TWO OF A KIND.
BY H. S. C.
THE McKinley administration has been in power long
enough to show that the only material distinction between
it and the Cleveland administration lies in the fact that it
is slightly more extravagant. That is the characteristic
of the Republican party and no one is surprised. In
addition to being the party of violence, bigotry and fraud,
it is also the party of gay liberality with other people's
money. In the matter of directing the destinies of this
country towards a higher and better national existence,
there is really nothing to choose between Republicanism
and Democracy. Both are equally unwilling and incompetent,
both, despite the prating of civil service snobs and
snivellers are dominated by spoils, and the managers of
both regard a campaign not as a battle for the betterment
of America but as a battle for boodle. The McKinley
administration has appointed some Negro postmasters
in the South. This the Democratic administration would
not have done. The McKinley administration has played
openly into the hands of the trust. This the Democratic
administration would have done secretly. The McKinley
administration enacted a tariff law which robs the people
openly for the benefit of a few. This the Democratic
administration would have done in sly paragraphs here
and there, in the meanwhile declaiming loudly against the
unrighteousness of tariff barons. The McKinley administration
has based its contracted currency solely upon the
gold product. This the Democratic administration would
have based, with almost equal fatuity, upon the silver
product. McKinleyism and the Democracy with which
the country has been cursed on two occasions since the
war, are six of one and half a dozen of the other. Practically
considered, the main difference between Republicanism
and Democracy, is the difference between the highwayman
and the sneak thief. This being so, the question
naturally arises: What are we going to do about it?
Nothing. That is, not yet. The time may come when
the people will choose public servants for fitness, and will
demand that they keep the pledges made as a condition
precedent to election, but it is far from us. In many of
the years to come we will continue to build up an office-holding class that is now so utterly idle, incompetent,
impudent and corrupt that the history of the world can
show nothing like it. This will be always so with universal
suffrage. A government which permits the ballot of a
man who has not a dollar's interest in the good conduct
of the government, who can neither read nor write, who
cannot speak the English language, who is permitted to
vote merely upon the declaration that he intends at some
time to become a citizen, will continue to be a rotten
government. The wonder is not that the United States
has had war internecine and otherwise, but that it has
existed at all. It carries within itself the elements of its
own damnation. It has within itself the seeds of decay.
Unless they are dug out, that which is now one of the
worst governments under the sun will be no government
at all.
