Political expediency

“ We are kept normally in that most unprofitable of predicaments, a state of transition, and politicians measure their words and deeds by a standard of immediate and temporary expediency,—an expediency not as concerning the nation, but which, if more than merely personal, is no wider than the interests of party. ”

“ Including within the scope of States Rights, the threats of Nullification, Disunion and Secession—ideas abhorrent to the Patriot's mind—small wonder is it that, in those days, every fresh demand made by these political autocrats was tremblingly acceded to, until patience and concession almost utterly exhausted themselves. ”

“ Moreover, the policy with which an administration charged with the duty of maintaining itself and preserving the Union shall conduct a civil war, must be confined always to the existing condition of political forces, and to the public sentiment of the whole country. ”

“ Blind obedience to party fiat; the division of the people of one great political family into hostile camps; subjection of the public interest to partisan advantage; placing the badge of party servitude above the crown of American sovereignty—the ridiculous oriflamme of foolish division above Old Glory's star-gemmed promise of everlasting unity—have brought the first nation of all world to the very brink of destruction. ”

“ Unrestricted immigration, universal suffrage, rotation in office, the subjection of many offices and measures to popular vote, the parliamentary system, government by political parties—all these customs and habits into which we have fallen have arrived at failure which presages disaster. ”

“ These points being settled, the public mind may henceforth rest in the assurance that the period of the rebellion is indeed a thing of the past; that the existence of the Government and the legitimate results of the war are no longer in jeopardy, whatever political party may carry the elections, and that the American people can, without fear of any darkly lurking danger, give themselves to the discussion of questions of political ethics, or of administration, or of political economy, treating them upon their own proper merits. ”

“ The rebel States must not be allowed at once to participate in our Government. This privilege must be postponed. Meanwhile all parties will be prepared for the great changes in their political relations. ”

“ If political societies possess ambition, avarice, and all the other passions which render them formidable to each other, ought we not to view them in this light here? Will not the same motives operate in America as elsewhere? If any gentleman doubts it, let him look at the votes. Have they not been dictated by interest, by ambition? Are not the large states evidently seeking to aggrandize themselves at the expense of the small? ”

“ A position subservient to the exigencies of the situation is not easy for them to take, and we see, in the story of the Civil War, how the very leaders of the Fourth Estate who brought about the conditions that made the war inevitable were, because of the political power they still possessed and the frequency with which elections came, a source of embarassment and perplexity to the government. ”

“ The men who had plunged the country into war and had tried to destroy the Government were about to resume their civil and political rights, and, through the election of Representatives and Senators in Congress, regain influence and power in national councils. ”

“ If we want good government, is it not time that we should take our share in the struggle to secure it?” And hence that fresh political activity, that freedom of criticism, that breaking of party lines, that movement of independence all over the field, which makes political ringmasters tremble and patriotic citizens rejoice in new hope. ”

“ Some time ago, a Republican Senator, whom his colleagues had honored with the presidency pro tempore of the Senate, gave expression to these significant sentiments:
The purification of politics is an iridescent dream. Government is force. Politics is a battle for supremacy. Parties are the armies. The Decalogue and the Golden Rule have no place in a political campaign. ”

“ While other nations, precipitated by the rage of ambition or folly, have, in the pursuit of the most magnificent projects, riveted the fetters of bondage on themselves and descendants, these republicans secured their political happiness and freedom. ”

“ The unscientific character of a policy adopted at any crisis has often been an exact measure of the amount of external pressure applied through the competition of factions, or through the impetuosity of a populace only jaded into an unwonted attention to political affairs by exceptional events. ”

“ Doubts may well be entertained whether our Government could survive the strain of a continuance of this system, which upon every change of Administration inspires an immense army of claimants for office to lay siege to the patronage of Government, engrossing the time of public officers with their importunities, spreading abroad the contagion of their disappointment and filling the air with the tumult of their discontent. ”

“ What reason have we to expect that now, at last, the long expected time is drawing close when the ban of political stagnation will be broken, and that once more the fresh, joyful life of battle and victorious progress on the road to political power will appear? ”

“ The plea of bringing the government back to the people was catching and plausible, and it found eager response in the deeply rooted dislike of party machinery, party discipline and party constancy on the part of those who habitually neglect all attention to politics and the political duties of citizenship except during periods of popular excitement and upheaval. ”

“ We too must pause in every keen emergency to cajole, to persuade, to placate, to reconcile conflicting interests, to humour conflicting opinions,—termed by those who hold them, "principles." We too must forever bear in mind the political party which is in power, and the political party which waits to get into power ”

“ It is not easy, in the heat and passion of modern political life, to look beyond a parliament or an election, beyond the interest of a party or the triumph of an hour. Yet nothing is more certain than that the ultimate, distant, and perhaps indirect consequences of political measures are often far more important than their immediate fruits, and that in the prosperity of nations a large amount of continuity in politics and the gradual formation of political habits are of transcendent importance. ”

“ Candid and dispassionate minds, knowing the American people of all political shades and in all sections of the country, can see no possibility that any party in power, whether the present one or its opponent, would or could, now or soon, if ever, abandon or give back one foot of the territory gained in the late war, and ours now by the supreme law of the land and with the assent of the civilized world. ”

“ It would be a healing, a reconciling measure; softening all political transitions; securing that every opinion, instead of conquering or being conquered by starts and shocks, and passing suddenly from having no power at all in Parliament to having too much, or the contrary, should wax or wane in political power in exact proportion to its growth or decline in the general mind of the country. ”

“ It is clear to me that the chief force which produced the result was the fear of patriotic business men that they could not safely entrust the country and its great material interests in the hands of a party so full of dangerous and reactionary tendencies as the present Democracy. ”

“ The administration had indeed a most embarrassing problem to solve. It was engaged in a war of conquest which must be carried to a successful issue, or the political object would be unattained. Yet all the capable officers of the requisite rank belonged to the opposition, and the man selected for his lack of political ambition had himself become a prominent candidate for the Presidency. ”

“ The people, alarmed, excited, yet true to the Union and the constitution, are watching with eager fear, lest the noble government, baptized in the blood of the Revolution, shall be broken into fragments, before the President elect shall assume the functions of his office. ”

“ Meanwhile, it may be laid down as a political truth, that by irresponsible monarchy rather than by representative government can a multitude of insignificant political units be welded into a people, with common feelings of cohesion, power enough to protect itself against conquest or foreign aggression, and affairs sufficiently various and considerable of its own to occupy worthily and expand to fit proportions the social and political intelligence of the population. ”

“ The too narrow limits of the kingdom, the political uncertainty which has weighed upon the life and upon the future of the country, particularly during recent years, divert the attention of the Government and of the nation to more general and more urgent matters. ”

“ Power and expediency are the only rules that the practical politicians of foreign countries recognize, and the only question they ask themselves is, "Have we got sufficient power to do this," and if so, "Is it expedient to do it?" ”

“ In the midst, however, of this play and fluctuation of political life, the general causes remain steady, though they are often kept out of sight, and do not become visible, until politicians, inclining to their side, bring them to the surface, and invest them with open and public authority. ”

“ The great game of the government was to sow, if not dissension, at least distrust, in the ranks of the national party,—to chill the ardor of patriotism, and, wherever possible, to excite different views, and different roads to success, amongst the popular leaders of the time. ”

“ No sooner, however, had the controversy with the mother country reached the acute revolutionary stage, than the forces which had been silently and unconsciously working toward democracy, found an opportunity for political expression. ”

“ The shrewd men of every party saw not only how difficult would be the future government of the country, but that the critical moment was come which should decide into whose hands the chief influence would fall. ”

“ Is it to sit with folded hands and see our glorious republic drift on and on until it falls into the hands of the Democratic party, and then into the hands of European sovereigns, and then is blotted out in one eternal night? ”

“ At not one step in the long and shining pathway of the Nation's progress has representative government failed to respond to the Nation's need. Every emergency that 130 years of momentous history has developed—the terrible strain of war, the harrassing problems of peace—representative government has been equal to them all. ”

“ In the struggle for party power, the two great regions of the country have been brought face to face upon the most dangerous of all subjects of agitation. The authority of the Government was relaxed just when its power was about to be assailed; and the people, emancipated from every control and their passions inflamed by the fierce struggle for the Presidency, were the easy prey of revolutionary audacity. ”

“ I remember the vulnerable and scattered character of the empire, the universality of our commerce, the peaceful tendencies of our democratic electorate, and the hard times, the pressure of competition, and the high taxation now imposed ; and with these factors vividly before me I decline to be a party to encouraging the military and militant circle of the war office and admiralty to join in the high and desperate stakes which other nations seem to be forced to risk. ”

“ No sooner had the act of Congress, liberating the slaves of rebel masters, and the instructions issued to military commanders, relative to the reception of fugitives, become known in Europe, than the indifference of the liberal masses gave room to new hopes and good wishes for our cause. ”

“ Our party interests have everything to lose by a peaceable settlement of this trouble, and everything to gain by collision. For a generation we have been 'the outs;' now at last we are 'the ins.' While in opposition, it was very well to prate of Constitution, and of rights; but now we are the government, and mean to continue so; and our interest is to have a strong and centralized government. ”

“ Since so much emphasis has been placed on the conservative nature of Democracy and on its consequent slowness of action, a word should be added as to its possibilities in emergency. Tho we were slow in entering the Great War, once our duty was clear we acted with a promptness, a unanimity, and an efficiency that surprised both friend and foe, giving heart to the one and consternation to the other. [Pg 34] Tho a democracy, we invested our chief executive with a power and an authority beyond that possest by any monarch in the world. ”

“ I say these are difficulties which any party or any man, who is prepared to do his duty by the electorate of this country, not merely to ingratiate himself with them for the moment, but to win their confidence by deserving it, by telling them the truth, by serving their permanent interests and not their passing moods, is bound to face. ”

“ How many opportunities do they afford to tamper with domestic factions, to practise the arts of seduction, to mislead public opinion, to influence or awe the public councils! Such an attachment of a small or weak, towards a great and powerful nation, dooms the former to be the satellite of the latter. ”

“ Either you must organize those parts separately, placing in each section of the empire a portion of the government, thus maintaining security at the expense of unity, strength, and all the advantages which result from a great and homogeneous association, or else you will be forced to centralize an unchangeable power, which, never renewed by the law, presenting incessant obstacles to ambition, resists with advantage the shocks, rivalries, and rapid vibrations of an immense population, agitated by all the passions engendered by long-established society. ”