Page:History of Journalism in the United States.djvu/356

330 try, and a coalition of these forces was bound to occur. In Missouri, the leader of the protest was a very remarkable character, Carl Schurz, the editor of the St. Louis Westliche Post. Schurz had been a general in the Union army; he was one of the German patriots who had been driven out of their native land because of their battle for liberty.

Nominally, the Liberal movement had its origin in the state of Missouri in 1870. The state had not seceded, but thousands of its citizens had joined the rebel ranks. To prevent these men fighting against the Union as civilians, an amendment to the Constitution had deprived them of the rights of citizenship, and the Republicans, who held control of the legislature, were not inclined to restore these rights at once. Then and there, headed by Carl Schurz and Benjamin Gratz Brown, began the formation of the new movement. These Liberals combined with the Democrats and Missouri was turned over to Democratic control.

In many northern states, dififerent conditions were bringing about a feeling, among a vigorous minority, that the Republican party had failed to avail itself of its possibilities, despite its conduct of the war. It must be remembered that the Republican party was very young, and that to it there was not the attachment that was to be expected of the Democratic party, which had existed ever since the first president. On the Democratic party, however, was the stain of disloyalty, and many men, although they found themselves out of sympathy with the Republicans, were still unable to forget the record of the opposition during the war. They turned with enthusiasm to the third party, made up principally of bolters from the Republican ranks.

Originating with Carl Schurz, the new party was al-