POLITICS AS A FORM OF CIVIL WAR. 599 



consequence whether such men spell or speak correctly, or whether 

 they conduct themselves like boors and ruffians.* 



As implied in all that has been said, it is, however, upon morals 

 that the effect of politics is the most deplorable. From the beginning 

 of the discussion of the party platform and the nomination of the can- 

 didates to the induction of the successful combatants into office, the 

 principles applied to the transaction of business play the smallest pos- 

 sible part. The principles observed are those of war. All the tactics 

 needful to achieve success in the one are indispensable to success in 

 the other. First, there is, as I have already said, an attempt to misrep- 

 resent and injure political opponents, and, next, to confuse, befool, 

 and pillage the public. I shall not, however, describe the factional 

 conflicts that precede a convention — the intrigue, the bribery, the 

 circulation of false stories, and even the forgery of telegrams like the 

 one that brought about the nomination and defeat of Secretary 

 Folger. They exhibit only on a small scale the ethics of party war- 

 fare in general. More needful is it to illustrate these, and to make 

 clear the vanity of any hope of moral reform through politics, or 

 through any other agency, either religious, philanthropic, or peda- 

 gogic, as long as it remains a dominant activity of social life. 



" If Mr. Gage had been a politician as well as a banker," said 

 Senator Frye, criticising the secretary's honesty and courage at a 

 time when both were urgently needed, " he would not have insisted 

 upon a declaration in favor of a single gold standard. It was all 

 right for him to submit his scheme of finance, but hardly politic to be 

 so specific about the gold standard." Always adjusted to this low 

 and debased conception of duty, a party platform is seldom or never 

 framed in accordance with the highest convictions of the most intel- 

 ligent and upright men in the party. The object is not the proclama- 

 tion of the exact truth, as they see it, but to capture the greatest 

 number of votes. If there is a vital question about which a differ- 

 ence of opinion exists, the work of putting it into a form palatable to 

 everybody is intrusted to some cunning expert in verbal juggling. 

 A money plank, for instance, is drawn up in such a way that the 

 candidate standing upon it may be represented by editors and orators 

 of easy consciences as either for or against the gold standard. The 

 same was true for years of the slave and tariff questions; it is still 

 true of the temperance question, the question of civil-service reform, 



* As in the demand of Johnny Powers, the great Chicago boss, for the removal of Hull 

 House from his ward, politics often leads to hostility to the work of philanthropists to amel- 

 iorate the condition of the poor. Another striking example of the same evil was the fail- 

 ure of a Quay legislature to provide for the maintenance of the State charitable institutions 

 of Pennsylvania, and its sham investigation of the pitiful condition of the inhabitants of a 

 mining district. 



