OCR Text |
Show LIMITATIONS OF GOVERNMENT TERRITORIAL BONDAGE. Clarkson N. Totter of New York in a recent letter to Francis Kernan, chairman of tho delegation from that state to the St. .Louis convention, urges upon the democratic party three important principles of government: First, the establishment of a national court, to which every private claim now dependent upon the special action of congress should ho referred, no dollar to be paid on such claims without the judgment and sanction of such court first obtained. Second, the election hy the citizenB of localities locali-ties interested of postmasters, especially es-pecially of the smaller officos, the incumbents in-cumbents to he subject to removal by the postmaster general only for cause; third, all subordinate clerks and other minor government employes em-ployes to hold their positions during good behavior. This last reform, however, Mr. Potter admits, can hardly be put into practice under our present party system, except by a general agreement in advance that euch places Bbould not in the future be subject to party competition and control. Tho writer also suggests some declaration against subsidies and land grants, and the protection of vested rights against legislation by congress and the states. These amendments to the constitution would all be in the nature of limitations upon central government and party despotism, and in iuvor of local popular pop-ular government and individual freedom. free-dom. Such suggestions are worthy of careful attention by the democratic demo-cratic party at this turning point in our national history, when a halt is called for the people to determine whether the government shall con-1 con-1 tinue in the career of centralization ! and extravagance mapped out by tht t republican party, or go back to the old constitutional traditions and theories of the democracy, that for so long a period made the United States the best, freest, and cheapest government govern-ment on tho earth. But there i3 another topic upon which Mr. Potter might have enlarged en-larged with great effect. That is, the government of the organized territories terri-tories of the United States, which, under the theory and practice of the republican pArty, has become an unmixed despolism. Tho people of the states do not directly feel the weight of this crushing system of tyranny, and the people of the territories terri-tories having no political power cannot can-not appeal to either parly with any hope of their voice being heard or heeded. The democratic party, in-j deed, seem to be more obtuse in their disregard of the rights of the inhabitants inhabi-tants of the territories than the repub lican party, persistently refusing them even a representation in its national conventions. A full-fledged citizen of the United States residing outside the limits of a state has no rights which congress or the president is bound to respect, and nearly all the grievances complained of by the American colonists one hundred years aco in their declaration of independence independ-ence might be truely cited to-day by the subjects of the general government govern-ment resident in the territories. What will the democratic party do, should it succeed in November, to relieve more than half a million people from the subjection in which they are placed without constitutional authority? |