stantly encroaching upon the domain of private enterprise, until recently held sacred. The most advanced primary legislation on our statute books was passed by a Republican legislature and a Democratic governor.' Likewise the Democratic party has shown populistic tendencies. But because the party of opposition, of discontent and of the masses, it has naturally accepted more of the populist creed than the party in power, the party of capital and conservatism. Populism is very much alive in all parties of the day. Bryanism and Populism are not dead excrescences, but living parts of a great organism, the results of living causes and they are bound to continue active until these causes are removed. They are based upon a condition of fact, not an unrelated state of mind. They result from the inequalities of distribution which no one denies. They are akin to all those historic movements and creeds of the world's democracies, which have had as their object the equalizing of opportunity and privilege, or the minimizing of monopoly advantage. They revert in direct lineage to the ClevelandJackson-Jeffersonian Democracy, which the papers and journals of our time are wont to eulogize. It is not creditable to American journalism that historical inaccuracies with reference to the conservatism and dignity of the Jefferson-Jackson or even the Cleveland Democracy have gone practically unchallenged. To ascribe to Bryan the invention of "class politics" is to forget the traditions in which the Democracy glories. Jefferson, author of the Kentucky Resolutions of 1798, had no more reverence for the national judiciary, the Treasury squadron, nor the "stiff-necked aristocrats" from Boston, than has Bryan, opponent of Government by Injunction, for the judiciary of his day, the present treasury administration or for the "plutocrats of Wall Street." Monroe' urged upon Congress to prevent the monopoly 1 Minnesota, 1900. See ANNALS, November, 1900, p. 145. Messages, II, 17. of public lands by the capitalist class. Jackson was considered by the conservatives of his time a most violent demagogue, and, with Jefferson, gloried in the charge that he was attempting to array the masses against the classes. Cleveland, Mugwump as he was, the arch Democrat of the old school according to the current press, proclaimed himself the lineal descendant from those great fathers who battled for the masses against special privilege. He went further and declared that under the rule of the protected classes, there is not equality before the law.”1 When Democracy becomes conservative it will have outlived its usefulness and have repudiated its name. That it cannot endure as a conservative party, our history gives ample proof. It is this failure to accept the dictum of experience, which makes possible the extravagant verdict that radicalism in politics is forever abolished. racy that has changed but Conservatism. Jefferson's time have become the conventions of McKinley's generation. It is not Democ- If the causes which generated Bryanism and Populism and Prohibition and Socialism and Anti-Imperialism were not removed by the landslide of last November, then 48 per cent of the voters are still fundamentally and openly opposed to what has gone by the name of McKinleyism. Wise statesmanship will consider this numerically large opposition in determining legislative and administrative policies. The manifest duty of the party in power is, first, to hold what support it now has, and, secondly, to minimize the opposition. Neither can be done by branding opponents as Demagogues, Populists, Bryanites or Antis. For when opponents become numerous enough, opposition becomes respectable. The interpretation put upon the positive wishes of the 52 per cent majority does not seem to be less extravagant than the view taken of the future of the 48 per cent 1 Messages, VIII, 775. minority. Mr. McKinley himself warned his party that the desire to avert evil may be quite as powerful a motive as that to obtain good. The party press, as well as the foreign conservative press, have found in the "avalanche of votes under which Bryanism was buried" both desires working with superlative force. The victory is characterized as a splendid triumph "for the McKinley administration and everything it stood for." Which being interpreted means "a triumph for gold;""a victory for an unpartisan judiciary;" "universal support of the doctrine of protection.' "We do not wish to be a hermit nation;"' we have "upheld the foreign policy in a way that cannot be misunderstood;" we have declared "in favor of the expansion of the American nation to include territory other than that on the North American continent;" we "recognize the manifest destiny of this nation to be one of the greatest of modern world powers, and assert that that which is called Imperialism is but the indication of a healthy growth, properly termed expansion." These general explanatory phrases have since been translated into headings for legislative bills and upon them is based the conclusion: The American people demanded on November 6, by the largest vote ever given any executive, a ship subsidy bill; a permanent increase of the army; a continuance of the gold standard; the Dingley tariff, and the Republican trust policy; the continued interference of the judiciary in strike difficulties, and protective barriers between the United States and her colonial dependencies. "The people have decided, after deliberation, that it is not desirable that the Constitution follow the flag." These claims are certainly not based upon an analysis of the factors which co-operated in Mr. McKinley's re-election. Prosperity ( a), protection (b), the gold standard (c), the party's trust policy (= d), and the colonial policy (e), combined to attract 52 per cent of the votes. The first factor may, for reasons beyond the control of the Republican party, hide its alluring face before the next election. Then it will be important to have a majority who love the party's principles, and trust its methods in adversity as in prosperity. The problem may be presented in a mathematical form: a+b+c+d+e= 52 per cent of the votes, i. e., a + b + c + d + e > a' +b+c+d' + e'. It does not follow that b> b', c> c', d > d'or e > e'. Nor does it follow even that b+c+d+e > b' + c + d + e. It may be that b+c+d+e < b'+c+d+e'. In this case the elimination of a as a factor would leave the Republican party with a minority. Neither the party press nor the outline of proposed Congressional legislation gives evidence that the algebraic problem has been studied and solved by those most vitally interested. Instead, the party mathematicians argue, a+b+c+d+e > a' + b'+c+d+ e.' .. a> a', b> b', c> c', d>d' and e>e'. Q. E.D. The President has not only asserted that a logical and scientific analysis of the returns is indispensable to the proper execution of the popular will, but he has himself publicly presented such an analysis.' In the following order he has named the factors which co-operated to give him a 2 per cent majority of the popular vote: (1) "Our splendid party." (2) "The Gold Democrats." (3) "The Silver Republicans." (4) "The almost unbroken column of mechanics and agricultural laborers." (5) "The home influence." (6) "The business interests." If the co operation of all these factors was necessary to its success, then the party in power may not, without jeopardizing its future prospects, do anything which any one of these factors disapproves, unless by so doing compensating accessions are obtained from the opposition. The votes of the party organization were cast for whatever happened to go by the name of Republicanism. Under adverse circumstances in 1892, 43 per cent of the voters 1 November 24, 1900, before the Union League, Philadelphia. were steadfast in support of Republicanism; in 1888 and 1884 the party polled 47.7 and 48.5, of the votes. The party in 1900, therefore, probably received from 3.5 to 9 per cent of the total vote cast from the five independent factors enumerated by the President. On what issues did the regular traditional party organization receive the votes of these outsiders? To an onlooker this does not seem to be a very difficult question to answer. The negations of certain of the factors are so well known that we can readily determine several issues on which these factors did not unite with the Republican party. For instance, "the Gold Democrats" did not approve the Dingley Tariff, the ship subsidy bill, the Porto Rican tariff, nor the theory that the constitution is not coextensive with executive authority. "The Silver Republicans" distrusted monometallism. The mechanics and laborers did not form "an unbroken column" in support of Government by Injunction, the administration trust policy, nor the colonization of the Philippines. "The Home," to a great extent, disapproved the army canteen, the trust policy and the Porto Rican tariff. "Business Interests" did not universally endorse the Republican trust policy. To not one single positive proposition of the dominant party did these five contributaries give unqualified endorsement. To nearly every such proposition some one of these factors stands irrevocably and traditionally opposed. Yet they all united in support of McKinley. By a process of elimination, as well as by reference to pre-election pledges, it appears evident that these factors voted for a set of conditions, not a set of theories. They voted for Prosperity and against change. At the opening of the campaign Prosperity was a universally recognized condition, not an issue. The people had taken the Republican party at its word and believed that the promise had been fulfilled to make gold the standard of value.' They knew, furthermore, that the silver 1 Platform, 1900. |