Page:Famous Living Americans, with Portraits.djvu/553

 530 FAMOUS LIVING AMEEICANS campaign was brought to a successful issue. The ability, re- source and generalship shown by him made him a marked man in the Louisiana Democracy, and the sequel was his elec- tion to the United States Senate in 1891. This signal political distinction has been directly attributed to his successful lead- ership of the anti-lottery campaign forces. In the United States Senate, the man from Louisiana was soon recognized as a member of influence and ability. His senatorial career, though comparatively brief, was marked by two policies. It was in the days when the cloud with the mlyer lining appeared in the West on the Democratic horizon; the cloud which brought the storm separating the Democracy into two camps and alienating the majority from its president Senator White was loyal to his chief and to the cause of sound money. As to his second policy, let it be known that onr Southern Democratic senator was one of Louisiana's wealthy sugar planters. Now the very name Democracy has long been looked upon as a sort of restful, reassuring synonym for the common weal, with emphasis upon common; and at the same time a challenge to special privilege masquerading un- der whatsoever kind of cloak. The thrifty Louisiana planter Democrats wore a very undemocratic kind of cloak called a sugar bounty ; that is, it seemed very undemocratic to those Democrats who had no cloak at all. Following up their cam- paign covenant with the American voter, the Democratic Party proceeded with its free trade program, and forthwith ran afoul of Louisiana Democracy, which was just as sure then as it is now in the year of our Lord 1914, that there should be an exception to the very best and most democratic of Demo- cratic doctrines. The Louisiana senators filed their bill of ex- ceptions with such urgency and effectiveness, and so close was the vote in the Senate, that they forced the Democratic Party to its knees in a compromise, at once costly and humiliating. In this instance Senator White may possibly be said to have returned to a phase of the state 's rights idea — a phase which has long characterized our American political system, what- ever the party regime — a system representing widely diverse and apparently conflicting interests.