Party wall

“ There was a period in which I fancied these parasites were the monopoly of one political party. But I soon learned that this was far from being the case. All the four parties which the twentieth century saw established in parliament are equally surrounded by their camp followers, who each differ from each other only superficially, and, not unseldom, transfer their allegiance in pursuit of fatter game. ”

“ If we would leave parties to the politicians, and would vote not for the party, not even for men, but for the city, and the State, and the nation, we should rule parties, and cities, and States, and nation. If we would vote in mass on the more promising ticket, or, if the two are equally bad, would throw out the party that is in, and wait till the next election and then throw out the other party that is in—then, I say, the commercial politician would feel a demand for good government and he would supply it. ”

“ Mad merry Yule-tide was in full possession of London as the coach containing the Lady Rebecca and her party posted up from Plymouth.
Rolfe eagerly pointed out to Pocahontas the various places of interest as they came into South Wark.
“Here on our left, sweetheart, is Erber House, once the home of Sir Francis Drake. See that round tower lying to the west of it? That is Paris Garden, where the common folk resort to witness the bear-baiting. Yonder to the northeast rises the Tower of London. Long ago its walls resounded with mirth and feasting, now it is a gloomy prison house. ”

“ The questions of education, saloon regulation, taxation, corporation control, bank guarantee, pure food, or the tariff on foreigners or foreign goods, have now no certain standing and support in the legislature or before the people.
By making an issue and division inside the party lines, of "assembly" or "anti- assembly" for the suggestion of candidates, a political party is "slaughtered in the house of its friends." ”

“ So that, it seems to me, we can neither expect to get on without established parties, nor, having established parties, can we expect to escape machine methods whatever the parties divide on; and it also seems to me that, whether we like it or not, we must get on in city politics with the national parties—except that as a last resort there is the citizens' ticket as a corrective of a permanent party system. ”

“ At the ballot-box, whether at home or in the camp, they are Union men, and vote as they fight, and hold little in common with the political leaders of the Democratic Party in or out of this Hall—the Seymours, the Woods, the Vallandighams, the Woodwards, and their indorsers, who hold and control the Democratic Party here, and taint it with Treason, till it is a stench in the nostrils of all patriotic men. ”

“ And Parliament would become a gathering of prominent men instead of a means to prominence.
The two-party system which holds all the English-speaking countries to-day in its grip would certainly be broken up by Proportional Representation. Sane Voting in the end would kill the Liberal and Tory and Democratic and Republican party machines. That secret rottenness of our public life, that hidden conclave which sells honours, fouls finance, muddles public affairs, fools the passionate desires of the people, and ruins honest men by obscure campaigns would become impossible. ”

“ The mesmeric influence of national party names in civic politics is waning; the rise of home rule for the city is severing the unholy alliance between the legislature and the local Ring; the power to grant franchises is being taken away from legislative bodies and placed directly with the people; nominations are passing out of the hands of cliques and are being made the gift of the voters through petitions and primaries ”

“ Posing as a Chamber of review remote from popular passion, far from the swaying influences of the electorate, it nevertheless exhibits a taste for cheap electioneering, a subserviency to caucus direction, and a party spirit upon a level with many of the least reputable [217] elective Chambers in the world; and beneath the imposing mask of an assembly of notables backed by the prescription and traditions of centuries we discern the leer of the artful dodger, who has got the straight tip from the party agent.
It is not possible for reasonable men to defend such a system or such an institution. ”

“ Every vote is counted and every voter known, and to make assurance doubly sure the polls are guarded by both parties, and the noble citizen runs the gauntlet through double lines of detestable township or ward politicians, potent for mischief in their sneers and jeers, and, if need be, ready with dirty fists or clubs, sometimes revolvers, to back the edict of the party. ”

“ I press these points in order to justify me in making this statement, that the House of Lords, as it at present exists and acts, is not a national institution, but a Party dodge, an apparatus and instrument at the disposal of one political faction; and it is used in the most unscrupulous manner to injure and humiliate the opposite faction. ”

“ I know now that14 I was witnessing the crude beginnings of the money-machine in politics,—the beginnings of the downfall of parties,—the beginnings of the overthrow of the people as the political power. Those stiff-armed men were the "floating voters" of that ward of Pulaski. They had been bought up by a rich candidate of the opposition party, which was less scrupulous than our party, then in the flush of devotion to "principles" and led by such old-fashioned men as my father with old-fashioned notions of honor and honesty. ”

“ Whatever the two party organisations have a mind to do together, whatever issue they chance to reserve from “party politics,” is as much beyond the control of the free and independent voter as if he were a slave subject in ancient Peru. ”

“ The franchises had been broadened until it included masses of ignorant men, ‘urban myriads,’ who went in their featureless thousands to vote together. And the natural consequence of a swarming constituency is the rule of the party organisation. Power was passing even in the Victorian time to the party machinery, secret, complex, and corrupt. Very speedily power was in the hands of great men of business who financed the machines. ”

“ It is a theory of permanent civil war carried on through the forms of parliamentary debate and popular election, and, indeed, the two traditional parties are the political descendants of the two sides which in the seventeenth century were actually engaged in civil war. For the ordinary purposes of the domestic life of the country the system has its advantages, but they are coupled with grave drawbacks. The party system destroys the sincerity of our political life, and introduces a dangerous dilettantism into the administration of public business. ”

“ These, when the offenses of the party in power become most flagrant, unite, and New York is temporarily freed from “boss” rule, to enjoy a respite of “reform administration.” Into such “moral campaigns” the House on Henry Street has always entered, and sometimes it has helped to initiate them, though steadily refusing to be brought officially into a political party or faction. Indeed, it would be impossible to range residents or club members under one political banner. As is natural in so large a group, nearly every shade of political faith is represented. ”

“ Whenever, if ever, they begin to be a power in the elections and get members in the House, the temptation to be members of a real live party which may have the government of the country in its hands, the temptation to what is (facetiously, I suppose) called practical politics, will be too much for many, even of those who gravitate towards Socialism; a quasi-Democratic parliamentary party, therefore, would probably be merely a recruiting ground, a nursery for the left wing of the Whigs ”

“ Neither do the independent movements we observe in several States distinctly foreshadow new party formations on the field of national politics. They are protests against “machine” rule, as in Pennsylvania, or against a narrow-minded and vicious use of party power by factions, as in some of the Southern States, and may result in taking the controlling influence within the old parties from one set of persons to give it to another, or even in permanent defections and eventual transfers of considerable bodies of voters from one of the old parties to the other. ”

“ It means that Democratic principles must be followed by individual citizens as well as by the aggregated party, that they must oppose the petty boss in their own caucuses, and the arrogant majority in their own town, when these attempt to coerce the rights of the masses or change the self-governing principle of the free town. ”

“ The unreasoning obedience of their cohorts is the bulwark of their strength, failing which the dictatorship of the bosses would soon lose its footing. It is equally intelligible that the sworn henchmen of the bosses, who feed at their crib, should insist upon strict party allegiance as the primary virtue of the citizen, for their political, and usually also their material, existence depends upon the favor of the bosses, which, in its turn, depends upon the success with which they keep their subordinate commands in strict discipline. ”

“ These members cared less for the position of parties than for the welfare of their constituencies. Several of them had utterly failed to grasp the principles of party government. They would as soon follow one leader as another, as long as money was spent on roads and bridges and on other means of opening up the country. ”

“ That if any club or party of men whatever, arrogate to themselves the power of returning a representative for this city, whether designated by the title of the White Lion Club, or the Loyal and Constitutional Club; if they threaten, persecute, and oppress a voter, for the free exercise of his judgment in the disposal of his suffrage, they are enemies to their country, by acting in direct opposition to the sound principles of the British Constitution. ”

“ Of course the systems called Proportional Representation in use in France and Italy are scoundrelly caricatures of the idea. Under them the voters vote not for men but for party gangs, and the whole object of Proportional Representation is to release men from servitude to party manipulation. ”

“ The Administration side has, in more senses than one, been filled too full. It has spilled over the main aisle till half the Democratic seats are occupied with its surplus, and the forlorn hope, that still flies the banner of the dead party, is crowded into the extreme left. ”

“ Is it necessary that the organization and the workers should consist of a lot of mercenaries who put themselves to party work only for the purpose of making politics profitable to themselves personally? Some people will say that only that class of persons can be found willing to devote themselves to the drudgery of party work. This is plausible. But is it true? We have had political parties in this country before the offices were distributed among party workers with every change of administration, and before much money was used in elections to bring out the voters ”

“ And yet many people imagine that a disorganized collection of delegates of various sections can rule a nation? Such an assembly would be as much a mob as any primary assembly of the people, and would in no sense be a representative assembly. The fact is that the growing intensity of the evils which beset representative institutions throughout the civilized world to-day is due to imperfect expression of these two principles. Representative assemblies are not properly organized into two coherent parties, nor is each party allowed free play to select its most popular leaders. ”

“ As soon as the colored citizens in the South shake off the odium which arises from their having, as a solid, organized mass, been the main support of the worst kind of partisan rule, as soon as every one of them casts his vote on this side or the other, as his opinions or inclination may dictate, each party will make their protection a special object in order to attract a majority of those votes. ”

“ Removals by wholesale for political reasons, or the turning over of the public service to the members of one party as a reward for partisan services rendered, or as an inducement for partisan services to be rendered, would have been thought, during the first half century of the Republic, not only a scandal and a disgrace, but little less than a criminal attempt to overthrow free institutions. ”

“ If such a party should go into the dirty game of practical politics, seeking success by compromise and bargain, striving to put men into office, dealing for place and recognition, concerned about the good opinion of its enemies, elated when men spoke well of it, depressed by evil report, tacking and shifting, taking advantage of a local issue here and of a temporary unrest there, intent upon the goal of this office or that, it would inevitably fall into the pit that has engulfed all other parties. ”

“ A host of salaried political workers—agents, organisers, secretaries, etc.—will make popular representative government a mere matter of political rivalry, an affair of "ins and outs," and by this development of the party system will exclude from active politics all who are not loyal to the "machine," and are not strong enough to break it. ”

“ America and the Australian colonies are drifting further away from it. Already political philosophers are shaking their heads and predicting the failure of popular government. The cry everywhere is for a stronger executive. Party organization is breaking down; small factions actuated by self-interest hold the balance of power between the main parties, and render government unstable and capricious. The main parties themselves tend to degenerate into factions. Personality is declining—the demand is for followers, not leaders. Compromise is supplanted by log-rolling and lobbying. ”