLE</span>&mdash;Grover Cleveland&mdash;whom they believe to be honest, as they
-believed that Abraham Lincoln was honest, in 1860. They have elected
-the men of their choice, men representing the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; to both
-branches of the Legislature of the National Government. They have
-selected those who will express the sentiments of the &#8220;Common People&#8221;
-in the legislative halls of the nation. They, the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; will
-be<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[Pg 207]</a></span> heard through their representatives in the Congress of the Union.</p>
-
-<p>From the sad picture of unsuccessful strikes, starvation, and
-destitution, let us turn to the more pleasing picture of the
-possibilities offered by this exhibition of the <span class="smaller">POWER OF THE
-PEOPLE</span>.</p>
-
-<p>Carnegie, Frick, Webb, and others, have enjoyed a transient, delusive
-dream in which the delights of victory were enjoyed for the moment. Now
-comes the time of the people! They have learned that their power does
-not lie in associations, amalgamations, and organization. It lies in
-the selection by the majority, at the ballot-box, of representatives
-who will express the will of the people in making the laws of the
-land, such laws as will enforce and insure equality, the extinction of
-&#8220;caste,&#8221; and the protection of the poor men, who constitute the larger
-portion of the population of our country, and are therefore greater,
-being the majority on election day, than the rich, sham aristocrats,
-who have insulted, jeered, and snubbed the poor during the past
-twenty-five years.</p>
-
-<p>Now will come the crucial test of the honesty and fidelity reposed, by
-the people, in the administration and legislative bodies elected by
-them. Should they prove recreant and traitors to the trust reposed in
-them, it would be the first time in the history of the nation (with
-possibly the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[Pg 208]</a></span> single exception of John Tyler, who became President by
-the death of William Henry Harrison). Then, should the will of the
-people become manifest through the agency of their representatives, in
-Congress assembled, whereby the present laws be repealed; if it become
-evident that it was the will of the people that the Constitution of the
-United States should be amended, so as to be in accordance with the
-laws the enactment of which the people demanded, the legislators would
-be obliged to so amend and change the Constitution of the United States
-to make it consistent with the will of the people. Rock and foundation
-of the edifice of the Federal Government, the Constitution as it is,
-that which is more powerful than even the Constitution is the will of
-the people, the majority of the citizens of the Union, irrespective
-of wealth or assumed social position. It has been demonstrated that
-by some peculiar kind of method the wealth of the nation is becoming
-centralized in the hands of a few families and persons who render
-possible the construction of an oligarchy similar to that existing in
-the Republic of Venice.</p>
-
-<p>Suppose that the people should demand and insist upon the passage of
-an income tax for the support of the Federal Government, which would
-relieve them, the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; from paying<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[Pg 209]</a></span> for the privileges
-enjoyed by the rich, of living in a Republic and the security which
-their property there enjoys.</p>
-
-<p>And, suppose that the sham aristocracy should cry, &#8220;Inherent Rights,&#8221;
-as they would; the people might respond that it is not a question as
-to the Inherent Right of Mr. Astor, Mr. Vanderbilt, Mr. Rockefeller,
-<i>et al.</i>, to possess, under the present system of laws, any amount of
-property. It is a mere question of the Will of the People. Many good,
-learned, and great Constitutional lawyers have argued, and with much
-apparent truth, that the federation of States prior to 1865 was but a
-mutual copartnership entered into by the sovereign States, springing
-from the original thirteen colonies, constituting but a copartnership,
-surrendering no right to the firm or copartnership except such rights
-as had been specifically named in the Federal Constitution.</p>
-
-<p>Without entering into the legal aspects of the case, as to whether
-these claims be just or not; without assuming to know whether the
-nullification proposed by John C. Calhoun was legally sound; without
-discussing the question whether South Carolina and the other States of
-the South had a <i>right</i> to secede and disintegrate the Union; assuming
-that they had the right, inherently, and to draw a parallel to the
-assumed Inherent Right<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[Pg 210]</a></span> of the rich of America under the laws and the
-Constitution as they now exist, their attention might be attracted
-profitably to the lesson that was taught the minority in the South when
-they assumed to exercise Inherent Rights contrary to the wishes of the
-majority. 2,800,000 bayonets, with the flag of the Union floating over
-them, was conclusive argument that the Inherent Rights claimed by the
-Southern States were actually Wrongs in a Republic.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Vox populi, vox Dei.&#8221; The voice of the people, the majority, is the
-voice of God in a Republic, from which there is <i>no appeal</i>. Seek it,
-as the South did in 1861, and the result will be the same. <span class="smcap">The
-Majority will rule.</span></p>
-
-<p>Suppose that the Common People should demand a repeal of all the
-revenue laws, a repeal of all tariff duties and protection which
-did not result in direct benefit to them; suppose that they should
-insist that, except so far as protection benefited them (the &#8220;Common
-People&#8221;) by an increase of wages, which should be arrived at by a
-fair adjustment of the conflicting interests of capital and labor,
-adjusted by a board of arbitration selected by them, the Common People;
-suppose that the people should demand that these tremendous incomes
-enjoyed by the Vanderbilts, Astors, Goulds, Carnegies, Fricks, and
-others, should pay the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[Pg 211]</a></span> pensions of the Federal soldiers who fought
-for the preservation of the Union; suppose the people should demand
-that the expenses of the Federal Government, instead of being levied
-upon <i>them</i>, should be levied upon the incomes of those who remained
-at home in safety during the four years of the Civil War; who, while
-far away from the field of battle, have speculated upon the necessities
-and needs of the nation, who have utilized that protection, born in
-a spirit of patriotic desire to furnish means for the support of the
-defenders of the Union, emanating from patriotic principles of the
-Abraham Lincoln Republican party; suppose that the people should
-demand that they&mdash;not out of the accumulated mass, but out of the
-interest upon the amount accumulated under existing laws&mdash;which said
-laws the people, through their representatives, shall deem wise to
-change&mdash;requiring that in the future these masters of immense wealth
-shall contribute a share to the defraying of the expenses of the
-Government commensurate with the advantages they have derived, from the
-load of debt, in the shape of pensions and otherwise, occasioned by the
-Civil War, wherein the Union was preserved.</p>
-
-<p>Let us imagine a scale of income tax for the people of America:
-$5000 and under, untaxed; $5000 and over, to be taxed. If the chosen
-<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[Pg 212]</a></span>representatives of the people, selected by them last November and to
-be selected by the various State Legislatures elected by the people
-within the near future, refuse to make such an enactment as an income
-tax upon all incomes of more than $5000; suppose the people organize
-themselves, and call upon the country in a general election; gentlemen
-of aristocratic proclivities, where will you be? Of the mass of
-freeborn American citizens (quite as good as the sham aristocrats) not
-five per cent. enjoy an income as great as $5000. Would you resort
-to physical force? The Hon. J. Brisben Walker, in his article in the
-<i>Cosmopolitan</i>, indicates the true position that you would occupy.
-Consider the possibility. Yell &#8220;Unconstitutional.&#8221; Proclaim that it is
-illegal. The people would change the Constitution. By the voice of the
-majority, they would change the laws.</p>
-
-<p>What have you to offer to stem this tide of indignation that you have
-provoked? Do you say, &#8220;Capital would leave the country?&#8221; Well, you
-can&#8217;t carry the railroads, the factories, the soil, the buildings from
-America. You may have your castles in Scotland, but we have your plants
-of machinery, your buildings, and that upon which your security depends
-and is founded is in our power in America. Would you secede, as the
-Plebeians proposed to do from the Patricians at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[Pg 213]</a></span> Rome, and found a
-city on the Sacred Hills of your sham aristocracy? The Plebeians, the
-Common People, would never seek you with the olive branch of peace and
-promise offers of compromise, as did the Patricians of old seek the
-Plebeians, but they would recall to your attention in forceful manner
-the lesson taught to the Southerners in 1861, when the &#8220;Common People,&#8221;
-the majority in America, by their might, overpowered and overturned the
-seceders who, when they found that the minority, even though blessed
-with an attempted social superiority, could not rule in the American
-Republic, sought to secede.</p>
-
-<p>The Carnegies, Vanderbilts, Astors, Fricks, and others, would be as
-helpless in such a struggle, and never as brave and earnest, as was
-Lee&#8217;s decimated army at Appomattox.</p>
-
-<p>What the people <i>should</i> or <i>will</i> do, it does not interest us to
-discuss. What they <i>can</i> do is to require that the payment of the taxes
-for the support of the nation be derived from those sources which
-have become hateful and oppressive to the people; and, at a general
-election, the men who form the majority would be those whose incomes do
-not exceed $5000&mdash;no, not even $2000 per annum.</p>
-
-<p>Then, let us establish for the fancy of our sham aristocrats a picture
-for those who believe in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[Pg 214]</a></span> crime of &#8220;Caste&#8221; in our country, to dwell
-upon. The victors at Homestead and at Buffalo would do well, while
-imbibing the sweet draughts of victory, to consider the bitter cup of
-hemlock that the people can require them to partake of. Anything is
-possible in a Republic, by the votes of the majority.</p>
-
-<p><i>All incomes less than five thousand dollars to be entirely exempt from
-taxation; from five to ten thousand, a tax of five per cent.; from ten
-to twenty thousand, ten per cent.; from twenty to fifty, twenty per
-cent.; from fifty to a hundred, forty per cent.; from a hundred to two
-hundred, fifty per cent.; from two hundred thousand to half a million,
-seventy-five per cent.; from half a million and onward, ninety per
-cent.</i></p>
-
-<p>There is no pretence in this scale to be equitable or just. That
-could be arrived at by the statistician and the legislators. It is
-merely an example of what the people <span class="smaller">CAN AND MAY DO</span>. The fund
-thus derived would more than defray all the expense of the Federal
-Government, pensions included, and increase the pensions besides.</p>
-
-<p>What is to prevent the enactment of such a law, if the majority should
-demand it?</p>
-
-<p>You may say, Gentlemen of the Privileged Classes, &#8220;It is contrary to
-the spirit of the Republic. It will amount to confiscation.&#8221; To men<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[Pg 215]</a></span>
-of the Carnegie, Frick, and Webb stamp the people might reply, &#8220;Was
-the hiring of armed bullies, outcasts, and residents of other States
-consistent with the spirit of the Republic? When you have formed those
-hirelings into a private army to do your bidding against the lives of
-your fellow citizens, is it not late in the day for you to call up
-&#8216;the Spirit of the Republic&#8217;? You have gloated in triumph over your
-victories and the wants of the people. You have seen us surrounded by
-starvation and destitution. You, professing Christianity, have made us
-objects of your contempt and insult. Our daughters have not been safe
-from the contaminating gaze of your weak, puerile progeny. You have
-adopted crests, castes, social distinctions, sham aristocracy. You have
-bowed the knee before the degenerate British peerage. You have taken
-the money earned by our labor to purchase alliances with the decayed
-aristocracy of Europe. Is it not <i>late</i>, good my would-be lords and
-barons, to call up the Spirit of 1776?&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>And, even should it come, like the spectres of the dream of Richard
-III., would it not make you quake and quiver, so contrary are your
-wishes to the spirit of the founders of the Union?</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Impracticable, the collection of these taxes,&#8221; is one of the excuses
-for their non-imposition.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[Pg 216]</a></span> The people have trusted Grover Cleveland
-with the power of executing the laws of the nation. The people believe
-that, as Lincoln, Jackson, and Jefferson, he will not be recreant to
-the trust reposed in him. He will collect the taxes; he will seize
-the property of the corporations; he will imprison the perjurers. He
-will perform the duties imposed upon him, in the high office of the
-nation to which the will of the people has called him. He will see that
-the mandates of the people are obeyed. This tremendous accumulation
-of fortunes must cease! A Vanderbilt leaves a hundred million to one
-son! At five per cent. per annum, the income is five millions each
-year. It is impossible for him to spend it. The difference between his
-expenses and his income is added to this mighty mass of money, which
-is concentrating each year more and more, compounding the interest
-thereon, in the hands of a few citizens of the Republic. Mr. Gould
-dies and leaves a hundred millions. If evenly distributed between his
-children, it would be impossible for the income to be spent, and it
-would simply accumulate, generation after generation. The Astors have
-adopted a habit, like most of the rich men of the nation, in imitation
-of English entailment, of leaving the bulk of their property to the
-eldest son, while apportioning off the younger children<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[Pg 217]</a></span> with a million
-or two. The impossibility of that elder son spending the income is
-perfectly apparent. The object is to accumulate, in the hands of a few
-families, the wealth of the nation. The tendency is exactly in that
-direction.</p>
-
-<p>Not only is it un-American, but especially obnoxious to the people
-generally, as it tends toward the accumulation of wealth, not only
-to an unwholesome but to an alarming degree, in the hands of the
-eldest sons of these families. It is practically the entailment of the
-estate, without so announcing it. Let us take, for example, the Goulds,
-Vanderbilts, or Astors, and let this peculiar kind of distribution of
-their property continue, apportioning out the younger members of the
-family with a comparatively small sum, but leaving the bulk to the
-first son. Is it not concentrating wealth in the hands of one man, the
-income of which it is impossible that he should spend? The accumulation
-still goes on from generation to generation until, practically, the
-money power of our land lies within the grasp of the representatives of
-a few families. Let us imagine the condition of affairs a few hundred
-years hence, if we allow the Vanderbilts, Goulds, Rockefellers and
-Astors to apportion off, from generation to generation, the younger
-sons and daughters of the family, concentrating the vast accumulation
-from<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[Pg 218]</a></span> the interests of their tremendous fortunes in the hands of one
-representative of the family. Some dozen men of this great Republic,
-by a combination, could then practically control at all times the
-financial situation of the nation. There is no possibility of an
-equalizing process and the scattering of the wealth and accumulations
-of these families. From generation to generation, under this peculiar
-method of distribution and disposal adopted by our would-be nobility,
-there would be created a condition exactly similar to that existing in
-the pre-eminently commercial Venice, from which thraldom the Common
-People were only relieved by a foreign conqueror, Napoleon, whom they
-welcomed with unpatriotic joy because he brought relief from the
-discriminations with which the masses were cursed.</p>
-
-<p>No one will deny that, under the existing laws, Mr. W. H. Vanderbilt,
-the gentleman (?) who so forcefully and elegantly expressed himself in
-the utterance of his sentiments, &#8220;The public be damned,&#8221; had a perfect
-right, under the laws as they now exist, to leave the bulk of his
-property to his eldest son. Nay, he might have called him the Duke of
-Vanderbilt, if he pleased. By the pleasure of the people, he had the
-right to dispose of his possessions as to him seemed best. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[Pg 219]</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="center"><a name="i219.jpg" id="i219.jpg"></a><img src="images/i219.jpg" alt="WM. H. VANDERBILT" /></div>
-
-<p class="bold">WM. H. VANDERBILT,</p>
-
-<p class="bold"><span class="smcap">Author of the Famous Speech, &#8220;The Public be D&mdash;&mdash;d.&#8221;</span></p>
-
-<p>This is all perfectly within the bounds of and consistent with the
-laws that the people have made; but remember, that these people who
-made these laws can <span class="smaller">UNMAKE</span> them; they can require that a
-man&#8217;s property shall be equally divided among all of his children;
-they can tax it so that this infernal and ever-increasing income shall
-not create such an accumulation as to present a danger to the life and
-existence of the Republic. And this is not against the law. Good<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[Pg 220]</a></span> my
-lords, as the barons, the Common People will kill this &#8220;caste,&#8221; not by
-the headsman&#8217;s axe that decapitated the Stuart, not by the guillotine
-that drank the blood of a Bourbon; but they&#8217;ll do it with legislation,
-more peaceful, more quiet, and with more &#8220;general apathy;&#8221; but the
-result will be just as efficacious.</p>
-
-<p>Now that the nation, composed of the Common People of America, has
-suffered the assumption, upon the part of these few families, of a sham
-aristocracy and attempted &#8220;caste&#8221; in this country; suppose, when the
-people have felt the power that lies in them, that they should rise in
-their might and decree that the support of the Federal Government shall
-come from that surplus income, instead of permitting it to accumulate
-in the hands of each succeeding generation of a few families in
-America. What, again it may be asked, can the sham aristocrats do about
-it?&mdash;you people of the Carnegie, Astor, Vanderbilt class. The people
-decree it, and you must bow your heads to their will.</p>
-
-<p>The people are not socialistic. They do not believe in the division
-of property. Men like Dolan, at the Clover Club in Philadelphia, and
-others of his kind, deliberately libel and traduce the Common People
-when they pretend to explain the defeat of the Republican party upon
-the ground<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[Pg 221]</a></span> of a socialistic tendency in the people of this nation. The
-lie is apparent by the action of the militia, composed of the Common
-People, both at Homestead and Buffalo. The people are for law and order.</p>
-
-<p>The poor man&#8217;s morals are quite as good or better than the morals of
-the rich. His home is as sacred, and the slimy serpent of Nihilism is
-as objectionable in his home as it would be to the millionaire in his
-palace of grandeur. The little holdings of the poor man, his farm, his
-tool chest, and his furniture, are his; and he holds the right to own
-them as dear as Astor holds his right to his property in many hundred
-houses. The poor man, the Common People, nowhere in this broad Union
-wants anarchy. He&#8217;ll stamp it out, as he did in Chicago, and it is a
-libel upon him and the nation, for the rich and those who would impose
-the yoke of &#8220;caste,&#8221; to attempt to wave the bloody shirt of Socialism
-by their speeches on this subject.</p>
-
-<p>But this accumulation of property in the hands of the few, to the
-detriment of the nation, has become so pronounced and overwhelming in
-its productiveness of evil that, suppose the people should&mdash;for they
-could, by means of an income tax&mdash;decree that it should cease. Now,
-men of a sham and wealthy aristocracy, what would you do about it?
-You would be obliged to drink your<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[Pg 222]</a></span> cup of hemlock, as the striker at
-Homestead was obliged to partake of his draught of defeat.</p>
-
-<p>Gentlemen, who assume to be better every other day in the year, but who
-realize on election day that your votes are no better, and count for no
-more, than the laborer&#8217;s, mechanic&#8217;s, and the poor man&#8217;s all over our
-land, what are you going to do about it? It is a condition so pregnant
-with possibilities that it should occasion you to take thought. Do not
-arouse the resentment of your fellow-citizens; poor they may be, but
-rich in their rights as freemen. By the exercise of their franchise
-they can make legal that which would demand a division of some of
-your ill-gotten gains for the support of the Federal Government, thus
-lightening the taxes upon those who can least afford to pay them.</p>
-
-<div class="center"><a name="i223.jpg" id="i223.jpg"></a><img src="images/i223.jpg" alt="W. SEWARD WEBB" /></div>
-
-<p class="bold">W. SEWARD WEBB,</p>
-
-<p class="bold"><span class="smcap">Vice-President of the New York Central R. R.</span></p>
-
-<p>The poor have learned; the workman has been taught by sad experience;
-the laborer has had it forced down his throat, by the point of the
-bayonet in the hands of the militiamen, that he cannot hope to
-win in the battle against capital by strikes or organized labor.
-Homestead, and the wretched condition of the people there, is fraught
-with significance, to the laboring man, of the consequences of his
-ineffectual battle against capital. He knows that to resort to
-violence, mob law, dynamite, is against the spirit of the people of
-America. In his heart of hearts his home is as dear to the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[Pg 223]</a></span> workman as
-yours is to you, Mr. Carnegie. He does not believe in anarchy, and the
-dissolution of law, order, and the morals of the people any more than
-you do. He doesn&#8217;t believe, any more than you do, Mr. Son-in-law Seward
-Webb, in the destruction of property. He feels oppressed; he feels
-that the burden has been laid too heavily upon his shoulders; he is
-irritated at the load he is carrying; no longer will he resort, as the
-acme of his hopes, to a strike or a labor organization; he has learned
-in the election of 1892 that the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[Pg 224]</a></span> power to correct these evils is his;
-that on election day, at the polls, he may right these wrongs. Be you
-warned, who count your millions, that the bandage which has blinded
-the eyes of the poor, making them fight at shadows, has been removed
-from their eyes, and that they will make such a vigorous and effectual
-onslaught upon your cherished bulwarks of bullion that the equalizing
-process may become so rapid and effectual as to demolish your cherished
-fortresses of wealth.</p>
-
-<p>It is not to disorganize society; it is not to overturn religion, or
-resort to Nihilism, that the tendency of the workingman&#8217;s mind leans.
-It is your presumption, arrogance, and overwhelming self-esteem that
-has offended him. A baby&#8217;s finger may touch the spring holding the bar
-by which is caged the lion. The lion once uncaged, and a hundred men
-cannot restrain its freedom. A little stream of water, flowing over the
-top of a dam, might have been stopped by a handful of mud in the hands
-of a child; increasing, the stream weakens the barrier; the dam has
-gone, the flood has come.</p>
-
-<p>There&#8217;s a little stream of truth trickling over the dam that holds back
-the flood of the resentment of the people; silently, softly, with an
-appearance of &#8220;apathy,&#8221; it began to move, until the rich received the
-first spray, notifying them of its approach, November the 8th, 1892.</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[Pg 225]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2><span>CHAPTER X.</span> <span class="smaller">THE CAUSE OF BULLETS, &#8217;61; BALLOTS, &#8217;92.&mdash;ABRAHAM LINCOLN, THE PEOPLE&#8217;S
-CHOICE IN &#8217;60.</span></h2>
-
-<p>Of political parties in America, De Tocqueville declared that
-&#8220;Aristocratic or democratic passions may easily be detected at
-the bottom of all parties, and although they escape a superficial
-observation, they are the main point and soul of every faction in the
-United States.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>That greatest conflict of American history, the military and political
-struggle between the forces of slavery and the forces of human freedom,
-was no less a conflict between aristocracy and democracy. In the
-South, which President-elect Cleveland only the other day termed&mdash;with
-undoubted historical accuracy&mdash;the cradle of American liberty, there
-had been developed a social and political aristocracy as distinct and
-powerful as almost any the world has seen.</p>
-
-<p>To this development, which did not become marked until after the early
-part of the present century, many causes contributed. The industry of
-the South had become centralized in the hands<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[Pg 226]</a></span> of large land owners
-who cultivated extensive plantations with slave labor. The tremendous
-growth of slavery exerted a depressing effect upon the manufacturing
-spirit; the artisan, the mechanic, and the trader came to be regarded
-as socially inferior. The planting of rice, sugar cane, and especially
-cotton, which was found to be the most profitable business, was also
-the most esteemed; and the South became an almost purely agricultural
-section.</p>
-
-<p>Lorin Blodget lays it down as an accepted rule that &#8220;the country wholly
-devoted to agriculture necessarily tends to aristocratic despotism,
-or some form of enslavement of the masses;&#8221; and he quotes similar
-expressions from Adam Smith, Buckle, and other recognized authorities
-on political economy.</p>
-
-<p>Nor are reasons hard to find. De Tocqueville points out that the great
-guarantees of popular liberty in America are universal education and
-the general division of landed property. Now, in a purely agricultural
-country the education of the people is certain to be defective.
-The population is necessarily dispersed, for where there are no
-manufactories there can be few towns; and where there are few towns
-there are fewer and less efficient schools, and libraries and lyceums
-are practically unknown. Harrison&#8217;s<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[Pg 227]</a></span> &#8220;History of Virginia&#8221; states that
-that State had, in 1848, 166,000 youths between seven and sixteen years
-old, of whom only 40,000 attended any school.</p>
-
-<p>Landed property had naturally tended to fall more and more into a few
-hands. As John Stuart Mill said of ancient Rome: &#8220;When inequality
-of wealth once commences in a community not constantly engaged in
-repairing, by industry, the injuries of fortune, its advances are
-gigantic; the great masses swallow up the smaller. The Roman Empire
-ultimately became covered with the vast landed possessions of a
-comparatively few families, for whose luxury, and still more for
-whose ostentation, the most costly products were raised, while the
-cultivators of the soil were slaves or small tenants in a nearly
-servile condition.&#8221; The description is closely applicable to the landed
-aristocracy of the South in the years immediately before the war.</p>
-
-<p>It is a mistake&mdash;a not uncommon mistake&mdash;to suppose that the
-<i>ante-bellum</i> South was poor. It was rich&mdash;considerably richer than the
-North, in proportion to its population. In 1860 the South had much more
-than its share of the assessed wealth of the nation. The total value
-of property in the Union was $12,000,000,000, and of this the Southern
-States, with only one-third of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[Pg 228]</a></span> the country&#8217;s population (and less than
-one-fourth of the country&#8217;s <i>white</i> population), had $5,000,000,000, or
-more than forty per cent.</p>
-
-<p>But in the agricultural South wealth was far more unevenly distributed
-than in the manufacturing and commercial North. In the latter great
-fortunes were made, but were almost sure to be distributed among
-several heirs, or lost in the fluctuations of trade, while the
-prevalence of the industrial and inventive spirit opened the path of
-advancement to those born at the bottom of the ladder. In the former,
-large landed properties were handed down from father to son, and tended
-to grow larger by accretion, as is the rule with great estates. The
-small land owner could not compete with them. The peasant, whose only
-calling was the tilling of the soil, had little prospect of bettering
-his condition.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The Southern planter,&#8221; says a member<a name="FNanchor_2_2" id="FNanchor_2_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_2_2" >[2]</a> of one of the old landed
-families, who is now well known as the self-appointed manager of
-New York society, &#8220;was a born aristocrat. He had literally as much
-power in his little sphere as any old feudal lord. His slaves were
-the creatures of his caprice and pleasure. The work of their hands
-supported him, gave him his position and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[Pg 229]</a></span> influence. I have lived on a
-plantation with twelve hundred slaves, all devotedly attached to their
-master, evidencing as much loyalty and fealty as an Englishman to his
-sovereign, and taking great pride in their master and mistress.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>The planter&#8217;s life was one of patriarchal magnificence. His
-entertainments, according to the same authority, &#8220;would be appreciated
-in the old Faubourg at Paris;&#8221; his wines were old and abundant; his
-songs were the ballads of his historical prototype, the mediæval baron
-of England:</p>
-
-<div class="center"><div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
-<div>&#8220;Lord Thomas, he was a bold forester,</div>
-<div class="i1">The keeper of the King&#8217;s deer;</div>
-<div>Lady Eleanor was a fine woman,</div>
-<div class="i1">Lord Thomas he loved her dear.&#8221;</div>
-</div></div></div>
-
-<p>Political power within its own commonwealths was of course practically
-monopolized by this land-owning caste. Of power in national politics it
-wielded a tremendous share. It had taken advantage of that feature of
-the Federal Constitution which, when it was first framed, Patrick Henry
-attacked when he prophesied that &#8220;an aristocracy of the rich and well
-born would spring up and trample upon the masses.&#8221; Outnumbered in the
-House of Representatives, it had firmly intrenched itself in the United
-States Senate.</p>
-
-<p>In that body, up to the time just before the war, when it was no longer
-possible to create a new<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[Pg 230]</a></span> Southern State to offset each Northern
-State, it held half the seats and votes&mdash;a position that gave it
-complete control of all Presidential nominations to office. Through its
-possession of this unassailable veto power on appointments, it had come
-to pass that, as Mr. Blaine observes in his &#8220;Twenty Years of Congress,&#8221;
-&#8220;the Courts of the United States, both Supreme and District, throughout
-the Union, were filled with men acceptable to the South. Cabinets were
-constituted in the same way. Representatives of the government in
-foreign countries were necessarily taken from the class approved by
-the same power. Mr. Webster, speaking in his most conservative tone in
-the famous speech of March 7, 1850, declared that from the formation
-of the Union to that hour the South had monopolized three-fourths of
-the places of honor and emolument under the Federal Government. It was
-an accepted fact that the class interest of slavery, by holding a tie
-in the Senate, could defeat any measure or any nomination to which its
-leaders might be opposed; and, thus banded together by an absolutely
-cohesive political force, they could and did dictate terms.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>Such was the land-holding, slave-holding, office-holding aristocracy,
-against which the first directly and avowedly antagonistic movement was
-that of the Republican party. Young and weak in its<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[Pg 231]</a></span> first Presidential
-contest of 1856, the new organization gathered strength steadily; and
-when, on April 29, 1860, the Democratic Convention at Baltimore was
-rent asunder by the Secessionists, it became clear that the Republicans
-would have to face the threatened disruption of the Union.</p>
-
-<p>The Republican Convention met at Chicago and chose, in preference
-to the able and experienced Seward, Abraham Lincoln, of Illinois, a
-man who, then comparatively unknown, was to take rank as perhaps the
-noblest and greatest of all America&#8217;s sons.</p>
-
-<p>Lincoln, when asked for an account of his boyhood, said that it
-might be summed up in Crabbe&#8217;s famous line: &#8220;The short and simple
-annals of the poor.&#8221; J. G. Holland thus reviews the career of the
-man who led the struggle that began in 1860: &#8220;Born in the humblest
-and remotest obscurity, subjected to the rudest toil in the meanest
-offices, achieving the development of his powers by means of his own
-institution, he had, with none of the tricks of the demagogue, with
-none of the aids of wealth and social influence, with none of the
-opportunities for exhibiting his powers which high official position
-bestows, against all the combinations of genius and eminence and
-interest, raised himself by force of manly excellence of heart and
-brain into<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[Pg 232]</a></span> national recognition, and had become the local center of
-the affectionate interest and curious inquisition of thirty millions of
-people.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>To the end of his life, Lincoln was the very incarnation of democratic
-simplicity. He was never at home in a drawing-room; he never could
-dispose gracefully his hands and feet&mdash;appendages whose size was
-proportionate to his huge stature. After his nomination for the
-Presidency, he used to answer his own bell at his little house in
-Springfield, Illinois.</p>
-
-<p>The people&#8217;s man of 1860, <span class="smcap">Abraham Lincoln</span>! The pulse of
-patriotism quickens at the pronunciation of the name. The people&#8217;s
-plain Abe Lincoln; one of them, a commoner, of them, with them,
-like them. To foreign nations, he may have appeared as &#8220;President
-Abraham Lincoln, Chief Magistrate of the United States.&#8221; He may have
-been &#8220;Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy,&#8221; in the minds of his
-subordinates in those two important branches of his administration
-from &#8217;61 to &#8217;65. History may record him as the &#8220;wise, able, and
-philanthropical.&#8221; But his memory will last enshrined in a temple more
-lasting than bronze or stone&mdash;the hearts of the people.</p>
-
-<p>To them he was Abe Lincoln&mdash;one of them, feeling their sensations,
-a common bond <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[Pg 233]</a></span>between him and them. He was a democrat by birth, by
-experience, by sentiment, reason, and patriotism. He was a President
-of the masses, and how well and loyally did they love him! His homely
-ways and phrases, his unadorned and vigorous speeches, were the ways of
-the people, speeches of the people; loved by the people for the very
-enemies he had made, for his enemies were the enemies of the people.
-Every caricature of Lincoln was a caricature of the people; every
-attack upon his personality was an attack upon the personality of the
-&#8220;mudsills&#8221; of the people, and his call to arms was their call to arms,
-and they sprang forward, responsive to his appeal, recognizing in it
-their appeal, as no sham aristocrat or autocrat can ever hope to have a
-nation do.</p>
-
-<p>His memory will not remain green in the minds of the masses by his
-martyrdom; but dear will the picture be, from generation to generation,
-of the boy studying by the light of a flickering fire, and splitting
-rails for daily bread; fighting his way onward and upward without
-wealth, or powerful friends, until at last, in the supreme hour of the
-people&#8217;s need, he comes to bear their standard in the battle which
-they waged against &#8220;caste.&#8221; He did not come to the contest as a hired
-soldier, but as a volunteer, <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[Pg 234]</a></span>feeling all that was felt by the common
-soldier. It was <i>his</i> battle, for he had felt the sting of class
-distinction, as did every private soldier of his army.</p>
-
-<p>Loving, loyal, faithful Abe Lincoln! May your name never be belittled
-by any of your descendants adopting a crest or coat-of-arms. Your
-coat-of-arms is engraved in figures as lasting as the eternal hills of
-America upon the minds of the people. Should a degenerate descendant
-seek a coat-of-arms, let him make it an axe and rail, surrounded
-by the laurel wreath bestowed by the loving, trusting people; for
-Abe Lincoln was best and only loved by the very term by which the
-aristocrats attempted to disparage him&mdash;&#8220;the rail-splitter.&#8221; After
-the election of Abraham Lincoln, while he remained at Springfield,
-the chosen representative of the people, he was the most approachable
-man in America; even though at that time he must have felt the heavy
-weight of responsibility thrust upon him, viewing as he could the mass
-which, like a snowball, was increasing as it progressed under the weak
-administration of his predecessor. Think of the anxious hours that
-this man spent, knowing what the people expected of him, and seeing
-the number of his difficulties being added to, day by day, while
-those who had the burden to bear were<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[Pg 235]</a></span> obliged, until the fourth of
-the succeeding March, to sit still and watch the accumulation. Yet
-in those anxious hours, while receiving counsel of the mighty of the
-political world, many of whom were strangers to him and to whom he was
-a stranger, yet, still, while watching thus, the pillar of the Union,
-stone by stone falling away; while thus counselled, advised by those
-he knew not whether to trust or not; while his mind must necessarily
-have been weighed down with the thought of his own possible inability
-to meet the expectations of his friends, the people, in that great
-new sphere to which they had called him, Abe Lincoln still had time
-to grasp the hand and wish good cheer to an old friend, neighbor, or
-one of the people. From birth to death, his life will form a lesson
-that the new Chief of the people whom they have called to be President
-of the United States, Grover Cleveland, could well study, and Abe
-Lincoln&#8217;s example emulate, if he would hold the love of those who, by
-their votes, put him into the Presidential chair.</p>
-
-<p>This man, Abraham Lincoln, represented that class of people who had
-been dubbed &#8220;mudsills&#8221; by the orators who represented the believers
-in &#8220;caste&#8221; in the South. He stood as the very personification of
-&#8220;mudsillism,&#8221; which, read in the light of recently written history,
-meant the <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[Pg 236]</a></span>Common People&mdash;that is, the majority; and the majority ruled
-after his election in 1860, even though it required the use of bullets
-against the aristocratic class, just as the majority will rule in 1892,
-after the election of Grover Cleveland as representative of the Common
-People.</p>
-
-<p>The South sought by secession to absolve itself from the domination of
-the masses. It was like the patricians of Rome seeking the Sacred Hill
-to build a new city. It failed, as will ever the minority, representing
-a false idea of American society and a false conception of the spirit
-with which every American is imbued, do in the future. But, be it
-said to the credit of the believers in aristocracy in 1860, that they
-had the courage of their convictions, and they fought a manly battle
-to establish that which is impossible in America. The history of the
-Southerners&#8217; sufferings and dangers, endured uncomplainingly, forms a
-bright and shining exception to the conduct of the typical believer in
-&#8220;caste.&#8221; Sham aristocracy, which has disregarded the rights and wounded
-the feelings of the people for the past twenty-five years, that sham
-aristocracy which is a direct outgrowth resulting from the suppression
-of the Southern aristocracy, if tested as the Southern aristocracy
-has been, would be found deficient in those qualities of courage and
-determination<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[Pg 237]</a></span> which made even the Southerners&#8217; false ideas respected
-and respectable.</p>
-
-<p>The sham aristocracy of to-day, unlike the false aristocracy of 1860,
-would hire bullies, outcasts, and vagrants to do their fighting, as did
-those magnificent illustrations of &#8220;caste&#8221; in our country, Carnegie and
-Frick, at Homestead, and Son-in-law Webb at Buffalo.</p>
-
-<p>The advocates of &#8220;caste&#8221; in 1860, the Southerners, not alone possessed
-courage and determination, but, accepting the result of the conflict,
-have exhibited since the days of Reconstruction that wonderful
-degree of political acumen for which they have ever been famous.
-Early recognizing that in their struggle for an independent national
-existence, the Southern Confederacy, they had been defeated&mdash;not by
-the aristocracy of the North and West, but by the Common People; that
-is, the most powerful portion of the population of the Union&mdash;the
-Southerner, the secessionist, the aristocrat of 1860, submerged himself
-in the ocean of the Common People, the great majority, the democracy!
-The Secessionist, who opposed Abraham Lincoln&#8217;s administration in 1860
-and used bullets to express his opposition in 1861, had firm conviction
-carried to his hesitating heart by the events that transpired between
-1861 and 1865, that the &#8220;Common People&#8221;&mdash;the <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[Pg 238]</a></span>majority&mdash;must rule;
-and that with the freeing of his slaves he had lost the only possible
-foundation upon which he could rest his claim of social superiority
-in this country. Therefore, as the wise man that he has demonstrated
-himself to be, the aristocrat of 1860 has become the most earnest
-and patriotic member of a broad democracy in 1892; realizing from
-experience that upon that rock alone he can build the edifice of
-prosperity in his section of the country; also realizing from a sad
-experience that the Common People, democracy (though it was called
-Abraham Lincoln&#8217;s Republican party), was the crag upon which his bark
-of Secession was shivered in 1865. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[Pg 240]</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="center"><a name="i240.jpg" id="i240.jpg"></a><img src="images/i240.jpg" alt="ANDREW JACKSON" /></div>
-
-<p class="bold">ANDREW JACKSON.</p>
-
-<p class="bold">The &#8220;People&#8217;s&#8221; President, 1828.</p>
-
-<h3>FOOTNOTE:</h3>
-
-<p><a name="Footnote_2_2" id="Footnote_2_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_2_2">[2]</a> Of course I mean Ward McAllister. This is not from his
-book, but from a recent article of his published in the New York <i>World</i>.</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[Pg 241]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2><span>CHAPTER XI.</span> <span class="smaller">ANDREW JACKSON, 1828.</span></h2>
-
-<p>Jackson was in truth a popular idol. Hickory poles, the emblem of
-devotion to &#8220;Old Hickory,&#8221; stood in every village throughout almost
-every State, and at the street corners of many a city. In his own
-Tennessee, less than three thousand votes were cast against him in the
-entire State, and in many precincts he received every ballot.</p>
-
-<p>The story is told of a stranger who visited a Tennessee village on the
-afternoon of the election, and found its male population turning out
-with their guns, as if for a hunt, and in a state of great excitement.
-On inquiring what game they were after, he learned that they were
-starting in pursuit of two of their fellow-citizens who had had the
-audacity to vote against Jackson, thereby preventing the village from
-casting a solid vote for &#8220;Old Hickory.&#8221; The miscreants had avoided a
-tarring and feathering only by taking to the woods.</p>
-
-<p>The result of the campaign was a triumph for Jackson. New England was
-the stronghold of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[Pg 242]</a></span> Adams, who received all its electoral votes except
-one from Maine. The National Republicans also carried New Jersey and
-Delaware, and New York and Maryland were divided. Every other State
-declared solidly for Jackson, whose total vote was 178, to 83 for Adams.</p>
-
-<p>During that campaign, the same question appeared on the surface as
-that presented in the campaign of &#8217;92. The Whig party represented
-apparently higher tariff, and the Democrats were opposing the increase
-of duty; but the fact remained that John Quincy Adams represented the
-aristocracy of New England, and the Whig Party had become encrusted
-with the same false stucco of &#8220;caste&#8221; that concealed the merits,
-worth, and virtue of Lincoln&#8217;s Republican party in 1892. E&#8217;en the most
-wonderful orator that America has ever produced, the great and honored
-Daniel Webster, with all of his personal magnetism, magic of speech,
-and logic of argument, could not boost the aristocrats of the Whig
-party into power; even though the bill for a higher tariff had passed,
-the cry was kept up, and was made to appear as one of the issues of the
-campaign of 1892.</p>
-
-<p>Andrew Jackson represented, in his person, the people, the masses.
-By birth, education, and mode of living, Andrew Jackson was
-<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[Pg 243]</a></span>identified with the Common People, and, as we are all common, with
-all of the people. Like Abraham Lincoln, the masses saw in Andrew
-Jackson a champion, ready and brave enough to resent the attempted
-differentiation sought to be foisted upon the people of America by
-the then Whig aristocracy&mdash;the claimed parent of the Republican
-party. However, Abraham Lincoln&#8217;s Republican party was not a progeny
-of the aristocrats of the Whig party. Andrew Jackson, in his person,
-represented the purest type of the western pioneer, patriot, and
-soldier, and such men in America will only be found in the ranks of the
-people.</p>
-
-<p>In 1828, John Quincy Adams, and his party of the would-be &#8220;Four
-Hundred,&#8221; received at the hands of the people the same punishment and
-rebuke that was administered to Benjamin Harrison and the Republican
-party, which, just like the Whig party, had become hidden from the view
-of the people by the glamour of wealth and would-be aristocracy that
-was thrown over it. In Andrew Jackson, the people elected as their
-chief one possessed of great firmness and decision of character, one
-who was honest and true; not always correct in judgment, but when he
-erred the people were ready to forgive him, because the error was one
-of judgment and not of intention.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[Pg 244]</a></span> He was of them, and like them, as
-Abraham Lincoln was in 1860, and the people&#8217;s love and trust in him
-erased from their memory mistakes that in another would have been
-judged with a critical eye. He was often rash in expression and action,
-but his very rashness was the rashness of a man untrained in duplicity.
-He was not a diplomat. The people are not diplomatic, and he, as one
-of them, could not be expected to possess characteristics other than
-those of the mass. His actions were as a mirror in which the people saw
-themselves. How the chord he struck, when he threatened to hang John
-C. Calhoun and the nullifiers, finds a responsive echo in many of the
-utterances of Abraham Lincoln! What two men so nearly resemble each
-other to the people?</p>
-
-<p>The mere idle calling one a Democrat and the other a Republican is, as
-Hamlet says: &#8220;Words, words, words.&#8221; There is no significance in the
-mere word Democrat and Republican. Both were men of the people, elected
-as the choice of the masses, in the constant battle that the masses
-wage against the crime of &#8220;caste.&#8221; The similarity in the characters of
-Lincoln and Jackson is nowhere more forcibly illustrated than in that
-both were patriots of the purest stamp.</p>
-
-<p>Andrew Jackson took up the administration of the government with
-fearless energy, feeling <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[Pg 245]</a></span>confident that he had the unalloyed loyalty
-of the people to support him. Let us hope that Grover Cleveland,
-with the same fearless courage, will wage war upon those things
-objectionable to the people who have placed in his hands the weapons
-with which to do battle.</p>
-
-<p>The distinguishing act of Jackson&#8217;s first term was his veto of the
-bill to re-charter the United States Bank&mdash;the boldest defiance that a
-President ever cast to the money power of the country. &#8220;When President
-Jackson attacked the Bank,&#8221; De Tocqueville notes, &#8220;the country was
-excited and parties were formed. The well-informed classes rallied
-round the bank, the Common People round the President.&#8221; It is a
-commonplace of history that, in such cases, the &#8220;Common People&#8221; are
-more often right than those who claim superior information. Jackson&#8217;s
-veto is regarded by most observers as a remarkable popular victory over
-a great capitalistic monopoly.</p>
-
-<p>In none of the six Presidential campaigns between the time of Jackson
-and that of Lincoln was the question of popular sovereignty <i>versus</i>
-class pretensions brought into the contest as an issue, although events
-were gradually shaping themselves for the great struggle in which the
-period ended. Yet, in 1840, the Democratic<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[Pg 246]</a></span> personality of General
-William Henry Harrison, the Whig candidate, contributed not a little
-to his success. The veteran soldier, statesman, and frontiersman had
-spent most of his life in a log house beside the Ohio River, at North
-Bend, Indiana. A log cabin was chosen by his political followers as
-the symbol of his plain and unpretentious way of life, and a barrel of
-cider as an emblem of his simple but generous hospitality. During the
-&#8220;log cabin and hard cider&#8221; campaign all over the country, in cities,
-villages, and hamlets, log cabins were erected as rallying places for
-Harrison&#8217;s partisans, who met there to toast their champion in abundant
-glasses of cider. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[Pg 248]</a></span></p>
-
-<div class="center"><a name="i248.jpg" id="i248.jpg"></a><img src="images/i248.jpg" alt="THOMAS JEFFERSON" /></div>
-
-<p class="bold">THOMAS JEFFERSON.</p>
-
-<p class="bold">The &#8220;People&#8217;s&#8221; President, 1800.</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[Pg 249]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2><span>CHAPTER XII.</span> <span class="smaller">THOMAS JEFFERSON, 1800.</span></h2>
-
-<p>In 1800 Adams was a candidate for re-election, and fully expected to
-be successful. But the Democratic-Republican party, as the opposition
-was now called, defeated him, and elected to the Presidency its great
-leader, Thomas Jefferson.</p>
-
-<p>At a glance, it will be seen that the Republican of 1800 was the
-father of the Democratic party, the canonized Thomas Jefferson. The
-people, even thus early in the history of our nation, had begun to give
-evidence of that discontent at the aristocratic tendencies that even
-&#8220;The Father of his Country,&#8221; George Washington, and his successor, John
-Adams, displayed.</p>
-
-<p>It would be considered almost sacrilege were we to republish here the
-many attacks that were made upon George Washington, when President of
-the United States, on account of the odor of aristocracy with which
-he had become so strongly impregnated before the Revolution, and
-which clung to him like the scent of the roses to the shattered vase.
-While there can be no doubt,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[Pg 250]</a></span> of course, in the minds of us all, that
-Washington was pre-eminently a patriot, with a firm and steadfast faith
-in the doctrine of the rights of the people; still, he belonged to a
-section, to a State, that had been settled by Cavaliers who believed
-that they were somewhat better by birth than the Pilgrims of New
-England. And, having been born and educated in that atmosphere, it is
-small wonder that his character should have been somewhat attainted by
-his surroundings.</p>
-
-<p>Upon Washington&#8217;s elevation to the Presidential chair he surrounded
-the executive mansion with more of the air of ceremony and evidences
-of &#8220;caste&#8221; than were pleasant to the mass of the people. He was
-attacked, during his first and second terms, by pamphleteers, who, in
-most scurrilous articles, wrote of him as one designing to perpetuate
-aristocracy and &#8220;caste&#8221; in our country. The debt of gratitude which
-the new Republic and the people thereof owed Washington was too great
-for any effect to be produced similar to the revolution in 1892.
-However, an impression was made; reluctantly, John Adams, Washington&#8217;s
-Vice-President, was elected as second President of the Union. This
-reluctance became apparent by his failure to be re-elected four years
-later.</p>
-
-<p>A Minister from the United States to England always seems to become a
-suspicious object in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[Pg 251]</a></span> the minds of the people of America. No man ever
-added to his popularity by being sent as Minister to the Court of St.
-James. John Adams, who was our first Minister, was but the beginning of
-a long list of unfortunates. In fact, the American people will heartily
-endorse the opinion of that great statesman, James G. Blaine, which is
-being so vigorously advocated by the New York <i>Herald</i>, that foreign
-Ministers are expensive and useless appendages of this Republic. The
-election of John Adams was occasioned more by the reflected glory of
-Washington and the gratitude of the people, which, like the rays of
-the declining sun, became diminished as it sunk behind the horizon of
-time. In Thomas Jefferson, the people, even thus early in the history
-of our nation, saw <i>their</i> friend. His simplicity of life, purity of
-character, and honesty of purpose, surrounded his name with the same
-halo, in the sight of the people, as that with which the names of
-Jackson, Lincoln and Cleveland have since been made luminous. Though
-Jefferson was called a Republican, still, to the people, he was a
-Democrat in the sense that democracy means equality.</p>
-
-<p>Never was there a statesman more thoroughly imbued with the principles
-of popular liberty than Jefferson. &#8220;Rebellion to tyrants is obedience
-to God&#8221;&mdash;Oliver Cromwell&#8217;s saying&mdash;was the motto<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[Pg 252]</a></span> engraved on his seal.
-He had taken a leading part in the colonies&#8217; struggle for freedom.
-He was a member of the Continental Congress, Governor of Virginia
-during the war, and&mdash;a yet greater title to immortality&mdash;author of the
-Declaration of Independence. After the war he had been sent as American
-Minister to France, where he sympathized warmly with the revolution
-against Bourbon tyranny.</p>
-
-<p>Jefferson&#8217;s election to the Presidency was universally regarded as a
-great popular triumph. He was hailed everywhere as &#8220;the Man of the
-People,&#8221; and the day that saw him inaugurated was celebrated with such
-rejoicings as had not been witnessed since the news of peace came, in
-1783. No business, no labor was done on the 4th of March, 1801. It
-was a day of powder and parades, of church services, of bell-ringing,
-of speeches, and illuminations. The country&#8217;s satisfaction seemed
-unanimous.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The exit of aristocracy&#8221; was a toast drunk at one great banquet that
-evening; and when it had been duly honored, the band appropriately
-struck up the &#8220;Rogue&#8217;s March.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>The inauguration itself was a simple affair enough. It has, indeed,
-been asserted that Jefferson rode up Capitol Hill without a single
-attendant, tied his horse to a picket fence, and walked alone<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[Pg 253]</a></span> into
-the Senate chamber to take the oath of office. Professor McMaster
-offers evidence to prove this story inaccurate. Jefferson was not
-surrounded, on his induction into the Presidency, by such throngs as
-attended the inaugurations of Washington and Adams in New York and
-Philadelphia. But he went to the Capitol in the midst of a gathering of
-citizens, with the accompaniment of drums, flags, cannon, and a troop
-of militia. His dress was, as usual, that of a plain citizen, without
-any distinctive badge of office. On taking the oath of office he said,
-in a brief speech to the Senate: &#8220;I know that some honest men fear that
-a republican government cannot be strong&mdash;that this government is not
-strong enough. I believe this, on the contrary, to be the strongest
-government on earth.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>Jefferson&#8217;s administration&mdash;so economical, business-like, and
-democratic as to have made &#8220;Jeffersonian simplicity&#8221; a proverb&mdash;met
-with such approval that when he was re-elected in 1804 only fourteen
-votes were recorded against him. Only in one State&mdash;Massachusetts&mdash;was
-there any excitement in the campaign.</p>
-
-<p>The supremacy of the Democratic-Republican party lasted practically
-unchallenged until John Quincy Adams was elected, under peculiar
-circumstances, in 1824. There were in that year three<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[Pg 254]</a></span> leading
-candidates for the Presidency&mdash;Adams, Clay, and Jackson. As neither
-of them commanded a majority of the Electoral College, the question
-was referred to the House of Representatives, which selected Adams as
-being, in a measure, a compromise candidate.</p>
-
-<p>John Quincy Adams was at that time acting with the Democratic party,
-but he was, as James Parton points out in his &#8220;Life of Jackson,&#8221; &#8220;a
-Federalist by birth, by disposition, by early association, by confirmed
-habit.&#8221; And it soon became clear that Federalism, long supposed to
-be dead, was &#8220;living, rampant, and sitting in the seat of power.&#8221;
-Federalists were appointed to office&mdash;notably Rufus King, the most
-conspicuous survivor of the original Federalists&mdash;who was sent as
-minister to England. Adams was for stretching the Constitution, as the
-old Federalists were. In his first message to Congress he advocated
-government roads and canals, a government university and observatory,
-government exploring expeditions, and the like.</p>
-
-<p>His personality and manners revived the aristocratic traditions of his
-father. In the state he maintained at Washington he was said to go
-beyond the first President Adams. He refurnished the White House on
-a grand scale, and shocked the frugal taste of the day by placing a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[Pg 255]</a></span>
-billiard table in it. The East Room, in which his excellent mother had
-hung clothes to dry, was now a luxuriously fitted apartment.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;John II.&#8221; was the name that John Randolph of Roanoke bestowed upon
-the son and heir of the &#8220;Duke of Braintree.&#8221; Randolph had hated the
-Adams family since an incident that occurred on the day of Washington&#8217;s
-inauguration, which he recalled long afterwards in one of his speeches.
-&#8220;I remember,&#8221; he said, &#8220;the manner in which my brother was spurned by
-the coachman of the Vice-President&mdash;John Adams&mdash;for coming too near the
-vice-regal carriage.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>Even Mr. Blaine, who in his &#8220;Twenty Years of Congress&#8221; shows himself a
-kindly critic of the Federalist ideas and Federalist leaders, admits
-the &#8220;general unpopularity attached to the name of Adams.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>During John Quincy Adams&#8217; administration the mutterings of a coming
-political upheaval began to be heard. It began to be said that the
-Presidency was growing too much like an hereditary monarchy. It was
-becoming too settled a practice for each incumbent, after eight years
-in office, to make his Secretary of State his political heir. It gave
-the President what was almost equivalent to the power of appointing his
-successor. John Quincy Adams, it was said, counted confidently on the
-usual double<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[Pg 256]</a></span> term, and upon seeing his friend Clay, to whom he had
-given the chief post in his Cabinet, elected to succeed him.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The issue is fairly made out: Shall the government or the people
-rule?&#8221; asked Andrew Jackson, and on that issue he appealed to the
-country in his memorable electoral campaign against Adams, in 1828.
-That was the bitterest Presidential contest that had ever been fought.
-Jackson was attacked with unexampled ferocity. One day at his Tennessee
-home, the Hermitage, his wife found him in tears. &#8220;Myself I can
-defend,&#8221; he said, pointing to a newspaper which he had been reading;
-&#8220;you I can defend; but now they have assailed even the memory of my
-mother.&#8221; And it was, in great part, her distress at the invective that
-was heaped upon her husband that caused the death of Mrs. Jackson just
-after the election.</p>
-
-<p>It was a pitched battle between the &#8220;classes&#8221; and the &#8220;masses.&#8221; As
-James Parton says, in his biography of Jackson: &#8220;Nearly all the talent,
-nearly all the learning, nearly all the ancient wealth, nearly all the
-business activity, nearly all the book-nourished intelligence, nearly
-all the silver-forked civilization of the country, united in opposition
-to General Jackson, who represented the country&#8217;s untutored instincts.&#8221;</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[Pg 257]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2><span>CHAPTER XIII.</span> <span class="smaller">THE REVOLUTION IN 1776.</span></h2>
-
-<p>Revolt from aristocracy and detestation of &#8220;caste&#8221; in politics, in
-religion, and in society, have been the key-notes of the whole history
-of the Anglo-Saxon race in America. They were the incentives that first
-led men of that race to seek homes beyond the Atlantic, and have ever
-been the cardinal principles of the nation those pioneers founded.</p>
-
-<p>The westward movement began with that era of English history marked by
-the intolerable pretensions, in matters both of Church and State, of
-the Stuart monarchs. The doctrine of the &#8220;divine right of kings,&#8221; which
-cost Charles I. his head, was, with all that it meant, the grievance
-that drove from England the settlers of the American colonies.</p>
-
-<p>When James I., soon after his accession, was petitioned to allow
-liberty of assembling and of discussion to all classes and sects of his
-subjects, he replied that such a privilege &#8220;agrees with monarchy as
-well as God and the devil. Then Jack and Tom and Will and Dick shall
-meet, and at their pleasure censure me and my council and all our
-proceedings. Then Will shall stand up<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[Pg 258]</a></span> and say: &#8216;It must be thus;&#8217; then
-Dick shall reply and say: &#8216;Nay, marry, but we will have it thus;&#8217; and,
-therefore, here I must say: &#8216;The king forbids.&#8217;&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>The king forbade, but the native spirit of English liberty did not
-acquiesce without a murmur. There were mutterings of the storm that
-was to burst upon his son and successor in the full fury of rebellion.
-The subservient Wentworth complained that &#8220;the very genius of this
-nation of people leads them always to oppose, both civilly and
-ecclesiastically, all that ever authority ordains for them.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>Most outspoken in opposition to royal encroachment were the
-Puritans&mdash;those stern disciples of Calvin, who had furnished England
-her first Protestant martyrs, Hooper and Rogers, and who, in the early
-seventeenth century, were, as Hallam says, &#8220;the depositories of the
-sacred fire of liberty.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>Many Puritans preferred to leave their native country rather than
-submit. In 1607, a company of them were about to take sail for Holland
-from the Humber, when they were arrested and forced to return to their
-homes. In the following spring, they again attempted to escape. They
-reached the Lincolnshire coast, and were embarking, when soldiers, who
-had been dispatched in pursuit, rode down to the shore, and seized some
-of the women<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[Pg 259]</a></span> and children. As the only fault of these prisoners was
-that they had followed their husbands and fathers, they were afterward
-released.</p>
-
-<p>The fugitives, whose leaders were John Robinson, their minister, and
-William Brewster, their ruling elder, first tarried at Amsterdam, and
-the next year settled at Leyden. There they lived for eleven years&mdash;a
-body of exiles, who did not fraternize with their Dutch neighbors, and
-who gradually formed a plan of migrating to the new country beyond the
-Atlantic, where they might be under their old flag, and yet hope for
-civil and religious liberty.</p>
-
-<p>In 1617, they sent two of their number to England, to secure for their
-project the consent of the London Company, to which James I. had
-granted proprietary rights over Virginia&mdash;then the general name of the
-North American coast. The two embassies received a permit, although
-they put no great trust in it. &#8220;If,&#8221; said they, &#8220;there should afterward
-be a purpose to wrong us, though we had a seal as broad as the house
-floor, there would be means enough found to recall or reverse.&#8221; They
-did not foresee their future strength against oppression.</p>
-
-<p>Thus it was that in the August of 1620 the Pilgrims set sail from Delft
-Haven, and in November landed on the shores of Massachusetts&mdash;forty-one
-families, numbering in all a hundred and two<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[Pg 260]</a></span> souls. Before they
-landed, they signed a mutual agreement, covenanting &#8220;to enact,
-constitute, and frame such just and equal laws as shall be thought
-most convenient for the general good of the colony.&#8221; The agreement
-was loyally kept in the face of hardship and danger from within and
-without. The colony they planted grew in the spirit of popular liberty
-as it grew from penury to prosperity.</p>
-
-<p>Bancroft remarks that &#8220;in the early history of the United States,
-popular assemblies burst everywhere into life, with a consciousness of
-their importance and immediate efficiency.&#8221; This development of freedom
-was attained in Virginia even earlier than in Massachusetts.</p>
-
-<p>Virginia&#8217;s first struggle against usurping pretension was in 1624,
-when James I. sent out royal commissioners with orders &#8220;to enquire
-into the state of the plantation.&#8221; The colonists protested against the
-commissioners&#8217; proposal of absolute governors, and demanded the liberty
-of their Assembly; &#8220;for nothing,&#8221; they said, &#8220;can conduce more to the
-public satisfaction and public utility.&#8221; And the Assembly succeeded in
-retaining its rights.</p>
-
-<p>Thirty years later, a domestic attempt at usurpation was met with equal
-firmness. Samuel Cotton, the elected governor of the colony, had a
-quarrel with the Assembly, and arbitrarily proclaimed it dissolved.
-The representative defied<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[Pg 261]</a></span> his authority, and speedily forced him to
-yield. For even in that colony in America, where existed more of the
-inclination to class distinction than in many other of the colonies,
-the same spirit of hatred to &#8220;caste,&#8221; and the exercise of any assumed
-superiority was deep-rooted, and thus early gave evidence of its
-presence.</p>
-
-<p>At the foundation of Virginia&#8217;s sister colony of Maryland, the king
-expressly covenanted that neither he nor his successors would lay any
-imposition, custom, or tax upon the inhabitants of the province. The
-proprietors had the right to establish a colonial aristocracy, but
-it was never exercised. &#8220;Feudal institutions,&#8221; says Bancroft, &#8220;could
-not be perpetuated in the lands of their origin, far less renew their
-youth in America. Sooner might the oldest oaks in Windsor forest be
-transplanted across the Atlantic, than antiquated social forms. The
-seeds of popular liberty, contained in the charter, would find in the
-New World the soil best suited to quicken them.&#8221; One of the early acts
-of the Provincial Assembly of Maryland was the framing of a declaration
-of rights. And yet, it was in Baltimore, the metropolis of the State
-of Maryland, that the first resistance was offered to the soldiers of
-the people, who were going to enforce the will of the majority upon the
-minority. Maryland, while, from proximity to the Federal capital, was
-less inclined<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[Pg 262]</a></span> toward the secession movement, was still sufficiently
-influenced by the aristocratic slave-holding part of her population
-as to be the scene of the first actual resistance to the will of the
-people in 1861.</p>
-
-<p>The same spirit animated the pioneers of Connecticut, where Hooker
-declared that &#8220;the foundation of authority is laid in the free consent
-of the people.&#8221; When John Clark and William Coddington founded the
-settlement of Newport, it was &#8220;unanimously agreed upon&#8221; among their
-people that the body politic should be &#8220;a <i>Democracie</i> or popular
-government.&#8221; The colonization of Pennsylvania&mdash;&#8220;the holy experiment,&#8221;
-as Penn called it&mdash;was inaugurated by its great leader with a solemn
-pledge of &#8220;liberty of conscience and civil freedom.&#8221; And similar
-incidents accompanied the birth of nearly every new colony.</p>
-
-<p>As Massachusetts grew to be the most prosperous of the northern
-colonies, she &#8220;echoed the voice of Virginia like deep calling unto
-deep. The State was filled with the hum of village politicians; the
-freemen of every town on the Bay were busily inquiring into their
-liberties and privileges.&#8221; [Bancroft.] The American spirit, which was
-to leaven the world with a new ideal of liberty, found its philosophers
-and statesmen in the farms and hamlets of the young and simple
-community. It found, of course, its critics and its doubters. Lechford,
-a Boston lawyer, prophesied<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[Pg 263]</a></span> that &#8220;elections cannot be safe long here,&#8221;
-where manhood suffrage was the rule. John Cotton spoke against the
-accepted principle of rotation in office; but neither could stem the
-current of democratic doctrine, because the early settlers of America
-still retained the scars of their recent conflict with the aristocrats
-of Europe. Their arrival in the then wilderness of America had been too
-recent to obliterate the impression made on their minds by &#8220;caste&#8221; in
-Europe.</p>
-
-<p>In 1635, there was a short-lived possibility that the aristocratic
-system of Britain might be transplanted to Massachusetts. Henry Vane,
-younger son of a titled English family, emigrated to the colony, where
-he was kindly received, and elected governor a few years after; and two
-noblemen, Lord Brooke and Lord Say-and-Seal, expressed their intention
-to follow him if the colonists would agree to establish a second
-chamber of their legislature and constitute them hereditary members of
-it. But the burgesses, easily perceiving the trend of such a proposal,
-declined it, courteously but decidedly.</p>
-
-<p>Aristocracy never found a foothold in any of the colonies. The only
-approach to it was the privileges accorded in some of them to the
-&#8220;proprietors,&#8221; and these were, while they lasted, regarded with some
-jealousy. For instance, when Pennsylvania, after Braddock&#8217;s defeat at
-Fort<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[Pg 264]</a></span> Duquesne, decided to raise £50,000 for self-defence by an estate
-tax, the proprietors&mdash;heirs of William Penn&mdash;claimed exemption from
-the levy; but, though Governor Morris approved the claim, the Assembly
-refused it.</p>
-
-<p>Bancroft thus characterizes the elemental beginnings of the American
-nation: &#8220;Nothing came from Europe but a free people. The people,
-separating itself from all other elements of previous civilization;
-the people, self-confident and industrious; the people, wise by all
-traditions that favored its culture and happiness&mdash;alone broke away
-from European influence, and in the New World laid the foundations
-of our Republic.&#8221; And periodically, as we see from the records of
-our nation, the might of the majority has been exercised to suppress
-anything like the attempted institution of &#8220;caste&#8221; in our country. This
-often-recurring crime begins to upraise its head, slowly at first,
-after each defeat, but eventually its growth becomes sufficiently great
-to attract the attention of the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; and, as a result,
-receives its punishment, so justly due.</p>
-
-<p>And the same historian adds: &#8220;Of the nations of Europe, the chief
-emigration was from that Germanic race most famed for the love of
-personal independence. The immense majority of American families were
-not of &#8216;the high folk of Normandie,&#8217; but were of &#8216;the low men,&#8217; who<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[Pg 265]</a></span>
-were Saxons. This is true of New England; it is true of the South.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>It is true of the South, in spite of the fact&mdash;influential throughout
-the history of that section&mdash;that its population contained an element
-drawn from the wealthier classes of the mother country. It has indeed
-been said that Virginia was &#8220;a continuation of English society.&#8221;
-The seeds of privilege may have existed in the Old Dominion, but,
-nevertheless, in no colony was the spirit of personal independence
-more signally evinced. &#8220;With consistent firmness of character,&#8221; to
-quote again from Bancroft, &#8220;the Virginians welcomed representative
-assemblies; displaced an unpopular governor; rebelled against the
-politics of the Stuarts; and, uneasy at the royalist principles that
-prevailed in their forming aristocracy, soon manifested the tendency of
-the age at the polls.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>With the aims of the English rebellion against Charles I., the American
-colonies were in full sympathy. Immediately after its outbreak, the
-general court of Massachusetts directed the governor to omit the oath
-of allegiance to the king, &#8220;seeing that he had violated the privileges
-of Parliament.&#8221; But the civil war had no effect upon the colonial
-governments. In England, the monarchy, the peerage, and the prelacy
-were at swords&#8217; points with the people; in America, there was neither
-peerage nor prelacy, and monarchy<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">[Pg 266]</a></span> was rendered remote by the Atlantic,
-so that there were no two parties to join battle.</p>
-
-<p>The Restoration opened a new era in the history of the colonies&mdash;a
-period of conflict between royal usurpation and aristocratic oppression
-on the one hand, and popular liberties on the other; a period that,
-after many years of difficulty and struggle, culminated in events that
-gave rationality and independence to the greatest democracy the world
-has ever seen.</p>
-
-<p>It was a period marked in England by the political ascendency of the
-aristocracy. At the Restoration, the nobility resumed possession of
-the hereditary branch of the Parliament. Through their influence
-over elections, they, to a great extent, controlled the House of
-Commons&mdash;and through it the crown, over which the Commons had given
-recent and striking proofs of power. It was the aristocratic element
-that dictated the policy which goaded the colonies into secession from
-the mother country. It supplied the office-holders&mdash;&#8220;carpet-baggers&#8221;
-they might have been termed in modern political slang&mdash;whom the home
-government quartered upon the colonials by an official system tainted
-with nepotism and corruption. Its foe&mdash;Pitt, the great Commoner&mdash;was
-the friend of America, and one of her few champions in Parliament. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">[Pg 267]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>Equally the friend of America was the English democracy&mdash;politically
-far less powerful during the century after the Restoration than in the
-preceding and the subsequent periods. When the hated Stamp Act was
-repealed, the &#8220;Common People&#8221; of London lit bonfires and illuminated
-the streets, rang the historic Bow Bells, and decked the shipping in
-the Thames with flags.</p>
-
-<p>But the House of Commons, before whom came the critical measures of
-legislation for the colonies, reflected the feeling of the aristocracy
-and not that of the populace. &#8220;The majority,&#8221; said a member, during
-a debate on American affairs in 1770, &#8220;is no better than an ignorant
-multitude.&#8221; Sir George Saville, a man of rare independence and
-integrity, replied in strong words. &#8220;The greatest evil that can befall
-this nation,&#8221; he declared, &#8220;is the invasion of the people&#8217;s rights by
-the authority of this house. I do not say that the members have sold
-the rights of their constituents; but I do say, I have said, and I
-shall always say, that they have betrayed them.&#8221; But his protest was
-shouted down as treason, and Parliament blindly pursued its course of
-usurpation.</p>
-
-<p>Long before that time, there had been in America thoughts of
-independence as a refuge from usurpation. The colonists cherished a
-genuine loyalty to the old flag, and a strong pride in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268">[Pg 268]</a></span> the Saxon
-blood, whose latest and, indeed, most typical product they themselves
-were. Yet, as far back as 1638, when Charles I. tried to revoke
-the original patent of Massachusetts, the settlers threatened to
-&#8220;confederate themselves under a new government for their necessary
-safety and subsistence.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>In 1698, Governor Nicholson, of Virginia, reported that &#8220;a great many
-in the plantations think that no law of England ought to be in force
-and binding upon them without their own consent.&#8221; Three years later, a
-public document noted that &#8220;the independence the colonies thirst after
-is now notorious.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>The sentiment grew gradually during the reigns of the Georges, slowly
-overcoming the strength of the old attachment to the mother country.
-Every encroachment attempted by royalty or officialism aroused a
-hostility that reinforced the spirit of liberty. For instance, when
-Samuel Shute, Governor of Massachusetts in 1719, tried to prevent the
-publication of the Assembly&#8217;s answer to one of his speeches, claiming
-power over the press as his prerogative, he only succeeded in evoking a
-vigorous resistance, that finally disposed of his pretension, and gave
-the press untrammeled freedom.</p>
-
-<p>And thus it was that a generation later the patriotic Otis, of Boston,
-the man &#8220;who dared to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269">[Pg 269]</a></span> love his country and be poor,&#8221; spoke so boldly
-in reply to Hutchinson, who summed up his aristocratic preferences in
-the odious Horatian maxim, <i>Odi profanum vulgus</i>, and who avowed his
-dissatisfaction that &#8220;liberty and property should be enjoyed by the
-vulgar.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;God made all men naturally equal,&#8221; said Otis. &#8220;The ideas of earthly
-grandeur are acquired, not innate. No government has a right to make
-a slave of the subject.&#8221; And again, &#8220;to bring the powers of all into
-the hands of one or some few, and to make them hereditary, is the
-interested work of the weak and wicked.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>Such was the philosophy that was daily preached among the burghers of
-Boston. Such was the doctrine that Patrick Henry came from the Virginia
-backwoods to voice with his burning eloquence. Such was the spirit that
-was everywhere animating the colonies, while Parliament enacted one
-unjust and oppressive law after another. &#8220;The sun of American liberty
-has set,&#8221; Ben Franklin wrote from Europe to a friend in America, when
-he heard of the enactment of the ill-fated Stamp Act; &#8220;now we must
-light the torches of industry and economy.&#8221; &#8220;Be assured that we shall
-light torches of another sort,&#8221; replied his friend.</p>
-
-<p>The torches were lit; they blazed forth in the shots fired at
-Lexington, and on Bunker Hill, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_270" id="Page_270">[Pg 270]</a></span> in the Declaration of Independence,
-at Philadelphia; and they were not put out until Parliamentary
-oppression had been forever ended, and a new nation&mdash;a plebeian
-democracy&mdash;took its place by the side of the proudest of earth&#8217;s
-empires.</p>
-
-<p>The war was fought and won by the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; in the face of the
-armed force of the foreigner, and the treachery, active or passive,
-of not a few colonists, whose aristocratic connections or pretensions
-held them aloof from the movement for liberty. Even in the darkest
-days of the struggle, when Washington, driven from New York, was
-retreating before Howe&#8217;s advance, and many men of prominence were
-giving up the patriotic cause as hopeless&mdash;Joseph Galloway and Andrew
-Allen, of Pennsylvania, Samuel Tucker, of New Jersey, John Dickinson,
-of Delaware, and others&mdash;even then the Commander&#8217;s wonderful faith and
-courage was reflected in the fidelity of the populace. That alone made
-possible the final triumph.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;When the war of independence was terminated,&#8221; remarks DeTocqueville,
-in his famous study of &#8220;Democracy in America,&#8221; &#8220;and the foundations
-of the new government were to be laid down, the nation was divided
-between two opinions&mdash;two opinions which are as old as the world, and
-which are perpetually to be met with<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_271" id="Page_271">[Pg 271]</a></span> under different forms and various
-names, in all free communities&mdash;the one tending to limit, the other to
-extend, indefinitely, the power of the people. The conflict between
-these two opinions never assumed that degree of violence in America
-which it has frequently displayed elsewhere. Both parties were agreed
-on the most essential points, and neither of them had to destroy an
-old constitution, or to overthrow the structure of society, in order
-to triumph. In neither of them, consequently, were a great number of
-private interests affected by success or defeat; but moral principles
-of a high order, such as the love of equality and of independence,
-were concerned in the struggle, and these sufficed to kindle violent
-passions.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>The party that sought to limit the power of the people was that of
-the Federalists; its opponents took the name of Republican, which
-afterwards became Democratic-Republican, and finally, under Andrew
-Jackson, Democratic. In view of the fixed bent of the American national
-character, it is not difficult to discern the inevitable result of the
-conflict between them. The Federalists were certain to be ultimately
-overcome. America is the land of democracy, and the anti-democratic
-partisans were always in a minority.</p>
-
-<p>Thus for the brief period succeeding the Civil War, while the wounds
-of the conflict were still<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_272" id="Page_272">[Pg 272]</a></span> fresh upon the body politic, the party of
-the aristocracy&mdash;for such had the Republican party become&mdash;utilizing
-the soreness still existing as the result of the conflict, succeeded,
-by the clamor of sectionalism, in diverting the attention of the masses
-from the tendency towards social superiority and &#8220;caste,&#8221; which the
-continuance of the Republican party in power was creating.</p>
-
-<p>This brief ascendency during the first twelve years of the republic
-was due to several temporary causes. Most of the great leaders of the
-war for independence believed in a strong, centralized government,
-and therefore ranked themselves with the Federalists. The failure of
-the first attempt at federal control&mdash;the Continental Congress&mdash;and
-the local disorders that arose after the war, had inspired the people
-with a dread of anarchy. They were willing to accept, for a time,
-restrictive political theories, which it soon became safe to throw off.</p>
-
-<p>The Federalist leaders were more than suspected of aristocratic
-tendencies. Elbridge Gerry, of Massachusetts, declared in the
-Constitutional Convention of 1787, that &#8220;the ills of the country come
-from an excess of democracy. The people do not want virtue,&#8221; he added,
-as if in apology, &#8220;but are the dupes of pretended patriots.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>Sherman, of Connecticut, said at the same time and place that &#8220;the
-people should have as<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_273" id="Page_273">[Pg 273]</a></span> little to do directly with the government as
-possible.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>John Adams repeatedly advocated, in his writings &#8220;a liberal use of
-titles and ceremonials for those in office,&#8221; and the establishment
-of an upper legislative chamber to be filled by &#8220;the rich, the
-well-born, and the able.&#8221; The words, &#8220;well-born,&#8221; gave intense offence.
-Their inconsistency with the grand democracy of the Declaration of
-Independence was bitterly commented on. The whole Federalist party was
-sarcastically called &#8220;the well-born&#8221;&mdash;a fatal appellation!</p>
-
-<p>The expression &#8220;well-bred,&#8221; as describing the commander of the
-Pennsylvania militia at Homestead, will be recalled by the mass of the
-people long after every vestige of the militia&#8217;s visit to Homestead
-has departed. To the American mind such expressions as &#8220;well-born&#8221; and
-&#8220;well-bred&#8221; present an absurd attempt at class distinction.</p>
-
-<p>Hamilton shared the same theories. He was openly accused by Jefferson,
-while both men were members of Washington&#8217;s cabinet, of a desire to
-overthrow the republic. He was closely connected with the rising
-financial power of New York. The people, while they admired his able
-and amiable personality, never quite forgave him for the part he took
-in defending one Holt, a rich Tory of New York, in a suit for redress
-brought<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_274" id="Page_274">[Pg 274]</a></span> by a poor widow whose house he had seized during the British
-occupation.</p>
-
-<p>George Washington himself, who was a Federalist so far as he belonged
-to any party, was a man of ceremony and <i>hauteur</i>. He never forgot that
-he had descended from a titled English family, and belonged to the
-wealthiest class of Southern landed proprietors. When he assumed the
-Presidency, he established an almost courtly etiquette. On Tuesdays
-and Fridays he gave stately receptions to visitors; on Thursdays,
-Congressional dinners. While New York was the Capital of the Union,
-he had a Presidential box at the theatre (the only theatre the city
-then boasted), elaborately decorated, and whenever he occupied it,
-the orchestra played the &#8220;Presidential March&#8221; (now known as &#8220;Hail
-Columbia&#8221;).</p>
-
-<p>At his inauguration, the House of Representatives addressed him simply
-as &#8220;President.&#8221; The Senate, probably cognizant of his personal wishes,
-sought a more high-sounding title. &#8220;His Excellency&#8221; was rejected as too
-plain, and after some debate the Senators decided upon &#8220;His Highness,
-the President of the United States, and Protector of their Liberties.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>The Senate&#8217;s suggestion was referred to the House, where it aroused no
-little opposition. Congressman Tucker, of South Carolina, inquired:
-&#8220;Will it not alarm our fellow-citizens? Will they<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_275" id="Page_275">[Pg 275]</a></span> not say that they
-have been deceived by the Convention that framed the Constitution? One
-of its warmest advocates&mdash;nay, one of its framers&mdash;has recommended it
-by calling it a pure democracy. Does giving titles look like a pure
-democracy? Surely not. Some one has said that to give dignity to our
-government we must give a lofty title to our chief magistrate. If so,
-then to make our dignity complete, we must give first a high title,
-then an embroidered robe, then a princely equipage, and finally a crown
-and hereditary succession. This spirit of imitation, sir, this spirit
-of mimicry and apery, will be the ruin of our country. Instead of
-giving us dignity in the eyes of foreigners, it will expose us to be
-laughed at as apes.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>So decided was the feeling of the House against the adoption of a
-sonorous title for the chief executive, that the Senate&#8217;s proposal was
-dropped. Nevertheless, a more elaborate ceremonial was maintained at
-the Presidential mansion&mdash;at first in New York, then in Philadelphia,
-and finally at Washington&mdash;during the first twelve years of the
-government, than after Jefferson&#8217;s accession in 1801.</p>
-
-<p>Washington&#8217;s two elections to the Presidency was the nation&#8217;s tribute
-to the splendid personal character and military record of the man
-who, above all others, gave it nationality. When he<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_276" id="Page_276">[Pg 276]</a></span> refused a third
-election, the honor went to John Adams, as his political heir, although
-the Federalists, whose candidate Adams was, had only a bare majority
-of the electoral college&mdash;seventy-one votes against sixty-eight for
-Jefferson. It was at that time the almost invariable rule for the
-electors to be chosen by the State Legislatures, not, as now, by
-a popular vote. Had the conflict between Adams and Jefferson been
-waged before the people at large, it is probable that the latter, the
-champion of advanced democracy, would have been successful.</p>
-
-<p>John Adams was a man of decided aristocratic tendencies. He was the
-first American minister to England, and had spent ten years at the
-courts of Europe. He did not conceal his admiration for English
-institutions. While in London he wrote a &#8220;Defence of the American
-Constitution,&#8221; which proved to be a laudation of the British form of
-government rather than that of the United States. In his &#8220;Discourses
-on Davilla,&#8221; he advocated a powerful centralized executive and a
-system of titles. He was frequently charged with favoring a monarchy
-and a hereditary legislature like the House of Lords. His political
-opponents nicknamed him &#8220;the Duke of Braintree&#8221;&mdash;Braintree being the
-Massachusetts town where he lived. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_277" id="Page_277">[Pg 277]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>Thus early in the existence of the nation was evident the detestation
-on the part of the people at any attempted introduction of &#8220;caste&#8221; in
-the country. The Stamp Act, and taxes, and unjust discrimination while
-truly expressed caused the revolution in 1776, were only supplemental
-causes. In the record of every colony will be found traces of the
-opposition to &#8220;caste,&#8221; and the strong objection that existed among the
-people to the introduction of class distinctions among them. While
-the immediate cause of the rebellion on the part of the colonies,
-the revolution, and consequent creation of a nation, may appear to
-be the resistance to the imposition of taxes and therefore a matter
-of pocketbook; still, beneath it all, the foundation upon which
-the strength and duration of the resistance to the British power
-rested, was the strong sentiment in the hearts of the early patriots,
-demanding <i>equality</i>, social as well as &#8220;equality before the law.&#8221; Our
-forefathers endured suffering at Valley Forge, not for the sake of the
-pocketbook, but because they had in their bosoms that ever-present
-sentiment of the Anglo-Saxon people, that all must be equal in every
-respect. It is rather a petty cause to assign for the revolution and
-the exhibition of heroism upon the part of the forefathers of the
-Americans&mdash;a matter of taxes.</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_278" id="Page_278">[Pg 278]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2><span>CHAPTER XIV.</span> <span class="smaller">THE FRENCH REVOLUTION.</span></h2>
-
-<p>Feudalism, introduced in France a thousand years ago, reconstructed
-society on the only basis then possible. It was a bridge from barbarism
-to monarchy. The invasion of the Northmen, though apparently a
-calamity, was a blessing. They brought fresh, lusty life. Their courage
-and vigor gave the country a new and needed impulse in progress and
-civilization.</p>
-
-<p>William, Duke of Normandy, conquered England in 1066, and proved an
-able and stern ruler.</p>
-
-<p>While many of her nobles were engaged in the Crusades in the East, a
-social revolution was going on in France, full of significance. This
-was the rise of free cities. The feudal bishops became so intolerably
-oppressive that the people succeeded in buying the privilege of
-electing their own magistrates; then the king, for a goodly sum of
-money, confirmed it. Appeal was thus secured from the bishop to the
-king. He encouraged the practice, for it freed him, to a degree, from
-dependence on his nobles, and gave him greater<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_279" id="Page_279">[Pg 279]</a></span> control over the
-cities. The process went on during the eleventh, twelfth, and the first
-part of the thirteenth century.</p>
-
-<p>The result was shown at the battle of Bouvines (A.D. 1214). King John
-of England, in the hope of recovering Normandy and other provinces
-which he had ignominiously lost, attacked France. He formed an alliance
-with the German emperor and with the Court of Flanders.</p>
-
-<p>The army of Philip, the French king, made up of barons, bishops, and
-knights, clad in steel, and a large body of foot-soldiers sent by
-sixteen free cities and towns, gained a complete victory. It was one of
-the most memorable contests of the Middle Ages, for on that hard-fought
-field three great branches of the Teutonic race&mdash;German, Flemish, and
-English&mdash;went down before the furious onset of &#8220;hostile blood and
-speech.&#8221; Lords, clergy, and Common People fought side by side against a
-foreign foe, and henceforth were united by a common bond of pride. It
-was the hardy yeomanry of Edward, the Black Prince, who won the battle
-of Crecy (1346), at the beginning of the Hundred Years&#8217; War, against
-three times as many Frenchmen.</p>
-
-<p>It was in 1598 that Henry IV. issued the Edict of Nantes, which
-secured to the long and bitterly persecuted Huguenots the rights they
-demanded.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_280" id="Page_280">[Pg 280]</a></span> It marked a new era in history. It was the first formal
-recognition of toleration in religion made by any leading power of
-Europe, and anticipated a similar act in England by nearly a century.</p>
-
-<p>The king saw what all have since come to see, that freedom of
-conscience is one of the surest guarantees of national strength.</p>
-
-<p>Henry IV. of France was essentially the people&#8217;s king. He was popular
-with the masses to the same extent that Louis XV. was unpopular. To
-the Common People in France, Henry IV. represented as much democracy
-in that age of tyranny as Abraham Lincoln and Grover Cleveland do in a
-better age and country. Henry was murdered on the streets of Paris by
-the fanatic Ravaillac, whose dagger inflicted an almost mortal wound
-upon France herself.</p>
-
-<p>With the aid of Richelieu, the absolute power of the crown was built
-up; then followed the despotisms of Louis XIV. and Louis XV.; the
-revocation of the Edict of Nantes; the disastrous failure of the
-Mississippi Scheme; the struggle between England and France for mastery
-in the New World, and the complete triumph of the former, and the
-preparation for the awful revolution of 1789.</p>
-
-<p>France had materially and powerfully assisted the American colonies in
-their struggle with Great<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_281" id="Page_281">[Pg 281]</a></span> Britain for independence. Many illustrious
-sons of France, like Lafayette and Rochambeau, had joined and fought
-side by side with those sons of liberty who were then creating the
-great republic of America. America was a storehouse of freedom,
-liberty, and concentrated hate of &#8220;caste&#8221; and class distinction,
-from whence Frenchmen like Lafayette carried to France the spirit of
-freedom. It may fairly be said that the struggle on this continent
-lighted the torch of liberty which has illuminated the world since,
-torn Spain&#8217;s oppressed colonies in America from her grasp, and made
-possible the existence of the French Republic, which has now taken its
-place among the most powerful nations of the earth.</p>
-
-<p>The dormant desire had long been present in the breasts of the
-poor of the French nation for equality and liberty. The quickening
-influences and light radiating from the new Republic of the West,
-among whose children the sons of France had served in the struggle for
-independence, soon ignited the fires in the heart of the impetuous
-Frenchman.</p>
-
-<p>Louis XVI. had been more condescending than any of his predecessors;
-he occupied, possibly, a higher position in the hearts of the people
-than any king the French had had since Henry IV. But the time had come
-when, inspired by the <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_282" id="Page_282">[Pg 282]</a></span>example of the Americans, the crime of &#8220;caste&#8221;
-in France had become unendurable. Louis XVI. was, of all the Bourbon
-kings, probably the least objectionable.</p>
-
-<p>His character, while weak and influenced by the stronger will of Marie
-Antoinette, did not represent the worst phases of the character of
-Louis XV. or Louis XIV. Gradually, but irresistibly by attrition, the
-will of the people had been making marks upon the royalty of France.
-The tyranny, insolence, and arrogance of Louis XIV., in whose presence
-one dared not speak, had been lessened in Louis XV. to the extent that
-one could speak in a whisper; but in the presence of Louis XVI. one
-might speak aloud. With tireless, resistless, sullen determination the
-billows of the sea of humanity, wherein all is equality and fraternity,
-had beaten upon this rock of adamant until these divine Bourbon kings
-had become impressed by its constant, ceaseless energy.</p>
-
-<p>Weak, amiable, and pliable as Louis XVI. was, poor Jacques had been
-so long deprived of one heart-beat of feeling that his bosom could no
-longer restrain the emotions of liberty and equality. The nobles of
-France, more than Louis XVI., retained the impress of the reign of
-Louis XIV., &#8220;the Glorious&#8221; (?), who had proclaimed that he was a Sun;
-and while the ruling monarch,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_283" id="Page_283">[Pg 283]</a></span> as the bulwark of royalty, &#8220;caste,&#8221; and
-social inequality, had received the first shock of the wave and been
-marked thereby; still the nobility, sheltered behind the bulwark of
-the personality of the king, continued to indulge the wild license of
-their privileges and &#8220;caste&#8221; distinction, gamboling like lambs upon
-the greensward of their delusion, becoming fattened for the knife of
-that butcher that was sure to follow, the guillotine. A more powerful,
-touching, and realistic picture was never drawn of the arrogance and
-presumption of the nobles, privileged classes, &#8220;higher caste,&#8221; than
-that made by the people&#8217;s author, the man who of all others has nearer
-touched the hearts of the Common People, who will be loved and revered
-when others more learned may be forgotten, because he wrote of scenes
-of sensation, emotion, and relations of the Common People&mdash;Charles
-Dickens&mdash;in the &#8220;Tale of Two Cities,&#8221; and for our purpose it would be
-impossible to find words more fitting than those used by this master
-delineator of the feelings, thoughts, heart-throbs, and wrongs of the
-Common People:</p>
-
-<blockquote>
-
-<p>&#8220;What has gone wrong?&#8221; said Monsieur, calmly looking out. A tall
-man in a night-cap had caught up a bundle from among the feet of
-the horses and had laid it on the base of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_284" id="Page_284">[Pg 284]</a></span> fountain, and was
-down in the mud and wet, howling over it like a wild animal.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Pardon, Monsieur the Marquis!&#8221; said a ragged and submissive man,
-&#8220;it is a child.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Why does he make that abominable noise&mdash;is it his child?&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Excuse me, Monsieur the Marquis, it is a pity&mdash;yes.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>The fountain was a little removed, for the street opened where it
-was, into a space some ten or twelve yards square. As the tall man
-suddenly got up from the ground and came running at the carriage,
-Monsieur the Marquis clapped his hand for an instant on his
-sword-hilt.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Killed!&#8221; shrieked the man in wild desperation, extending both
-arms at their lengths above his head and staring at him. &#8220;Dead!&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>The people closed round and looked at Monsieur the Marquis.
-There was nothing revealed by the many eyes that looked at him
-but watchfulness and eagerness; there was no visible menacing of
-anger. Neither did the people say anything; after the first cry,
-they had been silent, and remained so. The voice of the submissive
-man who had spoken was flat and tame in its extreme submission.
-Monsieur the Marquis ran his eyes over them all as though they had
-been mere rats come out of their holes. He took out his purse.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;It is extraordinary to me,&#8221; said he, &#8220;that you people cannot take
-care of yourselves and your children. One or the other of you is
-forever in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_285" id="Page_285">[Pg 285]</a></span> the way. How do I know what injury you have done to my
-horses. See! give him that.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>He threw out a gold coin for the valet to pick up, and all the
-heads craned forward that all the eyes might look down as it fell.
-The tall man called out again, with a most unearthly cry, &#8220;Dead!&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>He was arrested by the quick arrival of another man, for whom the
-rest made way. On seeing him, the miserable creature fell upon his
-shoulder, sobbing and crying and pointing to the fountain, where
-some women were stooping over the motionless bundle, and moving
-gently about it. They were silent, however, as the men.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;I know all, I know all,&#8221; said the last comer. &#8220;Be a brave man,
-my Gaspard. It is better for the poor little plaything to die so,
-than to live. It has died in a moment without pain. Could it have
-lived an hour as happily?&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;You are a philosopher, you there,&#8221; said the Marquis, smiling.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;How do they call you?&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;They call me Defarge.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Of what trade?&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Monsieur the Marquis, the vender of wine.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Pick up that, philosopher and vender of wine,&#8221; said the Marquis,
-throwing him another gold coin, &#8220;and spend it as you will. The
-horses there; are they all right?&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>Without deigning to look at the assemblage a second time, Monsieur
-the Marquis leaned back in his seat, and was just being driven
-away with<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_286" id="Page_286">[Pg 286]</a></span> the air of a gentleman who had accidentally broken some
-common thing, and had paid for it and could afford to pay for it,
-when his ease was suddenly disturbed by a coin flying into the
-carriage, and ringing on its floor.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Hold!&#8221; said Monsieur the Marquis. &#8220;Hold the horses! who threw
-that?&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>He looked to the spot where Defarge, the vender of wine, had stood
-a moment before; but the wretched father was groveling on his face
-on the pavement in that spot, and the figure that stood beside him
-was the figure of a dark, stout woman, knitting.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;You dogs!&#8221; said the Marquis, but smoothly, and with an unchanged
-front, except as to the spots on his nose; &#8220;I would ride over any
-of you very willingly, and exterminate you from the earth. If I
-knew which rascal threw at the carriage, and if that brigand were
-sufficiently near it, he should be crushed under the wheels.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>So cowed was their condition, and so long and hard their
-experience of what such a man could do to them, within the law and
-beyond it, that not a voice or a hand, or even an eye was raised.
-Among the men not one. But the woman who was knitting looked up
-steadily, and looked the Marquis in the face. It was not for his
-dignity to notice it; his contemptuous eyes passed over her and
-over all the other rats; and he leaned back in his seat again, and
-gave the word, &#8220;Go on!&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_287" id="Page_287">[Pg 287]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>In vain would we seek for words describing better the horrible
-condition of the Common People, and the tremendous extent of the
-assumption of a superiority upon the part of the nobles, than in
-the foregoing picture so ably portrayed by Charles Dickens. Such a
-condition of the social life in France could produce but one result.
-The harvest was ripe for the sickle. The people had witnessed an
-illustration of the might of the Common People of America when opposed
-to the representatives of &#8220;caste&#8221; in the British army. That the storm
-should have burst that so long had been hovering over the heads of
-the French nobles is not a matter of surprise, in view of the fact
-that Dickens is historically correct in his picture of the oppressed
-condition of the poor in France. The only wonder to us Anglo-Saxons is
-that brave men, as the Frenchmen are, should have borne so long the
-cruel, heartless oppression of the rich nobility.</p>
-
-<p>Duruy says: &#8220;The French Revolution was the establishment of a new order
-of society, founded on justice, not privileges. Such changes never take
-place without causing terrible suffering. It is the law of humanity
-that all new life shall be born in pain.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>When Louis XVI. ascended the throne, in 1774, revolution was in the
-air. The outward<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_288" id="Page_288">[Pg 288]</a></span> splendor of Versailles, as Carlyle intimates, was the
-rainbow above Niagara: beneath was destruction.</p>
-
-<p>There was a general feeling that a crisis was at hand. The spirit of
-free inquiry aroused by the leading writers and thinkers was ominous.
-Government, religion, social institutions, were all burned in the
-crucible, and a new order of things was inevitable. The country was
-hopelessly deep in the mire of debt; the tax agents were brutal, and
-the peasants ground to the lowest depths of misery and suffering.</p>
-
-<p>The power of the nobles over the peasants living on their estates was
-absolute. Large tracts of land were declared game-preserves, where wild
-boars and deer roamed at pleasure. To preserve the game with its flavor
-unimpaired, the starving peasants were not allowed to weed their little
-plots of ground. The nobility and clergy, who owned two-thirds of the
-land, were nearly exempt from taxation.</p>
-
-<p>The peasant must grind his corn at the lord&#8217;s mill; bake his bread
-in the lord&#8217;s oven, and press his grapes at the lord&#8217;s wine-press,
-paying whatever the lord chose to charge. If the wife of the seigneur
-fell ill, the peasants must beat the neighboring marshes all night to
-prevent the frogs from croaking, and so disturbing the lady&#8217;s rest. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_289" id="Page_289">[Pg 289]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>French agriculture had not advanced beyond the tenth century, and the
-plow in use was the same as that used before the Christian era. The
-picture of rural wretchedness is completed by the purchase and sale of
-150,000 serfs with the land on which they were born.</p>
-
-<p>Louis desired to redress the wrongs of his country, but did not know
-how. Ministers came and went in a continuous procession, Turgot,
-Necker, Colonne, Brienne, and Necker again, tried to solve the problem,
-and gave up in despair.</p>
-
-<p>As a last resort, the States-General, which had not met for one hundred
-and seventy-five years, assembled May 5, 1789, and that day marked the
-opening of the Revolution.</p>
-
-<p>The National Assembly, proving to be the most powerful body of the
-States-General, invited the nobles and clergy to join it, and declared
-itself the National Assembly. Louis closed the hall. The members
-repaired to a tennis-court near by, and swore not to separate until
-they had given France a constitution. The weak king soon yielded, and,
-at his request, the coronets and mitres met with the commons. The
-court decided to overawe the refractory Assembly, and collected 30,000
-soldiers about Versailles.</p>
-
-<p>Four members of that assembly were Lafayette,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_290" id="Page_290">[Pg 290]</a></span> Count Mirabeau,
-Robespierre, and Guillotine, inventor of the fearful instrument of
-punishment bearing his name.</p>
-
-<p>The Paris populace were infuriated by the menace from the soldiers.
-They stormed the old Bastile and razed its dungeons to the ground.
-The insurrection spread like a prairie-fire. Chateaux were burned,
-and tax-payers tortured to death. Soon a maddened mob surged toward
-Versailles, screeching &#8220;Bread! bread!&#8221; The palace was sacked and the
-royal family brought to Paris.</p>
-
-<p>Political clubs sprang up like mushrooms, chief among which were the
-Jacobins and the Cordelies, whose leaders, Robespierre, Marat, and
-Danton, advocated sedition and organized the revolution.</p>
-
-<p>The Assembly, in its burst of patriotism, extinguished feudal
-privileges, abolished serfdom, and equalized taxes. The estates of the
-clergy were confiscated, and upon this security notes were issued to
-meet the expenses of the government.</p>
-
-<p>Austria and Prussia took up arms in behalf of Louis, and invaded
-France (1791). This step doomed the monarch and the monarchy. The
-approach of the &#8220;foreigners&#8221; kindled to unrestrainable fury the wrath
-of the masses. The &#8220;Marseillaise&#8221; was heard for the first time on the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_291" id="Page_291">[Pg 291]</a></span>
-streets of Paris; the palace of the Tuileries was sacked; the faithful
-Swiss guards were slain, and Louis sent to prison. The Jacobins were
-triumphant. They arrested all who spoke against their revolutionary
-projects; assassins were hired to go through the crowded prisons
-and murder the inmates. For four days during September the terrible
-carnival of blood raged.</p>
-
-<p>The Prussian army was checked at Valmy, and soon recrossed the
-frontier. Then the Austrians were defeated at Jemmapes, and Belgium
-was proclaimed a republic. The leaders of the French revolution were
-electrified, and the next Assembly established a republic in France.
-The king was arraigned and guillotined. As the bleeding head tumbled
-into the basket the furious crowds shouted &#8220;<i>Vive la Republique!</i>&#8221;
-Europe was horrified, and a league, with England as its moving spirit,
-was formed to avenge the death of Louis. The royalists held Marseilles,
-Bordeaux, Lyons and Toulon.</p>
-
-<p>The Convention appointed a Committee of Safety, which knew neither
-mercy nor pity. Revolutionary tribunals were set up, and the work
-of slaughter began and raged with a ferocity beyond the power of
-imagination to conceive. To charge a person with being in sympathy
-with the aristocrats was his death warrant. Men<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_292" id="Page_292">[Pg 292]</a></span> saved themselves by
-denouncing their neighbors before their neighbors could denounce them.
-Intimate friends suspected each other, and members of the same family
-became mortal enemies.</p>
-
-<p>Marie Antoinette, her head silvered by the awful woe and desolation
-and horror, perished on the same scaffold where her husband had died.
-At Lyons, the guillotine was too slow, and the victims were mowed down
-with grape-shot; at Nantes, boat-loads were rowed out and sunk in the
-Loire. The people were made frantic by their thirst for blood.</p>
-
-<p>Marat rubbed his hands and chuckled with glee at the carnival of
-murder. He showed his admiring friends his reception room, papered with
-death warrants.</p>
-
-<p>But his turn speedily came. Charlotte Corday, a young girl from
-Normandy, gained access to him, and, while he was jotting down the
-names of fresh victims, stabbed him to death, and then walked proudly
-to the guillotine.</p>
-
-<p>Danton expressed a suspicion that the massacre had continued long
-enough, for which he was promptly guillotined, and then for nearly
-four months the appalling Robespierre reigned supreme. His aim was
-to destroy all the other leaders; the axe worked faster and faster,
-but not fast enough to suit the clamoring tigers; the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_293" id="Page_293">[Pg 293]</a></span> accused were
-forbidden defence, and were tried <i>en masse</i>.</p>
-
-<p>Finally, when common safety demanded it, friends and foes united for
-the overthrow of the colossal monster. He was arrested and beheaded
-July 28, 1794. The reign of terror ended with his life. It had lasted
-little more than a year. But what a year of woe, massacre, murder, and
-blood! From the first outbreak of the revolution to its close, it has
-been estimated that 1,000,000 lives were sacrificed.</p>
-
-<p>From this appalling furnace of fire and death emerged the true life of
-France. The revolutionary clubs were abolished; the prison doors flung
-wide; the churches opened, and the emigrant priests and nobles invited
-to return.</p>
-
-<p>But, though the Convention had organized the government of the
-Directory in name, it had yet to fight for its existence. The Royalists
-hoped they might restore the monarchy. The National Guard was persuaded
-to join the monarchical party. In October, 1795, the combined forces,
-40,000 strong, marched on the Tuileries to expel the Convention or
-prevent the establishment of the Directory.</p>
-
-<p>The Convention called on General Barras to defend them. Barras asked
-a Corsican artillery officer of twenty-six, who had distinguished
-himself at Toulon, to act as his lieutenant. He<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_294" id="Page_294">[Pg 294]</a></span> speedily converted the
-palace into an intrenched camp. He had 7000 troops, but he planted his
-batteries with such admirable skill, and used his grape-shot with such
-effect that the advancing hosts were defeated and scattered, and the
-Convention, with its defender, Napoleon Bonaparte, was master of the
-situation.</p>
-
-<p>Thankfulness should fill the hearts of all the citizens of the American
-Republic that the history of our own country will not present a
-duplicate picture of the scenes portrayed in this chapter. It certainly
-is not the fault of the good management of the sham aristocrats
-that these scenes of such monstrous horror, exhibiting the birth
-of liberty in France and the erasure of the word &#8220;caste&#8221; with its
-most objectionable features from French life, were not reproduced in
-America. Fortunately for the would-be aristocrats, the volcano, upon
-which they slept, had a crater known as the <span class="smaller">BALLOT-BOX</span>, where
-the pent-up steam of the indignation of the people found a vent-hole.
-November 8, 1892, the safety-valve was opened by the people, and the
-believers in &#8220;caste&#8221; should be thankful that there existed some means
-of relief; had such not been the case, the pent-up energies and the
-indignation of the people would have caused another explosion, which
-would have rivalled in force, if not in the howling scenes of blood,
-the French Revolution.</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_295" id="Page_295">[Pg 295]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2><span>CHAPTER XV.</span> <span class="smaller">ENGLAND, 1645.</span></h2>
-
-<p>The American regards England with more than kindly eyes. Her history
-has been the history of our race. The sterling valor of the Englishman
-early made itself felt in the demands made by him upon the reluctant
-kings who ruled him. At no time in the history of Great Britain,
-from the Norman Conquest, had the peasantry and &#8220;Common People&#8221; been
-submerged as completely by the power of the privileged classes as has
-been the case in France, and, in fact, as in all of continental Europe.
-When John, known as &#8220;Lackland,&#8221; the younger brother of Richard C&#339;ur
-de Lion, came to the throne of England (1109-1216), he ruled weakly
-and lost nearly all the English possessions in France. The peasants
-rose against the imbecile monarch and, joined by the barons and feudal
-lords, compelled him to sign the Magna-Charta or Great Charter, at
-Runnymede (1215).</p>
-
-<p>By this immortal instrument the king gave up the right to demand money
-when he pleased, to imprison or punish when he pleased. He was to take
-money only when the barons granted the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_296" id="Page_296">[Pg 296]</a></span> privilege, for public purposes,
-and no freeman was to be punished except when his countrymen judged him
-guilty of crime. The courts were to be open to all, and justice was
-not to be sold, refused, or withheld. The serf villein was to have his
-plow free from seizure. The church was secured against the interference
-of the king. No class was neglected, but each obtained some cherished
-right.</p>
-
-<p>Thus, early in the history of England, we find the &#8220;Common People&#8221; of
-that nation from whom we derive our blood and many of our laws&mdash;the
-foundation, in fact of all of them&mdash;and much of our domestic and
-social conditions and manners, asserting rights for which Americans
-afterwards contended with the parent country, England. The Magna-Charta
-was wrested from King John not by the lords and barons alone&mdash;but by a
-union between the nobles and the &#8220;Common People.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>Thus early the &#8220;Common People&#8221; of England learned to appreciate their
-might and strength. And the Americans, as inheritors along with their
-blood of so many of the traditions and characteristics of the English,
-have not failed to possess themselves of that quality which is inherent
-in the Anglo-Saxon heart&mdash;the fearless demanding of the right to
-equality.</p>
-
-<p>Pronouncedly did the American people, November 8, 1892, reiterate in an
-unmistakable<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_297" id="Page_297">[Pg 297]</a></span> manner the sentiment of the race who, in 1214, had forced
-from King John of England the Magna-Charta which has been, ever since,
-the foundation of English liberty.</p>
-
-<p>English kings have continually tried to break the Magna-Charta, but
-have ever failed in the attempt. They have been compelled, during
-reigns succeeding that of King John, to confirm its provisions
-thirty-six times. The early assertion of the right to representation
-by the people is interesting as a step onward in the march of the
-Anglo-Saxon toward equality and liberty.</p>
-
-<p>Henry II.&#8217;s foolish favoritism to foreigners caused a revolt, under the
-leadership of Simon de Montfort, Earl of Leicester, who defeated the
-king at Lewes. Earl Simon thereupon called together the Parliament,
-summoning, besides the barons, two knights from each county and two
-citizens from each city or borough to represent free-holders (1265).
-From this beginning, the English Parliament soon took on the form it
-has since retained of two assemblies&mdash;the House of Lords and the House
-of Commons. Thus, the thirteenth century became ever memorable in the
-history of the English-speaking people of the world, for the granting
-of the Magna-Charta and the forming of the House of Commons&mdash;that House
-of Commons, which, as its name indicates, was and is made up of the
-representatives of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_298" id="Page_298">[Pg 298]</a></span> &#8220;Common People,&#8221; and which has ever been the
-bulwark of the liberty of the &#8220;Common People&#8221; of England, resisting
-every attack of autocratic monarchs upon the rights of the people.</p>
-
-<p>In the reign of Edward III. (1327-1377) the Normans and Saxons were
-fused completely, and created the English nationality; chivalry
-reached its highest exaltation; but the court and the upper classes
-were morally rotten. The laboring classes rose during this reign, and
-compelled their employers to pay them just wages, and rent to fragments
-the despotic edicts that effected them; just as the &#8220;Common People&#8221;
-will ever do, whether the attempt is made to beguile them by the cry of
-Protection, Free Trade, Force Bill, or other distracting exclamations.</p>
-
-<p>Richard II. (1377-1399) was a tyrant, with neither the capacity nor
-courage of his father and grandfather. He lost all the respect and
-admiration with which the people of England had ever regarded his
-father and grandfather. One of Richard II.&#8217;s tax-gatherers insulted
-the daughter of one Watt Tyler, at Dartforth on Kent, in exactly the
-same manner as &#8220;Chappie&#8221; feels at liberty to do, by his glances, the
-daughters of the laboring men to-day. Watt Tyler, the wrathful father,
-killed the man with one blow, and a formidable revolt sprang at once
-into being. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_299" id="Page_299">[Pg 299]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>The shouts of about 100,000 &#8220;Common People,&#8221; gathered on Black Heath,
-June 12, 1381, reverberated through the valley of Richard II. The vast
-horde poured into London, seized the Tower of London, put to death
-the Archbishop of Canterbury and others, and spared the cowering and
-cowardly King Richard II., only on his promise to abolish slavery and
-grant their demands.</p>
-
-<p>That, my good and would-be lords and barons, is but another evidence
-of the Anglo-Saxon blood and its resentment of insult when offered to
-the female members of the race. Women ever have occasioned, in the
-Anglo-Saxon bosom, just and righteous indignation when insulted. The
-slights, sneers, and snubbing of the women of America by the snobs
-and sham aristocrats produced the reappearance of the same traits
-of character as led Watt Tyler and his horde of peasants to London.
-The women of America had become Democratic, and the result of their
-influence upon the voters of our country was revealed, November 8th, in
-an unmistakable manner.</p>
-
-<p>James I. (1603-1625), the first Stuart to reign in England, was
-stubborn, conceited, weak, slovenly, dissipated, and cowardly. In
-his reign was first heard the prattle about &#8220;the divine right of
-kings, and the passive obedience of the subject.&#8221; He ostentatiously
-opposed his will to that of the people, and during his reign was in
-constant<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_300" id="Page_300">[Pg 300]</a></span> conflict with Parliament. He was obliged to beg the House of
-Commons for money, and that body adopted the principle, now one of the
-cornerstones of the British Constitution, that &#8220;a redress of grievances
-must precede a granting of supplies.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>Charles I. (1625-1649), the son of James I., was more refined and
-held more exalted ideas of his prerogatives; he repeatedly broke his
-promises made to the people; his reign was one long struggle with
-Parliament.</p>
-
-<p>He was not as frivolous and false as his son Charles II., but James
-I., his father, had brought the idiotic doctrine of the divine right
-of kings into England along with the rest of his peculiar Stuart
-eccentricities,&mdash;for eccentric it was to the Anglo-Saxon people,
-who had forced from John the Magna-Charta at Runnymede before the
-amalgamation of the Norman and Saxon into one homogeneous race had been
-completed; who, while there still existed internal dissensions and race
-distinction, had been united upon the one great subject for which the
-Anglo-Saxon people, best and bravest representatives of the Aryan race,
-have ever fought&mdash;the equality of man in the representation in the
-legislation of the people.</p>
-
-<p>Strange to the ear of the masses was the doctrine of the Stuart, that
-the king was one of the Lord&#8217;s anointed and could do no wrong. They<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_301" id="Page_301">[Pg 301]</a></span>
-had seen kings do wrong when cursed with a wrong-doer as king, and
-supported any aspirant to the crown of England, no matter how slender
-may have been the thread of his claim thereto. Richard II. had played
-the autocratic ruler. Englishmen had resisted by espousing the cause of
-the first claimant who appeared upon the field. The assumption by the
-Stuarts of a divine right was the first stab that they gave to their
-own existence as the ruling House of an Anglo-Saxon people. Charles I.
-reaped where James I. had sown. The English people had forgiven before
-the bad faith of their sovereign, as they have since. They have endured
-the waste of their money because the Anglo-Saxon, whence we Americans
-derive the source of blood and laws, has not his tender spot upon the
-pocketbook, but in his heart, his home, his pride, believing himself,
-each man, equal to any other man.</p>
-
-<p>In 1628, Parliament wrested from Charles I. the famous Petition of
-Rights, the second great charter of English liberty. It forbade the
-kings to levy taxes without the consent of Parliament, to imprison a
-subject without trial, or to billet soldiers in private houses. As
-usual, Charles disregarded his promises, and then for eleven years
-ruled like an autocrat.</p>
-
-<p>During that period no Parliament was convoked, a thing unparalleled
-in English history.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_302" id="Page_302">[Pg 302]</a></span> Buckingham having been assassinated by a Puritan
-fanatic, the Earl of Stafford and Archbishop Laud became its royal
-advisers. The Earl contrived a plan for making the king absolute. All
-who differed from Laud were tried in the High Commissioner&#8217;s Court,
-while the Star Chamber Court fined, whipped, and imprisoned those
-who spoke ill of the king&#8217;s policy or refused to pay the money he
-illegally demanded. The bitter persecution of the Puritans drove them
-to America. In Scotland, Charles carried matters with a high hand.
-Laud attempted to abolish Presbyterianism and introduce a liturgy. The
-Scotch rose <i>en masse</i>, and signed (some of them with their own blood)
-a covenant binding themselves to resist every innovation directed
-against their religious rights. Finally, an army of Scots crossed the
-border into England, and Charles was forced to assemble the famous
-&#8220;Long Parliament&#8221; (1640), which lasted twenty years. The old battle
-was renewed. Stafford, and afterward Laud, were brought to the block;
-the Star Chamber and High Commissioners&#8217; Courts were abolished, and
-Parliament voted that it could not be adjourned without its own
-consent. Charles attempted to arrest five of the leaders of Parliament
-in the House of Commons itself. They hid in the City of London, whence
-a week later they were brought back to the House of Commons<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_303" id="Page_303">[Pg 303]</a></span> in
-triumph. Charles hastened Northward, and unfurled the royal banner. For
-a time his supporters swept everything before them.</p>
-
-<p>Then arose Oliver Cromwell, a man of the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; who, with
-his Ironsides regiment at Marston Moor (1644), drove the cavaliers
-pell-mell from the field. Nasby (1645) was the decisive contest of the
-war. Cromwell swept the field, and the royal cause was irrevocably
-lost. Charles fled to the Scots, who gave him up to the Parliament; but
-the army of the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; led by Cromwell, soon got him into its
-possession, and he was condemned to death on the charge of treason, and
-was beheaded.</p>
-
-<p>Thus, as has ever been the case when the &#8220;Common People&#8221; have been
-goaded by insult into a furious state of temper, some leader has aptly
-sprung, like Cromwell, from their ranks, and carried them triumphantly
-to victory. In the same way George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Andrew
-Jackson, Abraham Lincoln, and Grover Cleveland have each in turn led
-the hosts of the &#8220;Common People&#8221; to victory in their battles against
-&#8220;divine rights,&#8221; injustice, &#8220;caste,&#8221; and &#8220;sham aristocracy.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>England, by the execution of Charles I., was without a king. The
-authority was vested in the House of Commons (diminished by Pride&#8217;s<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_304" id="Page_304">[Pg 304]</a></span>
-Purge the expulsion of the Presbyterian minister) contemptuously styled
-&#8220;the Rump.&#8221; Cromwell, the man of the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; and his terrible
-army, composed of the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; were the actual rulers. In
-Ireland and Scotland the Prince of Wales was proclaimed as Charles II.,
-whereupon the grim Ironsides&mdash;those representatives of the people, and
-their terrific earnestness when aroused&mdash;conquered Ireland as it never
-was conquered before. Crossing then to Scotland, the covenanters were
-routed at Dunbar, and again at Worcester.</p>
-
-<p>Cromwell, while he had the power of a king, like Cæsar, dared not
-take the title. He recognized, what it would be well for the sham
-aristocrats to attentively regard, that the people <span class="smaller">MAKE</span> and
-<span class="smaller">UNMAKE</span>; hence, he did not dare offend the &#8220;Common People&#8221; by
-assuming the title of king, though exercising all the powers of a king.
-Under Cromwell, England&#8217;s glory became greater than under Elizabeth.
-The Barbarian pirates were punished; Jamaica was captured; Dunkirk was
-received from France in return for help against Spain; protecting the
-Protestants everywhere, Cromwell compelled the Duke of Savoy to cease
-persecuting the Baudois. The very name of England became terrible to
-the oppressor of the poor in every land. The people, in their might,
-were ruling England; because, even though<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_305" id="Page_305">[Pg 305]</a></span> Cromwell was styled &#8220;Lord
-Protector of the Commonwealth,&#8221; he still understood that his greatest
-power rested upon the will of the &#8220;Common People&#8221; as a foundation.</p>
-
-<p>Upon the death of Oliver Cromwell there was no hand strong enough to
-seize the helm of the ship of State. His son Richard, who did not
-inherit the genius of his father, and did not hold the confidence of
-the &#8220;Common People&#8221; of England, was quickly put aside. And the English
-people&mdash;the &#8220;Common People&#8221;&mdash;casting about for an executive to place
-at the head of the nation, selected Charles II., whom they called to
-England to rule them, but not &#8220;by divine right;&#8221; simply as their king.</p>
-
-<p>The popularity of Charles II., the most profligate, the most licentious
-and immoral ruler that Great Britain has ever had, arose because he was
-the people&#8217;s king. They had called him from over the sea; he ruled by
-no divine right, but through the affections of the people. He was to
-them <i>their</i> king, and though he sinned, erred, and wasted the money of
-the nation, he was <i>of</i> the people, and they forgave him. When James
-II. attempted to revive (as the people feared he would, and hated him
-in consequence, even before his succeeding Charles II.) &#8220;the divine
-right of kings,&#8221; and the privilege of doing anything, the idea that
-nothing that he did could be wrong, the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_306" id="Page_306">[Pg 306]</a></span> people resented it. It was not
-Catholicism. Dear as religion may be in the heart of man, there is one
-thought that is dearer: it is his right to be a man, and equal to any
-other. Had James II. been a people&#8217;s man, as was Charles, his brother,
-it is quite possible that the House of Stuart might now reign in Great
-Britain. William of Orange was beloved by the people, because he was so
-thoroughly a people&#8217;s man, that even the proud Anglo-Saxons preferred
-to submit themselves to his rule, joined with a daughter of the House
-of Stuart, rather than to the legitimate successor of Charles II. The
-mighty voice of the people was heard resounding in the selection of
-the Prince of Orange with the same notes that marked the music of the
-march of a triumphant Democracy, on November 8, 1892; like the grains
-of wheat taken from the tombs of the Pharaohs, though gathered in a
-harvest of fifty centuries ago, when planted will produce the same crop
-as to-day.</p>
-
-<p>History repeats itself continually, and nowhere more obvious is the
-repetition than in the record of the Anglo-Saxon race. The same causes
-which occasioned the unpopularity of Charles I., the popularity of
-Cromwell, the popularity of Charles II., were working to create
-Cleveland&#8217;s tremendous popularity and the overthrow of the Republican
-party November 8, 1892.</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_307" id="Page_307">[Pg 307]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2><span>CHAPTER XVI.</span> <span class="smaller">THE GERMAN EMPIRE, 1520-1525.</span></h2>
-
-<p>Germany does not present a fruitful field for examples of popular
-uprisings and the exhibition of the indignation of the people when
-crushed by the oppressors of the upper classes. Germany to-day, even
-in the last decade of the nineteenth century, presents a picture of
-the only government in Europe which pretends to have a representative
-form of government, where the chief executive, the Emperor, can speak
-of himself, or would dare to do so, as the &#8220;war lord,&#8221; to whom absolute
-obedience is due by the citizens of the Empire. The Anglo-Saxons,
-while a branch of the great Teutonic race, seem to have acquired, by
-their being transplanted to the British Isles, a greater spirit of
-independence than the other branches of the German race that have
-remained on the continent of Europe.</p>
-
-<p>Otho I., son of Henry I., the mighty Saxon duke, was the founder of
-the German empire (936-973), and remorselessly crushed the rising
-opposition of the princely aristocracy. Mutterings of discontent,
-ominous of coming revolution, began to be heard throughout the whole
-of South<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_308" id="Page_308">[Pg 308]</a></span> and Central Germany, in the early years of the seventeenth
-century. The social position of the peasants was of the most degrading
-character. They were serfs; or, in other words, belonged to the soil on
-which they were born, and through that to the lord who owned the soil.</p>
-
-<p>The miserable peasants had no right to move from these lands; there was
-no appeal from the authority of the lord. When he appropriated for his
-own use the common pasture grounds of the village; when he forbade them
-to fish in the streams, or to hunt in the woods; increased the ground
-rent; tithe socage service, according to his own need, they had to
-submit or revolt.</p>
-
-<p>Thomas Münzer was an earnest, advanced preacher at Zwichfau, in Saxony,
-in 1520 and in 1523. He was expelled from Allstadt by the government,
-and went first to Nuremberg, and then to Schaffhausen, returning
-soon to Thüringia, and settled at Mülhausen. There he succeeded
-in overthrowing the city council and appointing another which was
-completely under his control.</p>
-
-<p>Götz von Berlichingen was a famous German knight, surnamed &#8220;The Iron
-Hand.&#8221; He was born in 1480, at Berlichingen Castle, in Wurtemberg. He
-lost a hand at the siege of Land Shut, and replaced it with an iron
-one. He was a daring and turbulent subject, continually involved in
-feuds with neighboring barons. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_309" id="Page_309">[Pg 309]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>Thomas Münzer and Götz von Berlichingen were the only leaders who took
-part in what is known as &#8220;The Peasants&#8217; War,&#8221; in Germany. This was
-an uprising of the peasants, which first manifested itself January
-1, 1525, by the capture and looting of the convent of Kempton. This
-served as a signal for general uprising of the peasantry from the Alps
-to Havz, and from the Rhine to the Bohemian frontier. Münzer quickly
-persuaded the whole population in and around Mühausen and Laugensalza
-to rise in revolt, and Götz von Berlichingen hastened to place his
-skill at the service of the infuriated peasants.</p>
-
-<p>Unfortunately, however, the uproarious hordes were without other
-leadership, and lacked discipline and effective weapons. They gathered
-in throngs of from 5,000 to 10,000, and ran hither and thither, with
-clubs, stones, and perhaps a few firearms, burning castles, destroying
-monasteries, plundering villages, towns, and cities, and committing
-ferocious outrages. Before the regular armies, these multitudes were
-scattered like chaff in the hurricane. They fought with the fury and
-courage of tigers, but it availed them nothing; they were routed,
-dispersed, and massacred, and effectually crushed in a few months.
-Münzer was tortured and beheaded. Von Berlichingen was placed under
-the ban of the empire by Maximilian<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_310" id="Page_310">[Pg 310]</a></span> I., his exploits serving as the
-subject of Goethe&#8217;s drama of &#8220;Götz von Berlichingen.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>While unsuccessful, this uprising of the peasants demonstrates that
-the inherent love of liberty has a place in the hearts of the German
-race, and should furnish to Emperor William a warning note that there
-may be a point where, in spite of the Germans&#8217; love for Fatherland,
-and pride in the glories achieved by the Empire, they may resent
-expression of autocratic authority on the part of their Emperor.
-When the German becomes an American citizen&mdash;and there are no better
-citizens of America than the Germans&mdash;the spirit of equality, which
-has lain dormant in the Teutonic blood for centuries, immediately
-asserts itself. Under the wise guidance of Bismarck, German unity was
-made possible, and the glory won by united Germany has influenced
-the Germans in Europe to submit to heavy taxation, and the continued
-assumption of social superiority; but the time is rapidly approaching,
-which it would be well for Emperor William to consider, when the German
-people of Europe will exhibit the same love of liberty and equality
-that the children of the German race exhibit as citizens of the
-American Republic. It is to be hoped that the German empire will not
-sustain the severe shock in the latter part of the nineteenth century
-by which the whole social system in the kingdom<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_311" id="Page_311">[Pg 311]</a></span> of France was rent
-asunder, in the latter part of the eighteenth century.</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_312" id="Page_312">[Pg 312]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2><span>CHAPTER XVII.</span> <span class="smaller">SWITZERLAND, 1424.</span></h2>
-
-<p>That little dot on the map of Europe, situated among the Alps, called
-Switzerland, has always formed an attractive and pleasing object to
-lovers of freedom and equality. Surrounded by powerful neighbors, the
-mountaineers of these little cantons seem to have imbibed, with the
-purer air of heaven in which they live on the mountains, that degree of
-stern courage, determination, and love of liberty which enables them to
-resist the pressure of the great nations by which they are surrounded.
-Switzerland, like the wedge of steel, tempered by the spirit of
-republicanism, has formed one point of pressure which the monarchies
-around her have been unable to resist. The love of liberty with which
-the Swiss are endowed, and their hatred of &#8220;caste,&#8221; are best typified
-by &#8220;The Gray Leaguers&#8221; and their story:</p>
-
-<p>In the green valleys of Eastern Switzerland, on almost every hill
-that juts out from the gray mountain walls of the Alps and commands
-the fertile fields and villages of the upper Rhineland, there stands
-a ruined castle. And in that castle, in the early Middle Ages,
-there dwelt some little local<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_313" id="Page_313">[Pg 313]</a></span> princeling who lorded it with almost
-unquestioned power over the peasantry around him.</p>
-
-<p>These feudal nobles had held sway, with no right save that founded on
-might, for generations, before the subject peasants, weak, scattered,
-and resourceless, were at last driven by the intolerable arrogance
-of this dominant &#8220;caste&#8221; to combine for mutual defence. Some of the
-leaders of the movement met in the little hillside chapel of St. Anna,
-still standing near the town of Truns, in March, 1424, and took solemn
-oaths to respect their own and all the people&#8217;s rights, and to wage war
-upon those who would not respect them.</p>
-
-<p>Johann Caldar&mdash;a name revered in his district as is that of William
-Tell in the scenes of his legendary exploits&mdash;gave the signal for
-the first attack on the oppressors. Caldar dwelt in the upper Rhine
-valley, not far from the baronial castle of Fardun. The Lord of Fardun
-entered the peasant&#8217;s cottage one day at noontide, and in wanton token
-of contempt spat into the soup that was boiling for the midday. Caldar
-seized him, and crying, &#8220;Eat the soup thou hast seasoned!&#8221; thrust his
-head into the pot, and held it thus until he was choked. Then he went
-forth to bear over mountain and valley the banner of a revolt that
-forever annihilated the nobles&#8217; tyranny and left their strongholds in
-ruins. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_314" id="Page_314">[Pg 314]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>For three centuries and a half the Gray Leaguers, as the victorious
-peasants called themselves, met every tenth year in the chapel of St.
-Anna, where their first oaths had been taken, and renewed the pledge of
-popular liberty. At length their territory became the fifteenth canton
-of the Swiss Republic, still retaining, as it does to-day, its old
-name&mdash;the Grisons, as it is in French.</p>
-
-<p>The American traveling in Europe may view with delight scenes upon the
-beautiful Rhine; his artistic eye may be delighted by the art treasures
-of Italy; memories made dear to him may be recalled as he visits
-England; but in Switzerland he seems to fill his lungs with kindred and
-familiar air. This little oasis in the desert of monarchies, surrounded
-by worshippers at the temple of &#8220;caste,&#8221; is to the American an Alabama,
-&#8220;Here we rest.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>Until the overthrow of the Third Napoleon and the establishment
-of a republic in France, nowhere else in Europe did the American
-feel himself so much at home as in Switzerland; and to those rugged
-mountaineers of the Alps is due the credit of keeping alive the spirit
-of liberty almost submerged beneath the flood of monarchical ideas
-which inundated Europe. Every republic on earth, and each republican,
-should feel indebted to little Switzerland that the fire of freedom was
-not entirely extinguished.</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_315" id="Page_315">[Pg 315]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2><span>CHAPTER XVIII.</span> <span class="smaller">RUSSIA.</span></h2>
-
-<p>At the very name of Russia a kind of horror fills the souls of those
-who love liberty, equality, and detest &#8220;caste&#8221; and oppression. Russia
-is a veritable blot upon the civilization of the nineteenth century.
-She furnishes an example of all that was horrible under the old
-monarchical governments of Europe. Russia&#8217;s social life is honeycombed
-with anarchy, nihilism, and hatred. Beneath the surface, made smooth by
-military despotism, there burns the fierce fires of inextinguishable
-hatred. The people are deprived of those rights and liberties enjoyed
-by the citizens of even those monarchical governments by which Russia
-is surrounded, curtailed though those privileges may appear to the
-free American citizen. Germany, Austria, Hungary, and Italy are almost
-respectable in comparison with Russia. There can be, of course, but one
-end to such a condition&mdash;we can hardly call it civilization&mdash;in that
-tremendous empire. Revolution and anarchy in its worst form will sooner
-or later drench the soil of Russia with blood. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_316" id="Page_316">[Pg 316]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>Unfortunately for the future welfare and happiness of the Russians,
-their autocratic master, the Czar, permits no existence of a vent-hole
-or crater of the volcano upon which the nation slumbers. An election
-like that of November 8th in America relieves the pressure. In Russia,
-the discontent of the Common People, and all expression of it, are
-suppressed by the iron hand that controls the vast horde of soldiers of
-which he is master. Russia&#8217;s history and record present not one shining
-spot to relieve the dark picture of crime, ignorance, oppression,
-intolerance, and the suffering of the Common People.</p>
-
-<p>Briefly, Russia contains one-sixth of the land of the entire globe
-and one-quarter of the inhabitants. The government is an absolute and
-strongly centralized monarchy. It is one of the most arbitrary and
-merciless despotisms on the face of the earth.</p>
-
-<p>As the positive and negative poles of an electric battery, or as like
-and unlike attract, there has long been a strong friendship between
-Russia and our country. The two represent the antipodes of government.</p>
-
-<p>From the period of the appenages (small, petty States, 1054-1238) the
-enmity has been in a state of smothered or open revolt. It was overrun
-by the fierce Mongols and held under their<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_317" id="Page_317">[Pg 317]</a></span> iron yoke from 1238 to
-1462. During that period Moscow and many other cities were burned and
-the country devastated.</p>
-
-<p>Ivan III. (1263), during his reign of 43 years, did much to consolidate
-the empire, and introduced the knout as an agent of civilization.</p>
-
-<p>Ivan IV., known as Ivan the Terrible, was a ferocious monster
-(1533-1584), who first assumed the title of Czar (a Slavonic form of
-the Latin Cæsar), committed numerous atrocities, and killed his eldest
-son by a blow in a fit of anger.</p>
-
-<p>Peter the Great (1689-1725) was remorseless in his punishment of those
-who revolted, as in the case of the streltzi; the rebellion of the
-Cossacks of the Don; that of Mazeppa, the hetman of the Little-Russian
-Cossacks; he inaugurated serfdom, and tortured his own son, Alexis, to
-death.</p>
-
-<p>The rule of Paul was intolerable; he was won over by the artful
-diplomacy of Napoleon, and assassinated in March, 1801. In the Polish
-insurrection of 1831 the people were ground to powder.</p>
-
-<p>Alexander II. (1855-1881) emancipated the serfs in 1861. It was freedom
-only in name. Nihilism sprang up and flourished frightfully. Where his
-father daily walked unattended, <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_318" id="Page_318">[Pg 318]</a></span>Alexander was in hourly peril. April
-16, 1866, he was shot at by a Pole; the following year another Pole
-shot at him while visiting Napoleon at Paris; April 14, 1879, another
-Pole attempted to kill him. The same year saw the first attempt to
-blow up the United Palace and to wreck the train upon which the Czar
-was riding from Moscow to St. Petersburg. A similar conspiracy was
-successful, March 13, 1881. Five of the conspirators, including a
-woman, were executed. Alexander ruled twenty-six years, and left Russia
-exhausted by wars and honeycombed by plots.</p>
-
-<p>He was succeeded by the present Alexander, whose reign has been
-characterized by conspiracies and the constant depredations of
-suspected persons.</p>
-
-<p>The mines of Siberia have been the living death of hundreds of
-thousands of patriots. More than 50,000 Poles were transported thither
-after the insurrection of 1863. Since the opening of the present
-century more than 600,000 men, women, and children have been sent to
-Siberia. All are in the depths of utter misery and despair. Out of
-200,000, more than one-third have disappeared without being accounted
-for. From 20,000 to 40,000 are living the life of <i>brodyaghi</i>&mdash;that is,
-trying to make their way through the forests to their native provinces
-in Russia. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_319" id="Page_319">[Pg 319]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>And yet nihilism, socialism, the spirit of revolt, are more powerful
-than ever, and ere long will come the upheaval, when all shall be
-overturned and &#8220;the old shall pass away and all things become new.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>The Russian nobility, with the Czar at their head, as the high priest
-of &#8220;caste,&#8221; are solely and entirely responsible for the spirit of
-anarchy and nihilism which is abroad in the domain of immense Russia.
-It is a fashion and the fancy of the sham aristocracy in this country
-to inveigh against anything like socialism, nihilism, and anarchism in
-America. Should the presence of this dread monster, called nihilism,
-ever be felt in America, the blame would rest entirely upon the
-shoulders of the sham aristocrats, just as the Czar and his nobles in
-Russia are responsible for its presence in that country. There must be
-a vent for the pent-up indignation of the people; this is, happily for
-us, found in the ballot-box. It is to this source of relief that we are
-indebted for the non-existence of socialism in America. It has not been
-the prudence, wisdom, or consideration of the sham aristocrats which
-prevents the growth of nihilism here.</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_320" id="Page_320">[Pg 320]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2><span>CHAPTER XIX.</span> <span class="smaller">PATRICIANS AND PLEBEIANS IN ROME.</span></h2>
-
-<p>There is a striking historical parallelism between the Anglo-Saxons
-in modern history and the Romans a thousand years before. The Romans
-conquered the world as the Anglo-Saxons are conquering the world. The
-Romans were the first race to found and maintain an empire as wide as
-the bounds of western civilization. Their characteristic qualities
-were, like those of the Anglo-Saxons, their supreme sense of duty,
-their respect for law, their great natural aptitude for government,
-their earnest practicality, their somewhat deficient sense of the
-beautiful, and their high military skill and discipline.</p>
-
-<p>But before Rome could begin her march toward her later position as
-mistress of the world she had to rid herself of the domestic incubus of
-an internal oligarchy. The authentic history of Rome&mdash;for the earlier
-annals of her seven kings are little more than legends&mdash;opens with the
-struggle of the Plebeians&mdash;the mass of her people&mdash;to break down the
-hereditary domination of the privileged &#8220;caste,&#8221; the Patricians, who
-had a monopoly of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_321" id="Page_321">[Pg 321]</a></span> political power, had appropriated the whole of the
-public land, and by unjust laws had burdened the Plebeians with taxes
-and debts, and reduced many of them to actual slavery.</p>
-
-<p>In the year 495 <span class="smaller">B. C.</span>, there one day rushed into the crowded
-forum an old man, ragged and emaciated, his back covered with bloody
-stripes. He loudly proclaimed his history, which was that of hundreds
-of others. He had done service in several wars; his farm had been
-ravaged and burned, and his cattle driven away; to pay his taxes he had
-been forced into debt; his Patrician creditor had demanded a usurious
-interest, and had finally compelled him to work as a slave.</p>
-
-<p>The occurrence created great excitement among the Plebeians, and
-would have provoked an outbreak had not messengers entered the city
-bearing the news that a Volucian army was marching to attack Rome.
-With their stern sense of patriotic duty, the disaffected citizens
-prepared to meet the foe, it being promised that their wrongs should be
-investigated after the war. They met and defeated the enemy, but the
-promise of the Patricians was not kept.</p>
-
-<p>In despair of obtaining justice, the Plebeians decided to secede from
-the Commonwealth and to found a city on the Sacred Hill, three miles
-from Rome. This brought the Patricians to terms.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_322" id="Page_322">[Pg 322]</a></span> Rather than lose
-the working force of the community, they agreed to release all those
-enslaved for debt, and to authorize the appointment of magistrates,
-called Tribunes, who should be chosen from the Plebeians, and should
-have the right of forbidding any act of oppression.</p>
-
-<p>From that beginning the Plebeians advanced to full political and social
-enfranchisement, after a struggle that lasted for two centuries&mdash;a
-stern and bitter struggle, although it was waged &#8220;with a perseverance,
-forbearance, and moderation, of which there is scarcely a parallel
-in the history of the world.&#8221;<a name="FNanchor_3_3" id="FNanchor_3_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_3_3" >[3]</a> The next step was a law to compel
-the Patricians to pay rent for the public land they occupied. It was
-disregarded, and the Tribune Genucius, who attempted to enforce it, was
-murdered. Then by mutual agreement a body of commissioners (Decemvirs)
-was appointed to draw up a revised code of laws for all classes. Again
-the Plebeians had been deceived; the commissioners seized the executive
-power, and held it illegally and tyrannously until the Commons ended
-their usurpation by a second secession to the Sacred Hill.</p>
-
-<p>The agrarian question remained a burning one until the Tribunes
-Licinius and Sextius forced a settlement of it by stopping the whole
-machinery<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_323" id="Page_323">[Pg 323]</a></span> of government until their propositions were accepted. The
-procedure was constitutional, but for ten years (376 to 366 <span class="smaller">B.
-C.</span>) Rome was in a state of anarchy, and the fact that actual civil
-war was avoided testifies strongly to Roman self-restraint.</p>
-
-<p>The legislative power was now the only one denied to the Plebeians.
-The Publican law was passed to give it to them, but the Patricians
-prevented its enforcement until by a third secession the Commons again
-carried their point, and at last secured final and complete equality
-between the classes. (286 <span class="smaller">B. C.</span>)</p>
-
-<p>Rome, once the mistress of the world, retained her grandeur only so
-long as the principles of true democracy pulsated through her body
-politic and nerved her every action. When prosperity, corruption, and
-abuse blinded the rulers to the claims of the Plebeians, then came
-revolution, civil war, decline, and finally the fall of the proudest
-empire known in the history of man.</p>
-
-<p>So, the mightiest empire the world ever knew declined and fell before
-the power of the <span class="smaller">PEOPLE</span>, who, outraged in their most sacred
-rights, revolted again and again, until, as may be said, the fabric,
-whose shadow reached to the uttermost ends of the earth, was torn
-asunder, and so went to fragments that not one stone was left upon another.</p>
-
-<h3>FOOTNOTE:</h3>
-
-<p><a name="Footnote_3_3" id="Footnote_3_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_3_3">[3]</a> Dr. Schmidtz&#8217;s History of Rome.</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_324" id="Page_324">[Pg 324]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2><span>CHAPTER XX.</span> <span class="smaller">GREECE&mdash;VENICE&mdash;THE RULE OF &#8220;CASTE.&#8221;</span></h2>
-
-<p>Although ancient Greece was divided into many small countries, yet they
-were united by bonds of union, of community, of blood and language, of
-religious rites and festivals, manners and character. In these respects
-they were distinguished from all other people, whom they called
-barbarians.</p>
-
-<p>A thousand years before the Christian era the Greeks were divided into
-the nobles, who were powerful and wealthy; the freemen, some of whom
-owned estates; and the slaves.</p>
-
-<p>But the manners of the highest class were simple. The nobles were proud
-of their skill in the manual arts, and their wives and daughters ably
-discharged their household duties.</p>
-
-<p>Two hundred years later (<span class="smaller">B.C.</span> 800) most of the states and
-cities of Greece became democratic. One uniform method characterized
-the change from monarchy to democracy. An oligarchy of nobles would
-overthrow the monarchy, and then some one noble would overthrow the
-oligarchy and establish the cause of the people. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_325" id="Page_325">[Pg 325]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>Sparta was the highest type of oligarchy; Athens of democracy.</p>
-
-<p>Ever since Aristotle distinguished them, there have been three
-recognized types of government&mdash;monarchy, oligarchy, and democracy&mdash;the
-rule of one man, the rule of a few men, and the rule of the people.</p>
-
-<p>That the last is the just and the true form of polity, the enlightened
-opinion of the world has long ago irrevocably decided. Of the other
-two, experience shows that monarchy is more tolerable. A Nero may
-have stained the pages of history by the diabolic cruelty to which
-autocratic power gave free scope; a Napoleon may have poured out half
-the life-blood of his country to further his selfish personal ambition;
-yet, on the whole, the evils of one man&#8217;s rule have been more endurable
-than those of the domination of a class or &#8220;caste.&#8221; In latter days
-the sovereign has come to be looked upon less as a personal ruler
-than as an abstraction&mdash;an embodiment of theory expressed in the old
-maxim that &#8220;the king can do no wrong&#8221;&mdash;a conception far less offensive
-to the innate democracy of all manly peoples; or, he is regarded as
-a mere figure-head, as may be said to be the case is England, whose
-nominal monarch has far less practical influence upon the executive and
-<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_326" id="Page_326">[Pg 326]</a></span>legislative departments than has the President of the United States.</p>
-
-<p>An oligarchy is the worst of all governmental systems. It has never
-made a people truly great. Wherever such a government has existed its
-record has almost always been dark and its end bloody.</p>
-
-<p>Look, for example, at two of the most successful oligarchies of
-history&mdash;ancient Sparta and mediæval Venice. Sparta was, as Bulwer
-justly observes in his &#8220;Rise and Fall of Athens,&#8221; a &#8220;machine wound
-up by the tyranny of a fixed principle, which did not permit it even
-to dine as it pleased; its children were not its own&mdash;itself had no
-property in self. So it flourished and decayed, bequeathing to fame
-men only noted for hardy valor, fanatical patriotism, and profound but
-dishonorable craft&mdash;attracting, indeed, the wonder of the world, but
-advancing no claim to its gratitude and contributing no single addition
-to its intellectual stores.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>Such was the state that was ruled by the privileged &#8220;caste&#8221; of the
-Spartans and its administrative committee, the Ephoræ&mdash;a state
-remembered only for its brief military supremacy over her Grecian
-neighbors. Contrast her with one of those neighbors&mdash;Athens, the most
-typical and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_327" id="Page_327">[Pg 327]</a></span> the most democratic of ancient democracies.<a name="FNanchor_4_4" id="FNanchor_4_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_4_4" >[4]</a> &#8220;The people
-of Athens,&#8221; says Bulwer, &#8220;were not, as in Sparta, the tools of the
-state&mdash;they were the state! In Athens the true blessing of freedom
-was rightly placed in the opinions and the soul. This unshackled
-liberty had its convulsions and its excesses, but it produced masterly
-philosophy, sublime poetry, and accomplished art with the energy and
-splendor of unexampled intelligence. Looking round us, more than four
-and twenty centuries after, in the establishment of the American
-Constitution, we yet behold the imperishable blessings which we derive
-from the liberties of Athens. Her life became extinct, but her soul
-transfused itself, immortal and immortalizing, throughout the world.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>Venice was another such oligarchy as Sparta&mdash;ruled by a small patrician
-&#8220;caste,&#8221; who chose an all-powerful Senate from their own number; and
-from the Senate was selected an Executive Council of Three&mdash;a name that
-has become proverbial for a body of secret and irresponsible tyrants.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_328" id="Page_328">[Pg 328]</a></span>
-Venice&#8217;s strength was in commerce, in finance, as Sparta&#8217;s was in war.
-Her rich trade with the East and West made her seem</p>
-
-<div class="center"><div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
-<div>The pleasant place of all festivity,</div>
-<div>The revel of the earth, the masque of Italy.<a name="FNanchor_5_5" id="FNanchor_5_5"></a><a href="#Footnote_5_5" >[5]</a></div>
-</div></div></div>
-
-<p>But her internal government was one long reign of terror. The Council
-of Three met at night, masked and robed in scarlet cloaks, to judge
-those against whom accusations had been thrust into the yawning &#8220;Lions&#8217;
-Mouths&#8221;&mdash;two slots in the wall into which any might thrust an anonymous
-denunciation of his enemy. And from the Council&#8217;s sentence there was no
-hope of appeal; its victims were hurried across the Bridge of Sighs to
-vanish forever from human sight in the awful torture chambers to which
-that melancholy passage led.</p>
-
-<p>The ending of most oligarchies has been a violent one, as was that of
-the Thirty Tyrants at Athens, or that of the Decemviri at Rome. At
-Venice the sway of a &#8220;caste&#8221; lasted for centuries, and was ended only
-by a foreign conqueror&mdash;so complete an ascendency had the privileged
-patricians gained over the fettered populace. The wonderful mercantile
-prosperity of the community<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_329" id="Page_329">[Pg 329]</a></span> stifled the sentiment of popular
-liberty&mdash;a notable warning to mercantile and materialistic America!</p>
-
-<p>No oligarchy, and nothing of oligarchic tendencies can be endured in
-this country. We must not and will not have a dominant &#8220;caste.&#8221;</p>
-
-<h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
-
-<p><a name="Footnote_4_4" id="Footnote_4_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_4_4">[4]</a> In the best age of Athens, life was marked by a dignified
-and elegant simplicity. Every free citizen was one of the rulers
-of the state, through his vote in the assembly and the law courts;
-and, consequently, there was little exclusiveness in social life. An
-Athenian might be poor, but if he had general ability, wit, or artistic
-skill, he was welcome in the best houses of Athens.&mdash;<i>Sanderson&#8217;s
-Epitome of History</i>, p. 169.</p>
-
-<p><a name="Footnote_5_5" id="Footnote_5_5"></a><a href="#FNanchor_5_5">[5]</a> Childe Harold, Canto IV.</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_330" id="Page_330">[Pg 330]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2><span>CHAPTER XXI.</span> <span class="smaller">EGYPT, 4235 B. C.</span></h2>
-
-<p>Egypt, the cradle of civilization, had its Democrats, who struck
-resistless blows for equality, freedom, and fraternity for the race.
-So accustomed have we become, in thinking of Egypt, to be struck so
-forcibly by those evidences, the pyramids, of slave labor and the
-oppressed condition of the large portion of the ancient population
-of Egypt, that the existence of democrats in Egypt seems totally
-inconsistent with our preconceived idea of the ancient civilization
-of that country. Yet, we find, during the fourth dynasty&mdash;4235 <span class="smaller">B.
-C.</span>, the pyramids were builded, and the great Sphinx at Gizeh. The
-wealth and splendor of Egypt were unapproached elsewhere; civilization,
-the arts and sciences, reached a height which, in some respects, the
-world has never known since that time. The civilization of to-day is
-unequal to the task of rearing such structures as the pyramids, over
-which more than fifty centuries have rolled without displacing a stone
-or crumbling a corner of the prodigious masses of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_331" id="Page_331">[Pg 331]</a></span> granite, hewn from
-the distant quarries of Asswan, Mokattam and Tarah, and transported
-by means beyond the skill and comprehension of the science of the
-nineteenth century.</p>
-
-<p>But with all its splendor, wealth, magnificence and culture, the
-kings and rulers of the Fourth Dynasty became corrupt, oppressive and
-tyrannical. The Common People, as they were called, revolted, and a
-revolution of fire and blood extinguished the dynasty, 3951 <span class="smaller">B.
-C.</span></p>
-
-<p>Heedless of the immutable law that only in union is there strength,
-Egypt not only became corrupt and tyrannical, but divided into two
-kingdoms, who warred furiously against each other. Then it was that the
-nomadic hordes of Arabia and Syria saw their opportunity, and, swarming
-over the borders (2114 <span class="smaller">B. C.</span>) and overflowing the valley of
-the Nile with a human flood a thousand-fold more destructive than the
-turbid inundation of that great river, they crushed the struggling
-legions like worms in the dust, and became the masters of the country.</p>
-
-<p>They were the Hyksos, or Shepherd Kings, who stamped their rugged
-individuality on that wonderful land. They ruled for four centuries,
-forming the fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth dynasties. Their last
-king was Apepi, who reigned sixty-one years, and is believed by many<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_332" id="Page_332">[Pg 332]</a></span>
-to have been the Pharaoh (&#8220;Pharaoh&#8221; was the general name for kings) in
-whose reign Joseph came into Egypt and was made governor over all the
-land.</p>
-
-<p>The Shepherd Kings gradually succumbed to the civilization, culture,
-and manners of the Egyptians, and vanished from history by absorption
-among those people.</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_333" id="Page_333">[Pg 333]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2><span>CHAPTER XXII.</span> <span class="smaller">CHRISTIANITY.</span></h2>
-
-<p>Aside from the fact of its divine origin and inspired teachers, the
-doctrine of Christianity, the advent of the Messiah, was so opportune
-that, even had he not been the true Saviour, but taught as he did and
-as his disciples did, Christianity, by reason of the condition of the
-civilized world, would have made rapid and permanent progress among
-the &#8220;Common People.&#8221; Rome was at that time mistress of the world. Her
-empire extended over the whole of Western, and a large portion of
-Eastern civilization. Her conquering legions had carried their eagles
-to the utmost confines of the then civilized portion of the Western
-world.</p>
-
-<p>The cultured Greek and the barbarous Briton, the learned Egyptian and
-the warlike Teuton, alike felt the Roman yoke. Palestine was a province
-of the great Roman Empire. Roman officials, Roman representatives,
-and Roman soldiers ruled the people of Palestine with a rod of iron.
-It had once been said that &#8220;to be a Roman citizen was to be a king.&#8221;
-While the Roman Republic had ceased to exist, and the Cæsars ruled in
-place of the old republican form of government, creating,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_334" id="Page_334">[Pg 334]</a></span> as a result
-of a monarchy, a nobility, class distinction, and &#8220;caste,&#8221; still the
-traditions and the feelings of the Roman citizen remained with him. He
-was a king in comparison with the conquered people of the provinces
-which had been added to the Roman Empire.</p>
-
-<p>The Romans were essentially warriors; cruel and oppressive,
-merciless and masterful, at every period of the existence of the
-Roman government, whether monarchical or republican. But under the
-Cæsars there had sprung up a privileged class, the nobility, who
-had accumulated vast wealth, surrounded themselves with an army of
-retainers and servants, through whom they imposed upon the &#8220;Common
-People&#8221; every kind of oppression imaginable.</p>
-
-<p>This was not so much the case where the nobility came in contact with
-only Roman citizens, but in every conquered province or country the
-arrogance and cruelty of the representatives of the nobility of Rome
-made absolutely wretched and hopeless the lives of the conquered people.</p>
-
-<p>The Jewish people had become almost accustomed, as a race, to the yoke
-of a conqueror. So often had they been oppressed, and so long, they had
-learned that the ark of their hope and comfort lay, not in temporal
-power, but in that hope of everlasting happiness which the Word of God,
-delivered to Moses, insured them hereafter. This<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_335" id="Page_335">[Pg 335]</a></span> had resulted in the
-creation among the Jewish people of a priesthood and a religious order
-almost as powerful as the priesthood of ancient Egypt, which exerted,
-with regard to spiritual and social affairs, though not in conflict
-with the power of Rome, almost the same tyrannical power as Rome did by
-the might of her legions in temporal affairs.</p>
-
-<p>Between the grindstones of military despotism and priestly despotism
-the poor Jew was ground until his very soul cried out in anguish. The
-true religion, given to his forefathers, through that great teacher,
-Moses, by God Almighty, had ceased to afford him comfort. &#8220;Caste&#8221;
-had crept into the temple, as well as into the Roman government,
-destroying, as it ever will, peace and happiness at home, security and
-prosperity abroad. Therefore, when a voice was heard &#8220;crying in the
-wilderness, Come, ye who are heavy-laden,&#8221; the ears of the Jew, the
-Gentile, the barbarian, all the world over, were ready to listen and
-follow the sweet music of hope created in the breasts of the oppressed,
-which Christ brought.</p>
-
-<p>The persecution of our Saviour and his sufferings arose and were
-occasioned by the priestly &#8220;caste,&#8221; and executed, in that scene on
-the cross, by the military &#8220;caste&#8221;&mdash;the Roman soldiers. &#8220;Caste,&#8221; and
-the crime of it, is responsible for the crucifixion of our Saviour,
-the Son of God.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_336" id="Page_336">[Pg 336]</a></span> The &#8220;Common People,&#8221; in multitudes, followed Jesus,
-and listened in rapt attention to the loving words of peace and hope
-he brought them. It was the high priests of the temple who accused
-him; it was the Roman governor who had him crucified, by reason of the
-accusations of the priestly &#8220;caste.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>No fair-minded man, examining into the beautiful story furnished by
-the existence of the Son of God on earth, can fail to recognize that
-the loving, peaceful, kindly mission of our Saviour was made wretched,
-resulting in his suffering and death, by reason of the <i>crime of
-&#8220;caste.&#8221;</i></p>
-
-<p>Aristocrats and aristocracy have occasioned, from the beginning of the
-world, nearly all of the sins, wretchedness, and misery of the children
-of God; and when He sent His Son to save us, they crucified Him. In the
-coming of Christ, the &#8220;Common People&#8221; of Palestine saw a gleam of hope,
-a star to guide them to that haven of rest where neither priesthood
-nor Romans ruled; that province where all should be bright, where all
-should enter into perfect bliss. This sensation among the &#8220;Common
-People,&#8221; starting like the ripples created by casting a stone into
-still waters, extended and widened until it permeated every province of
-Rome, making converts of the &#8220;Common People.&#8221; </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_337" id="Page_337">[Pg 337]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>The conquered provinces had felt the severity of the iron heel of
-Rome upon their necks. The Roman nobles had driven so deeply into
-the hearts of the conquered the idea that &#8220;to be a Roman was to be a
-king,&#8221; and that the subjugated people, though morally and mentally
-often the superiors of the Romans, were, by the power of the Roman
-legions, the inferiors of the followers of the eagles of the Cæsars.
-The utter uselessness and impotency of any outbreak upon the part of
-the subjugated people, where resort to arms would be sought, was so
-apparent, the futility of contending with the might of Rome was so
-great, that the civilized world at that time was hopelessly suffering.
-To contend with the trained and masterful soldiers of the Cæsars
-would be productive of but one result&mdash;destruction, suffering, and
-humiliation.</p>
-
-<p>To the world, so bereft of all hope for relief from their sufferings,
-from the oppressive Roman &#8220;caste,&#8221; His words and His teachings came
-like the sweet, refreshing breath of heaven, bringing a salve to the
-wounded spirits of the hopelessly oppressed masses. Christ, the Son of
-God, was of the people. The earthly parents selected by the All-Wise
-Almighty for the Son that He should send to save His people, were of
-the lowly. Christ himself learned the trade of His father, and was
-a carpenter; His every utterance, His life,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_338" id="Page_338">[Pg 338]</a></span> the selection of His
-disciples, was, like the Truth, democratic. In fact, Christ would
-to-day have been pronounced a socialist. In the nineteenth chapter of
-St. Matthew, twenty-first verse, we read: &#8220;Jesus answered, If thou
-wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, and give to the poor.&#8221;
-In St. Mark, tenth chapter, twenty-first verse: &#8220;And Jesus, beholding
-him, loved him, and said unto him, One thing thou lackest: go thy way,
-sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor.&#8221; In St. Luke, twelfth
-chapter, thirty-third verse, we find Jesus saying: &#8220;Sell that ye have,
-and give alms.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>Imagine a minister of to-day, a teacher of the doctrines of this same
-Jesus, rising in some good Episcopal church with the would-be noble
-Astors seated in front of him, and proclaiming to them: &#8220;One thing thou
-lackest: go thy way, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor.&#8221;
-Think of a Baptist minister, before permitting John D. Rockefeller
-and William Rockefeller to partake of the Holy Sacrament, commanding:
-&#8220;Sell that ye have, and give alms.&#8221; Imagine the outrage, indignation,
-of these many-millioned moneyed lords, if the son of a poor carpenter
-should suggest to them, as Jesus did of old: &#8220;If thou wilt be perfect,
-go and sell that thou hast, and give to the poor.&#8221; That meek and lowly
-Jesus who came as a panacea for all sorrow, selecting fishermen to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_339" id="Page_339">[Pg 339]</a></span>
-abide with Him and be His associates, sitting at the table and breaking
-bread with these fishermen, making of them &#8220;fishers of men,&#8221; teaching
-to the world the equality of man by His actions and His life; He who
-was in the beginning the God, the Saviour, could sit at the table and
-live in close communion and association with fishermen. Will you, Mr.
-Rockefeller, will you, Mr. Astor, good Christians that you are? Are you
-following the doctrines of Him in whose praise you raise your voices,
-Sunday after Sunday, in a hundred-thousand-dollar church, before an
-aristocratic, well-bred, genteel, ten-thousand-dollar-a-year clergyman?</p>
-
-<p>Would you, fair dames of fashion, assist at the coming into the world
-of a child in a stable, whose cradle was a manger, whose curtain was
-the straw thereof? You ladies of America, whose crests adorn your
-carriages, affect to view with adoring eyes a hundred-thousand-dollar
-painting of the Madonna and her child, yet gaze with contempt, and
-avoid with averted glances, contact with the pure but poor wives and
-mothers of our land.</p>
-
-<p>St. Paul, who, of all the early teachers of Christianity, was probably
-the &#8220;most respectable,&#8221; as soon as the angel of God appeared to him,
-became converted to the doctrines of Him who was Truth personified,
-and threw &#8220;caste&#8221; to the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_340" id="Page_340">[Pg 340]</a></span> winds. In the seventeenth chapter of the
-Acts, St. Paul, upon Mars Hill, at Athens, proclaimed the equality of
-man; in the twenty-sixth verse, he says: &#8220;And hath made of one blood
-all the nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth.&#8221;
-As God has made us all of one blood, how contrary to the teaching of
-Him whom you say you follow, to endeavor to establish a theory that
-birth makes a difference and inequality, that there is any peculiarity
-about one drop of human blood that makes it better than another. The
-teachings of the divine philanthropist, the Saviour of mankind, took
-deep and permanent root in the minds of men, because the very essence
-of it was that no matter whether the believer in those teachings be
-a poor, oppressed Jew, or an outcast Gentile, or a Roman Cæsar, he
-stood only before his God as an equal of any other of God&#8217;s children.
-It was the leveling, the equalizing of rank and power that gave the
-impetus, at first, to those truths which are the pillars of the faith
-of the Christian nations of earth. &#8220;Come, ye who are heavy-laden,&#8221; is
-the doctrine that appealed to the &#8220;Common People.&#8221; As lasting and as
-abiding as the faith that we have in the Christian religion, so long
-and enduring will be the sentiment of the human soul believing in the
-equality of man. It has been so from the beginning, and will be to
-the end, and surprise and astonishment at each fresh<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_341" id="Page_341">[Pg 341]</a></span> evidence of its
-outburst is unnecessary. The plebeians of Rome, before the coming of
-the Lord, asserted the same right, and would have sought the Sacred
-Hill to establish a city of their own had not the patricians made
-concessions. It is the same spirit that cost Charles I. his head, Louis
-XVI. his head, the British Government this vast empire, and the same
-spirit that, November 8, 1892, cost the Republican party its hold upon
-power; because, in the minds of the people, that party was thoroughly
-impregnated with the much-hated principle of the inequality of man.</p>
-
-<p>The rich and powerful were the last to be converted to Christianity.
-They trembled and said, as the Roman Governor did, &#8220;Almost thou
-persuadest me to be a Christian,&#8221; but not quite, because the very
-fundamental principles of the Christian religion are Love, Charity,
-and Equality. Their conversion would mean the surrendering of their
-cherished claim of &#8220;caste.&#8221; Many a conversion among the mighty, when at
-last effected, was the result of policy upon the part of the converted,
-who had commenced to feel the power of the &#8220;Common People&#8221; who had
-listened and become imbued with the divine teachings of the doctrine of
-Christianity.</p>
-
-<p>Had it been necessary, as now, to pay salaries of from one to
-ten thousand dollars to those teachers who, in the early age of
-Christianity,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_342" id="Page_342">[Pg 342]</a></span> promulgated the doctrines of their God, how few
-conversions would have been made at all. These wayfarers, obeying the
-divine injunction of our Saviour, to &#8220;go and teach all the people of
-earth,&#8221; took no heed of the morrow. They did not teach in temples which
-required thousands of dollars to build; they did not find it necessary
-to be surrounded with luxury; they needed no vacations and excursions
-to recuperate their exhausted natures. Had it been necessary for
-those &#8220;fishers of men&#8221; to have carriages, temples, and salaries, the
-Christian religion would have made exceedingly slow progress. There
-were no Astors, Vanderbilts, Rockefellers, in the congregations that
-surrounded the early teachers of the doctrine of the meek and lowly
-Jesus.</p>
-
-<p>We hear on every side (when this idea is advanced), proclaimed by
-the gentlemen of the clerical profession, that &#8220;the conditions have
-changed.&#8221; If such be the case, then history is terribly misguiding. We
-are told of the luxuries that surrounded the rich of the Roman empire.
-We read, in the Scripture, of Dives, and the rich men of that day. We
-know&mdash;unless history is entirely in error&mdash;that Astors, Vanderbilts,
-Rockefellers, existed then. But the early teachers of Christianity
-loved their Lord and followed his footsteps, in that he came to give
-hope, comfort, and rest to those who were heavy-laden. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_343" id="Page_343">[Pg 343]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>The meetings held by the early followers of Christ were not &#8220;club
-meetings,&#8221; at which expensive music entertained the audience.
-The audience was not addressed by high-priced elocutionists, nor
-entertained by the mental gymnastics of some word-painting acrobat.</p>
-
-<p>Humbly and meekly, hopefully, trustingly, the people sought the
-presence of that Teacher whose earnestness and faith was evidenced in
-His life and manner of living. His words were blest, all untutored
-as he was, with the eloquence of that truth with which his soul was
-filled. He did not say to the people, &#8220;Give alms,&#8221; and at the same
-time live in a brown-stone front. He did not say, &#8220;Take no heed of the
-morrow,&#8221; and keep a bank account. He did not preach to his cold and
-hungry brother that the Christian religion would give him comfort, and
-keep the warm overcoat on his back while doing so.</p>
-
-<p>In their very lives the early teachers of Christianity made the truth
-of their own convictions apparent. Is it any wonder that in this, the
-nineteenth century, doubt arises in the minds of the people? They doubt
-the doctrine because they doubt the sincerity of the teacher. It is so
-utterly inconsistent in a man to preach, &#8220;If thou wilt be perfect, go
-and sell that thou hast, and give to the poor,&#8221; while his hearers know
-that within a few blocks of where this teacher lives in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_344" id="Page_344">[Pg 344]</a></span> comfort and
-luxury, some poor family is starving.</p>
-
-<p>Let us find men to teach us, who, when they find a poor, shivering
-wretch, but a brother, on the streets, will take off their warm coats
-and throw them round his shoulders. Let us find our leaders in the path
-made plain by the divine Master, taking off their shoes to clothe the
-benumbed feet of the outcast tramp. Then, and when that day arrives,
-there&#8217;ll be no such thing as &#8220;caste&#8221; and class distinction in the
-house of God. Then will the house of God be sought by the multitudes,
-as of old they sought the mount whereon the Lord did preach. When the
-privilege of entering the house of God and occupying a seat therein
-is not sold to the highest bidder, to furnish the ten-thousand-dollar
-salary for the teacher of the doctrine of that lowly Master, who had
-nowhere to lay His head, then will the multitudes gather to do the
-bidding of the teacher. When there are no high places in the temple to
-be sold to the representatives of &#8220;caste&#8221; and sham aristocracy, then
-will the house of God be a home and refuge for the people. When the
-charities of Christ&#8217;s church on earth are not controlled by snubbing,
-scornful, shoddy aristocrats, when the wife of the poor man shall feel
-welcome to give her mite, along with the contributions of the rich,
-without enduring their scornful glances,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_345" id="Page_345">[Pg 345]</a></span> and subjecting herself to the
-insult of their assumed social superiority, then will the people become
-charitable. The church, the Sunday-school, the church society, the
-charitable committees, have all become impregnated with this crime of
-&#8220;caste,&#8221; which crucified the Saviour.</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_346" id="Page_346">[Pg 346]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2><span>CHAPTER XXIII.</span> <span class="smaller">NOT A DEMOCRATIC PARTY VICTORY.&mdash;DEMOCRACY IS NOT THE NAME OF A PARTY,
-BUT OF A PRINCIPLE.</span></h2>
-
-<p>The endeavor has been made in the preceding chapters to furnish
-examples of the uprisings of the people from the time of ancient Egypt
-to the present day.</p>
-
-<p>The endeavor has been made to place before the thinking men of the
-wealthier class parallels, in ancient history, of great political
-upheavals in the past history of our own country, as well as in the
-history of foreign countries and nations&mdash;exhibitions similar to the
-powerful protest made by the people on November 8, 1892.</p>
-
-<p>The object to be attained by such an arrangement of facts as will
-impress the wealthier classes, is that a change in their methods and
-manners may be brought about. No one can pretend to contradict that
-the people with incomes less than $5,000 a year could, if they saw
-fit, cause such legislation as would relieve them from the burden of
-the expenses of the government. It is almost incredible that a journal
-as preëminent in the Democratic campaign as was the New York <i>Sun</i>,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_347" id="Page_347">[Pg 347]</a></span>
-should publish an editorial, as late as the 10th day of December, as
-follows:&mdash;</p>
-
-<p class="center">NOT DEMOCRATIC.</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;Various propositions for an income tax come from Democratic
-free-traders, who are ready for any scheme for raising revenue
-that doesn&#8217;t depend upon a protective tariff. Then there are the
-Populists, Nationalists, and divers miscellaneous cranks who
-object to wealth on general principles. Other men&#8217;s wealth, of
-course. To these powerful thinkers an income tax is a penalty
-to be inflicted upon the plutocrats, a discouragement to the
-acquisition of money. There is much flabby talk about plutocracy,
-and a good deal of the talk in favor of an income tax is of that
-nature.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;With the opinions of the Populists we are not concerned, except
-as students and observers of the political curiosities of the
-time. It is proper, on the other hand, to remind Democrats that an
-income tax is undemocratic. Undemocratic in principles, because
-it is an interference with individual business and a premium upon
-perjury. Undemocratic in precedent, because the imposition of such
-a tax was unanimously and strenuously opposed by the Democratic
-party, and because the extension of the life of that tax from 1870
-to 1872 was likewise opposed, with substantial unanimity, by the
-Democratic party.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The only excuse for the income tax was that it was a war measure.
-What excuse can be given for reimposing it? Is there a war against
-money or against common-sense?&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_348" id="Page_348">[Pg 348]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>Democratic free-traders, so obnoxious to the New York <i>Sun</i>, by the
-suggestion of an income tax, are merely seeking for means whereby the
-expenses of the Government may be defrayed. They know that something
-is the matter with the Democratic masses, who have shown their
-dissatisfaction with the existing state of things. These Democratic
-free-traders (and they fairly represent the doctrine proclaimed as a
-principle of the Democratic party, and adopted as a platform in the
-Chicago Convention) know that if they are to be consistent they must
-abolish, to a great extent, the duties upon imported articles. They
-also know that if they abolish duties, there will not be sufficient
-money paid into the treasury of the United States to defray the current
-expenses of the Government. They have realized the powerful current of
-public opinion, which demands the equalization of taxes between those
-who enjoy the benefits of living under the government of the Federal
-Union. The tariff duties do not fall with the same proportionate weight
-upon the rich and the poor. The rich derive greater benefit from the
-security offered their property than the poor, as the amount of their
-property is greater than that of the poor; yet a Vanderbilt consumes
-no more sugar, and therefore pays no more duty, than the Homestead striker. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_349" id="Page_349">[Pg 349]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>The Democratic free-trader, &#8220;with his flabby talk of an income tax,&#8221; is
-merely seeking for a means to furnish, upon something like an equitable
-basis, the money necessary to run the Government.</p>
-
-<p>The &#8220;Populist, Nationalist, and divers miscellaneous cranks&#8221; (referred
-to in the editorial quoted) call to mind the Abolitionists of 1856, who
-were spoken of with so much contempt, and yet who, four years after, as
-the Republican party, with Abraham Lincoln as their candidate, swept
-the country. If &#8220;flabby talk&#8221; means a demand made by the people upon
-the wealthier class to render unto the Government in proportion to
-benefits conferred by the Government, then let &#8220;flabbyism&#8221; continue to
-characterize the talk of our legislators, because it would be, with all
-of its &#8220;flabbiness,&#8221; a welcome doctrine to the &#8220;Common People.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>The editorial under discussion goes on to recite the fact that the
-opinions of &#8220;the Populist are not worthy of concern, except to those
-students and observers of the political curiosities of the times.&#8221;
-Again is called to mind the studies and observations made concerning
-&#8220;curiosities&#8221; that existed in the political firmament in 1856, and
-resulted in the <span class="smaller">AURORA BOREALIS</span> in 1860.</p>
-
-<p>This editorial, which is worthy of great attention, emanating from the
-source that it does,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_350" id="Page_350">[Pg 350]</a></span> reminds the Democrats (meaning the Democratic
-party) that an income tax is &#8220;undemocratic&mdash;undemocratic in principle,&#8221;
-because the Democratic party strenuously opposed the life of that tax
-from 1870 to 1872. There is <i>not</i> a shadow of doubt that an income tax
-is <i>not</i> in accordance with the principles of that party which bears
-the name of the <i>Democratic party</i>; but that <i>it is in accordance</i>
-with <i>democracy</i> and the <i>feelings</i> that fill the breasts of the
-masses who voted last November for Grover Cleveland, and no one better
-understands the fact that the victory of last November was not won by
-the Democratic party, as a party, than the one man most benefited and
-elevated thereby; that is, the President-elect, Grover Cleveland.</p>
-
-<p>The howl that one thing or another is &#8220;not according to the principles
-of the Democratic party,&#8221; ought to have but little effect upon him;
-and, judging from the editorial of November 21st, which appeared in
-that other journalistic pillar of the Democratic party, the New York
-<i>World</i>, Grover Cleveland appreciates the exact position of affairs,
-and how and why he was elected.</p>
-
-<p class="center">THE FRUITS OF VICTORY.</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;Mr. Cleveland&#8217;s speeches since the election are even better than
-those which he made in the campaign. There is an advantage in
-perfect freedom. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_351" id="Page_351">[Pg 351]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>&#8220;No truer or more philosophical statement of the causes that
-underlay the recent political revolution has been made than
-was contained in Mr. Cleveland&#8217;s brief speech at the Manhattan
-Club. &#8216;The American people,&#8217; he said, &#8216;have become politically
-more thoughtful and more watchful than they were ten years
-ago. They are considering now vastly more than they were then
-political principles and party policies, in distinction from party
-manipulation and the distribution of rewards for partisan services
-and activities.&#8217;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;During the campaign, it was a common remark that so quiet a
-Presidential canvass had not been seen in many years before.
-But the result showed that the people had been thinking, and
-that they knew what they wanted. What they want, and what they
-have demanded, they must be given, if the Democratic party is to
-remain in power. And what the people ask and expect, Mr. Cleveland
-clearly indicated in this earnest and elevated passage in his
-speech:&mdash;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;&#8216;In the present mood of the people, neither the Democratic party
-nor any other party can gain and keep the support of the majority
-of our voters by merely promising or distributing personal
-spoils and favors from partisan supremacy. They are thinking of
-principles and policies, and they will be satisfied with nothing
-short of the utmost good faith in the redemption of the pledges
-to serve them in their collective capacity by the inauguration of
-wise policies and giving to them honest government.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;&#8216;I would not have this otherwise, for I am willing that the
-Democratic party shall see that<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_352" id="Page_352">[Pg 352]</a></span> its only hope of successfully
-meeting the situation is by being absolutely and patriotically
-true to itself and its profession. This is a sure guarantee of
-success, and I know of no other.&#8217;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Truer words were never spoken. The fruits of Democratic victory
-must be sought in lower and more just taxes, in lessened
-expenditures, in a better public service, in the reform of abuses
-and the remedy of evils from which the people are suffering, and,
-in general, in good and honest government. This is indeed the
-only vindication of the success that has been achieved, the only
-guarantee of other triumphs to come.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>Grover Cleveland, better probably than any other man in the Union,
-appreciates the fact that his elevation to the Presidential chair was
-not secured because there are more members of what is known as the
-Democratic party in the Union than members of what is known as the
-Republican party. It must be apparent that many who formerly voted with
-the Republican party decided, for some good and sufficient reason,
-that they would vote for the nominee of the Democratic party, in the
-last Presidential election, and that they did so vote on the 8th day
-of November is evidenced by the fact of Grover Cleveland&#8217;s large
-majorities, and the increased vote for the ticket bearing his name,
-even in States whose electoral votes will be cast in the Electoral
-College for the nominee of the Republican party. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_353" id="Page_353">[Pg 353]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>It is impossible to ascribe this change to increased emigration and the
-fact that recently naturalized citizens voted the Democratic ticket. In
-the first place, there is no such unanimity of love for the Democratic
-party, as a <i>party</i>, in the breasts of the emigrants who have been
-recently naturalized, as to account for their voting unanimously the
-Democratic ticket. Again, the number of foreigners who have been made,
-by naturalization, citizens of the United States within the last four
-years is not sufficient to account for this tremendous revolution;
-and, further, the greatest gains made by the Democratic nominee were
-not made in those sections wherein the greatest flood of emigration
-has poured. Therefore, it seems conclusive that the nominee of the
-Democratic party received the support of Americans who had formerly
-voted with the Republican party.</p>
-
-<p>Now, upon what ground can this general conversion rest? It was not done
-by the flaring of trumpets, by oratory, or reasoning upon the issues as
-set forth in the platforms of the two parties. It is hard to imagine
-many voters being convinced of the advantages that would arise under a
-system of State banks. It would seem that that would convince few, if
-any, that the Democratic party was more desirable than the Republican
-party, to have in charge of the finances of the nation. That, as an
-abstract principle, &#8220;Free Trade,&#8221; or<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_354" id="Page_354">[Pg 354]</a></span> &#8220;tariff for revenue only,&#8221;
-converted this large number of former Republican voters, is a statement
-not justified by the vote cast in different States, nor is it possible
-to find one man, in each hundred who voted the Democratic ticket, who
-can intelligently discuss the subject of Protection and Free Trade and
-give satisfactory reasons for preferring Free Trade. The subject is a
-perplexing one, even to those who have devoted much time and study to
-political economy.</p>
-
-<p>To show a lack of unanimity among the high priests of Democracy on
-the subject of Protection and Free Trade, one has only to refer to
-the record of the late and eminent Samuel J. Randall, who was a most
-pronounced Protectionist, yet a sterling member of the party known
-as the Democratic party. On the other hand, we have the Hon. John G.
-Carlisle, Senator from the State of Kentucky, who represents ultra
-Free Tradeism. Even the same difference exists between those two great
-journals, in which are supposed to be mirrored Democratic doctrines
-and principles: the New York <i>Sun</i>, whose editorial is here quoted,
-which is an absolute Protection organ, and the New York <i>World</i>, whose
-editorial is also quoted, the last-named paper being an absolute Free
-Trade organ.</p>
-
-<p>It would seem perfectly apparent to even the most benighted mind
-that, with such divergence<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_355" id="Page_355">[Pg 355]</a></span> of opinion among the old-line Democrats,
-a doctrine not believed in unanimously by them, could make but few
-converts from the ranks of the party pledged to Protection.</p>
-
-<p>Free Trade and State banks were the two leading cries in the campaign
-of the Democrats, joined to which was occasionally heard the cry of
-fear of a Force Bill.</p>
-
-<p>The worthy New York <i>Sun</i> would, doubtless, attribute largely the
-victory to its efforts in calling the attention of the public to the
-Force Bill and the danger of its passage if the Republicans should gain
-the control of the Federal Government. As a matter of fact, however,
-the people of the Union had seen the Republicans in power, controlling
-both branches of the National legislature, and also the executive
-department of the Government; yet, the people have seen the Lodge Bill,
-known as the Force Bill, pass the Republican House of Representatives,
-and die a doleful death in the Republican Senate, killed by the votes
-of Republican Senators. Therefore, that part of the Democratic policy
-which indicated a strenuous objection to the passage of a Force Bill,
-if put in power, could not possibly have a great deal of effect in the
-missionary work done by the Democratic managers. Those Republicans who
-voted for the nominee of the Democratic party, at the last election,
-could not have<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_356" id="Page_356">[Pg 356]</a></span> been influenced to do so by the arguments advanced with
-regard to the Force Bill.</p>
-
-<p>They had seen Senators of their own, the Republican party, kill a
-Force Bill in the Senate of the United States, and they had no reason
-to believe but that a recurrence of murder would take place should
-another Force Bill pass the House of Representatives and be sent to a
-Republican Senate. These three leading features of the Democratic party
-appear most prominently in the campaign. Can any fair man say that any
-one or all of them influenced those Republicans who voted for Grover
-Cleveland to change from the Republican party and become members of the
-Democratic party? Is there anything in any one of them or all of them
-jointly to make a man forsake old associates, old ideas and faiths, and
-to associate himself, by reason of conviction, with things that are new?</p>
-
-<p>It could not be a matter of reason. It was a matter of sentiment. And
-(again repeating) no one seems to understand that to be the case better
-than the President-elect. It was the sentiment of detestation upon the
-part of the masses&mdash;the &#8220;Common People&#8221;&mdash;for that assumption of class
-distinction, the attempted introduction of &#8220;caste&#8221; in our country
-by those who are allied to, or who had forced themselves upon, the
-Republican party. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_357" id="Page_357">[Pg 357]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>The cold and clammy arms of &#8220;caste,&#8221; in which the Republican party was
-encircled, doomed it to defeat. All of the great virility with which it
-was endowed when, as Abraham Lincoln&#8217;s Republican party, it represented
-the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; was crushed out of it by this venomous python,
-so that when it faced, in 1892, the arrayed resentment of the &#8220;Common
-People,&#8221; it was but a shapeless, disfigured form, in which all the
-beauty, purity, and strength with which it was endowed at the time of
-its creation had ceased to exist. Had the Republican party retained
-the vigor that marked its young manhood before it became suffocated by
-this mass of putrid matter, called aristocracy, there would have been
-another story to tell of the election November 8, 1892.</p>
-
-<p>Had the argument been well defined, as it was in the last election,
-with parties of equal merit in the eyes of the people, possessing
-equally the virtues and spirit of the American people&mdash;had we arrayed
-upon one side the Democratic party, with its oriflamme of &#8220;Free Trade,
-State Banks, and No Force Bill,&#8221; and upon the other side marshaled the
-Republican hosts under a leader like Lincoln, a man of the people, upon
-whose standard should be written, &#8220;Protection for American Industries,
-Sound Money Guaranteed by the Faith of the Nation, and Fair Election,&#8221;
-can any one who is fair doubt as to what the issue would have been? </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_358" id="Page_358">[Pg 358]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>It was not, Novembers, 1892, a battle between the Republican party
-and the Democratic party, and when journals like the New York <i>Sun</i>
-would attempt to yoke the people&#8217;s will by party principles and party
-traditions, they are merely preparing a harness of cobwebs, which
-public opinion will tear asunder, and ring the death-knell of the
-Democratic party in so doing.</p>
-
-<p>The New York <i>World</i>, November 10th, publishes a remarkable editorial,
-in which it recites, among other things, what this victory does <i>not</i>
-mean. The editorial is given, because, if it be correct&mdash;and the New
-York <i>World</i> is certainly good authority&mdash;then it surely does not mean
-a victory for the Democratic party, while it does mean a victory for
-the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; the democratic masses, and such cries in future
-as that of the New York <i>Sun</i> against an income tax, because it is
-contrary to the Democratic party, will be meaningless, inasmuch as the
-Democratic party has not won this victory, and Grover Cleveland was not
-elected President by the Democratic party.</p>
-
-<p>Quoting from the New York <i>World</i>, whose editorial of November 10th
-is printed herewith, these sentences occur: &#8220;This victory does not
-mean Free Trade.&#8221; Then, does it mean &#8220;Tariff for revenue only&#8221;? which
-is an expression in the Democratic platform, adopted in Chicago, and,
-therefore, if this be a Democratic victory, it must<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_359" id="Page_359">[Pg 359]</a></span> mean what the
-Democratic party pledged themselves to in their National Convention at
-Chicago. &#8220;It does not mean,&#8221; says the New York <i>World</i>, &#8220;the unsettling
-of industry nor the derangement of commerce.&#8221; Well, but how can we have
-tariff for revenue only without unsettling industry and the derangement
-of commerce? And, if it be a Democratic victory (by Democratic victory
-is meant a victory of the Democratic party), we must have such laws
-made and executed as will create a schedule of tariff for revenue only.</p>
-
-<p>Quoting further from this editorial: &#8220;It does not mean disturbance of
-what is sound in finance.&#8221; Then how can that portion of the Democratic
-platform, adopted at Chicago, be made consistent with the legislation
-in the future regarding the finances of the country? If the tax of
-ten per cent. upon State banks be withdrawn, and thus State banks be
-enabled to issue their notes, how will it be possible to prevent &#8220;a
-disturbance&#8221; of whatever is sound in finance?</p>
-
-<p>Now, if this be a victory of the Democratic party, such a repeal of the
-ten per cent. penalty tax upon State banks must be enacted&mdash;that is, if
-the Democratic party intends to keep faith with its constituents.</p>
-
-<p class="center">FOR THE GOOD OF ALL.</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;If there are honest Republicans who really believe what their
-party journals and speakers<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_360" id="Page_360">[Pg 360]</a></span> have told them&mdash;who fear that
-Democratic success in the nation threatens danger or disturbance
-to business&mdash;to them we say: Your fears are idle.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The majority of the people of the United States, represented by
-the great Democratic majority, do not mean injury to themselves.
-This country is their country. Its business interests are their
-interests. Its prosperity is their prosperity. Its honor and
-welfare are their concern.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;This victory does not mean Free Trade. It does not mean the
-unsettling of industry nor the derangement of commerce. It does
-not mean disturbance of whatever is sound in finance.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The President-elect is the very embodiment of conscientious
-caution. He is preëminently conservative. His administration
-will mean economy, reform, retrenchment in every branch of the
-Government.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The victory does mean putting a stop to the riot of extravagance,
-profligacy, and corruption. It means the end of the reign of
-Plutocracy. It means relief from the monstrous robbery of the
-masses by unjust and unnecessary taxation. It means a veto
-upon the looting of the Treasury and the hideous waste of
-hundreds&mdash;nay, thousands&mdash;of millions of dollars in the course of
-a generation by unmerited pensions. It does mean lower and juster
-taxes and larger freedom of trade. It does mean good money, and
-good money only.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Our party has triumphed under the happy union of a great issue
-and a great man. The Republic is stronger for this Democratic
-victory. The Republicans themselves will be more prosperous, and
-in the end happier because of it. <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_361" id="Page_361">[Pg 361]</a></span>Government of the people is
-safe in the hands of a great majority of the people.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>In the concluding paragraph of the above editorial of the <i>World</i>, we
-read (and those of us who live in New York State, with considerable
-astonishment): &#8220;Our party has triumphed under the happy union of a
-great issue and a great man.&#8221; To start with, the issue seems to have
-been, judging from all of the preceding, Tariff on one side, Free Trade
-on the other; National banks on one side, State banks on the other; and
-Force Bill as a kind of &#8220;Flyer.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>With regard to these &#8220;great issues,&#8221; there was a lack of unanimity
-among even the great newspapers of the Union, at the head of which,
-justly and properly, we put the Free Trade New York <i>World</i> and
-the Protection New York <i>Sun</i>. With regard to the &#8220;great man&#8221; (and
-there is no attempt to disparage in any manner the President-elect
-of this nation), it seems somewhat peculiar to use the term &#8220;great&#8221;
-to designate that citizen of the Union who has been selected as
-chief magistrate of the nation, in view of the fact that he had been
-dubbed the &#8220;Stuffed Prophet&#8221; by that great organ of Democracy, the
-New York <i>Sun</i>, and was so heralded through the Union for more than
-a year before his nomination. And when four years ago, he sought
-re-election, the New York <i>World</i> killed this &#8220;great man&#8221; by faint<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_362" id="Page_362">[Pg 362]</a></span>
-praise. His popularity and greatness did not seem to be recognized
-by the seventy-two members of the Democratic National Committee
-who represented the State of New York, in the National Democratic
-Convention at Chicago, as these representatives protested against the
-nomination of their &#8220;great&#8221; fellow-citizen, declaring that he could
-not be elected if nominated; and they represented the politics of the
-Democratic party; and they told the truth as far as the Democratic
-party was concerned.</p>
-
-<p>By reason of his greatness or his popularity, he could not have been
-elected. But when he came before the people, as representing the great
-mass of the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; then he became great, but only great in so
-far as he represented the greatness of the people.</p>
-
-<p>The politicians of New York State pronounced the verdict of all that
-which is controlled by politicians in the State of New York, when
-they declared it as their opinion that Grover Cleveland could not
-carry the State of New York. They were simply saying what they, the
-politicians, in their little political way, could do. But when Grover
-Cleveland became the representative of the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; then the
-&#8220;Common People&#8221; made him great&mdash;far greater than could the politician
-have done&mdash;and he has sailed into office on the favorable wind of the
-opinion of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_363" id="Page_363">[Pg 363]</a></span> &#8220;Common People.&#8221; His greatness is only the reflected
-greatness of those whom he represents. Inherently, greatness in Grover
-Cleveland may exist, but certainly no evidence of it has yet been
-given. He is great to-day because of the great support that has been
-given him by the will and pleasure of the &#8220;Common People.&#8221; He is no
-more great of himself and in himself than would be the rifle in the
-hands of an expert marksman. The masses, the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; represent
-the marksman. Grover Cleveland is merely the weapon which they will
-use to bring down the animal which has been devouring their substance,
-destroying their homes and happiness. The weapon, even though it be
-the rifle of Davy Crockett, would become impotent in the hands of the
-weak and inexperienced. The people are powerful, and they will render
-great the weapon which they wield. The people are skillful. For many
-centuries, as the preceding chapters recount, in the history of all
-nations, the people have become trained and skillful in the use of
-their power.</p>
-
-<p>The President-elect has it within his reach to achieve greatness as
-the willing and trusty weapon of the masses, the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; by
-whom he was elected. And wherever the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; the masses, have
-found a weapon untrustworthy, they have cast it aside as readily and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_364" id="Page_364">[Pg 364]</a></span>
-quickly, and secured another, as the ordinary hunter of the wild animal
-would do.</p>
-
-<p>The &#8220;Common People&#8221; have been engaged in a chase after this wild
-animal, this destructive beast, called &#8220;caste,&#8221; sham aristocracy, and
-over-accumulation of wealth. They imagine that they have secured a good
-weapon in the man of their choice, November last. And, should it become
-evident that they have been mistaken, his greatness will cease to be as
-soon as the great power by which he is supported falls away from him.</p>
-
-<p>It is not well to call a man great until he is dead. Had Benedict
-Arnold died after the Battle of Saratoga, he would have gone down in
-history as one of the great heroes of the Revolution.</p>
-
-<p>Grover Cleveland was elected, contrary to the expectations expressed
-(and expressed honestly) by the seventy-two most influential Democratic
-politicians of the State of New York. He carried the State represented
-by these sagacious politicians by more than 40,000 majority. And it was
-all done, independently of the politicians, by the will of the &#8220;Common
-People&#8221;&mdash;not by the Democratic party. For upon what issue, possibly,
-could converts have been made by the politicians?</p>
-
-<p>From the standpoint of politicians, and from past experience, that
-eminent Democratic orator, the Hon. Bourke Cockran, was perfectly
-correct<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_365" id="Page_365">[Pg 365]</a></span> when he stated in Chicago, in his famous speech before the
-National Democratic Convention, that Grover Cleveland was the most
-popular man in the country on every day in the year, except election
-day. This was said, honestly and sincerely, by a leading light of the
-political world of the Democratic party. Mr. Cockran could not foretell
-that the great Democratic masses, the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; would utilize
-any one who might happen to be chosen as the weapon of destruction
-which the &#8220;Common People&#8221; would use in the chase after the object of
-their resentment, that brute, represented by &#8220;Chappie&#8221; on Broadway, the
-Astors, Vanderbilts, Rockefellers, and Goulds&mdash;the sham aristocracy.</p>
-
-<p>Mr. Cockran has, since the election, doubtless realized that, as a
-politician of the State of New York, he is justly eminent for his
-sagacity and wisdom, as well as his eloquence; but, as a judge of what
-the <span class="smaller">PEOPLE</span> will do, he is as unreliable in his judgment as the
-veriest babe in swaddling clothes.</p>
-
-<p>He was talking in Chicago, as was the honorable Governor of the State
-of New York, and others, for the Democratic party, which <span class="smaller">COULD
-NOT</span> and <span class="smaller">DID NOT</span> elect Grover Cleveland. When, therefore,
-after the election of Grover Cleveland, that Democratic party, as
-represented by the New York <i>Sun</i>, assumes to dictate to the party of
-the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_366" id="Page_366">[Pg 366]</a></span> people, who, independently of the Democratic party as a political
-organization, but acting only as &#8220;Common People,&#8221; have elected a chief
-magistrate and representatives to represent them, the &#8220;Common People,&#8221;
-it is simply bidding for the extinction of the power of that political
-party known as the Democratic party, with whom, on this occasion, the
-&#8220;Common People&#8221; have acted, for purposes of their own, and to achieve
-ends which they consider desirable.</p>
-
-<p>Should it be assumed by those elected November 8, 1892, to represent
-the people in the government of the nation, that they were elected
-because they were Democrats&mdash;or, rather, members of the Democratic
-political party&mdash;then it would become their duty, as honest men,
-pledged to support the views entertained and expressed by the makers
-of the platform of the Democratic National Convention at Chicago, to
-repeal all existing tariff laws, until the amount received from duties
-would only be sufficient to defray the expenses of the Government. In
-other words, having a tariff for revenue only, and not for protection;
-but, inasmuch as the expenses of the Government are as great or greater
-to-day than its income, it would mean that the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; who
-voted for the nominee of the Democratic party, have simply swapped
-horses in crossing a stream, without benefiting themselves<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_367" id="Page_367">[Pg 367]</a></span> in any
-particular. The Government must have money to defray its expenses, and
-if, practically, the present tariff is only furnishing a sufficient
-revenue to defray the expenses of the Government, where is it possible
-to reform it, so as to lighten the burden of taxation now imposed
-upon the &#8220;Common People&#8221;? This is all upon the assumption that the
-Democratic party claim that it was that peculiar plank in their
-platform, &#8220;Tariff for Revenue Only,&#8221; that gave them the victory last
-November. Then the tariff would remain as it is, as we need every
-dollar of the income of the nation to defray its expenses.</p>
-
-<p>Should the Democratic party assume that it was that peculiar part of
-their platform which demanded a repeal of the ten per cent. penalty
-tax for the State banks, then, by the repeal (to which they are
-pledged) of the said penalty tax of ten per cent., State banks would
-spring into existence, issuing their own notes, as was the practice
-before the National Banking Act was enacted. What great good to the
-&#8220;Common People&#8221; could grow out of this change in the currency of the
-nation (that would apparently be the only thing, if the Democratic
-party is convinced that its nominees were elected because of the
-virtues contained in their platform), that can possibly be carried
-into execution by the incoming Government? The suggestion of an
-increase in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_368" id="Page_368">[Pg 368]</a></span> the internal revenue tax levied upon alcohol would not be
-productive of an increase in the revenue derived from this source, as
-past experience, both in this country and in Europe, has demonstrated
-that increased taxes upon any article decrease the consumption of said
-article, and, therefore, decrease the revenue.</p>
-
-<p>The perplexing question, therefore, that will confront those who
-believe that the <span class="smcap">Democratic Party</span> was elected to power, is:
-How can we adhere to the platform of the Democratic party, and at the
-same time benefit, in the slightest degree, the people of the nation?
-For even the most egotistical Democrat will understand, and does
-understand, that the people of the nation, having placed in the hands
-of those men whom they have chosen, the entire control of the affairs
-of the nation; that they, the &#8220;Common People&#8221; of the nation, will not
-be satisfied with merely holding things as they are. That would be
-merely a shifting of scenes without changing the play on the stage of
-public affairs. Something must be done, in addition to the mere putting
-out of one set of office-holders of the Republican party and putting
-in another set of office-holders of the Democratic party. The &#8220;Common
-People&#8221; of America, the masses, are not office-seekers. They desire
-something more than the mere changing of the political faith of their
-Postmasters, United<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_369" id="Page_369">[Pg 369]</a></span> States Marshals, and other Federal office-holders.</p>
-
-<p>If the Democratic party, now in power, fails to do anything except
-shift the scene and change office-holders, then the Democratic party
-will be relegated to that dismal slough of despondency, at the next
-election, in which the Republican party is now submerged. The people
-will elect, by some political name, a party who will perform something
-for the people&#8217;s benefit.</p>
-
-<p>It is almost impossible to reduce the tariff without running the
-government into debt. It is impossible to increase the internal revenue
-tax to supply the deficiency. Then, if the Democratic party believes
-in lower duties and decreased tariff, what other course is open for
-it? What other course is fair to the poor &#8220;Common People&#8221; of America
-than to pass an income tax to supply the needs of the nation? It is
-perfectly useless to talk about abolishing the pensions to any amount
-sufficient to create any perceptible impression upon the decrease in
-the income of the nation, should the tariff be materially reduced. It
-is utterly worthless to argue the subject. The time is wasted. Pension
-frauds&mdash;if any exist&mdash;should be at once abolished. But any attempt to
-repeal any existing legislation with regard to the pensions of the old
-soldiers of the Union would simply be met by such a howl of indignation
-as to make a step<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_370" id="Page_370">[Pg 370]</a></span> of that nature impracticable. Whatever sums have
-been given, and whatever obligations have been incurred, by the Federal
-Government in the last four years (except frauds which may possibly
-have been perpetrated), must continue to exist until time shall have
-relieved the Federal Government from its obligations to the old
-veterans of the Civil War.</p>
-
-<p>We must have money for internal improvements, for our navy, and for
-our pensions. We cannot procure the money if we materially reduce
-the tariff, except in one way, and that is by an income tax, which
-necessarily must be a graded one. The people of America will not stand
-a general income tax, wherein one man with an income of a million
-dollars per annum can pay two per cent., and the man whose income is
-only two thousand dollars per annum shall pay also the same percentage
-upon his small income. That would be obviously unfair to the poor
-man, to whom two per cent. from his small income would represent an
-inconvenience to him greater than fifty per cent. would to the man with
-an income of a million.</p>
-
-<p>If the Democratic party assume to have won this victory, then let
-them proceed, upon the platform adopted at Chicago, which will result
-practically in nothing being accomplished. If Grover Cleveland has
-been elected solely for his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_371" id="Page_371">[Pg 371]</a></span> &#8220;greatness,&#8221; and by reason of his immense
-personal popularity, then let him gather the Reform Club with one arm
-and Tammany Hall with the other. This trinity of greatness, purity, and
-brightness will be sufficient for his administration, but nothing will
-be done.</p>
-
-<p>If, as the facts are, or seem to be&mdash;and the vote indicates the
-correctness of the position&mdash;Grover Cleveland and the Democratic
-party have been put into power by the &#8220;Common People&#8221; because they
-represented to the minds of the &#8220;Common People&#8221; the opposition to
-&#8220;caste,&#8221; sham aristocracy, and great accumulation of wealth, and not
-by the mugwumps and the kid-gloved gentlemen of the Reformed Club or
-the Tammany Heelers, then, if Grover Cleveland and the Democratic party
-recognize their election to be the result of the votes, not alone of
-the faithful of the Democratic faith, but of the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; let
-something be done that may enable the &#8220;Common People&#8221; to realize their
-hopes and expectations&mdash;then, at the end of Grover Cleveland&#8217;s four
-years of administration, he having performed the wishes of the &#8220;Common
-People,&#8221; let us pronounce him <span class="smaller">GREAT</span>.</p>
-
-<p>If the Democratic party, with the President at its head, will now
-utterly throw to the wind old traditions and principles of the
-Democratic party, and give no heed to the howling of the Democratic<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_372" id="Page_372">[Pg 372]</a></span>
-press, but comply with the mandates of the people, that they should be
-relieved from this incubus which is crushing them&mdash;over-accumulation
-of wealth, centralization of capital, and sham aristocracy; the only
-possible way, without resorting to measures obnoxious to the American
-mind&mdash;confiscation and like enactments&mdash;is by a graded income tax,
-which will throw the burden of the Government where it belongs,&mdash;<i>i.
-e.</i>, upon the shoulders of those who have become fat and lusty by
-feeding upon the blood of the nation. And, in proportion as the burden
-of taxation is laid upon those ample shoulders, it may be lifted from
-the crushed and suffering poor of the body politic.</p>
-
-<p>The mere utterance and repetition of the word &#8220;reform&#8221; is meaningless.
-<i>Saying</i> the word does not make any reformation. When Grover Cleveland
-was elected eight years ago, he was elected upon the &#8220;Reform&#8221; cry.
-The people were then suffering from this &#8220;class&#8221; infliction, and they
-gave vent to their feelings by the election of Cleveland. It had been
-so often repeated that there was great corruption in the Republican
-party, that the people expected a wonderful exposure of corruption and
-a great reformation in the affairs of the nation. Nothing was done. No
-corruption was exposed. The ledgers of the nation seemed to have been
-accurately kept. No<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_373" id="Page_373">[Pg 373]</a></span> crime was unearthed, and nothing was accomplished.
-The very plausible excuse was offered that the Republican party still
-controlled the Senate of the United States, and made abortive any
-attempt at reformation, or the accomplishment of any relief for the
-&#8220;Common People.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>Now, upon this occasion, Grover Cleveland, after a vacation of four
-years, has been called once again by the &#8220;Common People&#8221; to command the
-Ship of State. Both mates and the whole crew have been placed under his
-command. They believe of him what the New York <i>World</i>, November 13th,
-here gives us:&mdash;</p>
-
-<p class="center">THE &#8220;STUFFED PROPHET.&#8221;</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;The &#8216;Stuffed Prophet&#8217;&mdash;that is the nickname bestowed upon Mr.
-Cleveland by the newspaper organ of plutocracy, which has for
-years professed Democracy for the purpose of betraying it.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The name was bestowed in derision. It was the favorite invention
-of a malice which mistakes insolence for wit. It was intended for
-ridicule, but, rightly viewed, it is a title to be worn as an
-honor.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;It is an honor to Mr. Cleveland that he has never had or merited
-the approval of the New York <i>Sun</i>. It is a credit to him that
-that journal is chief among those to whom General Bragg referred
-when he said, &#8216;We love him for the enemies he has made.&#8217;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;And there is fitness in the nickname, too. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_374" id="Page_374">[Pg 374]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Mr. Cleveland was a true prophet when he set the face of
-Democracy towards reform, foreseeing that the country would
-in due time demand it. He had the gift of the seer, when at
-the Washington Centennial banquet, he avowed his unfaltering
-confidence in the wisdom of the people who had so recently
-overthrown his cause, and his assurance that they would soon come
-to a juster view, and vote down the policy of monopoly and class
-privilege and oppressive taxation. They have done it this year.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;And this prophet is stuffed.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;He is stuffed with the virtue which accepts public office only as
-a public trust;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Stuffed with the honor which refuses to &#8216;palter in a double
-sense&#8217; with words, or even to keep silence when&mdash;as at the time
-of the silver craze&mdash;frank utterance seems to promise only
-destruction for his own and his party&#8217;s ambitions;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Stuffed with sturdy common-sense which &#8216;sees clear and thinks
-straight,&#8217; and so commends itself to the &#8216;plain people&#8217; who love
-the right and seek justice;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Stuffed with a foresight unsurpassed by that of any statesman of
-our time;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Stuffed with a purity of patriotism which views place and power
-merely as opportunities to render service to the country;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Stuffed with unprecedented majorities, the eager tributes of the
-people in testimony of their approval;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Stuffed with the confidence of his countrymen, who have called
-him again into their service in order that wrongs may be righted,
-oppressions<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_375" id="Page_375">[Pg 375]</a></span> overthrown, errant tendencies checked, and that
-government of the people, by the people, and for the people may
-not perish from the land;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Stuffed with the Democracy that means all this, for truly&mdash;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The next President <i>is</i> a Democrat.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>If, as we hope, &#8220;Grover Cleveland is stuffed with the virtue which
-accepts public office only as a public trust,&#8221; then he will accept his
-office as President of the United States as a trust from the &#8220;Common
-People&#8221; of our country, and not from the political party who nominated
-him,&mdash;<i>i. e.</i>, the Democratic party; he will accept the trust confided
-in him by the Democracy in its broadest sense&mdash;the &#8220;Common People&#8221; of
-the land.</p>
-
-<p>If he be &#8220;stuffed with honor,&#8221; in accepting that trust, he will do so
-with full cognizance of the fact that in honor bound he is to acquit
-himself in his high office to which he has been called by the &#8220;Common
-People&#8221; of America, as will best satisfy them, and remove those crying
-evils which call aloud from the hearthstone of every Common Man in
-America. The most objectionable of all the evils, and the one most
-prominently considered by the voter last November, was the existence of
-an attempted class distinction in our country.</p>
-
-<p>If he is &#8220;stuffed,&#8221; as God grant he is, &#8220;with sturdy common-sense,
-which sees clearly and thinks straight, and so commends itself to
-the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_376" id="Page_376">[Pg 376]</a></span> plain people who love the right and seek justice,&#8221; his sturdy
-common-sense will teach him that he has been elected by the &#8220;plain
-people,&#8221; and he will &#8220;think straight,&#8221; that the &#8220;plain people&#8221; want
-such legislation and the execution of such legislation as may relieve
-them&mdash;not in pocketbook, but in feeling&mdash;from the assumption of a
-superiority upon the part of the wealthy worshipers at the throne of
-&#8220;caste,&#8221; and to that end a graded income tax will be productive of more
-good and be more efficacious in the accomplishment of an object so near
-to the &#8220;plain people who love right and seek justice,&#8221; that it made the
-plain &#8220;Common People&#8221; forget old affiliations last November&mdash;old ties
-and associations&mdash;and vote for the President-elect and the political
-party by which he was nominated.</p>
-
-<p>If he be &#8220;stuffed with a purity of patriotism which views place and
-power merely as opportunities to render service to the country,&#8221; then
-when his term of office shall have expired, having rendered that
-service to the country, and the &#8220;Common People&#8221; of the country, to do
-which he was elected President by the &#8220;plain people,&#8221; he will have
-endeared himself so to the patriotic &#8220;plain people&#8221; of the land, having
-faithfully kept the trust reposed in him by the people, that his name
-shall go down in the records of the nation<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_377" id="Page_377">[Pg 377]</a></span> associated with the names
-of Washington, Jefferson, Jackson, and Lincoln.</p>
-
-<p>Grover Cleveland is certainly &#8220;stuffed&#8221; with the confidence of his
-countrymen, who have called him again into their service, in order
-that wrongs may be righted, oppression overthrown, arrant tendencies
-checked, and that &#8220;the government of the people, by the people, and
-for the people, may not perish from the land.&#8221; Let us hope that
-this confidence is well placed, and that now, when he may call to
-his assistance both branches of the national legislature, he will
-right those wrongs, and overthrow the oppression of which the people
-complain; and the chiefest of these is the accumulation of vast sums of
-money in the hands of families and persons, which creates a danger to
-&#8220;the government of the people, by the people, and for the people.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>The people do believe that he is &#8220;stuffed with true democracy, in
-its broadest sense,&#8221; else they never would have elected him. And how
-can that true democracy be exhibited better than by suggesting such
-legislation as will cast the burden of taxation upon that class who
-can so easily bear it&mdash;that class which have rendered themselves so
-entirely obnoxious to the &#8220;Common People&#8221; of America, those &#8220;plain
-people, who love the right and seek justice,&#8221; and who, loving the
-right, have sought justice by calling him to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_378" id="Page_378">[Pg 378]</a></span> the position of Executive
-of the nation? How can Grover Cleveland better right the wrongs of the
-&#8220;Common People&#8221; than by urging, as chief of the party in power, the
-passage of a graded income tax, which would certainly meet with the
-approval of the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; by whom he was elected, that thereby
-funds might be furnished for defraying the expenses of the nation, and
-thus relieving the burden cast upon the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; at the same
-time preventing a continuation of this much-to-be-feared accumulation
-of wealth in the hands of a few in our country.</p>
-
-<p>A double object would be thus accomplished: First, the primary
-consideration for which they voted, the abolition of &#8220;caste,&#8221; sham
-aristocracy, would be brought about by preventing vast incomes being
-enjoyed by individuals or families, and the consequent idleness,
-luxury, selfishness, sensuality, and snobbishness attendant upon the
-enjoyment of vast incomes, where the recipient remains in idleness.
-Second, it would afford a cure and relief for the present excessive
-system of taxation which falls so heavily upon the general mass of the
-people. Thus, at one time, and by one measure (perfectly consistent
-with the will of the people by whom he was elected), Grover Cleveland
-could right most of the wrongs, and give relief to the &#8220;Common People,&#8221;
-the &#8220;plain<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_379" id="Page_379">[Pg 379]</a></span> people&#8221; (so called by the New York <i>World</i>), by whom he has
-been chosen as chief.</p>
-
-<p>There is no need to mince matters upon this subject. It is plainly
-and obviously the duty of Grover Cleveland to give some outward and
-visible sign of the inward and spiritual grace which is in him. There
-is no time to waste in this matter. Grover Cleveland understands too
-well that he was not elected by the Democratic party; that he will have
-the support of the party of the people, call it by what name you will.
-The Populists, representing, as they do, some of the grievances of the
-&#8220;plain&#8221; &#8220;Common People,&#8221; will act with Grover Cleveland&#8217;s party, the
-party of the &#8220;Common People.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>The New York <i>World</i> furnishes an admirable article upon the subject,
-&#8220;Why Are They Natural Allies?&#8221; speaking of the Populists. Because
-they are the party of the plain &#8220;Common People,&#8221; who, along with
-the Democratic party, will control the legislation of the nation,
-Grover Cleveland represents this army of &#8220;Allies,&#8221; as surely as did
-Wellington, at the Battle of Waterloo, and the &#8220;Common People&#8221; will
-expect him to defeat, &#8220;horse, foot, and dragon,&#8221; the enemy&mdash;the sham
-aristocracy, the representatives of &#8220;caste,&#8221; and the monopoly of money,
-who have, like Napoleon, carried devastation and destruction into our
-country; just as Napoleon did into every country<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_380" id="Page_380">[Pg 380]</a></span> of Europe. Grover
-Cleveland will have the assistance of these &#8220;Natural Allies,&#8221; the
-Populists, which is indicated in the timely article below, from the New
-York <i>World</i>, of December 15, 1892:&mdash;</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;The Populists in the next Senate will be the natural allies of
-the Democrats on the most important matters that will come before
-Congress.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The Democrats and the Populists fused in several of the Western
-States. They will together control several of the legislatures.
-The third party has no affiliation with the Republicans. It is
-composed in the main of voters who have become disgusted with
-Republican rule.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The Republicans cannot rely upon retaining their grip on the
-Senate by the votes of the men who have overthrown them at the
-West.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>If Grover Cleveland and the party which nominated him will but once
-recognize, <i>and at once</i>, that they did not triumph by reason of
-the conversion of old Republicans to the doctrines enunciated in
-the Democratic platform, at Chicago, but will now promptly come to
-the conclusion, which is so obvious, that they were elected by the
-&#8220;Common People,&#8221; for the plain purpose of righting those wrongs which
-the people have endured in silence, then it will be impossible for
-Republican newspapers to claim that they are &#8220;at sea without a chart.&#8221;
-They are &#8220;at sea without a chart&#8221; at present, because the Democratic
-party, under the whip and spur of Democratic<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_381" id="Page_381">[Pg 381]</a></span> newspapers, driving
-them to cling on to Democratic principles, and to hold to Democratic
-doctrine, will prevent Grover Cleveland and the Democratic party from
-taking any action which would furnish relief to the people. The New
-York <i>Sun</i>, under the able and magnificent management of Hon. Charles
-A. Dana, cries for Protection and against the Income Tax; while that
-most potential newspaper, the New York <i>World</i>, also Democratic, under
-the control of the Hon. Joseph Pulitzer, inveighs against Protection
-and in favor of an Income Tax. Torn by the dissensions in its own
-ranks, the Democratic party, if it attempts to cling on to the old
-ideas, will simply do nothing; <i>and that is what the people fear</i>.</p>
-
-<p>Now is the occasion for Grover Cleveland to prove himself to be a
-&#8220;great&#8221; man. Now is the time for those representatives, elected by
-the will of the people, to demonstrate to the people that they are
-willing servants, and that &#8220;public office is a public trust&#8221;; that, as
-trustees of the will of the people, they will comply with the request
-of the people. And the request has gone forth to give relief to the
-people from this tumor which has grown upon the body politic&mdash;&#8220;caste,&#8221;
-snobbery, and sham aristocracy, and the attendant evil which was the
-cause of the tumor&mdash;excessive taxation and class legislation. Throw
-old doctrines and principles of the Democratic party to the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_382" id="Page_382">[Pg 382]</a></span> winds.
-Cleveland, the next House of Representatives, and the Senate of the
-United States were not elected and selected upon old principles,
-which were part of the constitution of the Democratic party. They
-were elected upon a broad democracy, and if they will adopt the will
-of the people, their wants and needs, and apply such remedies as the
-people may demand, then will it be impossible for Republican writers,
-who wield a trenchant pen like that of the Hon. John A. Cockerill, to
-truthfully say: &#8220;The incoming party is at sea without a chart.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>The New York <i>World</i>, of December 11th, says of Grover Cleveland&#8217;s
-speech, that its generalities are eminently sound and patriotic, and
-that he asserts that the people can be trusted and that they know what
-they want, which is here given:&mdash;</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;Those who looked for any definite statement of his policy from
-the President-elect in his speech at the Reform Club banquet last
-night will be disappointed. Mr. Cleveland evidently thinks, and
-probably correctly, that the time for this has not yet come.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;But Mr. Cleveland&#8217;s generalities are eminently sound and
-patriotic. Especially excellent is his sturdy assertion of the
-good Democratic doctrine that the people can be trusted, that
-they know what they want, and are entitled to have their will
-respected. Contrasted with the current Republican talk that the
-voters have been befooled for three years and are bent on turning
-the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_383" id="Page_383">[Pg 383]</a></span> progress of their country backward, Mr. Cleveland&#8217;s robust
-patriotism and faith are eminently refreshing.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The spirit in which he contemplates the responsibility soon to
-be placed upon him and his party is equally admirable. There
-is neither shrinking nor boastfulness, but a calm courage
-characteristic of the man and befitting the occasion. It is
-to be hoped that Mr. Cleveland&#8217;s admonition to and defence of
-economy, as something about which &#8216;there is nothing shabby or
-discreditable,&#8217; will not be lost upon the present Congress.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>This fills us with hope, we &#8220;Common People,&#8221; who regard the <i>World</i> as
-a leading light in the Democratic firmament of journalism. It is like a
-bow of promise set in the heavens of the future, and especially when,
-upon the succeeding day, the <i>World</i>, which voices the sentiments of
-the Democratic party, publishes the following:&mdash;</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;A monopoly organ declares that an income tax is &#8216;undemocratic.&#8217;
-It says that &#8216;the only excuse for the income tax was that it was a
-war measure,&#8217; and asks: &#8216;What excuse can be given for reimposing
-it?&#8217;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The excuse of necessity. The government is confronted with the
-condition of an empty treasury and a demand for tariff reduction
-twice made by the people. Either one of these things may make new
-taxes necessary. Combined, they are almost certain to do so.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;With an annual expenditure of over $220,000,000 due to the war
-(for pensions and interest<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_384" id="Page_384">[Pg 384]</a></span> upon the public debt) a choice in war
-taxes would fall on a graded income tax upon every principle of
-economy and justice.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;It is surely Democratic to tax luxuries rather than necessaries,
-superfluities rather than essentials. As one of the speakers at
-the Reform Club said: &#8216;Any tax on what men have is better than a
-tax on what men need.&#8217; It cannot be undemocratic to tax those who
-are best able to pay, to apportion public burdens in a manner to
-cause the least hardship to the greatest number.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;A graded income tax is the coming tax if the expenditures of the
-government are to continue anywhere near the present mark.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>It is with hope and trustfulness that we regard the future.</p>
-
-<p>Here is a spectacle presented before us by two of the Democratic
-newspapers of New York City&mdash;the stronghold of Democracy in the Union
-is New York City&mdash;one arrayed on the side of Protection and against a
-graded income tax, the other, of equal prominence and position, arrayed
-on the side of Free Trade and a graded income tax. Now, let the members
-of the Democratic party view this picture presented to the &#8220;Common
-People&#8221; of America, and ask themselves: For what did the people vote
-November 8, 1892? Did they vote with the New York <i>Sun</i> when they voted
-for Grover Cleveland, or did they vote with the New York <i>World</i> when
-they cast their ballots for the President-elect? Common-sense, common<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_385" id="Page_385">[Pg 385]</a></span>
-reason, would indicate to the most superficial that they voted neither
-with the New York <i>Sun</i> nor the New York <i>World</i>, nor the Democratic party.</p>
-
-<p>This is not a victory of the Democratic party! And it cannot be said
-too forcefully that this victory <i>does not belong</i> to the Democratic
-party! It is a <span class="smaller">VICTORY OF THE PEOPLE</span>, who demanded a
-suppression and an extinguishing of the wrongs that had been inflicted
-upon them. They voted out West with the Populist party on the same
-basis as they voted with the Democratic party in the East and South. It
-was anything&mdash;call it by what name you please&mdash;so that that thing, when
-elected, should be a party of the people.</p>
-
-<p>Don&#8217;t insist upon a revivification of the doctrines of the Democratic
-party. The people have spoken for themselves, and their voices must
-be heard through the representatives selected by them in the halls of
-Congress. During the next four years, Grover Cleveland must execute
-the <span class="smaller">WILL OF THE PEOPLE</span>. He has been elected by no party. The
-Populists will be his &#8220;natural allies,&#8221; because they represent the
-People, as he does. He need not remain &#8220;at sea without a chart&#8221; one
-day or hour, only follow the will of the people! They have placed
-their heels of disapprobation upon &#8220;caste&#8221; and sham aristocracy and
-the attempt to engraft it upon American society. They have placed the
-nail erect and have given Grover<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_386" id="Page_386">[Pg 386]</a></span> Cleveland the hammer. Now let him
-drive it home! And we will stud the coffin of dead &#8220;caste&#8221; so full
-of nails that the shaking skeleton, borrowed from Europe, will never
-have a resurrection in our country. There is only one effectual way to
-accomplish the end desired&mdash;the eternal entombment of this multi-lived
-creature&mdash;and that is by the infliction of such an income tax as will
-prevent the possibility of the existence of a thing like &#8220;Chappie&#8221;
-on Broadway, and make America an undesirable field for the coroneted
-sportsmen of Europe to hunt in for matrimonial game, and prevent the
-accumulation of fortunes that would arouse a feeling of cupidity in
-the weazen chests of the puppified lords and degenerate descendants of
-Europe&#8217;s nobility, whose greatest pride is in the &#8220;Bar Sinister&#8221; in
-their armorial bearings.</p>
-
-<p>Why is delay in the execution of the will of the people necessary?
-Grover Cleveland is thoroughly convinced that he was elected, not by
-the Democratic party, but by the people at large. The first step in
-the right direction would be this&mdash;as soon as Grover Cleveland assumes
-the office of President of the United States&mdash;(that is, President
-of the nation, by the will of the &#8220;Common People&#8221;), to then and at
-once take such steps as would quickly afford the relief the &#8220;Common
-People&#8221; expect of him and his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_387" id="Page_387">[Pg 387]</a></span> administration. Will the cry of the
-Republican newspapers, that &#8220;the Democratic party will do nothing,&#8221;
-prove correct? It is only for four years that this man of the people,
-Grover Cleveland, can occupy the position to which he has been called
-by the &#8220;plain&#8221; people of America. After his induction into office, the
-&#8220;Common People&#8221; will expect that not one single day will be wasted
-in the execution of their wishes. &#8220;Twice in the election of Congress
-the people have decreed a reform in taxation and other changes in the
-policy of the government.&#8221; And the people will not permit any further
-delay in the matter. The people, in the most pronounced manner, have
-exhibited their determination to bring about certain changes and a
-certain kind of reformation. Every hour that it is delayed is pregnant
-with danger to the Democratic party.</p>
-
-<p>The closing sentence taken from the New York <i>World</i>, of December
-10th, seems full of meat&mdash;&#8220;The way to reform is to reform.&#8221; All the
-platitudes and promises ever uttered would not be a reformation. The
-people, by an overwhelming majority, have decreed that there shall be
-a reformation in taxation, and with regard to the social life of the
-American people, which has been made unhappy by the introduction of
-foreign mannerisms. The way to begin is to <i>begin</i>, and the sooner the better. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_388" id="Page_388">[Pg 388]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>The calling of an extra session of Congress is but a minor detail
-where the will of sixty-five million people has been expressed in
-the positive manner that it was on November 8th, 1892. The great
-Democratic dailies of the Union, like Kilkenny cats, are fighting over
-little matters, seemingly losing sight entirely of the truth of the
-case, <i>i. e.</i>, that this is not a Democratic victory, but a victory
-of the people. And the sooner the wrongs of which the people complain
-are righted, so much sooner will end the sorrow, sufferings and the
-oppression of the people. Whether there should be an extra session or
-not, it is hardly worth while for two great dailies like the New York
-<i>World</i> and New York <i>Herald</i> to quarrel over. The people have said: It
-is well that certain things be done. &#8220;Then, if it be well that it be
-done, it is well that it be done quickly.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>In concluding this chapter, it is desirable to have it distinctly
-understood that this volume was not written or intended as a Democratic
-aftermath campaign argument. If it be incomprehensible with the mass
-of the people who may read this book, that it was written from a broad
-democratic standpoint, and not from a Democratic party standpoint, that
-it is to be regretted. It has not been the aim of the author to fall
-prostrate at the feet of the Hon. Grover Cleveland, the President-elect
-of the nation, further than to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_389" id="Page_389">[Pg 389]</a></span> believe and trust in his promises and
-integrity, and his manliness of character, and to await the result
-of his actions, with regard to the will of the people, pronounced
-the 8th day of November, 1892, in their selection of him as their
-representative. Should the Hon. Grover Cleveland, President-elect of
-the Union, by the will of the &#8220;Common, &#8216;plain&#8217; People&#8221; of America,
-prove himself to be all that the people believe, should he fulfill
-the trust reposed in him, as did Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson,
-and Abraham Lincoln, then with earnestness and sincerity would the
-author lend his voice to the anthem that would go up in his praise from
-the mouths of the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; saying: &#8220;Well done, thou good and
-faithful servant; great hast been thy trust, and in such manner hast
-thou executed the trust that thy name shall be handed down, in the
-records of history, to be read by future generations of Americans as
-<span class="smcap">The Great Grover Cleveland</span>.&#8221;</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_390" id="Page_390">[Pg 390]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2><span>CHAPTER XXIV.</span> <span class="smaller">NOT A DEFEAT OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN&#8217;S REPUBLICAN PARTY.</span></h2>
-
-<p>The &#8220;Grand Old Party,&#8221; which sprang from American intelligence and the
-advancement of civilization, fully armed, like Minerva from the brain
-of Jupiter!</p>
-
-<p>That transcendent glory which will ever surround the name of the
-Republican party with a halo, was not forever submerged beneath the
-flood of indignant votes, November 8, 1892. That party which, by its
-deeds, shall ever live in the grateful recollection of the American
-heart, was not vanquished in the fight November last.</p>
-
-<p>The symmetry, beauty, and virtues so pre-eminent in the party of
-Abraham Lincoln in 1860, will ever present a spectacle for the
-admiration of the &#8220;plain&#8221; &#8220;Common People&#8221; of America. They loved the
-Republican party in 1860, and cast their votes for it because it
-represented them&mdash;the plain &#8220;Common People&#8221;; because the candidate of
-the Republican party, Abraham Lincoln, was one of them, the &#8220;Common
-People&#8221;; because in the right hand of the Republican party was carried
-the standard of <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_391" id="Page_391">[Pg 391]</a></span><i>equality and emancipation</i>; because in their
-standard-bearer, Abraham Lincoln, the plain people recognized a typical
-man of the &#8220;Common People.&#8221; &#8220;Mudsillism&#8221; was synonymous to them with
-the term &#8220;Common People.&#8221; The industrial and laborial North was aroused
-to righteous indignation by the assumption of a social superiority on
-the part of the cavaliers, the believers in &#8220;caste,&#8221; in the South.
-The Republican party, led by that wonderful creation of the American
-soil and the air of freedom, Abraham Lincoln, won the battle of the
-equality of man in 1861-65. Following still the guiding star which had
-left its reflected glory upon the horizon even after it had descended
-into the tomb made by the assassin, the people of the Union elected the
-victorious general, Ulysses S. Grant, to the office of Chief Executive
-of the nation. Believing in and trusting the man who had been a friend
-to Abraham Lincoln, when he was surrounded by a multitude of dangers,
-they cheerfully re-elected the victorious General Grant to be the
-President of the people for a second term.</p>
-
-<p>Slowly, but none the less surely, had been going on, during General
-Grant&#8217;s administration, the disintegration of those principles that
-made the party of Abraham Lincoln <i>great</i> in the eyes of the &#8220;Common
-People&#8221; of the Union. After twice enjoying the exalted position of
-Chief<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_392" id="Page_392">[Pg 392]</a></span> Magistrate of the nation, General Grant was called upon to
-surrender his office to a successor. So great had been the inroads
-of decay upon that sterling honesty of the Republican party&mdash;that
-Republican party which had been planted by the loving hands of Lincoln
-in the breasts of the American people&mdash;that President Hayes succeeded
-General Grant, as a Republican President, only by concessions made in
-the interests of peace by a great statesman, Samuel J. Tilden.</p>
-
-<p>The weakening influence of the barnacles growing upon that stalwart
-tree of Republicanism, and which had been washed there by the ocean
-tide of prosperity that had surged upon our nation, was felt in
-the campaign between Hayes and Tilden. And let all good Americans,
-Republicans as well as Democrats, uncover their heads in speaking of a
-man like Tilden, who was a man of the people, thought of the people,
-and of the horrors of civil war. Each succeeding administration tended
-but to weaken the hold of that good old Republican party, that Grand
-Old Party! (and it gives us pleasure to say it) upon the hearts of
-the American people, because the barnacles which had clung on to the
-life-giving roots of the stalwart oak of Republicanism and the Grand
-Old Party&mdash;those barnacles of sham aristocracy, believers in &#8220;caste&#8221;
-and class distinction, the wealthy&mdash;had managed to sap the strength of
-the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_393" id="Page_393">[Pg 393]</a></span> vigorous young tree planted by Abraham Lincoln, until, deformed,
-it presented a spectacle obnoxious to the eyes of the &#8220;Common People&#8221;
-of America.</p>
-
-<p>The first decisive evidence of the dissatisfaction of the people was
-given in the election of Grover Cleveland in 1884.</p>
-
-<p>While Burchard, with that remarkable alliteration, &#8220;Rum, Romanism, and
-Rebellion,&#8221; is accredited with having caused the defeat of James G.
-Blaine, the impression made upon the &#8220;Common People&#8221; by the spectacle
-of that dinner of millionaires, called the &#8220;Belshazzar feast,&#8221; at which
-the nominee of the Republican party, James G. Blaine, occupied a seat,
-was much greater than the howling of &#8220;Rum, Romanism, and Rebellion,&#8221; by
-an obscure preacher.</p>
-
-<p>The Republican party had ceased to represent to the minds of the plain
-&#8220;Common People&#8221; what it had originally represented. There had grown
-upon that party the fruit of evil, in the shape of a moneyed class, who
-assumed to be better than the plain &#8220;Common People&#8221; of America. Hence,
-James G. Blaine, with all his personal popularity, magnetism, and
-magnificent record, was unable to secure, from the ranks of the &#8220;Common
-People,&#8221; the votes necessary to elect him President.</p>
-
-<p>The defeat of Grover Cleveland by President Harrison was brought about
-(and there can be no<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_394" id="Page_394">[Pg 394]</a></span> doubt of it) largely by the use of money, secured
-as contributions from the moneyed class to perpetuate the control of
-the Republican party in the Federal Government, thinking that by so
-doing the power and assumption of social superiority upon the part of
-believers in &#8220;caste,&#8221; who cared nothing about the principles of the
-original Abraham Lincoln Republican party, and who were as far beneath
-it in patriotism, honesty, and truth as the earth is beneath the
-heavens, would also be perpetuated.</p>
-
-<p>There is not a shadow of doubt, and even the most prejudiced slave of
-political &#8220;bossism&#8221; will be forced to admit, that President Harrison
-has filled his high office with dignity; that he is an honest,
-patriotic, representative American. He has kept faith with the American
-public, as far as was possible for him to do so, in the execution
-of the laws enacted by the legislative bodies of the nation. His
-renomination was but the natural consequence of his administration.</p>
-
-<p>The Republican party certainly entered the campaign of 1892 opposed
-by a divided Democratic press, a divided Democratic party, upon the
-supposed and alleged great issue of the campaign&mdash;that is, Protection
-and Free Trade.</p>
-
-<p>To illustrate that point, compare the New York <i>Sun</i>, believing in
-Protection, with the New York <i>World</i>, believing in Free Trade. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_395" id="Page_395">[Pg 395]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>The American people for intelligence will average as highly as the
-people of any other nation, but they are not all political economists.
-They had not, even during the four years and with all &#8220;the campaign of
-education,&#8221; become sufficiently instructed to form a decided opinion
-upon the information acquired by them with regard to the questions of
-political economy involved in the discussion of Protection and Free
-Trade.</p>
-
-<p>It is perfectly ridiculous to hear it asserted that the people of the
-United States voted against the Republican party in sufficient numbers
-to create a political revolution by reason of the fact that they had
-learned sufficient to become convinced, founding their conviction upon
-information and reason, that Free Trade was preferable to Protection.</p>
-
-<p>The average American voter would be as lost in an argument upon the
-subject of political economy as would a disputant regarding a legal
-proposition who had never heard of Blackstone or Kent, because the
-average American citizen has never read one line of Adam Smith, John
-Stewart Mill, or, in fact, any of the hand-books of political economy.</p>
-
-<p>The conclusion to be drawn from the assertion that the people of the
-United States had become convinced that it was beneficial to them to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_396" id="Page_396">[Pg 396]</a></span>
-have Free Trade is groundless. The Republican party had certainly the
-advantage in the argument, because, under the existing state of our
-tariff laws, the country is and was prosperous, wages were higher, a
-greater sum of money was deposited in the savings banks by the laboring
-classes than ever before in the history of our country. Now, these good
-things, representing a prosperous condition, actually existed and do
-exist under the Protection policy of the Republican party. It is hard
-to believe that the mass of our fellow-citizens would be led away by
-the simple desire for an &#8220;experimental change.&#8221; It is hard to convince
-any man (when you select an individual) that he shall forsake a
-business or occupation which he knows furnishes him with a competency,
-to embark into some new and untried venture, forsaking that which he
-already knows furnishes him with a sufficiency, for that which is
-speculative.</p>
-
-<p>Now, this is exactly what the Republican party, as represented by the
-Republican newspapers, is trying to preach as the cause of the defeat
-of the Republican party last November. In other words, the press of the
-Republican party assumes that, collectively, the people of the Union
-are more utterly ignorant, stupid, and absurd than they would be when
-acting as individuals, which, of course, is ridiculous. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_397" id="Page_397">[Pg 397]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>It was not a question of the pocketbook with the masses. It was not a
-question whether they were doing better by reason of the Protective
-policy of the Republican party than they could hope to do under
-the Free Trade policy enunciated by the Democratic party. It was a
-clear-cut proposition: Shall we allow longer the accumulation of
-money in the hands of a few families, who are assuming before us and
-flaunting in our faces their claim to a social superiority, making a
-sham aristocracy, &#8220;caste,&#8221; in our country? It was not the pocketbook,
-for with regard to that proposition there can be no doubt that the
-American characteristic, &#8220;shrewdness in business,&#8221; would have inclined
-every voter to let well enough alone.</p>
-
-<p>The Republican party and the principles enunciated at Minneapolis with
-regard to Protection had certainly the best of the argument. From a
-business standpoint, what was and is, is well. What may be in the
-future, under the Free Trade theories of the Democratic party, from
-a business standpoint, is problematical. But the voter remembered
-the snubs, sneers, and insults inflicted upon his wife and family
-by would-be social superiors, whom he associated in his mind, in an
-unmistakable manner, with the Republican party.</p>
-
-<p>It was not a defeat upon the principles of the Republican party. It
-was a defeat of <i>class</i>,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_398" id="Page_398">[Pg 398]</a></span> &#8220;caste,&#8221; and sham aristocracy. It was not a
-defeat because of the pocketbook.</p>
-
-<p>On November 5th, the <i>Mail and Express</i>, of New York City, published
-the following editorial, which is absolutely truthful:&mdash;</p>
-
-<p class="center">BUSINESS AND POLITICS.</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;Here it is the last week before the Presidential election, and so
-sound are all the conditions that people seem to have little time
-to talk politics. Never before in the history of the country has
-business gone right on with so much more than usual activity for
-the season. Money has been easy and the volume of exchanges, as
-shown by the Clearing House returns, unprecedented for the season.
-Anxiety over the result of next Tuesday&#8217;s election has neither
-interfered with the ordinary trend of trade nor has it checked its
-activity.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The fact that wheat has this week sold at the lowest price ever
-known at New York (73&frac12; cents) must interest the farmer in
-the cry of English cheap labor. If the Englishman comes to this
-country because he can live better here, he increases the demand
-for bread, and the farmer can certainly get a better return for
-his produce when he sells it to a workingman at home instead of
-sending it 3,000 miles across the ocean, paying freight room in a
-foreign steamship to support a foreign workman.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;It is rather surprising that this cry should have been raised
-just at this time. If the consumer and the producer are brought
-closer together, is<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_399" id="Page_399">[Pg 399]</a></span> it not better for both? They save the cost of
-the transfer from one to the other. If the English weaver can come
-to this country and work, so that his product does not have to
-cross the ocean, and then get his wheat, flour, and meal without
-having to pay the additional cost, do not both profit? The country
-is so large that we can well afford to increase its population
-when we can reduce to a minimum the cost of the exchange of
-necessary means of life.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The market for iron is better all around, from the fact that
-stocks are being taken up faster than ever at this season of the
-year. This is due very largely to the even weather, which has been
-so favorable to building projects, the number of working days in
-October being probably more than in the same month for years, and
-now, in the first week of November, work is going on just the same.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;This will be apparent to every one who has watched the progress
-of work and seen new buildings reach the fifth or sixth story
-when, if the season had been adverse, they might not have been
-half as high at this time. The railroads have also contributed to
-consumption, for they are forehanded in placing early orders for
-the large increase in the equipment that they will have to have
-for next year.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The voluntary advance in wages by the Fall River manufacturers
-is another suggestive indication. The South has had three years
-of steadily increasing cotton crops. The country has not only
-exported more than ever, but it has consumed more, and out of this
-great crop the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_400" id="Page_400">[Pg 400]</a></span> proportion spun and woven in the United States has
-advanced even more rapidly. The figures will show that domestic
-consumption has increased proportionately faster than the crops.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;There is no better proof of prosperity than the ability of the
-people to buy clothes. Food they must have, but they can wear old
-clothes. Now, the woolen factories are full of work, and yet,
-thus late in the season, the orders are so large that the cotton
-manufacturers make a second advance in wages within three months.
-There is no idleness in the boot and shoe factories, and the
-rubber mills are as fully occupied.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The country never was more prosperous on the eve of election.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>It is impossible for a truthful man, who is not talking for the
-benefit of &#8220;the galleries,&#8221; or as a political demagogue, to dispute
-the facts recited in the above article in the <i>Mail and Express</i>.
-That argument and the facts therein recited, ought to have had great
-weight; but did they? No! And the reason? The <i>Mail and Express</i> is
-owned by Colonel Shepard&mdash;doubtless a most worthy gentleman&mdash;but,
-unfortunately for any effect that might be created by the utterances
-of Colonel Shepard; unfortunately for the influence looked for by
-articles published in the <i>Mail and Express</i> upon this occasion, it
-is well and thoroughly understood that Colonel Shepard is a very
-wealthy man, a son-in-law of the Vanderbilts; that he represents the
-money power of the Vanderbilt<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_401" id="Page_401">[Pg 401]</a></span> family. The people of New York City
-(and Colonel Shepard and the <i>Mail and Express</i> is but an example)
-said to Colonel Shepard, to the <i>Mail and Express</i>, in no hesitating
-manner, November 8th, We will not dispute the facts that you publish
-concerning our prosperity and the advantages that we enjoy under the
-Protective policy. You appeal forcibly to our pocketbooks. But it is
-now the turn of the people to say to Colonel Shepard, the <i>Mail and
-Express</i>, and all the representatives of capital&mdash;The truth of your
-argument, so far as our pocketbooks are concerned, to the contrary
-notwithstanding, you, Colonel Shepard, representing that <i>class</i> of
-which your father-in-law was a prominent member, and to quote from his
-magnificent rhetoric&mdash;you, Colonel Shepard, <i>Mail and Express</i>, and
-representatives of &#8220;caste&#8221; and sham aristocracy, now in turn we say
-it, &#8220;You be damned!&#8221; as Vanderbilt a few years ago said &#8220;The public be
-damned.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>We have been Republicans, we, the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; until the party for
-which we voted in 1860, and which, under the leadership of that great
-Commoner, Abraham Lincoln, forever silenced the claim of the Southerner
-to social superiority. We have been good Republicans until <i>you</i> have
-fostered and aggravated the ulcerous sore of a sham aristocracy,
-defiling the healthy and vigorous body of the Republican party. You
-may<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_402" id="Page_402">[Pg 402]</a></span> have the best of the argument on Protection; it may benefit our
-pocketbooks, but we are not selling our birthright, the equality of
-man, for a mess of pottage!</p>
-
-<p>The <i>Mail and Express</i>, at great trouble, and, doubtless, expense,
-furnished plausible excuses for the defeat of the Republican party, and
-disliking to admit the <i>true cause</i>, for in admitting that true cause,
-it would be necessary to hold the father-in-law of the proprietor
-of the newspaper responsible for his share of this &#8220;Waterloo.&#8221; (In
-fact, W. H. Vanderbilt was to the Republican party what Grouchy was
-to Napoleon at Waterloo.) With great care did the <i>Mail and Express</i>,
-saving no expense, ascertain the opinions of the various newspapers
-in the State of New York, concerning the cause of the defeat of the
-Republican party.</p>
-
-<p>Its columns were filled with the opinions of editors throughout the
-Empire State. Many and various were the reasons given. The defeat
-was blamed upon the &#8220;stay-at-homes&#8221;; the defection of the farmers
-on account of the McKinley Bill; the Saxton Ballot Law; a simple
-desire for a &#8220;change&#8221;; lack of organization; and a few correspondents
-intimated that the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; tired of accumulations of wealth,
-voted the Democratic ticket in the hope of securing relief and equality
-thereby. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_403" id="Page_403">[Pg 403]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>Could not one editor have been found by the inquiring representatives
-of the <i>Mail and Express</i> who possessed sagacity sufficient, coupled
-with enough frankness, to say, directly, that it was not against the
-policy of the Republican party, their platform, nor candidate, that
-the people voted November 8th, but that it was against that element
-in society which the proprietor of the <i>Mail and Express</i> represents
-so ably as the son-in-law of W. H. Vanderbilt, the sham aristocracy,
-snobbery, and the believers in &#8220;caste&#8221;?</p>
-
-<p>It is not so much a matter of astonishment that the editors of
-Republican newspapers should have misjudged with regard to the cause of
-the social revolution as it is to find that eminently representative
-American, General Benjamin Harrison, the candidate of the Republican
-and the present President of the United States, giving expression to
-ideas so erroneous as those accredited to him in an interview published
-in the New York <i>World</i>, November 13, 1892.</p>
-
-<p>The American people will always regard with kindly feeling the present
-President of the United States, General Benjamin Harrison, as a citizen
-of the Union, who was elevated to the position of Chief Executive of
-the nation, and who has kept faith with those by whom he was elected.
-It is well for a President, upon leaving the White House, to feel
-that he carries with him into his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_404" id="Page_404">[Pg 404]</a></span> reabsorption in the mass of the
-people, the respect and confidence of his fellow-citizens. President
-Harrison, personally, has the respect and admiration of every patriotic
-American citizen in this broad land of ours. He may feel justly that
-satisfaction which is the reward of services well rendered to the
-Republic. Had his party, or, rather, the party which nominated him,
-the Republican party, not been cursed with the crime of &#8220;caste,&#8221;
-doubtless he would have been re-elected, for he enjoys the confidence,
-irrespective of political affiliation, of each individual voter in the
-Federal Union.</p>
-
-<p>In the day of disaster to the party by which he had been nominated, in
-the bewilderment arising from the overwhelming defeat of the Republican
-party, President Harrison may reasonably be excused for his erroneous
-judgment as to the cause of the disaster to the Republican party.
-That he should seek for an excuse, standing upon the vantage ground
-of truth itself, in the idea that the people of the Union had become
-Free Traders, possibly may be justifiable. At the same time, President
-Harrison is so thoroughly American that we would have expected a
-nearer approach upon his part to the real cause of the defeat of the
-Republican party.</p>
-
-<p>That the Republican party had the best of the argument, so far as sound
-finance is concerned,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_405" id="Page_405">[Pg 405]</a></span> there can be no question or doubt. There lingers
-yet, in the minds of many voters, recollections of the debased currency
-in use prior to the National Banking Act, passed by the Republican
-party. A bill issued now by a bank has the guarantee of the credit of
-the Federal Government behind it. Such would not be the case should
-the penalty tax of ten per cent. upon State banks be repealed. Every
-dollar of currency to-day in use in America is worth a hundred cents.
-And a lively picture to the contrary is presented by the experience
-of those older citizens who endured all the inconveniences of a
-State bank currency. The most ardent Democrat (meaning member of the
-Democratic party) would hardly have temerity sufficient to assert that
-the financial policy, as advocated by the Democratic platform, adopted
-at the Chicago National Convention, is superior to the sound money
-existing by reason of the legislation enacted under the Republican
-administration of the finances of the Federal Government.</p>
-
-<p>But the people said, November 8, 1892, it matters not whether the
-currency be debased or not. We, the plain &#8220;Common People,&#8221; will not
-be debased into social inferiority! It matters not whether there be
-thousands of counterfeits in the currency of the community. We would
-rather have counterfeited currency than counterfeited aristocracy! The
-dollar to-day, guaranteed by<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_406" id="Page_406">[Pg 406]</a></span> the faith of the Federal Government,
-may be worth a hundred cents, and we&#8217;ll make it worth only fifty
-cents, as guaranteed by each State in the Union, but the position,
-socially and otherwise, of each man and citizen of the Union must be
-worth a <i>hundred cents</i>. And we are weary at the attempt made by sham
-aristocrats to depreciate the value of that doctrine, which is dearer
-to the American than dollars and cents&mdash;the <span class="smaller">EQUALITY OF MAN</span>.</p>
-
-<p>With regard to the Force Bill, the Republican party had the best of
-the argument. Their platform, as adopted in Minneapolis, only indorsed
-the idea of a fair, free, and honest election, all of which was
-but the reiteration of part of that Rock of Ages for the patriotic
-American&mdash;the Constitution of the United States. Can any man argue
-that, as a good citizen of the Union, it is proper for him to believe
-in anything other than a fair, honest election? If there be such, he
-is not to be found in the ranks of the plain, common, honest people,
-who absolutely abhor any fraud upon their franchise as citizens of the
-United States.</p>
-
-<p>So that, in point of fact, apparently the three great issues to be
-decided in the last campaign by the American people were: Protection
-<i>versus</i> Tariff; National Banks <i>versus</i> State Banks; Fair Elections
-<i>versus</i> Frauds on the Franchise. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_407" id="Page_407">[Pg 407]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>Without a moment&#8217;s hesitation, the American people would have decided
-that the Republican party should continue in control of the affairs
-of the nation, especially when that Republican party had for its
-standard-bearer a man who, like Benjamin Harrison, possessed the
-confidence of the American people&mdash;a man in whom the American people
-recognized every patriotic principle inherent in the breasts of the
-common, plain people of America.</p>
-
-<p>But the Republican party of 1892 had become lost in the mist arising
-from the exhalations from the manure heap of sham aristocracy and
-&#8220;caste.&#8221; Figures looming out of the gloom of the present, hardly
-compare favorably with those giants who cultivated the soil in which
-was planted the Republican oak tree.</p>
-
-<p>Through the miasma arising from the rotting present of the Republican
-party, the picture of Thomas Platt appears. In the pellucid atmosphere
-of the Republican party of the past, we see the picture of Seward.</p>
-
-<p>Amidst the odoriferous present we find the likeness of the skillful,
-the Honorable Matthew S. Quay. Upon the clear sky of the past is
-mirrored the majestic Roscoe Conkling.</p>
-
-<p>Amidst the hurly-burly and charlatan parade of the present, we
-perceive that prince of clowns and jesters, Chauncey M. Depew, king
-of after-dinner<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_408" id="Page_408">[Pg 408]</a></span> speech-makers, the witty buffoon who represents the
-princely Vanderbilts, the man who was never heard of except when
-clothed, either in dress suit or imported English clothing. By the side
-of this figure of the present, look back and see the picture of that
-man of the Republican party who met Stephen A. Douglas on the stump in
-Illinois, whose jests were filled with the meat of common-sense, whose
-heart was an out-gushing spring of kindness towards his fellow-men,
-the &#8220;Common People.&#8221; Place the present picture, Chauncey M. Depew, in
-dress suit, supported by the Vanderbilts&#8217; millions, beside the long,
-angular figure of that Illinoisian, Abraham Lincoln, supported by the
-people&mdash;but pause; this is sacrilege!</p>
-
-<p>Republicans, you know why your party was defeated. Be frank; be brave;
-be manly, and charge it upon the proper cause&mdash;&#8220;caste!&#8221; affectation!
-sham aristocracy! degeneracy!</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_409" id="Page_409">[Pg 409]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2><span>CHAPTER XXV.</span> <span class="smaller">THE POPULIST: THE &#8220;ALLIES.&#8221;&mdash;ELECTED BY THE PEOPLE; THEREFORE, WITH THE
-&#8220;COMMON PEOPLE.&#8221;</span></h2>
-
-<p>It does not seem to afford any great amount of pleasure for the
-hide-bound members of the Democratic party, the thought that possibly
-the Democratic party may become but a fifth wheel to the coach, and
-they view with evident dislike the growing power of the Populist party.</p>
-
-<p>Quoting from the New York <i>Sun</i>, of December 11th, that able
-representative, in a journalistic way, of the Protection Democrats, we
-print the following statements:&mdash;</p>
-
-<p class="center">WEAVER AND HIS MILLION VOTES.</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;The Populists are naturally excited and encouraged by their
-demonstration of numerical strength at the election of 1892. The
-Populist view of the achievement, and the Populist interpretation
-of its significance, are set forth in detail in the very
-interesting summary of results printed in another part of this
-paper. In brief, the claim is this:&mdash;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;One million votes in the South and West for the Weaver electors; </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_410" id="Page_410">[Pg 410]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Twenty-three electoral votes obtained by fusion or otherwise;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Five Populist Senators and ten Populist Representatives in the
-next Congress;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Populist State Governments in Kansas, Colorado, and North Dakota,
-and greatly increased Populist representation in the legislatures
-of these and several other States;&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>Which evidently furnishes no great amount of satisfaction to that
-organ, which is essentially Democratic in a party sense.</p>
-
-<p>Weaver, and his 1,000,000 votes, present the startling possibility
-to the organ of the Democratic party, that perhaps the people, who
-are members of that broader democracy, may be breaking away from the
-traces of the party harness. It is a little harder to prognosticate
-concerning future political events and manage the people, when they
-escape from party traces. The million votes for Weaver represent that
-part of the people who have become thoroughly exasperated by the manner
-of that excrescence, &#8220;sham aristocracy,&#8221; on the Republican party, and
-who, at the same time, were still unwilling to become harnessed in the
-party-wagon controlled by the Democratic party. Thousands would have
-been glad to vote with the Populists had that party not been filled
-with all kinds of incongruities and &#8220;isms.&#8221; There was a curse on the
-houses of both the Democratic and the Republican parties,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_411" id="Page_411">[Pg 411]</a></span> and the
-people, exclaiming with Mercutio, in Romeo and Juliet: &#8220;I am hurt;
-a plague o&#8217; both your houses! I am sped,&#8221; voted for Weaver and the
-Populists; because the plain &#8220;Common People,&#8221; who were Republicans of
-the Abraham Lincoln school, had no confidence in the Democratic party
-as a party. They were plain &#8220;Common People,&#8221; who wanted a party in
-which they would feel at home. They did not find it in the Democratic
-party, and, being absolutely disgusted with the degeneracy and social
-shams of the Republican party, they flocked to the party of the
-Populists to the extent of 1,000,000 voters, as presenting a haven&mdash;no
-matter how insufficient&mdash;in the storm created by the wrath of the
-people, caused by the idiocy and assumption upon the part of believers
-in &#8220;caste&#8221; in our country.</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;The prestige of gains and achievements, indicating that the
-Populist party is destined to become one of the two great
-political organizations of the country.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;This last item is the deduction of optimism from the foregoing.
-The heavy popular vote for the Populist electors in some of
-the Southern States serves principally to show that under the
-conditions existing in 1892, the solid South would have been
-broken and its solid electoral vote lost to the democracy had
-not the Force Bill issue been put at the front. The twenty-three
-electoral votes credited to Weaver in the West and Northwest
-separate themselves, on analysis, into elements<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_412" id="Page_412">[Pg 412]</a></span> in which the
-Omaha platform and the specially characteristic features of the
-Alliance movement sustain a subordinate part. Colorado and Nevada
-went for Weaver because they were for silver, not because they
-were for Weaver. Kansas, Idaho, North Dakota, and the one vote in
-Oregon were gained by the acquiescence of the Democratic managers
-in a scheme of fusion obviously to the advantage of the Democratic
-national ticket. Weaver&#8217;s proportion of the vote, either popular
-or electoral, cannot be accepted as a trustworthy measure of the
-growth of public sentiment in the West in favor of the general
-programme drawn up at Omaha.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The first solid and effective achievement in the list is the
-direct gain of the Populists in their representation in the
-Congress of the United States. This means something. They must
-have Senators and Representatives if they are ever going to shape
-the legislation of the country; and until they can legislate, or
-muster sufficient strength at the Capitol to force legislation
-agreeable to their ideas of public policy, they have accomplished
-nothing. Now they turn up with five Senators, as they believe,
-and with at least ten Representatives, as they have reason to be
-certain. It is a respectable showing for a new party, even if we
-do not count the silver Senators as Populists out and out. But,
-as an indication of the probable strength of the Populists in the
-Fifty-fourth Congress, or in the Fifty-fifth, as a reasonable
-assurance of future progressive development, it is worthless.
-We need only remind the Populists that their predecessor, the
-so-called<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_413" id="Page_413">[Pg 413]</a></span> National party, representing the greenback craze, and,
-in a measure, the dissatisfaction with political conditions that
-marked the period after the counting in of Hayes, went into the
-Forty-sixth House with fourteen Congressmen. The Greenbackers
-and Readjusters went into the Forty-seventh House with eleven
-Congressmen. In the Forty-eighth, their strength dropped to two.
-The Greenback wave had swept off and away; the two old parties
-confronted each other as before, and the phenomenon of a third
-party in Congress, mustering more than a dozen lawgivers, had
-disappeared as utterly as if it had never been.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The same thing is true respecting the capture, with the aid of
-fusion, of some of the Western States. Nobody has forgotten the
-astonishingly sudden appearance and subsidence of the Greenback
-wave in the old and conservative New England State of Maine. In
-1878, the Greenbackers cast about fifty per cent. more votes than
-the Democrats. In 1879, the Greenback vote was more than double
-the Democratic, and the election was thrown into the Legislature,
-which chose a Democratic Governor. In 1880, the Greenbackers
-fused with the remaining fragments of the Democracy, and carried
-the State and controlled its government. Where are the Maine
-Greenbackers to-day?</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The two great political organizations in this country have always
-been and must always be the party of centralization, paternalism,
-and meddlesome interference with affairs not belonging to the
-Federal Government, and the party resisting those destructive
-tendencies on the lines of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_414" id="Page_414">[Pg 414]</a></span> Jeffersonian Democracy and home rule.
-The issue is permanent and the same, no matter what the parties
-may call themselves. There is no chance for the Populists on the
-ground now occupied by the victorious Democracy. If they can crowd
-the Republican organization out of the special function which it
-has filled with distinguished ability for a quarter of a century,
-that is their business, not ours. The achievement would be much
-like Jonah swallowing the whale.&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>The Abolition party, which absorbed the old Whig party and made the
-present Republican party, had not nearly so respectable a beginning as
-the Populist party. With all the predictions of failure recited above,
-the Populist party has a name&mdash;and there is much in a name&mdash;which has
-already endeared it to the hearts of the masses to the extent of a
-million votes.</p>
-
-<p>It was the suffering masses, the plain &#8220;Common People,&#8221; who, under the
-name of Populist, voted for Weaver. There can be no doubt about the
-affiliation between the Democratic party and the Populist party in the
-next Congress of the United States. Every Representative elected by the
-Populist, every Senator selected as the result of their votes cast for
-the State legislators, will recognize that the Populist party contains
-the same elements, to the plain &#8220;Common People,&#8221; as the Democratic
-party, and, therefore, faith will best be kept with the constituents
-by whom the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_415" id="Page_415">[Pg 415]</a></span> Populist Representatives and Senators were elected, by
-acting with the Democratic party, so long as it continues to wage war
-upon &#8220;caste&#8221; and class distinctions and the accumulation of wealth in a
-dangerous degree in our country.</p>
-
-<p>The Populists have a mission in furnishing to the weary wayfarer
-a resting place. Many political wayfarers who formerly journeyed
-under the guidance of the Republican party, hesitate before seeking
-the protection of the Democratic party. To such the Populist party
-furnishes a haven of rest.</p>
-
-<p>Should the Democratic party and Grover Cleveland, as representative
-of the party by whom he was nominated, fail to secure to the &#8220;Common
-People&#8221; those rights of which they deem themselves deprived by the
-Republican party; and should there be a hesitancy or neglect in
-righting those wrongs of which the &#8220;Common People&#8221; complain, then the
-Populists, if some of the &#8220;isms&#8221; be weeded out of its fair garden,
-would furnish the Eden for the &#8220;Common People.&#8221; Should Grover Cleveland
-and the Democratic party neglect quickly and unhesitatingly to pass
-such laws, and execute the same, as will relieve the &#8220;Common People&#8221;
-of the burden that is cast upon them by ungraded taxation, then the
-&#8220;Common People,&#8221; by the might that abides with them, may select the
-Populist party, freed from some of its idiosyncrasies, as the party of
-the people. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_416" id="Page_416">[Pg 416]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>It is merely a question of whether the Democratic party and Grover
-Cleveland will perform the will of the people. If not, the people, by
-a reorganization of this, the Populist party, will secure a political
-organization which will perform the mandates of the &#8220;Common People.&#8221;
-The &#8220;Common People&#8221; will thrust aside both the old parties and utilize
-that party which by the magic of simply a popular name was enabled to
-gain a million votes taken from both of the old parties.</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_417" id="Page_417">[Pg 417]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2><span>CHAPTER XXVI.</span> <span class="smaller">&#8220;FLABBYISM&#8221; AND THE INCOME TAX.</span></h2>
-
-<p>Now, be it well understood that there is no attempt made, in
-commenting upon the article on the editorial page of the New York
-<i>Sun</i>, to disparage in any manner that worthy and eminent journal. It
-represents one part, or side, of that incongruous party, called the
-Democratic party, which presents phases as worthy of observance by the
-curiosity-seeker in the political field as the Populist party. On one
-side, Protection, endorsed by the New York <i>Sun</i>; Free Trade, endorsed
-by the New York <i>World</i>; a graded income tax, endorsed by the New York
-<i>World</i>, and even the suggestion of an income tax, dubbed by the New
-York <i>Sun</i> as &#8220;flabby talk.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>Noah Webster defines flabby to mean, &#8220;soft, yielding, loose, easily
-shaken.&#8221; Well, if the will of eleven million voters, as heard in the
-verdict rendered by the majority November 8, 1892, be &#8220;soft, yielding,
-easily shaken,&#8221; then the talk of an Income Tax <i>is flabby</i>, then the
-talk of a Graded Income Tax <i>is flabby</i>. The will of the majority of
-the said eleven million voters made possible the election of Grover
-Cleveland and the other nominees of the Democratic party. Possibly the
-will<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_418" id="Page_418">[Pg 418]</a></span> of the people, so expressed November 8th last, may be &#8220;flabby&#8221;;
-but there will be another and fearful story to tell unless the will
-of the people, as expressed, be executed by their servants selected
-November last.</p>
-
-<p>The New York <i>Sun</i> does not astonish the people&mdash;the plain &#8220;Common
-People&#8221;&mdash;of America when it announces a predilection upon the part of
-the privileged wealthy classes to commit perjury. The &#8220;Common People&#8221;
-of America have become accustomed to associate in their minds the
-worshipers of &#8220;caste&#8221; with every kind of crime which is consistent
-with their assumed superiority. It is only necessary to quote an
-article which appeared in one of the leading journals, to give evidence
-that, even under the present system of a tax on personal property,
-the inclination of these sham aristocrats, the would-be nobility of
-America, is to commit perjury. So worthy is the article of attention
-that it is given in <i>extenso</i>, that the people may judge of the animal
-they are chasing, and that the weapon, Grover Cleveland, may duly
-appreciate what efficiency is necessary, upon his part, as the weapon
-in the hands of the huntsman to destroy this beast of &#8220;caste&#8221; and
-accumulated wealth in our land:&mdash;</p>
-
-<blockquote><p>&#8220;Ever since the Comptroller and Tax Commissioners of the city
-declared war upon Lawyer H. Charles<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_419" id="Page_419">[Pg 419]</a></span> Ulman for issuing his famous
-circular, offering legal services to those whom he believed to
-be grossly wronged by a wilfully corrupt administration of the
-personal tax laws, the enterprising counsellor has been hard
-at work accumulating evidence in support of the very critical
-attitude he has assumed.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Mr. Ulman is a hard fighter and is determined to prove to the
-entire satisfaction of the public that the serious allegations he
-makes against our Tax Department officials are all true.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Yesterday Mr. Ulman notified me that he had completed the
-compilation of a few statistics which he desired to submit to
-the <span class="smcap">Herald</span> for publication. I found him ready with
-his statistics and loaded to the muzzle with hot shot for the
-Tax Commissioners in general and Tax Commissioner Feitner in
-particular.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;&#8216;Let us get right down to business,&#8217; were the words with which
-Mr. Ulman supplemented the regulation greeting. &#8216;I have recently,
-as all New York is aware, challenged the methods of our Tax
-Commissioners as to personal property taxation. I now reiterate
-the challenge and desire to submit to public judgment a few
-figures taken from the personal tax records recently opened for
-inspection. These figures conclusively prove that our richest men
-are assessed for ludicrously small personal properties, so small
-and palpably unfair as to establish the conviction that falsehood
-and fraud are at the bottom of the ridiculous valuations. Here is
-the list:&mdash;</p>
-
-<table summary="Valuations">
-  <tr>
-    <td></td>
-    <td><span class="smaller">Assessed for<br />Personal Prop-<br />erty to the<br />Value of</span></td>
-    <td></td>
-    <td></td>
-    <td><span class="smaller">Assessed for<br />Personal Prop-<br />erty to the<br />Value of</span></td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Jay Gould</td>
-    <td>$500,000</td>
-    <td>&nbsp; &nbsp;</td>
-    <td class="left">George Kemp</td>
-    <td>100,000</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">George J. Gould</td>
-    <td>10,000</td>
-    <td>&nbsp; &nbsp;</td>
-    <td class="left">Luther Kountz</td>
-    <td>10,000</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Russell Sage</td>
-    <td>100,000</td>
-    <td>&nbsp; &nbsp;</td>
-    <td class="left">Augustus Kountz</td>
-    <td>15,000</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Wm. Rockefeller</td>
-    <td>50,000</td>
-    <td>&nbsp; &nbsp;</td>
-    <td class="left">Andrew Carnegie</td>
-    <td>150,000</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">C. P. Huntington</td>
-    <td>150,000</td>
-    <td>&nbsp; &nbsp;</td>
-    <td class="left">Addison Cammack</td>
-    <td>100,000</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Henry Hilton</td>
-    <td>100,000</td>
-    <td>&nbsp; &nbsp;</td>
-    <td class="left">William Astor</td>
-    <td>500,000</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">E. S. Jaffray</td>
-    <td>100,000</td>
-    <td>&nbsp; &nbsp;</td>
-    <td class="left">W. W. Astor</td>
-    <td>4,311,400</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Morris K. Jesup</td>
-    <td>75,000</td>
-    <td>&nbsp; &nbsp;</td>
-    <td class="left">Henry Villard</td>
-    <td>25,000</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Eugene Kelly</td>
-    <td>100,000</td>
-    <td>&nbsp; &nbsp;</td>
-    <td class="left">Jessie Seligman</td>
-    <td>50,000</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left"><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_420" id="Page_420">[Pg 420]</a></span>James Seligman</td>
-    <td>50,000</td>
-    <td>&nbsp; &nbsp;</td>
-    <td class="left">Robert Goelet</td>
-    <td>150,000</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">I. Wormser</td>
-    <td>10,000</td>
-    <td>&nbsp; &nbsp;</td>
-    <td class="left">F. W. Vanderbilt</td>
-    <td>100,000</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">S. Wormser</td>
-    <td>10,000</td>
-    <td>&nbsp; &nbsp;</td>
-    <td class="left">G. W. Vanderbilt</td>
-    <td>100,000</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">D. O. Mills</td>
-    <td>50,000</td>
-    <td>&nbsp; &nbsp;</td>
-    <td class="left">W. K. Vanderbilt</td>
-    <td>200,000</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Henry Flagler</td>
-    <td>25,000</td>
-    <td>&nbsp; &nbsp;</td>
-    <td class="left">C. Vanderbilt</td>
-    <td>200,000</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">John H. Flagler</td>
-    <td>10,000</td>
-    <td>&nbsp; &nbsp;</td>
-    <td class="left">T. A. Havemeyer</td>
-    <td>100,000</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">R. P. Flower</td>
-    <td>150,000</td>
-    <td>&nbsp; &nbsp;</td>
-    <td class="left">H. O. Havemeyer</td>
-    <td>120,000</td>
-  </tr>
-  <tr>
-    <td class="left">Ogden Goelet</td>
-    <td>150,000</td>
-    <td>&nbsp; &nbsp;</td>
-    <td class="left">Wm. F. Havemeyer</td>
-    <td>15,000</td>
-  </tr>
-</table>
-
-<p>&#8220;&#8216;Now,&#8217;continued Mr. Ulman, &#8216;whether every one of these
-individuals appeared in person before the Commissioners, or
-whether the amounts were placed by the Deputy Commissioners, I
-cannot say.&#8217;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;The fact remains the same, that among all our very rich men
-there is but one&mdash;W. W. Astor&mdash;who pays taxes on anything
-like the amount of his actual personal property. Either the
-deputies charged with making the examinations have committed
-&#8216;larceny,&#8217; or the wealthy citizens above mentioned have appeared
-before the Commissioners, &#8216;swore off&#8217; as a matter of form, and
-been &#8216;whitewashed&#8217; as a matter of course upon due exercise of
-&#8216;influence.&#8217;</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;&#8216;Let me tell you something that will surprise the public. The
-ladies of the city are its heaviest tax-payers. Every one of them
-who has personal property has an assessment levied upon her to the
-full amount of her possessions. In her case there are no votes
-to be considered, no political influences to be placated, and,
-as a result, no deductions are made, no scaling or estimating is
-allowed, but every dollar possessed is taxed. I have, practically,
-but just inaugurated this crusade against the corruption existing
-in the Tax Office, and I believe that a careful examination of the
-public records, backed by the logic of facts and figures, will
-enable me to expose a degree of rottenness more startling even
-than that of the old Tweed ring.&#8217;</p>
-
-<p class="center">THE BLAME.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;&#8216;Who is to blame for the state of things in the Tax Office?&#8217; I
-asked. </p>
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_421" id="Page_421">[Pg 421]</a></span></p>
-
-<p>&#8220;Mr. Ulman pondered this question for some minutes before he
-replied, as though hesitating to convert his general charges
-against the Tax Department into a direct personality. But once
-having made up his mind, the counsellor sailed into the senior
-member of the Tax Commission&mdash;Mr. Thomas L. Feitner&mdash;with
-surprising vigor, handling him without gloves, and winding up with
-the suggestion of an appeal to Mayor Grant for his dismissal.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;&#8216;The fact of the matter is,&#8217; said the counsellor, &#8216;Mr. Feitner
-is the entire commission. The two gentlemen associated with him
-are comparatively new to the department, and are pushed into the
-background and kept there, by this all-wise Pooh Bah.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;&#8216;The Chief Justice and his associates on the bench of the Court
-of Appeals have had occasion to chide Feitner in their decisions,
-but Feitner will tell you that the Court of Appeals does not
-understand tax laws, and that its rulings are not good law.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;&#8216;Special capital is his special prey just at this time. Under
-the laws of New York it must be contributed in money and the
-amount advertised. This renders Mr. Feitner&#8217;s raid upon it a
-matter of very simple procedure, and he levies his assessments
-upon it whether the status of the property in which the capital
-is invested is in Spain, Africa, or New York. Nor does it matter
-if the money is invested in imported goods in original packages,
-although, by the constitution of the country, such goods are
-removed from the jurisdiction of the State&#8217;s taxing powers.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;&#8216;But this does not trouble Feitner. He puts his assessments upon
-capital so invested, compelling the owner to submit to a taxation
-of from ten to fifteen per cent. of his money or go into court by
-certiorari and obtain a release at an expense of more than the
-amount of illegal tax.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;&#8216;If Mayor Grant desires an equitable and proper administration
-of the Tax Office he will dismiss Mr. Feitner and appoint a man
-to fill his place who, to say<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_422" id="Page_422">[Pg 422]</a></span> the least, has a knowledge of
-commerce, the needs of business, and can understand the plainly
-written law when he reads it.</p>
-
-<p>&#8220;&#8216;There is another point in this matter which furnishes food for
-reflection&mdash;namely, the very small number of persons in this city
-who are assessed for taxation&mdash;less than thirteen thousand out of
-a taxable population of nearly one hundred thousand.&#8217;&#8221;</p></blockquote>
-
-<p>After reading the above&mdash;and presumably it is correct&mdash;let us stand in
-holy astonishment that Jay Gould should suddenly have acquired over
-$65,000,000 of personal property, according to his will, since this
-schedule and assessment of personal property was filed, because this
-late lamented Gould was the possessor of personal property only, with
-the exception of his residence. Therefore it is obvious, since he swore
-to possessing only $500,000 of personal property, that he must have
-acquired, in some miraculous manner, more than $65,000,000 of personal
-property, which he bequeathed to his children, according to his will,
-recently filed in the Surrogate&#8217;s office in the city of New York.</p>
-
-<p>Mr. George Gould swears that he has only $10,000 in personal property.
-Now who believes it? Mr. Russell Sage has only $100,000 in personal
-property! and the Vanderbilts each have from $100,000 to $200,000 worth!</p>
-
-<p>Poor men! Let the commiseration of the masses go forth. These
-gentlemen, who are accredited with the possession of millions, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_423" id="Page_423">[Pg 423]</a></span>
-who, when they die, find themselves suddenly possessed of the millions
-with which they are accredited by the public, are poor men while they
-live, and have to pay taxes!</p>
-
-<p>Right you are, New York <i>Sun</i>; an income tax would lead to perjury!
-Of course, not upon the part of the gentlemen named&mdash;for &#8220;Brutus was
-an honorable man&#8221;&mdash;but we will agree with you, after reading this
-schedule, that an income tax would lead to perjury. But let us suggest
-that we, the people, have elected a man as chief executive of the
-nation, who represents us, the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; and will see to the
-execution of the laws of the nation&mdash;Grover Cleveland. To be an honest
-man and fulfill the expectations of the people, he will see that those
-who should pay the expenses of the Government by an income tax shall
-make honest returns concerning their possessions, and pay that sum of
-money to which the Government is entitled.</p>
-
-<p>If he do not so, he is faithless, and the people will hold him
-accountable. The power of the Government will be in his hands&mdash;both
-branches of the Legislature. And should the National Legislature,
-selected by the people, deem it wise to furnish revenue for the
-Government, and pass an income tax graded according to the incomes
-received, then it will devolve upon Grover Cleveland, as trustee of
-the nation, to see that the will<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_424" id="Page_424">[Pg 424]</a></span> of the Legislature is executed. He
-has the power to appoint such officers as may be necessary to properly
-execute the laws of the Federal Union, and we, the &#8220;Common People,&#8221;
-will expect a ratification of all the promises made by him to the
-people of the Union. The people of the nation, trusting and relying
-upon his honesty and integrity, selected him for the high office of
-Chief Magistrate of the <span class="smaller">GREATEST NATION ON EARTH</span>. We have
-placed in his hands the power of the majority, and we shall expect the
-execution of such laws as the will of the majority may dictate; <i>the
-foremost of which will be an income tax</i>, whereby may be eradicated
-many of the evils of which the masses, the &#8220;plain people,&#8221; complain.</p>
-
-<p>Should perjury be committed&mdash;and it would not be astonishing, because
-the &#8220;plain people&#8221; of America are not apt to be astonished at anything
-vile that may be done by the sham aristocracy and worshipers of &#8220;caste&#8221;
-in our country&mdash;then let Grover Cleveland, as Executive of the nation,
-having the power of the people behind him, supported by the mighty
-voice of the broad democracy of our land, prosecute, by means of the
-officers of the Federal Government (paid by the people to punish crimes
-of the character indicated by the New York <i>Sun</i>, such as perjury),
-and, upon conviction, let the glorious sight be afforded to us plain
-&#8220;Common People,&#8221; of a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_425" id="Page_425">[Pg 425]</a></span> millionaire working in a shoe shop at Sing-Sing;
-let us see the stripes of the criminal adorning the backs of some
-of these good, my lords, the barons, who swear to lies and perjure
-themselves about their incomes; grab a dozen of them; convict them
-of perjury; make them appear before the people as criminals, as the
-people believe they are. One batch of a dozen going to Sing-Sing and
-Auburn&mdash;one batch of a dozen would-be Patricians breaking rock for the
-good of the public, would be a sight that would delight the very souls
-of the &#8220;Common People.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>The people make the laws! Now, you millionaires, obey the laws; and a
-transgression against those laws, though you be worth $100,000,000,
-will not be excused. The people believe that an income tax can
-be collected in spite of the perjury predicted by the New York
-<i>Sun</i>, because of the <span class="smaller">PUNISHMENT</span> that the <span class="smaller">PEOPLE WILL
-INFLICT</span> upon the perjurers.</p>
-
-<p>The people have had enough, a surfeit, of this cry of immunity from the
-consequences of crime because the criminal happens to possess wealth.
-We are weary, tired of it. And the people have made up their minds that
-the wealthy criminals shall be brought to the bar of justice along with
-the poorest, pilfering thief of a penny loaf. There shall not be in our
-land one law for the rich and another for the poor. If these wealthy
-criminals<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_426" id="Page_426">[Pg 426]</a></span> perjure themselves with regard to their incomes, they must
-be punished, and the people will expect the punishment and penalty to
-be inflicted by and through the administration of Grover Cleveland.</p>
-
-<p>To cry out, with the New York <i>Sun</i>, that &#8220;If you pass a law requiring
-the citizens of the American Union to swear to the truth and record
-their incomes, it is but offering an inducement to perjury, and,
-therefore, is undesirable,&#8221; is to admit that our Government is a
-failure, that a Republic is a failure, that the will of the majority
-shall not rule, that the American Constitution is a farce and a fraud,
-all of which the &#8220;Common People&#8221; will not believe to be the case.
-They demand the law! The enforcement of it rests with the Executive
-of the nation. The punishment rests upon the integrity and honor of
-the judiciary of the Federal courts. And there has been no evidence
-yet of a lack of honesty in the members of the Federal judiciary. The
-perjurers can and should be punished. If the Legislature of the nation,
-the Congress of the United States, will pass a graded income tax, as
-the people desire that they should do, the people believe that the
-law will be executed under the wise and honest administration of that
-Executive chosen by them November 8, 1892&mdash;Grover Cleveland. The people
-believe that, should any be accused of perjury and false return of
-their incomes, they will be prosecuted by the officers of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_427" id="Page_427">[Pg 427]</a></span> the Federal
-courts, who will be honest, being appointed by Grover Cleveland, the
-representative of the people; that, when so charged, perjurers brought
-to trial will be prosecuted fairly and ably by the representatives of
-the executive department, selected by the people November last, and,
-when so tried, the people, by twelve of their number, the jury, will
-decide whether the accused be guilty or innocent, and, if guilty, the
-people believe that the wealth and position of the accused will not
-enter into the consideration of the Magistrate representing the Federal
-Government, but that he will sentence a guilty man, even though he be
-worth a million or a hundred million, in the same manner as he would
-the commonest counterfeiter or petty larceny thief in the land.</p>
-
-<p>Believing thus, the plain people of America see no good reason or
-argument in the cry that an income tax will be productive of perjury
-and that it is a sufficient reason to prevent its passage. And,
-therefore, a graded income tax becomes the most desirable measure
-possible to introduce for the advantage of the people who elected the
-incoming administration, November 8, 1892.</p>
-
-<hr />
-
-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_428" id="Page_428">[Pg 428]</a></span></p>
-
-<h2><span>CHAPTER XXVII.</span> <span class="smaller">CONCLUSION.</span></h2>
-
-<p>It would be with feelings of regret that this volume is brought to
-an end if the object for which it was intended could reasonably be
-expected to be in any way nearer of attainment. Unfortunately for the
-successful solution of the social problem in the United States, such
-can hardly be hoped for by the publication of one book, or as the
-result of one election; it will require the efforts of many skillful
-writers, a vast number of volumes, and it is to be feared many and
-more serious exhibitions of the indignation felt by the &#8220;Plain People&#8221;
-than that of the election of November 8, 1892, to convince the sham
-aristocracy of our country, that the existence of &#8220;caste&#8221; or privileged
-classes will not be endured in Free America. It is to be dreaded by
-all who love the Union, that the blinded believers in snobbery and
-imitation of European manners will not be warned by the positive,
-pronounced disapprobation exhibited last election day of the plain
-&#8220;Common People&#8221; with the conduct, lives, morals, and manners of the
-worshipers of &#8220;caste;&#8221; that these sham aristocrats will neglect to
-heed the signal of danger which their insolence and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_429" id="Page_429">[Pg 429]</a></span> affectations have
-created in our loved Republic, until upon the next occasion the plain
-&#8220;Common People&#8221; may have become so incensed as to no longer exercise
-the great and good common-sense of the American people in dealing
-with questions of internal interest&mdash;but will throw to the winds
-moderation, and crush out the pretensions of that asinine part of the
-human family who believe in the possible existence of anything like
-&#8220;caste&#8221; in our country. To some of these shoddy aristocrats who have
-become absolutely intoxicated by their dreams of social greatness,
-this book will be unworthy of their condescending attention; they will
-dismiss the subject as the vaporings of a madman, without investigating
-the possible and more than probable theory expressed herein, that the
-result of the last Presidential election was produced, not by the fact
-that the people of the nation had become Free Traders and gone over
-to the Democratic party, <i>en masse</i>, but by the natural resentment
-felt by the democratic &#8220;plain&#8221; people of the country at the absurd
-and offensive pretensions of the wealthy classes who had fastened
-themselves like leeches upon the Republican party, and who, by aping
-the manners and morals of the aristocracy of Europe, had rendered
-themselves hateful in the eyes of the worth and merit of our land, the
-&#8220;Common People&#8221; of America. By the existence of this<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_430" id="Page_430">[Pg 430]</a></span> leech upon the
-body of the Republican party, all the pure patriotic blood had (in the
-opinion of the people) been sucked out of that Grand Old Party, leaving
-only a withered skeleton around whose fleshless form was twined in
-festoons the venomous serpent of &#8220;caste,&#8221; imported, like the cholera,
-along with much else of evil that comes to this dear land of ours from
-Europe.</p>
-
-<p>A small part of owners of villas at Newport and castles in Scotland
-will see in this book the expression of opinions which they dub as
-dangerous, and declare should entitle the utterer to the treatment
-accorded the private soldier who did not sympathize with the tyrannical
-Frick in his treatment of the Homestead strikers. This part of our
-would-be nobility have always ready in their throats the cry of
-&#8220;Socialist&#8221;&mdash;&#8220;Anarchist.&#8221; With studious care has the author of this
-volume insisted upon the fact that the only practical and effectual
-method of ridding the land of the curse that would result from the
-existence of &#8220;caste&#8221; here, is by the ballot&mdash;by laws enacted to prevent
-the accumulation of menacingly large fortunes in the hands of a few
-citizens of the Union.</p>
-
-<p>To this part of the pretended &#8220;Lords and Barons,&#8221; who declare that
-truth is sometimes best left unexpressed, and that a man may become
-dangerous by giving utterance to the feelings that fill the breasts of
-other men, it would be well to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_431" id="Page_431">[Pg 431]</a></span> consider which is the most efficacious
-method to be adopted in dealing with the bite of a mad dog, or a
-cancer. Is it by covering it with beautiful silken bandages, and thus
-concealing it from view, or is it by cauterization? Does concealment
-render the disease less dangerous or deep-seated? Recommending a cure,
-and not a curtain to cover the wound which festers all the more rapidly
-by the fact that it is heated by the covering, should be the line of
-treatment adopted by the good physician of the public body, as of
-the individual body. Every party slave may object to the idea of the
-victory of the &#8220;Common People,&#8221; November 8, 1892, being considered
-in any light save that of a party triumph. The fact remains just the
-same, however; party machination had little to do with results produced
-by the people at the last election. There are such positive and
-unmistakable indications of the demand of the people for the passage
-of a Graded Income Tax, that silence any longer upon the subject is
-puerile.</p>
-
-<p>When leading Democratic party newspapers, like the New York <i>World</i>,
-openly proclaim the necessity of such laws, it is useless to hesitate
-in meeting frankly the causes that led to the demand of the people for
-such legislation as a &#8220;Graded Income Tax.&#8221; Since part of this volume
-was put in type, an American citizen has died, leaving an estate of
-$70,000,000, which tremendous amount<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_432" id="Page_432">[Pg 432]</a></span> consisted almost entirely of
-personal property, upon which practically no taxes were paid. This
-almost countless mass of the wealth of the nation is held entirely by
-the descendants of Jay Gould. Not one dollar was bequeathed to one
-single object of charity. Not one poor man calls to mind the name of
-Jay Gould with gratitude. The common, plain people of America have no
-desire to rob the children of Jay Gould of that $70,000,000. &#8220;Enjoy
-that great fortune in peace and safety,&#8221; the people say to the Goulds;
-but the people also add this: &#8220;We have now an opportunity to judge of
-the supreme selfishness and absence of charity in the hearts of the
-millionaires. As an object lesson, Jay Gould&#8217;s will is valuable. In
-future give us a Graded Income Tax, and prevent the vast accumulation
-of wealth in the hands of the selfish and uncharitable.&#8221;</p>
-
-<p>&nbsp;</p>
-<p>&nbsp;</p>
-<hr />
-<p>&nbsp;</p>
-<p>&nbsp;</p>
-
-<div class="mynote"><p class="center">Transcriber&#8217;s Note:<br /><br />
-Obvious typographic errors have been corrected.<br /></p></div>
-
-<p>&nbsp;</p>
-<p>&nbsp;</p>
-<hr class="pgx" />
-<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CRIME OF CASTE IN OUR COUNTRY***</p>
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