Democrat Party (United States)

“ To these young men who will, for the first time this year, take part as citizens in determining a presidential election, I suggest that you have become members of a party of precious memories. There has been nothing in the history of the Republican party, nothing in the platform of principles that it has proclaimed, that is not calculated to stir the high impulses of your young hearts. The Republican party has walked upon high paths. It has set before it ever the maintenance of the Union, the honor of its flag, and the prosperity of our people. ”

“ If the Democrats are equal to the occasion they will render the Progressives superfluous. But Democrats have a habit of not being equal to the occasion. If the Progressives show a judgment as cool as their emotions are warm, they may prove as great as the Republican party was once, the phoenix from its ashes. ”

“ From these, including Know Nothings, Abolitionists, Free Soilers, and Northern Democrats, was builded, in 1856, the present Republican party, whose foundation stone was opposition to the extension of slavery. Many minor parties have sprung into ephemeral life from time to time, but the Democrats and Republicans will undoubtedly be the two great political organizations for many years to come, as they have been for so many years past. ”

“ Now we must hold all these forward- looking people in line with us and make the Democratic party realize the dream that you and I had of it when we were boys, thirty years ago, and took part in our first campaign. There is room for only two parties in the United States, the liberal and the conservative, and ours must be the liberal party. ”

“ Of all the political parties which have ever existed, the Democratic party are the most indulgent and confiding masters. All they demand of any public servant is honestly and faithfully to represent their principles in the station where they have placed him; and this I feel proudly conscious that I have done in the Senate of the United States, according to my best ability. ”

“ If I have done anything like justice in this necessarily hasty sketch to the origin and development of the Democratic party of the United States, my readers will not need to be told that its advent to power at this time opens a new and most important chapter in the annals of the American Republic. It involves much, very much more than the transfer of executive power from one to another set of administrative officers. ”

“ But, sir, it is for our benefit, as well as for the benefit of the proscribed class, that I vote for and support impartial manhood suffrage in this District. We can not afford, as a nation, to keep any class ignorant or oppress the weak. We must establish here republican government. That which wrongs one man, in the end recoils on the many. Sir, if we accept, as the Republican party of the Union, our true position and our duty, we shall nobly win. If we are false and recreant, we shall miserably fail. ”

“ I met a lady the other day, not an elderly lady, who said to me with pride: "Why, I have been a Democrat ever since they hunted them with dogs." And you would really suppose, to hear some men talk, that Democrats were outlaws and did not share the life of the United States. ”

“ THE DEMOCRATIC VICTORY IN AMERICA. BY WILLIAM HENRY HURLBURT.
The United States being, and having been from the outset of their history, a Democratic Republic, it may well puzzle a European reader to understand why American “Republicans” should bewail a “Democratic” triumph, or American “Democrats” exult in the overthrow of a “Republican” party.
Yet it may not be impertinent to suggest that in no country are the names of political parties or factions commonly selected by a committee of philologists with an eye to making the national politics intelligible. ”

“ All American parties accepted long ago in theory “Jeffersonian democracy”; but the Democratic party has been “the political champion of those elements of the [American] democracy which are most democratic. It stands nearest the people.” [9] It may be noted that the Jeffersonian Republicans did not attempt to democratize the constitution itself. The choice of a president was soon popularized, however, in effect; and the popular election of United States senators is to-day a definite Democratic tenet. ”

“ But this prosperous organization has grown so rapidly since its birth, ten years ago, that it has overstepped all old and traditional party limitations. One-half of the House is not sufficient to afford its representatives adequate accommodations. Republican members have passed over the main aisle, and occupy half of the Democratic side, having pressed the thin ranks of their opponents to the extreme left. ”

“ Under a popular government like ours it is of the first importance that every man who votes should have some reason for his vote; that every man who attaches himself to this or that political party should intelligently understand both the creed and the purposes of the party to which he belongs. I think it is universally conceded by Democrats as well as by Republicans that the questions involved in this campaign do have a very direct bearing upon the national prosperity, and upon the prosperity and welfare of the individual citizen. ”

“ The Democratic party must rely upon themselves and await events. I see the Democratic members have been holding meetings preparatory to the assemblage of Congress. On their prudence, firmness and decision much will depend. Their platform, if it be wise, will give tone to the party throughout the country. ”

“ It is our hope and expectation that this brief account of the Republican party, of what it has stood for and what it stands for today, will assist in convincing an impressive majority of the new voters of the United States that it is the party which on the whole record is the more worthy of their choice. ”

“ In this State, to which I came in my earliest manhood, the Republicans are as staunch and true, as valorous and resolute, as can be found in any of the States. You have no advantage of us except in numbers. We welcome you all as Republicans. [A voice, "That's what we are!"] We believe that our party now advocates another great principle that needs to be established—made fast—put where it shall be beyond assault. It is a principle which has wrought marvellously in the development of our country since the war. ”

“ And it's important, as I said on election night, that we enter into the new administration with a sense of humility and a recognition that wisdom is not the monopoly of any one party. In order for us to be effective, given the scope and the scale of the challenges that we face, Republicans and Democrats are going to have to work together. ”

“ You ask my opinion as to the course which the approaching convention ought to pursue. Whilst I do not feel myself competent to state in detail what ought to be their proceedings, yet one thing is certain; they ought, neither directly nor indirectly, to break up the organization of the old Democratic party by forming anything like a new party. Leaving this as it is, and must ever remain, they ought to confine themselves pretty much to the question of reconstruction, and to the admission of Senators and Representatives from the Southern States. ”

“ Do those who are Democrats from principle, and not for personal spoils, intend to support the men who have first prostituted our benevolent institutions to party and now to personal advantage? These things, if not reproved and corrected by our people, will not only disgrace us in the estimation of all good people, but will substantially retard the material development of the State. [Cheers.] I am not talking to-day of questions in which I have any other interest than that you have, my fellow-citizens. ”

“ Democrats have been dropping off from their party from year to year on questions not essentially of a party character. It will be your destiny to call home the wanderers and marshal them again under the ample folds of the Democratic flag. ”

“ After the new parties were well under way, the Democrats in most of the States, being in a hopeless minority, made common cause with them in the hope of thus compassing the defeat of their hereditary rivals, the old-line Republicans. ”

“ When all the records of our past history prove that American Democrats have ever opened wide their arms to receive foreigners flying from oppression in their native land, and have always bestowed upon them the rights of American citizens, after a brief period of residence in this country. The Democratic party have always gloried in this policy, and its fruits have been to increase our population and our power with unexampled rapidity, and to furnish our country with vast numbers of industrious, patriotic and useful citizens. ”

“ While it was in the power of this Democratic Convention to antagonize the Republican party with a platform, simple, reasonable and just to all sections, on which the votes of all sections could be asked, it became divided into a Northern and a Southern faction, and wholly lost the opportunity of appealing to a national spirit of harmony and good-will. ”

“ We sincerely deprecate all sectional feeling and tendencies. We, therefore, note with deep solicitude that the Democratic party counts, as its chief hope of success, upon the electoral vote of a united, south, secured through the efforts of those who were recently arrayed against the nation; and we invoke the earnest attention of the country to the grave truth that a success thus achieved would reopen sectional strife, and imperil national honor and human rights. ”

“ There is no salvation in a narrow and bigoted partisanship. But if there is to be responsible party government, the party label must be something more than a mere device for securing office. Unless those who are elected under the same party designation are willing to assume sufficient responsibility and exhibit sufficient loyalty and coherence, so that they can cooperate with each other in the support of the broad general principles, of the party platform, the election is merely a mockery, no decision is made at the polls, and there is no representation of the popular will. ”

“ The serious issue before us tonight is the cause for which the Democratic Party has stood in its finest hours, the cause that keeps our Party young and makes it, in the second century of its age, the largest political party in this republic and the longest lasting political party on this planet. ”

“ If the Republican party cannot stand a demand for justice and fair play, it ought to go down. We were men before that party was born, and our manhood is more sacred than any party can be. Parties were made for men, not men for parties. ”

“ This, as its platform and the manifestoes of its candidates clearly show, is the purpose of the Democratic party. It is evident that the Republicans, placing themselves upon the ground of results already accomplished, have the advantage in argument; for the Democrats will not persuade the prudent and patriotic people of this Republic to overthrow that which exists and to launch into new struggles, troubles and uncertainties, unless they clearly show that that which has been accomplished is intrinsically bad, and that they have something better to put in its place. ”

“ I congratulate you, fellow-citizens, upon the nomination of Franklin Pierce and William R. King, for the two highest offices in your gift. This nomination has proved to be a most fortunate event for the Democratic party of the country. It has produced unanimity everywhere in our great and glorious party; and when firmly united we can stand against the world in arms. It has terminated, I trust forever, the divisions which existed in our ranks; and which, but a few short months ago, portended dire defeat in the present Presidential contest. ”

“ He believed in democracy and wished government to be simple in every respect. Being suspicious by nature, he thought that Hamilton and the Federalists were aiming to establish a strong republic that might develop into a monarchy. In order to oppose them, he drew together all the dissatisfied elements in the country, as well as all the advocates of a simple, popular government, into a party soon known as the Democratic-Republicans. Under one name or another, the two parties formed under Hamilton and Jefferson have existed to our own day. ”

“ Every party imagines itself the right party, and welcomes him joyfully to its bosom. Republicans love him, Independents worship him, while Democrats would endure even the Fifteenth Amendment for his sake. ”

“ Having enjoyed no opportunities for corruption worthy of mention, except in New York City where they had reaped a good harvest during the sunshine, the Democrats could honestly pose as the party of "purity in politics." ”

“ And he shows that the one dominant fact in this contest is that the more closely the Republicans adhere to their essential policy, the worse must be the demoralizing effect, and, per contra, the more faithful the Democratic party is to its avowed principles, the more wholesome and beneficent must be its influence on the country. ”

“ When the country has bestowed its confidence upon a party by making it a majority in the Congress, it has a right to expect such unity of action as will make the party majority an effective instrument of government. ”