An Appeal to Patriotism.
Signs are plentiful that tens of thousands of honest Democrats and Republicans are profoundly dissatisfied with the trend of recent events.
We look to the State, and no beacon light gives us confidence.
The time was when our rulers loved the people, trusted the people, worked for the people. Those were the times when there was light on the hearth, plenty on the board, and hope in the hearts of the people.
Those were the times when our rulers remembered that our forefathers came here to build a temple, a government, differing in all vital respects from the hateful systems of the Old World.
For this very purpose—that of establishing a system entirely different from that of Europe—our forefathers braved the perils of the deep; fought hunger and faced death; battled with the wilderness and the savages it held; determined to die free, rather than live slaves.
In Europe they were fettered by class laws, class privileges, class tyrannies.
They were crowded out from a fair competition for a share of nature’s bounties by monopolies, chartered wrongs, statutory abuses, legalized spoliations.
Braver than we, their degenerate sons, they counted life worth nothing unless freedom went with it, and their coming here was a sublime protest against the Old World system of Class-law and special privilege.
What have we, today, as the result of all their heroism, and suffering and success?
We have our rulers aping everything Europe does, and fitting upon us, forever, the abominable system our forefathers fled to escape.
Where are class laws more insolently dominant than here?
Where is Special Privilege more tyranically exacting than here?
Where are monopolies more contemptuous of law and public welfare than here?
What people are greater slaves to misgovernment than you whose low-priced products must bear the strain of untaxed bonds, useless offices, and a steady growth of ever increasing salaries?
Who pay nine-tenths of all the taxes?
The many who toil.
Who gets the lion’s share of all the wealth produced?
The few who do not toil.
In what country do the laborers, in shop and mine and mill and field, produce more of the good things of life than ours?
It cannot be named.
In what country has nature opened her royal hands with a more regal bounty?
It cannot be named.
Has there been any failure of harvest?
No.
Has there been pestilence, invasion, or civil strife?
No.
Then why is it that the signal guns of distress sound all along the commercial seas, telling of brave ships going down?
Why is it that the feet of the homeless and the unemployed beat the pavements of our great cities with a never-ending march?
Oh, brothers! why are so many hearths chill and dark, so many hungry mouths unfed, so many despairing souls weighed down with the nameless dread of the unknown future?
We have left the beaten track of our fathers. We have let the old landmarks be forgotten. We have gone after strange gods.
We have foresworn the faith upon which our republic was founded, and are being led back to the system our ancestors came here to shun. Why can’t we all see it? Why can’t we all act together? Why can’t we lay down prejudice, pride and passion, and devote our noblest efforts to the salvation of our country?
AN ABSURD PROPOSITION.
How can the Republican party cut loose from its Morgan-isms, its McKinley-isms, its Carnegie-isms, its John Sherman-isms, its Standard Oil-isms, its Steel Trust-isms.
How can the Democratic party cut loose from its Cleveland-isms, its Carlisle-isms, its Wall Street-isms, its Whiskey Trust-isms, its Sugar Trust-isms?
Neither will ever cut loose.
In the coils of the serpents of the sea, Laocoon may struggle, but will nevertheless be powerless to escape.
Why cannot WE cut loose from these corrupt and class ruled organizations, as Jefferson cut loose from Federalism, as Jackson cut loose from National Republicanism?
While we dispute as to names and organizations, the State suffers. While we quibble over technicalities of political practice, liberty asks in vain for help.
Would it were not so!
Would that we could agree where we differ, unite where we divide, and love where we hate.
Would that some divine touch of duty could lift us all to the summits of patriotism where the only rivalry would be that of service—the only purpose that of redeeming the land from those who despoil it.
Call the party what you please—names are nothing—but let us have a Union of all patriots who believe in equal and exact justice to all men, without special privilege to any. Let us have a democracy ruled by the people, instead of this greedy, corrupt, heartless plutocracy ruled by corporate money.