The Century Illustrated Monthly Magazine, October, 1913: Vol. LXXXVI. New Series: Vol. LXIV. May to October, 1913Various
General
The Century Illustrated Monthly Magazine, October, 1913: Vol. LXXXVI. New Series: Vol. LXIV. May to October, 1913
Various
Periodicals
As to the first fact, it is hardly necessary to point out that the
two old parties to-day no longer deal in any real sense with the
issues of fifty and sixty years ago. At that time there was a very
genuine division-line between the Republicans and the Democrats. The
Republicans of those years stood for a combination of all that was
best in the political philosophies of both Jefferson and Hamilton; and
under Lincoln they represented the extreme democratic movement which
was headed by Jefferson and also that insistence upon national union
and governmental efficiency which were Hamilton’s great contributions
to our political life in the formative period of the republic. The
Republicanism of that day was something real and vital, and the
Republican party under Lincoln was the radical party of the country,
abhorred and distrusted by the reactionaries and ultraconservatives,
especially in the great financial centers, precisely as is now true of
the Progressives. The Democratic party of that day, on the contrary,
was no longer the party either of Jefferson or of Jackson, whose points
of unlikeness were at least as striking as their points of likeness,
and in the world of politics stood for slavery and for such development
of the extreme particularistic doctrine euphoniously known as “States’
rights,” as to mean, when carried to its logical extreme, total
paralysis of governmental functions and ultimately disunion.
The outbreak of the Civil War and its successful conclusion forced the
majority of the conservative class of the North into the Republican
ranks; for when national dissolution is an issue, or even when any
serious disaster is threatened, all other issues sink out of sight when
compared with the vital need of sustaining the National Government.
There is no possibility of even approximating to social and industrial
justice if the National Government shows itself impotent to deal with
malice domestic and foreign levy.
On the other hand, after the Civil War, the Democratic party found its
position one of mere negation or mere antagonism to the Republican
party. The Democrats in the Northern States had very different
principles in the East and the West, and both in the East and the West
alike they had nothing in common with the Democrats of the South save
the bond of hatred to Republicanism.
OLD PARTIES AND NEW ISSUES
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